Clogged Arteries

This is a bit off topic, but I felt a need to summarize some reading that I've been doing lately. My interest in clogged arteries started a little over a year ago when my oldest brother had a heart attack, quickly followed by a second heart attack. Luckily, he survived both. Then my other brother shares this information with his physician. After some tests it turns out that he, too, has had two heart attacks that went undiagnosed.

Our father died at age 57 of a variety of stress-related diseases. I'm 53. With that and my older brothers' recent experiences in mind I decided to see if there is much that I can do now to avoid a similar fate. Of course I'm not a health care professional and can't diagnose or recommend treatment for anyone, but I can share what I've learned thus far:

Why Arteries Clog

The way I understand it, the process starts with damage to the lining of the arteries, which is super slick so that things don't stick to it. I haven't come across any known reason for the lining breaking down, though there are various hints about possible causes, which I'll cover later. After this damage occurs your body deposits fat at the damage site. Once the fat is deposited chloresterol gets stuck to the site and a plaque begins forming. Now I may not have this 100% right, as I am a layperson. The important thing to remember here is that chloresterol is the THIRD symptom of heart disease. There are two other things that need to be addressed before worrying about chloresterol.

Cholesterol

If you watch TV nowadays, you'd think that lowering your chloresterol is absolutely imperative if you have clogged arteries. It seems that the argument is that chloresterol is part of the plaque building process that leads to the narrowing of arteries. The thing that the drug companies don't tell you is that chloresterol lowering drugs on their own do absolutely nothing to improve your chances of survival after a heart attack or stroke. They're simply instilling fear to generate profits - nothing new there...

Thyroid Gland

I recently read Solved: The Riddle of Illness by Langer and Scheer. If I remember correctly Langer is an MD that practiced for decades and had studied with a prominent endocrinologist. An interesting story is told about a medical fad decades ago where people's thyroids would be removed thinking it would solve various problems. There may have been some short term success, but by and large, within a few years these folks would die of clogged arteries, even though many showed no evidence of such a problem prior to the surgery. Eventually they learned to avoid this by giving folks dessicated thyroid extract (I think from pigs?). But the important message is that the thyroid seems to have an important role in maintaining the lining of arteries. Unfortunately, the endocrine glands are not well understood. We do know that the thyroid needs iodine and that a short latency deficiency will result in a neck goiter. There are some thoughts that bromide (or bromine?) in the environment may be playing havoc with our thyroids by clogging up the iodine receptors in the thyroid. Whether this contributes to clogged arteries is an interesting question.

Low Fat, Low Protein Diets

Their are a lot of physicians making a lot of money selling books about low fat heart healthy diets. I beleieve the phenomenon started with Dean Ornish, who documented that his diet resulted in a reversal of arterial clogging. A lot of these diets are vegetarian, and if you know that your arteries are already clogged, please don't ignore their advice.

However, they cite studies indicating health problems related to consuming milk protein, which they then extrapolate to infer that very probably all animal protein could be bad for you. I have difficulty with this on many, many levels. First, we are probably talking about pasteurized and homogenized dairy products. It has been shown that these processes alter the proteins. I suspect that the problem is more likely to be caused by the processing of the milk and not the milk itself, at least not for folks that are genetically endowed not to be lactose intolerant.

Dr. Gabe Mirkin posted an article on avoiding mammal protein that is probably a better recommendation than simply avoiding all animal protein. After all, we are omnivore's, so have evolved to eat some meat. And all those great essential fatty acids found in seafood are pretty difficult to adequately replace with a vegetarian diet.

Vitamin C

A number of years ago nobel laureate Linus Pauling proposed a theory that the damage to arterial linings was caused by a long latency Vitamin C deficiency - basically a chronic low level Scurvy. While this appears to have been extensively researched and dicredited, I have to tip my hat to him for his thinking. I suspect that very likely there are two things likely to work together to create heart disease - too much of something that is bad for you (i.e. too much mammal protein) and too little of things that are good for you (i.e. some sort of long latency nutritional deficency).

Vitamin D

Hopefully you've heard a lot about Vitamin D lately, though not nearly as much as you should be hearing. There are a number of folks that are suggesting that the President needs to declare a Vitamin D health emergency to get the word out about the implications of long latency Vitamin D deficiency for people's health (rickets and osteomalacia are well known short latency deficiencies of this vitamin).

First off, Vitamin D is not a true vitamin, but a hormone precursor. And there are about 2,000 Vitamin D receptors throughout our bodies, thus it is very important to our health. It actually turns 2,000 genes on or off based upon its presence or absence.

Second, Vitamin D is made by your skin, or at least is was before we all started working indoors and the suntan lotion business convinced us to fear the sun. These are both reasons why current Vitamin D levels are lower than those that we have evolved to need for optimal health.

