Weight Loss and Collagen

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WEIGHT LOSS AND COLLAGEN

All current statistics strongly indicate that the human race is losing its battle of the bulge. In America, over 40 million people are thirty-five percent or more overweight. Today, the average American citizen weighs some eight to ten pounds more than he did a decade ago.

Given the current fitness revolution in the U.S., one would thing that weight would be dropping, but it is not. Sure, people go to more gyms, take supplements, and go out of their way to contribute over $40 billion a year to the fitness and supplement industry. Yet, even with this, the U.S. remains a nation of heftiest.
Weight is one of the great contributors to aging both in health and most certainly in appearance. Think about it! When you picture a man in his forties what do you think? Most likely it is a guy with a potbelly hanging over his belt. As he increases in age, the pot enlarges. With every passing year the pot drops a little more. All of this additional frontal weight pulls the best of men forward into a pronounced slumping posture. Just walk to your nearest mall and watch. You will see what I mean.

Women do not escape the curse either. Even worse for them, the droop and drop will start years earlier than in men. The hips widen, thighs thicken, and arms become flabby. All are identifiable marks of aging. As we continue to age, it is our size and weight that generally tend to indicate the years.

Being overweight is unhealthy. Medical research has consistently shown that overweight people run twice the risk of getting heart disease. It is much worse for the silent killer, diabetes. Overweight people increase their odds of contracting this disease by a multiple of forty times. Medical studies have also demonstrated that losing as little as eleven pounds can cut the risk of osteoarthritis of the knee by 50%.

Then there is the practical everyday struggle of size. As our waists enlarge our sluggishness increases. The wear and tear on the supportive joints like the knees and ankles increases. This in turn, worsens our posture, our appearance, the way we feel, and ultimately our self-image.

Growing Shorter by the Day

As if the weight gain, joint pains, and bad posture don’t contribute enough to looking and feeling older, something else kicks in. As we age, we grow shorter. All of the problem of being overweight, having bad posture, and growing shorter as we age are related in many ways to the body’s lack of collagen and its ongoing collagen destruction. The decrease of collagen production results in decreased metabolism, which leads to an increase in weight. The increase in weight places stress on our joints and spinal disks, which wears away at our posture and height.(22) This starts another cycle of collagen disease and… well, you get the picture.

What makes us the height we are? Certainly, it is our skeletal structure as determined by our genes. If you have long legs you are going to be taller than someone else with sort legs. The same is true if you have a long waist. All things being equal, a person with a long torso and long legs will stand taller than someone with a short torso and short legs.
Common sense, right? Well, how about this? No matter what your height, the tall person and the short person will both shrink with age. Getting shorter has become part of getting older. It is also a part of feeling older.

Part of our height is made up of the cartilage between our spinal disks. Physical stress, poor posture, added weight, and the aging process cause these discs to thin out. As they thin, the body shrinks. It is not uncommon to see elderly people lose eight inches or more in height by the time they have reached seventy-nine.(23) The problems of reduced cartilage further exacerbate the shortening process. Without a proper supply of collagen, the body cannot repair itself, so it continues to shrink. In addition, the loss of bone mass that occurs with aging creates a situation where the human structure not only grows shorter but begins to twist and turn. This places further stress on the already damaged spinal column. How many older people do you know who are not only much shorter than they were when they were younger, but who are now bent and deformed. No wonder their walking gait is anything but youthful. No wonder their mental attitude is affected.

The problems of diminished collagen supplies are not just with the elderly. The younger, over thirty-five population suffers from beginning to advanced degenerative collagen disease as well.(24) Admittedly, the negative affects of poor food processing has taken its toll. Nutrients that we should be getting in our food are processed out. In addition, the general population suffers from an overall lack of nutritional understanding. Rather than learning the proper way to feed the body, many flock to the latest celebrity’s website, hoping they have found the magic answer. But they have not. How many celebrities have you known that have lost weight, claimed success through their system, written a book on it, and then almost immediately put the weight back on? As of this writing, there is one very popular television personality who has written no less than four books on her system of weight loss… one for each time she lost and then gained back the weight. Now, I ask you, does it make sense to even listen to someone like that? Of course not. There are simpler answers and we will discuss them.

COLLAGEN

The Key to Looking and Feeling Younger

Type II collagen is the major collagen found in cartilage and is the substance that gives cartilage its tensile strength.(25) The key to building or repairing body parts remains in the ability to convert collagen into other resources as required by the body. So, in order to develop more muscles, tendons, and ligaments to rebuild and repair organs and skin, the body must go through a process of protein synthesis. This metabolic process requires a catalyst (a substance that increases the rate of a chemical reaction without itself undergoing any change), which is collagen.(26)

Losing Weight While You Sleep

Until recently, losing weight while you slept was a myth and a scam. Losing weight this way was a dream for years. Now, it is more of a reality. In fairness, we all lose a certain amount of weight while we sleep because of the body and collagen’s metabolic conversion that we have been discussing. The vast majority of collagen’s catalytic work is best conducted by the body at night during our sleep.(27) The body’s conversion of material requires energy and in the absence of a stomach full of simple carbohydrates/sugar (same thing), the body’s preferred source of energy is fat.(28) So, all the more reason not to stock the body up on carbohydrates before going to bed.

Sleep occurs in phases or stages. Fancy terms are frequently attached to sleep patterns with an almost mystical fascination. Often, their use is just flat wrong. Sleep is important. Sleep affects our youth and our age; so let me expand a bit.

