Aw shucks--December 22, 2012

Resveratrol--That's the ingredient found in red wine that has been shown to be effective in preventing heart disease. I liked that finding since I love a nice glass of wine with dinner when I go to a restaurant with friends or when I invite company home, which is rare these days.
The good news is that resveratrol has now been found to have preventive properties which help our brains and fight against developing Alzheimer's disease. As I read the NBCNews.com article the other day, I was disappointed to find that not all red wine is effective in its anti-aging properties and that in order to drink enough to get that benefit, the alcohol would defeat any positive effect.
Thus the recommendation is to get resveratrol from the food supplement store, in a pill and not from the red wine directly.

I have no more good excuse for indulging in my glass of wine, but I will continue to do so anyway AND get a resveratrol supplement. I am paying more and more attention to the food I ingest these days. I have avoided products containing aluminum for years, but I did not know that there is aluminum in the flu vaccine. The health food store has an alternative which is base-metal free. I am increasing my chicken, beans,egg and fish protein consumption to four ounces from three at each meal and adding fiber supplements, digestive enzymes and probiotics because, as we age, our bodies are less able to produce the digestive enzymes we need, given our normal American diet. The food that doesn't digest properly sits in our digestive tract, and we become constipated or expel the food products too quickly as diarrhea.

There is much research tying our consumption of sugar to dementia, some calling Alzheimer's disease Diabetes III. Our bodies store sugar as fat when we are not active enough to use all the fuel we produce, and none of us, well, very few of us, are active enough or eat small enough portions to metabolize the sugar we eat because it is so disguised. Sugar is in all corn products,like ketchup and salad dressing for example. So even if we say "no, thank you" to some of the holiday cakes, pies and cookies, the pounds pile on from the processed foods we eat.

Adiponectin is a hormone derived from belly fat. It too, effects the brain more of women than men. As we make our New Year Resolutions this week, let's decide to look at what we are eating from our brain's point of view. There are tasty choices we can make, but we will have to decide to spend more money on the food we purchase and on perhaps buying organic fruits and vegetables and non-genetically modified foods. Look for the label NGM.