Preventing Heart Disease and Reversing Aging Naturally

Preventing Heart Disease and Reversing Aging Naturally

The rusting of your car is not much different than the aging of our skin.
When the metal on cars is exposed to the elements it is vulnerable to damage by other minerals and chemicals, but especially air. Air has oxygen in it which reacts to metals causing rust. This process is called oxidization. The metal will continue to rust, as long as there is more air and metal exposed. Some substances can produce oxidization as well. For instance, place a nail into a cup of pop and the nail will rust, as it reacts with the metal to create oxidization.

Much like metal, our tissues will react negatively with some substances. Sugar, for instance, (which is found in most packaged food items in the grocery store) oxidizes our body, particularly our skin and arterial tissues. Oxidization is what is responsible for aging, as well as the deterioration of our arteries.

Oxidized arteries can cause heart disease, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, and can contributes to many diseases.

When the arteries begin to oxidize, lesions begin to occur. For instance, if we poured pop onto a wound, it would burn the skin and eat away at the tissue. This happens from the inside too. In order to protect the artery, the body produces cholesterol to cushion the area - like a scab. This scab protects the lesion, and prevents further oxidizing and damage to red blood cells. But if we continue eating the same foods that create the lesions, we will continue to collect more and more lesions, and more and more cholesterol, reducing the passageway in the arteries, leading to higher blood pressure.

Is cholesterol to blame?
It seems the solution to this problem is not to reduce cholesterol, but rather reduce and heal the lesions in our arteries. Studies show when these lesions heal, the cholesterol breaks down and the cholesterol and blood pressure levels return to normal.

Antioxidants reverse oxidizatio

Consuming foods that are high in anti-oxidants (think ‘anti-rusting’ agents) and mineral rich foods, will help repair our damaged, oxidized tissues, lesions, wrinkles and heart. If lemon juice has the power to strip the rust off of a nail, then it also has the ability to reverse the oxidization that has occurred to our body. Foods high in vitamins A, C, and E contain anti-oxidants (the vitamins themselves are the anti-oxidants) as well as mineral rich, and typically dark, yellow or red coloured plant foods are also excellent sources of these vitamins. Examples of anti-oxidant rich foods are: ndark leafy greens such as spinach such as kale, chard or collard, berries, beets, carrots, yam, broccoli, green tea, legumes and whole grains. Red wine and chocolate have been claimed to be healthy for us, as they contain anti-oxidants, but alcohol and sugar are oxidants making them a poor excuse for healthy food. Dark, unsweetened chocolate that does not contain sugar would be ideal, but consuming sugar does more damage than the chocolate does good!
Preventing heart disease and aging
Consuming lots of anti-oxidant fruits, vegetables, legumes and whole grains is a great way to protect, heal and restore your body, but avoiding foods that oxidize (also known as ‘free radicals’) is also very important.

Sunlight, pollution, radiation (even from a microwave), and smoking cause high levels of oxidization. The highest food sources of free radical damage to the body are from sugar, alcohol, white flour, meat, hydrogenated and rancid oils/fats (including stale nuts and deep fried foods) and processed foods. Additives and preservatives can also cause damage andnso as always...
Eat Fresh, Whole Foods!

The information in this article is for educational purposes only. It is not intended to replace diagnosis or treatment by a qualified health care practitioner.