ITS TIME TO RETHINK AGING

We actually CAN slow down the aging process!

The world’s population is ageing rapidly and the number of people aged 60 years and over is expected to double during the first half of the twenty-first century. If you live in the developed world its fair to say that you can expect to live to a ripe old age. My wonderful father survived until he was 88, and when he left us we could honestly say that his was a life truly well lived. I have however, asked myself a few times, whether his life could have been improved? I now know the answer and this is what I wish to share with you today.

The fact is, although our life expectancy has increased, the quality of our lives, for many, certainly has not. Indeed, most lives could be improved enormously with a little education and application.

The modern world seems determined to follow America in most things, and that certainly seems to apply to health care. Well, that’s probably not the wisest of ideas as the United States continues to be perhaps the unhealthiest of developed nations. For the vast majority, the last 30 years is filled with illness, disability, dependency and regret. The extra years they are getting aren’t the ‘Golden Years’ they’d worked so hard for. What’s the point of living longer if we can’t take a walk, hit a tennis ball or enjoy quality time with our families. It’s the quality of our additional years that matters, and this will quite simply be determined by the choices we make. It’s true…everything we do either helps to stave off the aging process, or to accelerate it. Yes, if we get things right, we absolutely CAN slow down the effects of aging.

It’s not down to bad germs, bad genes or bad luck!

We have been mistakenly taught that our lives and our health will be down to our genes. However, the more we learn about genetics, our biology of inheritance, the more we realize that our genes, despite being unquestionably the blueprint for how our bodies are constructed, will manifest either vibrant health or disease, depending on our lifestyle decisions and behaviors.

Due to natural selection in the past, we mostly have strong genes, coded for health and longevity. But it is the lives we lead, the choices we make along the way, that will determine our fate. 

Yes, your genes provide an overall blueprint for how you will develop and grow, but this development is then modified by the environment to which the cells are exposed. We now know that the environment in which you grow up is as important as your DNA in determining the person you become. Even disease carrying genes are not necessarily our destiny, because they too will express themselves  according to the environment to which they are exposed. What this basically means, is that certain genes can lead to a vulnerability but not necessarily an inevitability.

Genes and aging

It has been well accepted for many years that the aging process is down to the ticking away of some internal clock, to a predetermined plan, layed down in your genes. However, we now know that there is much more to it than that. When we take human cells and actually culture them in a laboratory, we find that tiny changes to the medium in which they are grown, or to the air quality, or temperature, or available nutrients, or in any one of many variables, will cause the cells to accumulate damage. Then, with every successive cell division, damage builds until the cells no longer replicate and die. The demise of the healthy cells was nothing to do with their internal clocks but entirely due to environmental damage. This is what happens in real life when we abuse our bodies.

Our CHRONOLOGICAL age is not our BIOLOGICAL age!

Our chronological age is NOT our biological age…..it’s a fact! How do we know this? Well, we know this for two main reasons. 

Firstly, we can see that while some people show progressive decline with increasing age, others show no decline at all. We therefore know that chronological aging is not an inevitable cause of biological aging. When someone blames their knee or shoulder pain on their ‘age’ they forget that the other good knee or shoulder is the same age. If it was only down to age, then it would stand to reason that both shoulders or both knees would be degenerated, and not just one. These problems are due to cumulative stress and traumas, perhaps weight bearing joints out of alignment, or repetitive overuse injuries, not to the passage of time. 

The second reason we know that much of our ‘aging’ is in fact a degenerative process caused by ourselves, is that in some populations, isolated from the ‘Western’ world, there is very little degeneration, but when these people move to America and embrace an ‘American lifestyle’, it doesn’t take long before they start to suffer the same diseases as the rest of the American population. 

The choices we make count more than we can possibly imagine.

We used to think that blood pressure would inevitably rise with age, but we now know this is not true, as there are populations in parts of the world, in the so-called “Blue Zones”, where the elderly have the same blood pressure as the young. If these people moved to Chicago they would find that they are just as susceptible to high blood pressure and heart disease as the locals.

Likewise with osteoporosis, which has become is a major health concern for western women, we see that women in other cultures around the world hardly ever suffer from this debilitating disease.

Life is about constant renewal

I think we all need to think a little deeper as to how our bodies actually work. Our bodies are actually an amazing collection of synergistic systems all controlled by an incredible intelligence, that we chiropractors refer to as ‘Innate Intelligence’. They are designed, as masterpieces of evolution, to be totally self-regulating and self-healing. We shouldn’t think of the body as ‘healing’ only when we suffer a cut to our skin or a broken bone. We are actually in a constant state of flux, a process of replacing old cells with new. The body is constantly monitoring what is happening within the body and what is happening outside in the immediate environment, making adaptive changes as necessary. This of course is called 'Homeostasis'.