When we first fall asleep, we are in a state of semi-consciousness. During this period, we are vaguely aware of what is going on around us. It is in this light sleep that we are most suggestive. People can talk to us, we can answer, and not remember a word of the conversation the following morning. Those who practice hypnosis do so at this level of sleep. The first stage or level of sleep is the period in which the active mind is getting ready to surrender itself to the subconscious mind. Sometimes, it resists and startles us awake. That is when we have the feeling of falling.
We quickly pass through the first level of sleep and into a state in which we have basic brain and body functions and that is about it. It is the body’s best physical relaxation state. After this, the subconscious side of the brain awakens, and the body begins its dream state. The dream state is characterized by rapid eye movements caused by our looking around in our dreams. This is frequently referred to as REM sleep.(29)

Contrary to what you have read or heard, you do not go from one state to the other and then the other and then wake up. Instead, you pass through most of the levels of sleep several times. In fact, to do otherwise results in less than restful sleep.

The body repairs itself in both levels 2 and 3, but works mostly at the REM level. Often it repairs itself in level three and returns for R & R (rest and recuperation) in level 2 before returning to work in level 3 again. And so the cycle of sleep goes on and on.

It is during REM sleep that the body primarily converts the available collagen and other nutrients into new body materials. It takes an extraordinary amount of energy to do this. The more efficient the conversion engine, the more calories of energy that are burnt. Likewise, the more deficient in collagen, the fewer calories that are used.

One of the negative side effects of sleeping pills is that they sort circuit sleep levels, often bypassing REM sleep to help us reach the chemically induced non- dream state level. A noticeable consequence of the body’s activity at night is the loss of weight in the morning. Keep in mind that effective collagen conversion operates to repair the tendons, skin, cartilage, and vital organs, as well as in the fabrication of bones and muscles.(30) Notice how teenagers sleep longer in the morning and how high their metabolism is. The same is true for children who do not necessarily fall asleep earlier, but do manage to get in some eleven to twelve hours of sleep. Tell that to a seventy-year-old who feels good if he or she can capture a good seven hours of sleep. But, who has an easier time losing and keeping the weight off? The teenager. Case made!

The Nature of Collagen

Cartilage is composed of four or five different kinds of collagen. There are fourteen different kinds of collagen altogether, but there are several primary collagens that are the most medicinal. One of these, collagen Type II, when properly made, has been shown in numerous medical studies to:

1. Dramatically improve skin texture.
2. Reduce pain in joints from injury, strain, or arthritis.
3. Rapidly reduce swollen and tender joints.
4. Promote healing in tendon, cartilage, or joint injuries.
5. Promote increased weight loss when taken as directed.
6. Promote an increase in strength and muscle when used in conjunction with exercise.
7. Dramatically slow the aging process overall. (31)

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Of all the collagens, Type II functions best because it is the easiest assimilated and used by the body. It is not toxic nor does it have the health-related dangers common to steroids or many of the other medications. In short, research has proven that collagen Type II is truly a breakthrough find for controlling the pains of collagen-related diseases, such as arthritis and osteoarthritis. It appears to be superior to any of the sulphates traditionally used to treat such conditions.(32) Collagen Type II contains the greatest number of anti-inflammatory and joint-supporting substances called proteoglycans, including glucosamine sulphate. These proteoglycans have over 30 years of studies backing up their ability to rebuild cartilage. Type II also contains a very high concentration of chondroitin sulphate, a powerful anti-inflammatory agent that also supports the soft tissue. Collagen Type II has been clinically shown to reduce the oxidative damage to joints and, in fact, is far superior to taking glucosamine or chondroitin by themselves.

A major advantage of collagen Type II is that it is far more absorbable than glucosamine, chondroitin, or cartilage supplements, such as shark or chicken cartilage. This means that far less collagen Type II has to be taken in comparison to the other substances. Yet Type II produces a far greater and more beneficial effect.

Collagen Type II limitations

Collagen Type II has a limited ability by itself. Remember the example of cartilage. It’s not one kind of cartilage. It is four. Therefore, any product, which only supplied a single type of collagen, would be very limited.

Scientists have known of collagen Type II limitations, which are one reason they have concentrated on derivatives, such as glucosamine. According to well-known Canadian research scientist, Dr. Jean Yves Leroux, the derivative will perform much better than just the collagen component alone.

The More Superior Collagen Matrix

A collagen matrix is a safe, formulated substance that stimulates the production of many different kinds of collagens in the body. The collagen matrix, formulated from pure collagen, produces incredible results in the human body when used on a regular basis. Results are usually seen within a few days to weeks. It seems that the mechanism for action by the collagen matrix is its effect on the white blood cells located within the GALT (gut-activated lymphoid tissue) that is part of our immune system. As we age the immune system, along with free radicals, begins attacking the body’s cartilage, inducing many of the collagen diseases that we have discussed. When the collagen matrix is introduced into the body, the cells doing the attacking devour some of the new collagen Type II cells that are produced and then identify them as a friend and not an enemy. The immune system is then alerted to stop attacking the collagen Type II. Ultimately, this decreases the number of incidents partly responsible for the inflammation reaction in arthritis and other joint pains.

A matrix-produced collagen’s supply of proteoglycans also inhibits blood vessel formation in joints and reduces enzyme attacks on the cartilage. This produces a rejuvenation of the cartilage-producing cells and a decrease in the destruction of the joints. These same proteoglycans also increase the thickness and lubricating effectiveness of the synovial fluid, the lubricating fluid of the joints.

As an added plus, an effective collagen matrix supplement in its pure form, cold- pressed and non-pasteurized, also floods the body with free radical inhibitors. Unfortunately, all but one of the collagen products on the market ruins much of its efficiency by pasteurization and by adding it to a liquid. That is the bad part. The good part is that we only need one product.

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