WELLNESS

Vegetarian Plant-based and Micronutrient-Rich Diet

What is a vegetarian plant-based diet?
A vegetarian plant-based diet is comprised of unrefined foods, such as raw fruits and vegetables, and minimally refined or processed legumes and whole grains. This diet excludes meat, fish, fowl, and eggs.

What is micronutrient-rich diet?
Foods that have a high density and wide array of vitamins, minerals, enzymes, and phytonutrients are micronutrient-rich. Examples include green leafy vegetables, berries, and seeds.

Daily supplements to a micronutrient-rich diet include multivitamins, herbs, minerals, probiotics, chlorella, spirulina, and marine phytoplankton. Also found naturally in foods, methyl-sulfonyl-methane (MSM) is also important for connective tissue and fascia to facilitate sulfur intake (as the fourth important compound in the body). Foods are denatured by cooking due to high heat, and fruits/vegetables can be picked too early to facilitate the ripening process during transit. Therefore, sulfur supplementation is necessary.

What are main food sources to support a healthy diet?
An ideal combination of 40-50% raw foods and the remaining 50-60% high-protein, calorie-rich foods, including grains (red and white quinoa, buckwheat, millet, oatmeal, and brown rice), legumes (beans, soybeans, lentils, chickpeas, peas, clover, peanuts, and sweet potatoes), raw nuts, tofu, and others would be beneficial.

Green smoothies (made in a Vitamix or NutriBullet) are a great way to provide your daily fiber intake. Add 16-20 oz of fresh vegetable juice, such as carrot, celery, beet, ginger, or cucumber. Key green ingredients to include are sprouts (the king of nutritional content), alfalfa, buckwheat, radish, broccoli sprouts, spinach, kale, and swiss chard. Rotate the green leaf on a weekly basis to provide a variety of nutrients. To sweeten, add wheatgrass, chia seeds, raw unprocessed coconut oil, bananas or berries.

I do:

• Breakfast: 2-3 cups of super grains oatmeal with fresh berries, or 2-3 cups of tofu scramble, accompanied with daily vitamins
• Busy schedule: One to two 32 oz green smoothie throughout the day
• Lunch: One 32 oz green smoothie with avocado salad or pairing of nuts and berries, such as, cashews and blueberries, macadamia nuts and red grapes, raw cashew butter and strawberries (also great as snacks)
• Dinner: High-protein, low carb, low to no sugar dishes, accompanied with remaining daily vitamins

I recommend:

• Daily 32-64 oz green smoothies for fiber and nutrients intake
• High protein, low carb, low sugar diet with vitamin supplements
• Consult your medical professional before starting any extreme dietary changes

Resources:
"Oak Brook Resident's Green Smoothie Recipe is Known for Serious Health Benefits"

Muscle pliability with exercise is important at any age.

As we age, the body loses bone density and muscle mass, so maintaining strength is important to the vitality of the body. Strength/resistance training, such as, weights, yoga, and pilates,  maintain strong bones and muscles. Conditioning keeps the heart and cardiovascular system healthy.

Conditioning can be high intensity interval training (HIIT), running, or heart rate increase, combined with strength training, such as circuit training, to reap health benefits, such as:

• strengthening the heart muscle
• removing plaque in passageways with blood volume/circulation
• burning fat/weight loss
• increasing metabolism
• improving the health of lungs
• improving lung capacity
• increasing oxygen delivery to tissues
• decreasing depression
• increasing mental health
• improving sleep

I do:

• Circuit training (strength and conditioning at the same time) three times a week for 30 minutes with maximum intensity
• Strength training one to two times a week at moderate intensity
• Running once a week

I recommend:

• Exercise at least three times a week for 30-60 minutes with days of rest in between for recovery
• Consult your medical professional before starting any extreme exercise program

Resources:
"The Best Workout for Every Age" 
"Fitness Challenges for Every Age from 20 to 80"

What is meditation?
Meditation is the practice by which we withdraw from our physical senses, still our minds by focusing within, and achieve mental clarity and a greater sense of awareness. Meditation, like any other practice (playing the piano, sports, etc.), requires a daily commitment to improve as time progresses.