Aging can best be defined as a gradual loss homeostasis, the bodies ability to respond to the environment. The effects of aging we see all around us are not just effects of chronological time but also due to the abnormal stresses we place on our bodies which inevitably start to break down. These stresses are caused by a number of things, including inactivity, chemical pollution, and neurological and postural stress.

Inactivity and disuse (Sitting Disese)

We humans quite simply are designed to move, our physiology requires it. Of course the problem nowadays, in this technological age of labor-saving devices and sedentary living, is that we move less and less. Disuse really is deadly and most of the degenerative diseases plaguing modern societies can be to a large extent blamed on this lifestyle.

Disuse is Deadly. Use it or lose it!

We can estimate that much as 50% of the decline in physiological functioning, weak muscles, stiff joints, and low energy levels (ie ‘aging’) is actually due to disuse and not as a normal consequence of age. 

Today, more people now die from the effects of a sedentary lifestyle than from smoking.

Without movement we can’t sustain life. When my father reached the end it was his ‘frailty’ that hastened his exit. Blood cells that don’t move cannot transport oxygen. Lungs that don’t move can’t breathe. Hearts that don’t move can’t pump blood. And spines that don’t move can’t create the motion required for proper joint nutrition or for the stimulation of joint-brain pathways required for proper brain and body function.  

Movement is vital for brain function - in the same way that a windmill generates electricity for a power plant, the receptors in our joints create electro-chemical energy that lights up our brain. In fact, half of all the nerve impulses that are sent between your brain and body through your spinal cord are for the delivery of movement stimulation to the brain. This empowers the brain, enabling it to coordinate all the body’s activities including learning, memory, motor control and organ function. Movement litterally charges your brains battery and makes you able to think better, feel better and function better, all of which are essential to health and longevity.

Balance, Movement and Aging

Proprioception is the term used to describe our ability to sense the position, orientation and movement of our body and its parts, all vital for balance and general brain function. Spinal proprioception plays a critical role in controlling our protective muscular reflexes that prevent injury, the joints of the body transmitting proprioceptive information into our central nervous system. 

Less movement in these spinal joints means less information going to the brain, and this means that when these joints are damaged or stiffen, there is diminished proprioception, pre-disposing the joints to further injury and this accelerates the degenerative aging process.

Chemical Pollution and Aging

The United States is the most medicated nation in the world, consuming 68% of all the drugs in the world, at the rate of 250,000 pills an hour, 24 hours a day.

Drugs are foreign to the body and work by altering the body‘s natural bio-chemistry in order to suppress symptoms. By only acting on the symptoms, the true cause of the problem may grow worse, and the body‘s natural healing mechanism becomes increasingly compromised by the drugs. In fact by interfering with normal cell function, drugs cause cellular malfunction which is the same as causing disease. 

In addition to toxicity, drugs also cause severe nutritional deficiencies. Antibiotics, anti-inflammatories and steroids all damage the human digestive system, by impairing the ability of the body to digest food and absorb nutrients. The main side effect of steroids is to increase many of the parameters of aging. This includes arthritis, degenerative changes of joints etc. These are all well documented in scientific literature. Research has shown that NSAIDS, such as aspirin and ibuprofen, interfere at the cellular level with the mechanism responsible for rebuilding and repairing cartilage. NSAIDS actually cause degradation of joint cartilage, causing further degeneration to the joint. This inhibits normal joint movement which further inhibits normal stimulation to the brain.

Neurological Stress and Aging

The human body can respond and adapt to just about anything it encounters, provided the nervous system is working correctly and it is in a state of homeostasis, able to send and receive nerve information. Obviously, the central nervous system is the master control system of the body controlling every single function. Nerve impulses travel from the brain down the Spinal Cord and out through gaps between the vertebrae in smaller ‘Peripheral Nerves’ to all parts of the body. Nerve impulses then return to the brain bringing vital information through return pathways. There are in excess of 100 billion neurons or nerve cells in the human central nervous system and the number of possible interconnections between the cells is greater than the total number of electrons in the known universe.

Recent research has clearly shown that even activity that occurs at the cellular and molecular level are controlled and coordinated largely by the Central Nervous System. The CNS therefore to a large extent regulates the aging process, and determines longevity, the quality of daily healing being directionally portional to the ability of the central nervous system to send and receive nerve messages.

