I wrote a Newsletter yesterday on Heart Disease and how to both prevent it and diminish any damage you’ve possibly already caused.  It takes about 20 years for a disease to develop blatant symptoms; “Silent Damage” is very real, and statistically, if we live a Standard American Life, we have it.

If you read my Newsletter already, re-read it with another horrible disease – Cancer – on your mind.  Most of the causes of Heart Disease are also causes of Cancer, and certainly causes of Inflammation.

Further, most of the causes of Heart Disease, Cancer, and Inflammation, will inhibit Weight Loss. 

This Newsletter contains both Reasons for damage to your arteries and heart, and Solutions.

Heart disease is the #1 killer in the U.S. About 1 million people die EACH year from heart attacks, strokes, or a “cardiovascular event”.

According to the American Heart Association, to lower our risk of Cardiovascular Disease we need to lower our cholesterol by eating low fat foods and taking statins if needed, exercise, reduce salt intake, and stop smoking.

Hmmm. Americans ARE taking statins ( 1 out of 4 over 45), we do eat less fat than 100 years ago ( when heart disease was rare), more people exercise than ever, salt intake IS down, and fewer Americans smoke.

The CDC predicts Heart Disease will increase EVERY SINGLE YEAR FOR THE NEXT 30 YEARS.
The advice has some problems.

One of the main causes of heart disease is damage to our Coronary Arteries, or CAD for short ( coronary artery disease). What damages our arteries? It’s not what you think.

Delete the image burned into our minds that we eat foods with saturated fats and cholesterol and within minutes those substances have filled our bloodstream, and then literally clog it. That’s biologically impossible.

If you’ve worked with me, you know that fat takes hours to digest. (that’s a good thing.) Fats from food sources are readily and easily used by the body for their individual fatty acids to build and repair. Remember, our body is made out of Water, Fat, and Protein; a teeny bit of mineral, and even less vitamin and carbohydrate (1-2%). Good fatty acids are CRUCIAL for our health. ( http://www.rocksolidnutritionandwellness.com/the-basics/fats/ )

We don’t develop heart disease because Saturated Fat and Cholesterol are horrible villains destroying our arteries. Other things do that. Here’s a list of reasons, and the solutions to go with it.

1) Insulin. Insulin is produced by the pancreas in response to sugar/glucose ( from flour, grains, fruit, beans, etc.) Insulin’s okay in SMALL amounts, critical even, and incredibly damaging in large amounts, like the amounts the average American makes due to ingesting simple carbohydrates several times a day. Think of the hormone Insulin like BARBWIRE COURSING THRU YOUR ARTERIES. It’s caustic and damaging in large amounts.

If you’re overweight, or over 40, and/or have high Triglycerides ( > 100) ask for a 3 hour Glucose Test. If your body can’t handle a bolus of glucose, that means your cells are saying “NO” to the Insulin, aka, Insulin Resistance. This is bad because this means high levels of Insulin and high levels of Glucose are staying in your blood stream WAY TOO LONG. The Insulin literally INFLAMES YOUR ARTERIES, and the Glucose attaches to the proteins in your arteries ( collagen, a protein, is a main component of arteries), and “GLYCATES” them: sticky sugar molecules inappropriately attach to the proteins and fats in your body and blood and DESTROY them. Their shape, their function: ruined. It’s bad.

Even easier: Buy A Glucometer and test your postprandial/after meal blood sugars. It’s simple – ask me how.

Solution: Quit eating Grains and Sugars! Insulin will decrease, Blood Sugar will decrease, Inflammation will decrease, Triglycerides decrease, VLDL ( the “bad” cholesterol) decreases, HDL INcreases, and your WEIGHT and STOMACH girth will decrease. Can’t imagine eliminating sugar and grains? Neither could I. It was easier than I thought; you can do it too. If you’re addicted, email me.

There’s NO medication to lower Insulin, there’s NO medication to lower Triglycerides, there’s NO medication to raise HDL, there’s NO medication to decrease Inflammation ( permanently). Statins don’t do any of that except for possibly, in some people, reduce some inflammation. SOME PEOPLE. What you put in your mouth is the only solution. A high fat, low carbohydrate REAL WHOLE FOOD diet, with great supplements, good sleep, and movement, is the fix.

2) Man made chemicals, found in foods ( preservatives, emulsifiers, flavors..), personal care products, lawn and garden chemicals, cigarettes, are LOADED with toxins that have the same effect on your arteries that Insulin does: they’re caustic and damaging. Did anyone read the Washington Post article on the FDA’s INABILITY to regulate and monitor all the chemicals in our daily lives? Pitiful. (http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/food-additives-on-the-rise-as-fda-scrutiny-wanes/2014/08/17/828e9bf8-1cb2-11e4-ab7b-696c295ddfd1_story.html) 100 years ago we had NO chemicals in our food supply, 50 years ago we had less than 1000, today, there’s more than 9,000. Many of these HAVEN’T been tested, and many that have, and are deemed possibly CARCINOGENIC, are granted a GRAS status (generally regarded as safe), and incorporated into items we eat, drink, and slather on. Other countries all over the world say NO to hundreds of chemicals that are prolific in American processed foods and products.

Solution: Quit eating processed foods! Shop, chop, pack, and cook. Become picky about food quality. Be suspicious of restaurant food. Read labels of your food and products.

