Metabolic and Mental Health
An Elderly Couple Eliminated Anabolic Resistance and Lowered the Risk of Sarcopenia in 7 Steps
Maintaining anabolic sensitivity with healthy lifestyle choices and professional support is essential to prevent sarcopenia as we age.
Purpose of the Article
This article explains anabolic resistance and sensitivity and highlights the importance of sarcopenia for the aging population.
I provide seven practical tips leveraging holistic health principles that anyone can customize with support from qualified healthcare professionals.
In addition, this piece summarizes a protocol many friends and I used to address anabolic resistance and prevent sarcopenia. This article does not include health advice. It is for information and awareness purposes.
Inspiration from a Case Study
I met Lawrence and Jill at a barbeque in Eliza’s beach house over a decade ago. Lawrence was 67, and Jill was 61 years old with two grandchildren. Eliza cared a lot about the health and well-being of these relatives and was concerned about their declining muscles.
Both Lawrence and Jill looked weak and unhappy. They were on strict plant-based diets for many years, thinking their eating regimen was best for their health. Eliza, as an omnivore, convinced them to eat both animal and plant-based food after their 60s.
In addition, Eliza referred them to her fitness coach Adrian who created a baseline for their metabolic rate, including muscle mass, bone density, and fat percentage using a DEXA scan.
Supporting them with a proven protocol, Adrian, with backing from other qualified healthcare professionals, helped them reverse their anabolic resistance and prevent sarcopenia after a year.
Lawrence and Jill substantially improved their health, fitness, and vitality. They are now in their seventies and look younger than their sixties.
I provide a summary of the protocol that helped many elderly people. I also use a customized version of this protocol which is principle-based. It is not prescriptive and can be personalized by anyone with support from qualified healthcare professionals such as dieticians, nutritionists, physiotherapists, endocrinologists, and other specialists.
What is anabolic resistance, and why does sarcopenia matter?
Like insulin and leptin resistance, our bodies can also have anabolic resistance. During this undesirable process, the body cannot synthesize muscles as an anabolic activity which leads to a breakdown which is a catabolic activity.
Anabolic resistance means that our muscles are resistant to typically robust anabolic stimuli such as amino acids and resistance exercise. The opposite of it is anabolic sensitivity.
When anabolic resistance continues for a while, the patients might start experiencing sarcopenia. The definition of sarcopenia is muscle wasting as we age, causing weakness and preventing us from performing daily tasks.
“Skeletal muscle plays an indispensable role in metabolic health and physical function. A decrease in muscle mass and function with advancing age exacerbates the likelihood of mobility impairments, disease development, and early mortality.” Source
Common symptoms of anabolic resistance are shrinking and weakening muscles, making day-to-day activities difficult and preventing the patients from undertaking exercise.
Aging is the most common cause of anabolic resistance. However, lack of bioavailable proteins in the diet and sedentary life is also critical causes.
In addition, underlying health conditions, especially metabolic disorders such as metabolic syndrome, fatty liver disease, type II diabetes, cardiovascular diseases, cancers, and neurodegenerative disorders, might cause anabolic resistance.
In the literature, two causes of sarcopenia are documented in numerous papers. They are “elevated basal-fasted rates of muscle protein breakdown” and a “reduction in basal muscle protein synthesis.” A combination of these two factors makes the situation worse.
Muscle loss and quality can be checked via various tools such as MRI and DEXA scans. If not covered by Medicare, they can be costly. I see a yearly DEXA scan for my body composure as a health investment.
Exceptionally, even though some elderlies consume lots of protein and exercise, their muscles cannot grow and maintain strength. Thus, there might be some other underlying conditions that healthcare professionals need to diagnose and treat.
Muscle is our longevity organ. Maintaining lean muscle mass is crucial as we age. Skeletal muscle is extra vital for our posture to support daily activities. Therefore, we need to gain anabolic sensitivity.
