Aging - Why Is It Happening And How Can I Slow It Down?
We are all trying to find a way to stay young for as long as we can. It's just a natural part of our thinking. However; it is always a very good idea if we try to learn a little bit about aging and what are the different factors that influence it as well as the different body systems that change during this process.
There are first different theories regarding aging and our body. One of those would be the programmed theory which states that our body is simply designed to age and everyone has their own biological time line that our bodies are programmed to follow. This is often called programmed longevity because there seems to be genes that seem to turn off or on over our lifetime. There is also the endocrine theory which means that there are certain hormones in our body that also help to control the aging process. Another theory is the immunological theory which says that the immune system declines over the years which will then leave us susceptible to a variety of diseases. The final theory is called the error theory. This is said to be caused from damage done to our bodies by our environment which takes it's toll over time.
A lot of researchers believe that genetics plays a big part on an individuals aging process and that genetics could play a big part in the differences in how some people age slower or faster than others. Some say that genetics may account for up to almost 35 percent of those variances. There are genes that specifically effect how long a person can live, these are the longevity genes. The process of certain cells and how they deteriorate during the years is called the cell senescence and this has an effect on aging. There are also structures of your DNA that will eventually be depleted over the years which causes some cells in your body to stop replicating.
Aside from genes you may have inherited there is also the matter of biochemistry. Our bodies are always undergoing a variety of biochemical reactions to outside sources and some can cause damage to our bodies and the aging process. Some of those tings are free radicals which are unstable oxygen molecules that damage certain cells in your body. Excessive sugars in your blood stream will cause damage to your protein molecules and this can make the proteins stick together. Proteins that can help your cells survive stress become fewer as we age as well.
Our body's organs also undergo a multitude of changes over the years as well and a lot of these changes can make us more susceptible to a lot of different diseases that we may not have been susceptible to when we were younger. Some of the organs and systems that are affected would be the heart. The muscle of the heart begins to get thicker as we get older which will lower the pumping rate. Our T cells take a lot longer to get replenished and they lose their ability to function as well. The arteries in our bodies will also stiffen as we get older which makes it harder for the heart to pump the blood through our bodies. The lungs ability to reach it's maximum capacity begins to start decreasing at the age of 20 and can decrease as much as 40 percent by the age of 70.
The kidneys with age are less efficient and don't clean the wastes from our body as efficiently as when we were younger. The brain will also age and sometimes the connections that run between the neurons are reduced or just not as efficient. The bladder loses some of it's capacity and sometimes parts of it will atrophy, this is what leads to incontinence. A person's weight or body fat will increase up until about middle age and then as you get past that and get older the weight starts to decrease. The muscles will age by losing their tone which is about 22 percent tone loss by 70 years of age. The bones will start aging at around 35 years of age, this is when they start losing their density. The sight and the ability to hear as efficiently as you did when you were younger also begin to decline, with some people around the age of 40.
Sounds pretty grim doesn't it? But we can help all of these different aging processes to slow down a bit if we change our behaviors. For instance we should consider eating a lot of foods that have a ton of antioxidants, these will slow down the damage of any free radicals.
You can limit the loss of muscle tone and bone density if you do some sort of exercising. Of course exercising needs to be designed for your personal abilities because over doing it can cause even more damage.
Make sure to keep your cholesterol down as low as you can. The lower this is the better off your arteries are going to be and in turn this will give protection to your heart.
Make sure that you exercise your brain. Never stop challenging your brain. Always learn new things, read new things. Keeping your brain challenged will in turn keep it sharp.
It is a proven fact that lifestyle changes can actually help you live a younger life. Some say that you can increase your life span by 40 percent or add 7 to 10 years onto your life expectancy.
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