Is Your Body Rusting Out?

Hi,

Continuing our series about the "ations" affecting your body, the next one is pretty familiar.  It is oxidation.

Almost everyone has heard of oxidation.  Or at least anit-oxidants.  Anti-oxidants are taken to prevent or decrease the amount of oxidation happening in your body. 

So just what is oxidation?  It is a natural and necessary process that occurs all the time in our body.  It is when an electron is removed from an atom or molecule.  It is the same process that happens when your car is rusting out, only this time it is happening in your body.

Sometimes this removal can damage the molecule and this can actually damage the DNA of your cells.  Not a good thing. 

Yet, oxidation is necessary as I mentioned before.  You need it to produce energy, like when glucose is turned into energy.  There are many processes in the body that use the oxidation process.

So here is how this process works.  You saw where oxidation is the removal of an electron from a molecule.  Well, these molecules get a little upset about this, so they go out looking to get that electron back.  And they don't care where they get it from. 

These upset molecules are called free radicals.  Normally the body can handle these free radicals by deactivating them. 

But, sometimes there are too many and the body gets overwhelmed.  When that happens the free radicals run rampant in their search for the missing electron.  They attack the brain and other organs to get their missing electron.  This causes a lot of damage throughout the body

As with all the other "ations" oxidation is involved in all major degenerative diseases. These include heart disease, clogged arteries, Alzheimer’s disease, all cancers,and diabetes.

A double whammy happens when you have low grade inflammation running throughout your body.  This inflammation increases free radicals. 

So one of the ways to keep the oxidation process at bad is to reduce the inflammation in your body.  You can see the previous post on inflammation for how to do this. 

In addition you can eat more of your fruits and vegetables especially organic ones.  Don't smoke or stop smoking.  Get an air purifier and a water purifier.

Reduce stress in your life, or start meditating to handle the stress better.  Don't get sun burned. 

Start taking some antioxidents along with your daily multi vitamin and mineral supplements.  This is especially true as you get older and if you exercise (remember from above when glucose is turned into energy)  to the extremes - like a professional athlete. 

Extreme exercise causes an abundance of free radicals and you might need some supplemental health.  

Green tea (not the kind with tons of sugar in it) has lots of anti-oxidants.  Extra supplements with coenzyme Q10, alpha-lipoic acid and N-acetylcysteine can help also. 

Doing the above few things can help you keep your body from rusting out.

Thanks,

Mike Val

http://www.valshealthsite.com/