First and foremost, let me tip my hat to all my wonderful Ph.D. friends who have taught me about telomeres, telomerase, and stem cells. The best scientists in the world have spoon-fed me.
They do things I ask in the lab but could never do.
They are in the truest sense the manifestors of my dreams and ideas. But I DO provide them later!!!
The thing is we both also know our limitations. When the rubber meets the road so to speak, I.e., taking care of people and saving and extending lives and healthspan, THAT is my domain.
And that is where the clinical trials get done- when we both collaborate, ideas, dreams, and pragmatic solutions.
I am here to tell you unequivocally you can slow down the aging process.
One critical way to do this is to stabilize the loss of the telomere segment of your chromosome (biologic time clock). You can even lengthen them under certain circumstances, which actually should add years to your health and your life, although aging remains a complicated process.
There are lifestyle hacks I list below, but you should understand it is highly unlikely you will lengthen your telomeres without adding some sort of supplemental telomerase activator- that turns on the enzyme telomerase and lengthens telomeres.
And here are just a few quick hacks to do so:
- Exercise: so far, the following have been evaluated with good results as measured by either increasing telomere length or increasing telomerase enzyme, long-distance running, middle distance running, yoga, certain forms of HIIT training. The key phrase is “evaluated so far.” Many times, researchers evaluate their pet exercise.
- Diet: I am a big fan of keto because it mimics the effects of calorie restriction on your cells, allowing them to take out the garbage. I have written much about the possible benefits of keto on longevity. Still, it is not easy to evaluate diets like this in humans because of the long term follow up, confounding variables. It is even harder in animals since most researchers don’t even know what keto is in animals!
- Meditation: Various forms of meditation that increase parasympathetic tone, relax the body, slow down the heart rate, and reduce the fight or flight response are beneficial.
- Sleep: We know this one ass-backward: if you sleep poorly, you age prematurely, but again studies focus on disease states like sleep apnea. Better not to tempt fate though and try to get those good 7 hours.
- Telomerase activation/support: no supplement can make a longevity claim- YET! But I am not shy about telling you about the Immortality Edge Packs and their role in telomere support.
You can truly stack the aging odds in your favor, and why not?! Don’t you want to see what’s on the other side!!!
Dr. Dave