There was a recent article posted at the New York Times about low Vitamin D levels and increased likelihood of death, stroke or heart attack for those that had recently had a cardiac event. Ironically, they show a picture of a milk carton as being representative of where to get your Vitamin D.

Inflammation

There has been a lot of buzz in the past decade about inflammation. Research is indicating that it is a root of most, if not all, chronic diseases. So what in our diet leads to inflammation? The Big Two are sugar and refined flour. And it seems that perhaps you can add mammal meat and make it the Big Three. Greatly reducing these in your diet will greatly lower most people's inflammation levels.

What in our diet decreases inflammation? Think fruits and vegetables and Omega 3 fatty acids. Which just happen to be Dr. Mirkin's basic nutritional recommendations.

Summary

It is likely to be years before anyone truly knows the solution to many chronic diseases, but there seems to be some commonality among many divergent views out there:

• Avoid sugar and refined flour.
• Limit meat consumption; avoid mammal meat and limit other meat portions to a serving roughly the size of your palm.
• Eat plenty of fruits and vegetables, but go easy on those that are high in starch (bananas, peas, corn, etc) - chose a wide variety, not just a few of the usual suspects.
• Take at least 4,000 IUs of Vitamin D per day, especially if you have a desk job or live very far from the southern U.S. Avoid sunscreen except when you'll have prolonged exposure to sun and an increased risk of sunburn.
• Limit your intake of dairy products (don't worry, there's plenty of high quality calcium in most fruits and vegetables).
• Don't overdo caffeine or alcohol.

Celery and Blood Pressure

Having previously had borderline high blood pressure for years (it's now down to around 118/74) I've done a lot of searching for ways to naturally lower my blood pressure. So, when I was watching a show with Gillian McKeith on BBC America my ears pricked up when she noted that celery was great for this purpose. A quick Google on the topic confirms this fact, such as this article from http://www.highbloodpressureinfo.org/index.html. Also check out their page on other foods that can help manage your high blood pressure in a healthful range so that you can avoid taking medications.

With this newfound knowledge at hand I started looking for ways to incorporate more celery into my diet, since I know from past experience that I tire very quickly of eating raw celery (though adding some peanut butter and sprinkling with some coconut meat makes a very tasty snack).

Some of our favorite celery recipes include:

Blue Cheese Waldorf Salad
4 large apples, chopped
2 cups red or green grapes, halved
3 stalks celery, chopped
1/2 cup golden raisins
2 Tbsp lemon juice, divided
2/3 cup Miracle Whip or equivalent dressing
1/2 cup milk (add some cornstarch if not using whole milk)
1/2 cup crumbled blue cheese
1 Tbsp sugar or honey
1/4 cup chopped walnuts, toasted

Add 1 Tbsp of lemon juice to the milk. Let stand for 5 minutes. NOTE: this is a substitute for using buttermilk in this recipe.

In a large bowl, combine apples, grapes, celery, raisins and lemon juice.

In a small bowl, combine Miracle Whip, milk, blue cheese and sugar or honey. Pour over apple mixture to coat. Cover and refrigerate for one hour. Sprinkle with walnuts before serving.

Cranberry Waldorf Salad
2 large apples, chopped
1 cup dried cranberries
2 celery stalks, chopped
1/4 cup Miracle Whip or equivalent dressing
2 Tbsp honey
1 Tbsp lemon juice

Toss everything in a bowl until fruit is evenly coated. Refrigerate for 1 hour before serving.

Soffritto
Soffritto is the Italian Holy Trinity technique for sauteing onion, carrots and celery as a base for some incredible one pot meals (the French call this Mirepoix). It's pretty simple - start with equal parts of these three vegetables, sauteing with olive oil over medium heat. From there add the cooked meat of your choice and/or some white beans, whatever spices you desire, some garlic and perhaps add a little wine or sherry. We use this technique a lot in the winter as a means of cleaning out the vegetable bin of our refrigerator, adding cabbage, peppers, zucchini or any other vegetables that sautes well.

To find more great celery recipes, check out Heathly Cooking Magazine.

Best Chicken Marinade

My last post was shortly after I joined the swelling ranks of the unemployed back in February. You'd have thought that I would have had more time for blogging since then, but that hasn't been the case.

Losing one income has forced us to rethink a lot of our expenses, and one of our strategies for saving money has been to reduce the amount of heat that we generate inside the house during the summer, which helps us save money by reducing our air conditioning load. There are three main ways that we've done this - drying our laundry outdoors (we live in the high desert, so this really makes sense for us), running our dishwasher with the "no heat dry" option, and cooking outside on the grill as much as possible. NOTE: The laundry and dishwashing saves us about $15 per month despite having some of the lowest electric rates in the nation, plus our clothes dryer and dishwasher will last a lot longer, saving us even more money in the long run.


