The best way to keep your brain in shape as you age is to exercise and nourish it. Just like going to the gym and eating healthily to maintain your body’s peak performance, doing the same for your brain will help it stay sharp as the years catch up to you. The following tidbits will empower your brain like never before.
Brain Fuel For a better, brighter brain, eat more often throughout the day. Consuming five small meals per day helps maintain glucose levels. Glucose is an excellent source of fuel for the brain, so keeping it in check will keep your cerebrum in check as well. In addition to how frequent you eat, what you eat is just as important. Supplementing your diet with low-glycemic index carbohydrates, antioxidants, and omega-3 fats will make your brain just that much more powerful.
Happily Apple Ever To ensure that your brain stays happy every day, have an apple. Research has shown that apples contain enough antioxidants to protect your brain from destructive free radicals and to raise acetylcholine, which is a crucial neurotransmitter for memory.
Wine-ding down Trying to let go of a stressful day? Kick back and relax with a glass of red wine. Sipping a glass will not only lower your cholesterol levels, but also help prevent plaque build-up in your body and brain. Also, the resveratrol compound found in it will help keep Alzheimer’s away.
Keep Cholesterol in Check Checking your cholesterol levels often will help you make adjustments to your diet and lifestyle, which ultimately affect your brain. As a result of cholesterol, plaque builds up in the body and not only affects the veins of the heart; by blocking blood vessels found in the brain, it can trigger memory problems and deprive the brain of essential nutrients.
Iron it out If you find yourself forgetting things all too often, iron could be the missing link. Iron assists neurotransmitters in maintaining memory function. When iron levels are low, your memory suffers. One study found that women with lower levels missed twice as many memory-related questions as women with sufficient levels did.
Meds & Memory A lot of prescription medications on the market today can affect your memory. And the scary new is that the older you are, the longer the meds stay in your system. Prescription drugs that do this include Parkinson’s drugs, sleeping pills, anti-anxiety drugs, antidepressants, antihistamines, painkillers, beta-blockers, chemotherapy, and statins.
Multitasking? Think Again. When doing two things at the same time, such as flipping through the newspaper while watching a televised football game, will actually cause you to recall less about either later on. This simply occurs due to the face that, when performing more than one task at a time, the brain moves processing over to another part of the brain that retains fewer details. By performing singles tasks, you will have a better recollection of each one.
Physical Fitness The more cardio you do, the bigger your brain will get. Extra cardio has been show to increase brain growth, with more neuron connections and more white matter popping up. So squeeze in a little time each day for power walks and stretching exercises.