Fat Belly? Protect your brain now....

Today's post: Monday, 3-31-2008

If you’ve seen the health news recently (It even made our local newspaper.) or read our blog post last Friday, you’ve seen the study reported that fat or pot bellied people were found to have much more risk of Alzheimer’s disease & other forms of dementia.

Normal weight people or almost normal weight overweight people who had fat bellies were more at risk than other people of the same weight.

Fat (or obese) people were at greater risk. But even here, having a particularly fat belly multiplied your risk.

That’s the bad news. And, the data I’ve seen suggests it’s likely to be true & correct.

But the good news is that if you use the info in this post, you can protect your brain even if your belly is fat now. Plus using some of the info in this post will also make your belly less fat.

1. Many of the causes of fat bellies DO put your brain at risk. But, if you reverse the causes, you will protect your brain even if you don’t shrink your belly much.

2. There are some powerful things you can also do that protect your brain regardless of the risks or how fat your belly is.

Let’s take the first one first:

1. Many of the causes of fat bellies DO put your brain at risk. But, if you reverse the causes, you will protect your brain even if you don’t shrink your belly much.

a) People who get no exercise fail to renew their brain cells. New research shows that exercise literally grows new brain cells & brain cell interconnections.

People who don’t exercise get fat & get fatter bellies. And, people who don’t exercise fail to renew their brains. But research has found that even people who are still fat who get regular exercise are healthier than skinny people who do not.

All you need to do if you have not been exercising is to start exercising regularly each week. Then your brain cells will be continuously re-grown which will help prevent you from developing dementia. This has the added benefit that if you don’t eat more calories when you exercise than you did before you started & include strength training, your belly will also get less fat.

And, you can do more to make this renewal process work. If you take DHA supplements --or, if you take purified fish oil supplements or eat high omega 3 wild caught fish or both which are high in DHA, the DHA has been found to have the same effect in growing new brain cells as exercise.

So, if you have a fat belly & both get regular exercise and take plenty of DHA, you’ll get substantial protection.

b) Too much stress tends to cause people to eat too many “reward” foods that are high in sugar or high fructose corn syrup and transfats. And, it also releases cortisol, particularly if the stress is severe or prolonged. Both of these results tend to make your belly fat. And, both the excessive blood sugar levels from one & the excessive cortisol from the other also tend to damage your brain or the blood vessels that supply it.

So, make an effort to prevent or overcome or escape or deal with stressing events without getting so stressed.

And, if you do get overstressed, use other means to relieve your stress with social support, tai chi, yoga, & breathing exercises all being much less likely to harm you & fatten your tummy than eating more & more of junky foods.

And, make an enormous effort to eat more health OK foods that you like & NOT turn to the junky “reward” foods when you are under stress.

c) People who don’t exercise, eat foods bad for their health, & even those who eat health Ok foods but too many that are high in carbohydrates all tend to get blood sugar levels that are too high.

You can only tell if this is happening to you enough to warrant taking massive action to fix if you get your fasting blood glucose & HBA1C tested from time to time.

If your fasting blood glucose is much above 100 or your HBA1C is much above 5.8, you need to exercise more & eat better, consuming far fewer carbohydrates & sugars.

This will both tend to shrink your fat tummy & protect your brain.

d) You also should get your triglycerides tested. If they are higher than your HDL cholesterol which you should test at the same time, you are at significant risk for heart attacks, strokes, & other cardiovascular diseases, specifically including reduced blood flow to your brain.

(If you smoke, quit. It has a strong & severe multiplier effect on all these risks.)

The good news is that the same cures will bring down your triglycerides. Regular exercise, eating abundant nonstarchy vegetables & lean protein foods & health OK fats while eating far fewer carbohydrates & sugars will bring down your triglyceride levels.

So will taking DHA supplements & taking purified fish oil supplements or eating high omega 3 wild caught fish or both.

In addition, eating lots of onions will both bring down your triglyceride level & boost your HDL which moves both measures in the desired direction at the same time.

2. There are some powerful things you can also do that protect your brain regardless of the risks or how fat your belly is.

Taking Curcumin or turmeric supplements & taking PS or phosphatidyl serine supplements also tends to protect your brain & prevent dementia.

Taking DHA (or taking purified fish oil supplements or eating high omega 3 wild caught fish or both which are high in DHA) helps your brain build new cells & interconnections.

So, even without or before upgrading to a lifestyle with regular exercise & eating right, you can take these supplements that will protect your brain.

Staying mentally active from following the news, learning new things, or doing things like playing cards or solving chess or crossword puzzles also is protective.

Socializing is also protective. Your perceived stress level will be lower & new research shows you also give your brain quite a workout when you do !!



If YOU have a fat belly, why not do as many of these things as you can?

If you do, you’ll protect your brain & avoid dementia. And, with luck & extra effort, you will also shrink your fat belly.