3) Lack of Vitamin D3, the B vitamins ( the heart LOVES B’s), K2 ( essential for placing Calcium in BONES and not arteries), along with other nutrients. How could you be deficient in Nutrients? Your gut. If you burp, bloat, or reflux, you don’t have enough stomach acid. If you don’t have enough stomach acid, breakdown and absorption of nutrients are reduced and good gut bacteria, who have thousands of jobs, are negatively affected. All disease begins in the gut.

Solution: (a) fix your gut with HCL and/or digestive enzymes (b) supplement with D3, K2, and other nutrients. If you’re confused, ask me.

4) Plaque build up and Inflammatory compounds from the damage you keep doing. Plaque is literally a God-Send. It saves our lives over and over. Plaques get sent to the damaged areas in our arteries to prevent them from busting open ( an occlusion). If we didn’t have plaque, heart disease would kill us a whole lot faster than it does. Atherosclerosis is “never-healing-lesions”. They don’t heal because we keep damaging them over and over with Insulin, Glucose, chemicals, etc. The assaults don’t stop, so the plaque can’t stop.

Our liver makes the plaques and sends it to the damaged areas. What’s in plaque? 68% is fibrous tissue, 8% is calcium, 7% inflammatory cells ( they call our fighter cells to them to remedy damage), 1% foam cells, and 16% lipids/fats. MOST OF THE FATS, ~74%, ARE UNSATURATED.

Solutions: quit building plaque! and supplement: Niacin increases HDL which helps reduce plaque, and lowers LDL and triglycerides; Vit K2 reduces calcium in arteries; Vit C is heavily used by arterial walls to rebuild; a good fish oil soothes inflammation (instead of plaque patches soothing inflammation); CoQ10 reduces amyloid plaques ( Statins turn OFF the cells that make CoQ10, they’re the same cells in the liver that make Cholesterol.) and CoQ10 is a preferred fuel for the hearts cells mitochondria ( fuel furnaces).

5) Magnesium Deficiency. Magnesium is critical for over 300 daily functions, magnesium deficiency is EPIDEMIC. It takes 28 molecules of Magnesium to process 1 molecule of sugar ( from dessert, bread, or pasta). Magnesium relaxes the artery walls, reduces blood pressure, and makes it easier for the heart to pump blood and for the blood to flow freely.

Solution: Supplement every single day with Magnesium. It matters that you use GOOD magnesium and not one that passes through quickly without being absorbed into your cells. Ask me if you need a recommendation.

6) Fibrinogins. These are blood clotting cells. I know about these because I’ve had 2 blood clots. Instead of Coumadin ( never!), I’m on Systemic Enzymes. I get my blood analyzed on a regular basis, and I haven’t had Fibrins in my blood for years now thanks to Systemic Enzymes, fish oil, and an Anti-Inflammatory diet ( Real Whole Food, no sugars or grains).

Have you ever heard of Systemic Enzymes? I LOVE them! What an enormous difference they’ve made in my life. I’ve been on them for about 10 years, I’m almost 50, I work out HOURS a week, and my level of pain and inflammation ( from exercise or injuries) has never been lower. I’m savvier at how to manage it via years of trial and error with which enzymes work best for me.

Basically, the inflammatory compounds in our body are mostly Protein based. Bacteria, virus, most pathogens, are protein based. Systemic Enzymes break down proteins in our blood and tissues: scar tissues, blood clots, cysts, plaques. There’s studies all over the world validating Systemic Enzymes in not only the fight against inflammation, but cancer too. ( http://www.inflammation-systemicenzymes.com/).

Again, if you’re interested, ask me. There’s several different fantastic Enzyme Formulas out there, you’ll need to find the one that works best for you.

7) Excessive alcohol. If I had a dime for every time I heard that wine is healthy, I’d be a millionaire. We’re NOT Italian or French. We don’t eat, live, or sleep like them. We’re Americans, and we’re fat ( 70% overweight), sick ( 70% are on at least 1 drug), and tired ( the CDC says it’s EPIDEMIC: http://www.cdc.gov/features/dssleep/). We can’t get away with excessive alcohol. Alcohol’s effects on the heart are many: it directly causes a “weak heart” or Cardiac Myopathy; alcohol ruins liver functions which is critical for the CoQ10 and good cholesterol the heart craves; and alcohol literally ruins stomach lining, which decreases stomach acid which decreases nutrient breakdown and absorption. Stomach lining also produces Intrinsic Factor, which attaches to B12 and escorts it into cells for use. Deficiencies in B12 are associated with high Homocysteine, a HUGE risk factor for Heart Disease and Stroke. ( Acid suppressors also reduce B12)

B12 should be sublingual for good absorption. CoQ10 is an excellent idea for anyone over 40, as even if you’re NOT on a statin ( and you probably shouldn’t be), your body produces less as you age. Your heart needs CoQ10 for “food”, so supplementation is a very good idea.

8) Trans fats in Margarines, and Vegetable Oils that are heated, or exposed to light and air (O2), are damaging to the arteries. Quit using them! Use Saturated Fats for cooking instead: they’re LOADED with nutrients, and their chemical structure is STABLE, which means heat, light, and air don’t oxidize or damage them.

Heart Disease is preventible. Become informed, be proactive, learn, study, read. Don’t take your doctors advice if it’s old-fashioned and clearly not working. Reread the info in the Newsletter, and then read the link at the bottom. There’s so much science out there that’s not getting to the masses. Don’t let that be you!

Here’s an interview with 2 doctors from one of my favorite books, The Great Cholesterol Myth.