Your Nervous System is a Miracle – Guard it Well!

The coordination and precision of our nervous system is truly unparalleled. There are more electrical and chemical connections in the human body (you and I included) than in all of the combined manufactured communication systems in the world. We understand but a fraction of it, but we do know that the body is wired for cell signaling so that the body can repair and restore all it’s tissues and systems. This enables our bodies to optimally adapt to the physical and psychological stressors that surround us.

The role of the nervous system in lifespan determination

Recent studies have provided evidence that our lifespan is largely controlled by our brain. Signaling pathways in both our central and peripheral nervous systems, together with our neuro-endocrine systems (hormones), affect our stress responses and our regulation of energy metabolism, both vitally influencing aging. The responses typically involve a behavioral response (fleeing the mugger or tiger), a vascular response (increased blood pressure and diversion of blood flow from the gut to muscles) and a metabolic response (increased mobilization of glucose.) These pathways make us more able to escape from a potentially lethal stressor thus preserving a healthy lifespan. 

Vertebral Subluxation and Aging

One of the main jobs of our spine is to protect our central nervous system. It is strong and provides our main supporting structure. However, the spinal column is also movable therefore becomes susceptible to various stressors and forces acting upon it, which can cause the vertebrae to lose their proper position. These misalignments of the spine are known as ‘Vertebral Subluxations’, which cause abnormal spinal movement and nerve interference, resulting in decreased nervous system function, improper healing and accelerated aging.

 These ‘Subluxations’ alter the optimal structure of the spine, weakening it and increasing degeneration. Vertebral subluxations are often referred to as the ‘silent killer’ because they can be present for long periods without any evidence of pain or symptoms. This is similar to a cavity eating away at a tooth. 

Any force that the human body cannot adapt to can cause a Subluxation. Such examples include auto accidents, work related injuries, stress, sports and repetitive movement, even the birth process. Vertebral Subluxations are very real and can be devastating to a person's health and longevity. They knock the body out of balance and equilibrium, causing structural dysfunction of the spine and nerve interference. To illustrate how the nerves can be affected, tests have shown significantly, that the weight of a dime on a spinal nerve will reduce nerve transmission by as much as 60%!

Chiropractic and Aging

Chiropractic is a healthcare system that is founded on the premise that a properly functioning nervous system is essential to overall health and function of the human body. 

Doctors of Chiropractic detect and correct Vertebral Subluxations by physically adjusting the spine. This restores the nervous system to an optimum level of function, which maximises the body's inherent healing potential. Chiropractic adjustments restore normal nerve function, improve spinal biomechanics, range of motion, reflex arcs and posture, all of which are essential to a properly functioning nervous system.

Doctors of chiropractic are experts in spinal structure and body mechanics. Chiropractic adjustments restore and maintain the structural integrity of the body by correcting spinal subluxations. Chiropractors are 'Gravitational Physiologists' and emphasize the importance of posture to overall health, a concept that has been often overlooked in traditional methods of healthcare.

Posture and health

Posture and normal physiology are interrelated. Posture affects and moderates every physiological function, from breathing to hormonal production. Abnormal posture is evident in patients with chronic and stress related illnesses. Homeostasis and nervous system function are ultimately connected with posture and structural alignment. 

Despite the considerable evidence that posture affects physiology and function, the significant influence of posture on health is not addressed by most physicians.

The Chiropractic Lifestyle (Wellness)

Healthcare is slowly changing from a symptom and disease based system to a function and performance-based system, where the structure of the human body is recognized as being of paramount importance. The spinal structure and the vital nerves within form a ‘Vital Organ’ which must be maintained at all times and corrected when necessary. 

In the pursuit of optimal health and longevity, the wellness industry is without doubt becoming the next trillion dollar industry. This is not a fad or trend and it is finding its way into all aspects of life - how we eat, exercise, sleep, work, play and age. Wellness incorporates all the elements for preventative healthcare, a nutritious diet, aerobic conditioning, good posture, strength and flexibility training, rest, a positive outlook and periodic spinal adjustments. 

Although millions of people have experienced relief from back and neck pain through chiropractic care, the focus and intent of chiropractic is far beyond the elimination of symptoms. But rather it is in the correction of Vertebral Subluxations in order to ensure a proper functioning nervous system. After all, as the the medical bible Grey’s Anatomy reminds us, the nervous system controls every function of the body.