Muscle Is Medicine

Muscle Is Medicine

Every weekend you will receive one tip to make you Harder To Kill.

Tip of the Week: If you want to live a long, high quality life, hold on to every ounce of muscle you have. In fact, strive to add muscle.

The default setting for Men over 50 is losing 1-3% of their muscle and strength every year (this default setting applies to women, too). Muscle loss due to aging is called Sarcopenia.

Unfortunately, this loss of muscle is directly correlated to a decrease in lifespan. The chances of you dying earlier than you should increase as you lose more muscle. .

Causes of Muscle Loss

Aging

For Men over 50, the aging process is at the top of the list of what causes muscle loss. Each day, week, and month that passes decreases your muscle mass.

Sedentary Lifestyle

Use it or lose it. A lack of physical movement and exercise is one of the strongest triggers of sarcopenia. This accelerates muscle loss and overall physical weakness. Even taking a couple weeks off from your fitness routine can set you back. When people take time off from fitness activities, they either don’t return to those activities or they return at a lower level (frequency, duration and/or intensity). Decreased activity leads to muscle loss, which leads to more fatigue, which prevents you from returning to activities that were your previous norm. It's a vicious cycle.

Sub-Optimal Diet

Most Men over 50 eat a sub-optimal diet. Processed foods that tend to be high in sugar, grains and seed oils wreak havoc on their health, metabolism and energy levels (and yes, muscle). A typical Man's diet includes:

• Too many calories (which is part of why 77% of Men over 50 are overweight or obese)

• Too little protein (muscle needs protein)

• Too little water. (1/2 your bodyweight in ounces is a good place to be, more when you workout).

Chronic Inflammation

Injury, illness, bad diets, and modern life all contribute to chronic inflammation. Chronic inflammation impairs the body’s ability to repair itself, which results in muscle loss. Many experts agree that inflammation is at the core of many illnesses and diseases.

Reversing Muscle Loss

Muscle loss is the default setting as we age. But you can change this setting and reverse muscle loss by following a few guidelines.

Exercise

A combination of resistance training, aerobic exercise and balance training will help keep your muscles active and functioning well. Having a good mix of different types of movement is a great recipe as we age. Walking, hiking, and biking are all excellent choices and can be done daily. Resistance training (lifting weights) can be done 2-4 times a week depending on a number of factors. Mobility, stretching and balance training can be done daily. Exercise is highly individualized so seek guidance from a professional if this is new to you. The key is to get started, have some variety and get out of your comfort zone on a regular basis.

And if you were to pick only one form of training and your goal was to live longer, you would choose resistance training. A 15 year study showed that older adults who did resistance training had 46% lower odds of all-cause mortality than those who did not!

Nutrition

Getting adequate protein in your diet tells your muscles to build and strengthen. If you make only one change in your diet, increase your daily protein intake. How much protein you need is dependent on a number of factors. As we age, our bodies don’t process protein as efficiently so we need more to get the same effect (this is referred to as anabolic resistance). A good place to start for Men over 50 is to get at least 35 grams of protein at every meal. Target four meals a day at 35 grams of protein per meal and see how you feel. Over time, increase your daily protein intake until you reach 1 gram of protein per pound of IDEAL body weight. If you weigh 205 lbs and your ideal body weight is 160, your eventual target is 160 grams of protein a day. For more information, follow Dr. Gabrielle Lyon on this topic. She has been interviewed a number of times. Also, check out her website and look for her free download "The Lyon Protocol 2.0."

Supplements

Vitamin D and Omega-3 Fatty Acids (obtained from seafood and fish oil supplements) have been shown to increase muscle growth. Look for high quality products and do some research on the right dosage for you.

Summary

Losing muscle mass as you age is the default setting for Men. You can change this setting by implementing this simple formula:

Exercise + Protein + Supplements = Muscle

Moving more, lifting weights, eating more protein and taking a few key supplements are the keys. Try this for at least one month and see how you feel.

If you enjoyed this newsletter, please share this with 3 Men over 50 who you think might be interested in becoming Harder To Kill. And follow me on LinkedIn to get more information to make you Harder To Kill. Thank you for your support!

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