The Life Plan Read Online Free PDF Page A

couch potato to being a mouse potato, immersed in your computer or favorite electronic gadget. The bottom line is you’re still not moving.
    Plus, your diet may be filled with processed foods, unhealthy proteins, and simple carbohydrates that accelerate aging and make you old. All of these bad food choices are quickly stored as body fat and arterial plaque, not to mention that they suck the energy right out of you, add weight, and create stroke, diabetes, heart disease, and Alzheimer’s disease. Men need to change their ways right now if they want to prevent the accumulation of body fat (or get rid of it if they already have it).
    And you must learn how to prevent or reverse the loss of bone and muscle tissue. This becomes critically important as we age if we are to avoid nursing home care, chronic pain, immobilization, mental deterioration, and prescription drug dependency. By adopting health-promoting policies, you can become part of a more “active” aging population who will have:

    Fewer premature deaths in highly productive stages of life
     

    Fewer disabilities and pain associated with chronic diseases
     

    More independence and positive life quality
     
    The time to plan and act is now. Remember, we don’t die of old age. We die because we allow ourselves to get old. I know that making behavioral changes can be challenging for many reasons, including one I often hear about from patients: money. But the fact is it takes far less to prevent disease than it does to treat it. A study published in
Diabetes Care
, which focused on the costs of a health-promoting diet, indicated that “adopting a diet that more closely follows nutrition recommendations will not increase diet costs.” Americans complain about rising prices, but actually we tend to have one of the lowest-priced food supplies globally—and spend the lowest proportion of disposable income on food.
    Introducing Age Management Medicine
    Fortunately, there is a new medical specialty that deals specifically and exclusively with all of these issues—age management medicine (AMM). Physicians like me who follow this type of medical practice are dedicated to the science of healthy aging. AMM emphasizes the enhancement of health over the treatment of illness, focusing on disease prevention, wellness, and quality of life. These strategies include the intelligent promotion of healthy key hormone levels combined with individualized exercise and nutritional programs specifically designed to lower body fat, increase muscle tissue and strength, reduce risk factors for illness, improve overall cardiovascular fitness, and find and treat asymptomatic vascular disease. I have been practicing age management medicine since I joined Cenegenics in January 2004, and have never looked back. That’s because as both a doctor and a patient, I know that my patients and I feel better than we ever have before.
     
    I’ve learned through my own experience that we must all change our thinking about aging. Older does not mean sicker. The majority of men already possess a genetic makeup that will allow us to live well beyond age 85. The key is to make the best of the genes we have so we can live better, for longer. By incorporating AMM practices into our daily lives we can reverse illness and reduce the time we are sick. We can’t stop the aging process, but we can definitely manage it. We can avoid premature disability and death. After all, what are the benefits of living longer if we end up in a nursing home, left with a body or brain that doesn’t work?
    That’s why I’m so very glad you’ve decided to join me and follow my Life Plan. This book is meant to steer you toward making significant changes to your current behavioral and medical choices. My program is based on the latest science-based protocols that work together with your current lifestyle, making a series of small yet important changes that you can implement right now. As you continue on the program, you will step