Chapter 7 Chapter 5 Lazy premature aging

We are all too familiar with such a cozy scene: the loose body sinks deep into the sofa, staring at the TV screen; with a cigarette in one hand and a can of beer in the other, the remote control is temporarily placed on the bulging on the belly.My wife, have another bag of potato chips.When he was talking to his wife, he didn't even blink his eyes. Anyway, the yellow-faced woman didn't even want to look at it anymore! Our American friends call them Couch Potatoes.They sit in front of the TV for hours, unknowingly, they are getting fatter and insulin resistance is getting stronger.But half of these people don't know their fate at all.From obesity and lack of exercise to insulin resistance, from hyperinsulinemia to diabetes, from diabetes to leg amputation, blindness or kidney failure, and finally to myocardial infarction or cerebral hemorrhage.It's like a ticking time bomb

Are we qualified to laugh at old beauty?Every well-off Central European now sits in front of the TV for an average of four hours a day.In ancient Europe, where we considered ourselves a nation of cultures, television has become the most important pastime after work and the main cause of lack of exercise in leisure time.There is a direct link between watching TV and obesity, albeit in varying degrees and effects, but the consequences are dire. The sooner you want to become a couch slacker, the better.A large-scale survey showed that children who watched more than five hours of TV a day were five times more likely to be obese than those who watched less or no TV.Many parents spend their hard-earned dollars putting a TV of their own in each child's room, saving them the walk to the living room and the debate over what to watch.If your child is still thin, don't worry just yet.Children who watch more than five hours of TV a day are eight times more likely to be obese than children who watch moderately.

Parents and friends who are reading this book may be a little worried, thinking that they will no longer be obedient to their children in the future.You have to be careful, at least the word no is not in the dictionary of German children these days, and anyone who dares to use this word may have a storm waiting for him.At this point, you may have only one option: pass a piece of chocolate, although it is full of fat, sugar and calories, but it can temporarily plug the little guy's mouth and let you be quiet for a while.But what next?Do you believe that, facing this most important audience, TV stations will replace the lucrative advertising revenue with high-level but nerve-wracking programs?Just think about who is advertising which commodity during prime time and you can see.Mindless staring and mindless eating are the perfect combination.

Once a person becomes obese, the risk of developing insulin resistance and diabetes is much higher than that of a slim person.This is true not only for adults, but also for children and teenagers.There is a large tendency for obesity in adolescence to herald the development of this lesion.Medical researchers at the University of Minnesota observed the growth of nearly 700 children from the ages of eight to 22, and found that those who gained weight and fat percentages more rapidly than those whose body mass index increased with normal development , fasting insulin levels were significantly higher.Not every obese person becomes insulin resistant and develops diabetes.But there is a simple biological reason why this is so likely: the fatter you are, the more insulin your body must produce, which enters the circulation to maintain normal sugar metabolism.So the beta cells in the pancreatic islets of obese people are constantly under stress until they run out of energy and stop producing insulin.

A recent study by Vermont State University in the United States proved that this happens to thin people too.Roman.Dr. Roman Dvorak and his researchers selected those with insulin resistance from a representative group of normal-weight young local women.They actually accounted for 18% of the proportion.Their average body mass index is 22, which belongs to the middle class. According to common standards, they must not be called fat.It is generally accepted that a person is considered overweight when their body mass index exceeds 25.The remaining insulin-sensitive women had the same average age as the previous group, with a body mass index of 21, and were only a little thinner (for example, they were all 1.63 meters tall, and the weights of the two groups were 59 and 57 respectively. Kilogram.)

The researchers checked everyone.After scientific analysis, they found that there were obvious differences between the two groups: women with insulin resistance, although their body mass index was similar to the other group, had a higher proportion of body fat, and it was mostly concentrated in the abdominal cavity and upper body.why?Lifestyle may be the answer to this conundrum.Subjects with insulin resistance were less physically active in their daily lives than those who were insulin sensitive.From a medical point of view, important differences arise from this. The metabolic index of a group of women with insulin resistance is similar to that of typical obese people: although they are still thin, their blood sugar and blood fat are significantly higher.It can be seen from this that there are many slim fat people among us, but no one sees the hidden dangers lurking in them.

Dear reader, is your body shape apple or pear?Where in your body fat deposits is very important to your health.It has long been believed that the fat that hides deep in the abdominal cavity, also known as visceral fat, or intra-abdominal fat, poses a serious threat to the metabolic system.This fat tissue is made up of exceptionally large white fat cells, mostly clustered around organs inside the abdominal cavity.From a genetic point of view, men are naturally prone to accumulate this kind of fat, and this fat molecule grows very rapidly under an unhealthy lifestyle, and is twice as active as women.In addition to lack of exercise, smoking and heavy drinking can also accelerate the growth of the so-called beer belly.

