Belly Fat

O.K.  I don’t believe there’s anyone out there that is particularly fond of belly fat or as it is often referred to -- the “muffin top.”  In the past, I’ve discussed that the excess around the girth starts producing its own hormones including estrogen.  In that article, I shared how this abdominal fat is a primary predictor of not only cardiovascular disease, but also of diabetes and cancer.  These are 3 of the 4 top killers in our society.  So obviously eliminating the belly fat is a big deal, but for anyone who has tried, it can be a challenge.  One of the reasons losing belly fat is so difficult is that it’s not there only as a result of poor diet and lack of exercise.  Chronic stress will also contribute to the spare tire.

When you have any perceived stress, your body releases certain "fight-flight" hormones including cortisol, norepinephrine and epinephrine.  This is a normal healthy response to any threat or perceived stress. Typically, these hormones will go up and down throughout the day with stress. The problem is that when you are chronically stressed your cortisol levels go up and stay up. These elevated cortisol levels cause the body to resist weight loss because your body thinks times are hard and you might starve.  So it hoards the fat you eat and takes fat from healthier areas and moves it to your abdomen causing increased inflammation and insulin resistance in the body. This belly fat then leads to more cortisol because it has higher concentrations of an enzyme that converts inactive cortisone to active cortisol.  This increased cortisol retains more abdominal fat and the cycle continues.

So what can be done?  To lose the weight in this area you must reverse the cortisol and fight-flight reaction.  Fortunately, as long as you can find a form of exercise that you don’t resent and get more stressed over; all exercises will at least temporarily inhibit the stress and cortisol response.  Secondly, stress is most often a perception – we are not truly in a life-threatening situation.  Thus, you need to practice shifting your mind and your thoughts from what is wrong in life (stress) to what is right (gratitude).  Meditation to quiet your mind is also critical.  This change in the brain will change the hormones released.  Finally, your fuel sources need to be appropriate.  Caffeine, nicotine, sugar, flour and processed grains all act as stimulants that stimulate stress.  Lean protein, healthy fats (omega 3’s) and the minerals found in raw fruits and vegetables help to shut off the stress response.  In essence, if you eat, think, and exercise appropriately, you can reverse this deadly epidemic to our health and society.

We also have an exciting new laser in our office that will help with belly fat and overall fat loss. The Zerona Z6 Fat Loss Laser flushes toxins from the fat cells, resulting in lost inches, weight and fat. If you are interested in learning more, join us for our open house on July 21st. Register on Eventbrite or by calling the office at 812-273-4325 to save a seat.  

Brain Boost

One of the very first articles I wrote for this column was about the benefits of physical exercise for improving memory and preventing disorders such as dementia and Alzheimer’s.  The good news is that nearly four years later, this information is still true.  In fact, some newer research reported in a recent book titled, The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain shows that exercise is absolutely vital for memory and proper brain function.

It wasn’t that long ago that the physiology books and med-school instructors taught that loss of brain cells was permanent and irreversible.  Fortunately, this was simply not true.  In the past, I’ve shared the research that emotional stress will shrink the cells of the hippocampus (considered to be the memory center of the brain).  One recent study proved that regular exercise will actually enlarge this memory center by 1-2% per year throughout life!  If you’re wondering how exercise can do all of this, the experts believe it’s because of the increased blood flow to the brain.  They also believe that physical exertion develops new nerves and increase nerve-protecting compounds.  Finally, numerous studies have shown that exercise alters the damaging proteins in the brain that are directly linked to Alzheimer’s.  Researchers also believe that you don’t have to dedicate large amounts of time to get a brain boost – as little as 20 minute workouts can improve long-term memory.  In one study of elementary students, they found that 40 minutes of exercise every day increased IQ by nearly four points on average and the fittest students scored 30% higher on IQ testing than average students.  In adult studies, employees who exercise regularly are about 15% more efficient at their jobs.

In most of these studies, it appears that the type of exercise doesn’t really matter as long as you’re getting appropriate exertion to get the heart pumping and increase blood flow to the brain.  Studies involving weight training, walking, running, and other forms all generated similar results.  The key is to know your target heart rate and get up to 90-100% of your target several times throughout the workout.  The only catch to all of these studies is that if you are looking to improve the brain, the exercise needs to be regular and routine.  In a recent rat study, they found that stopping exercise for just three weeks duration resulted in the nerve cells of the brain to begin to decrease and memory to suffer.  In a second similar study where the rats had only been exercising for a short time (10 weeks) followed by three weeks of inactivity, they determined that the benefits of the exercise were lost and the memory and nerve development was the same as those rats that had always been inactive.  The moral of the story is that exercise needs to be done and it needs to be done regularly!  But if you’re worried about aging gracefully and preventing the emotional hardship that goes with losing memory and dealing with diseases such as Alzheimer’s, this information is still great news and should give you hope and motivation.