Meditation:

• Improves concentration
• Creates a sense of well-being and happiness
• Decreases blood pressure and depression
• Increases telomeres length
• Helps stress-related disease

I do:

• 30-60 minutes first thing every morning
• 15 minute intervals throughout the day, when possible
• 3-5 hours for extended periods a couple days a week

I recommend:

• 30-60 minutes first thing in the morning; it’s ok to start at 15 minutes intervals at the beginning with the goal of increasing time
• 15-20 minute intervals throughout the day, when possible, to recharge and remove the weight of the day

Resources:
"Meditation Can Help Your Body Feel Better Too. Here's How."

What is Delos Therapy?
Delos Therapy is the process of restructuring muscle by stretching it apart with pressure.

During the wear and tear process, there is a build up of collagen deeply embedded in the muscle. This build up then becomes disorganized, making the muscle fibrotic. Tissue becomes stiff, rigid, and painful, and can impinge on nerves (causing neurological symptoms), impinge lymphatics (causing swelling), and cause various muscular conditions.

This fibrosis has a precise three-dimensional structure that does not appear on conventional imaging, and is resistant to change with stretching, foam rolling, and massage.

Delos Therapy addresses this fibrosis by performing a diagnostic scan of the muscles, isolating distinct patterns of tightness, applying pressure directly into the muscle tightness, forcing the stretch and separation of individual muscle fibers, and realigning collagen, thereby restoring pliability and function to the muscle.

The result of restored pliability allows muscle tissue to regain its natural flexibility, range of motion, dramatic improvement in muscular performance, increased strength, and growth and power. This restoration is the most overlooked essential component of muscular health.

I do:

• One 50-minute Delos Therapy session per week to maintain pliability as a regular maintenance and repair schedule

I recommend:

• An initial treatment phase of minimum of 3 treatments per week for 4-6 weeks to restore pliability (based on genetic predisposition of tightness, activity level, and response to pressure, etc. determines the maintenance frequency schedule for muscular health upkeep)
• Ongoing maintenance mode after initial treatment plan

Resources:
"Delos Therapy" 

Fasting (Intermittent and Extended)

In 2016, Yoshinori Ohsumi was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine for his discovery of cellular mechanisms for fasting. In the absence of food, cellular repair mechanisms kick in to degrade intracellular waste, bacteria, and viruses, recycling them as energy and extracting harmful substances. Fasting repairs cells and essential components of DNA, and can help alleviate chronic symptoms that have been linked to neurodegenerative disease, cancer, aging, and others.

What is fasting?
Fasting is the deliberate absence of food and nutrients, with the exception of water.

What is intermittent fasting?
Intermittent fasting means implementing specific time intervals of fasting and feeding. Most people don't realize that everyone already practices intermittent fasting during sleep, and then we wake up in the morning to eat breakfast, literally "break-fast". This means that people are in the feeding phase for 16 hours and the fasting state for approximately 8 hours.

A typical intermittent fasting protocol flips this ratio to 8 hours of the feeding phase and 16 hours of the fasting state.

What is extended fasting?
Extended fasting is fasting longer than a 24-hour period.

I do:

• Intermittent fasting for five days a week (8 hours of feeding and 16 hours of fasting)
• Historically, I've done multiple 3-5 extended fasts; one 10-day fast; and one 21-day fast (under medical supervision at a fasting retreat)

I recommend:

• If you feel like you want to lose weight or you just feel unhealthy, try a daily regimen of intermittent fasting (feeding to fasting hours ratio of 8:16 or 4:20), with once a week of a full 24 hours extended fasting or twice a month, depending on tolerance
• It is important not to be in a too much of a caloric deficiency to work out intensity
• Once a year, try an extended fast (consult a medical professional who specializes in fasting)
• Consult your medical professional before starting any extreme fasting regimen

Resources:
"The Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine 2016 Press Release" 
"8 Health Benefits of Fasting, Backed by Science" 
"Fasting Rejuvenates the Immune System"