These bad cells are characterized by being very active in the metabolic process and easily destroyed by the stimulation of steroid hormones.They can release a large amount of free fatty acids in a short period of time. After these fats enter the blood, they directly reach the liver and muscles, which can inhibit the absorption of glucose.In the liver, they also simultaneously slow down the excretion of insulin.In addition, they promote the production and entry of sugar and fatty acids (triglycerides) into the blood, enhancing blood clotting. Not long ago, it was speculated that it wasn't just visceral fat that was causing the ill effects.Further detailed studies found that fat throughout the abdomen and upper body had adverse effects.Thus, someone with a belly or, to put it mildly, a thick waist in some way is at greater risk to their health than someone who is overweight by BMI standards.We also found that excess fat in the leg muscles can also lead to insulin resistance.

It must be emphasized that although there are so many factors that endanger health, we cannot say that there is a problem with the basic structure and function of the human body.The adverse effects we have mentioned, such as the effects of fatty acids, should first be considered as normal reactions of the human body.The problem becomes serious only when the body's self-regulating machinery fails to cope with long-term, and often man-made, unhealthy lifestyles and becomes completely out of balance.The most important culprit for long-term imbalances in sugar and insulin metabolism is lack of exercise.

When muscles work, they mainly use fat as their energy source.Only when the exercise intensity is high, will most of the energy be obtained by consuming sugar.Therefore, muscle activity consumes high energy and consumes more fat at the same time.Regularly active muscles, that is, muscles that are exercised, have a more developed function of metabolizing fat and sugar.Through exercise, muscles can consume more fat during strenuous exercise.In this process, the particularly active parts of the muscle cells gradually enter the state.In addition, there is an increase in the number of muscle cells and the smallest blood vessels, capillaries, which ensure an adequate blood supply.

Exercise is like tuning the mitochondria, the energy burners of the cells, to optimize their function and spatial position.In the exercised muscle, the accumulated fat is directly connected to the mitochondria, and the glucose delivery system is also directly connected to the cell membrane.This allows for more efficient absorption of glucose from the blood.Generally speaking, about 70% of the glucose obtained by muscles is used for their own consumption.In contrast, in underexercised muscles, the fat is concentrated near the cell membranes, a location that prevents glucose from entering the muscle cells.The more fat there is in a muscle cell, and the closer it is to the area where glucose enters, the less able the cell is to absorb glucose and thus require more insulin.As a result, human beings are getting deeper and deeper in this vicious cycle characterized by hyperglycemia and hyperinsulinemia. The solution to the problem is to exercise the muscles.Through proper muscle load, the amount of exercise does not need to exceed the general housework that is slightly tiring, the cells can obviously absorb more sugar from the blood, and create more cells' own sugar storage glycogen.Surprisingly, the muscle cells don't have to rely on insulin for signaling at this point.The reason for this phenomenon is unclear, but what is certain is that people do not need as much insulin to absorb sugar from the blood after exercise. In addition, exercise has beneficial effects on blood pressure, blood fat and blood clotting.Recent findings also prove that exercise can promote the production of nitric oxide, an important substance on the blood vessel wall, and improve its working condition.Nitric oxide can relax blood vessel walls, thereby effectively maintaining the normal functioning of blood vessel walls. It is also becoming increasingly clear that physical activity is important when it comes to unknown syndromes.But for the first time to thoroughly analyze this issue, it was Steven.The latest survey by a research team led by Professor Steven Blair.Blair worked hard to instill in the public the understanding that the key threat to health is inactivity, not obesity itself.He provides the best scientific evidence for this.He's short and stout himself, but as strong as a sneaker, he likes to say in his presentations to audiences who are surprised by his size and opinions.Perhaps it was this characteristic of himself that gave him greater motivation. His research team observed 7,511 healthy men ranging in age from 30 to 70 over a six-year period.During this period, the researchers used the running machine to check their physical status several times.This is exactly the difference between Blair's research and most other epidemiological studies. Other investigations are often only based on the information provided by the subjects themselves. Add water to your own data. Of the 7,511 men who started out perfectly healthy, 593 developed impaired glucose tolerance over the next six years.When they divided the subjects into three groups according to their physical status, they found that regardless of body weight, the group with the least fitness was 70 percent more likely to develop impaired glucose tolerance than the group with the best fitness.They also took into account all other additional factors imaginable in the statistics, such as age, smoking status, blood fat content, and so on.Some of the subjects have developed into true diabetics in just a few years.People with poor physical strength are 260% more likely to suffer from diabetes than those with the best physical strength! This rigorous survey should convince the most die-hard skeptics that being physically active is fundamental to staying healthy.On the one hand, this can increase energy consumption and reduce the possibility of obesity, and on the other hand, it can also control sugar metabolism within the normal range.If we start to seriously consider what mistakes we have made in life, then the above understanding can be said to be the most basic and crucial. Now that we've struggled with couch slackers, I'm going to talk about their polar opposite: active people.Attention all mothers of active children: As much as they annoy you by jumping up and down and sitting still for a moment, let them be.Another new survey on the difference between fat and thin people found that active people are less likely to gain weight.In the state of non-stop hands and feet, or long-term unconscious restlessness, human muscle activities are frequent. Compared with those quiet and inactive companions, they can consume 700 more calories per day.Therefore, active people can easily dissipate excessive intake of calories and will not allow fat to accumulate in the body. In the next chapter we will take a closer look at several other trends in our way of life, whose influence on unknown syndromes cannot be underestimated, although they have not been thoroughly studied.