Another strategy for saving money is buying bulk packages of meat, despite cooking for only two.


The latter caused us to find ways to tenderize the meat, as we'd be reheating much of it for later meals. So, we tried a number of marinade recipes, especially for chicken. We've found that those that contain a lot of oil can cause flame out and smoke problems, as well as gunk up the bottom of the grill (though we've found several that result in great chicken). Our favorite marinade uses a lemon and yogurt base, which we discovered by trying this great recipe. Though the recipe suggests sauteing or baking, it also works great on the grill, even when using a hot grill, which is often the best way to make bad chicken. The marinade makes the chicken very moist and tender and the spices give it a lot of interest. We've also subsituted Cavender's Greek Seasoning for the suggested spices with great results.


For a four pound package of boneless chicken breasts we use the following base for our marinade, based upon the recipe link in the preceding paragraph:

1 cup non-fat plain yogurt
4 tablespoons lemon juice
1 teaspoon dried lemon peel or lemon extract, or 2 teaspoons of lemon zest if using fresh lemons for your lemon juice

From there, add your favorite Mediterranean spice combinations. We generally start with a hot grill and turn the heat down to low as we get ready to add the chicken. For our grill, that means about 7 to 10 minutes per side, depending on the size of the chicken breasts. We cut into the center of the breasts to check for doneness before pulling them off of the grill.

Supplements

I've found it necessary to supplement my diet for a variety of reasons, though essentially it's because even the best diet cannot assure that you get everything that you need to function at an optimal level.

My basic supplement recommendations include:
Fish Oil - 4,000 mg/day. This has anti-inflammatory properties and really helps improve mental functions.
Fiber - 1,000 to 2,000 mg/day. Our diet is fairly low in insoluble fiber, so we supplement to avoid getting plugged up. Colon cancers are becoming a bit too common, so this is good insurance.
Vitamin D - 4,000 mg/day during times of the year when we don't get adequate sun exposure. During the summer there should be no need to supplement if you are getting 10 minutes of sun exposure around noon everyday. This supplement amount is based upon a recommendation by the Vitamin D Council. Visit their website to learn more about this important nutrient, as it has tremendous health consequence for everyone.

I take a couple of supplements specifically to improve a condition known as Raynaud's Syndrome. These were recommended on an alternative medicine site and while they haven't cured the disease, they seem to have improved my cold tolerance, allowing me to commute in relative comfort by bicycle at temperatures as low as 8 degrees Fahrenheit for a half hour at a time:
Taurine (an amino acid) - 1,000 mg/day
Magnesium - 250 mg /day
The Magnesium seems to have had the added benefit of greatly reducing the amount of cramping that I used to experience while doing intense exercise in high temperatures. Experts claim that the majority of Americans eat a magnesium deficient diet, so you may want to consider this inexpensive supplement.

And I take a supplement for joint and bursa pain and inflammation, rather than taking "Vitamin I" (ibuprofen, which has some very nasty long term side effects):
Triple Strength glucosamine/condroitin - 2 tablets/day (for joints). This really helps lubricate the joints, but you need to take if for several weeks at an adequate dose to notice any improvement.
In the past I've taken Borage Oil (2,600 mg/day) to also help with hip bursa pain. I wasn't convinced that it helped any more than Fish Oil.

A number of supplements are purported to help lower blood pressure, including Grape Seed , Turmeric and the amino acid L-citrulline. All of them seem to have helped to keep my blood pressure at excellent levels, though increasing my intake of fruits and vegetables has had a more profound effect. I currently only take Grape Seed (200 mg/day) and Turmeric (500 mg/day).

In my cycling and strength training I also use the following:
GABA (an amino acid, 3 g per workout), prior to intense workouts only. In conjunction with intense exercise it has been shown to increase the production of human growth hormone, but this has not been definitively proven. It's an inexpensive supplement, so while I can't know for certain that it works, it's worth risking a few dollars in the hope that it does. I did see very significant performance improvements the first year that I used it.
Alpha Lipoic Acid and Acetyl L-Carnitine (800 & 400 mg/day, respectively) for the purported benefit of increasing the number of mitochondria in your body, a particular problem for aging cyclists. I haven't used this enough to have an opinion of whether it works or how well it works and haven't seen the research that would back up this claim.

I attribute my ability to live relatively pain free and to generally avoid common illnesses to frequent intense exercise, my diet and the supplements that I take regularly. I can't say for certain that the ergogenic supplements that I take to improve my cycling performance are having the desired effect, but at the same time they are safe and relatively low cost supplements, so I find the risk to be worth the potential reward.