Many people desire to live long, but longevity does not mean much unless those days are quality. Our movement also affects our mood and mental health. I believe no one wants to live a low-quality life with low mood, pain, and suffering.
Seven practical approaches to address anabolic resistance and improve sensitivity
In this section, I summarize critical points under seven broad headings. While the first three are fundamentals, the other four items can significantly contribute to improving the condition and preventing muscle loss as we age.
1 — Increase Bioavailable Proteins
Protein is a critical macronutrient for muscles and many other body functions. Amino acids are the building blocks of our cells. There are nine essential amino acids that the body cannot produce. We must get them from food or supplements.
I specifically highlight bioavailable as some food groups do not include complete amino acid profiles and are not bioavailable due to some allergens and toxins.
Even though some plant sources can provide adequate proteins, they are not as bioavailable as animal-based proteins such as eggs, red meat, organ meats, poultry, fish, seafood, and dairy.
As diet is a personal matter depending on many variables, it can be helpful to get our protein intake to be formulated by a certified dietician. Protein needs differ from person to person depending on many factors, such as age, sex, and activity level.
As I got older, my body needed more bioavailable protein to keep my skeletal muscle which I monitor diligently. Therefore, I moved from a plant-based to an animal-based diet to meet nutritional requirements.
2 — Perform Personalized Resistance Workouts
As documented in this paper, “the level of habitual physical activity may be fundamental to maintain the anabolic responsiveness to protein intake with aging.”
After food, the next critical item to keep anabolism is stimulating our muscles with resistance workouts. Weightlifting and calisthenics, from my experience, are the best options.
Some people, especially the elderly, do not like weightlifting or performing calisthenics. However, they don’t need to do it in the same amount or intensity as younger people.
For example, Adrian got started with Lawrence with five kilos of dumbbells and Jill with 2 kilos. After a year, Lawrence could lift 30 kilos and Jill 10 kilos in 20 minutes every third day. In addition, they do around 50 pushups, ten squats, 20 steps lunge walk, and ten minutes of planks daily.
3 — Improve sleep quality and recover timely
Even though protein and workouts initiate muscle synthesis by activating mTOR, the actual growth and maintenance of muscles happen during sleep time. All phases of sleep are essential for this activity.
Sleep deprivation is a well know root cause of muscle loss. When we don’t get enough sleep, our cortisol hormone rises in the bloodstream.
We also need to take breaks from work and exercise to reduce our stress and keep our cortisol hormone at an optimal rate. Slowing down is essential as we get older. We shouldn’t exercise before fully recovering from the previous sessions' effects.
Cortisol is a catabolic hormone causing muscle loss at elevated levels and for a prolonged time. Therefore, we need to optimize this hormone. I will explain the importance of hormones in the next section.
4 — Optimize and balance hormones
Our metabolism is managed by various hormones that require work in balance. The most critical hormone contributing to muscle and fat gain is insulin which is an anabolic hormone.
Insulin plays multiple roles in muscle growth. For example, it signals muscle cells to get blood glucose. Insulin also contributes to the activation of mTOR.
As hormones are highly complex and involved, it is impossible to cover them in a section. However, the critical point is that we need to optimize and balance our hormones with high-quality nutrition, especially bioavailable protein, personalized workouts, and restorative sleep. Our hormones also require some healthy fats to function well.
We must prevent insulin resistance and elevated cortisol to maintain a healthy muscle profile. Making our body leptin sensitive can contribute to insulin sensitivity. An insulin-sensitive body can melt visceral fat and maintain lean muscles.
For more information about hormones, you might check my previous articles.
Optimize Cortisol to Melt Belly Fat and Keep Lean Muscles with Three Tips.
Three Tips to Eliminate Insulin Resistance and Shrink Waistline.
Hormonal Intelligence: Sharpen It to Achieve Optimal Health.
Lose Visceral Fat by Understanding the Intricacies of Six Critical Hormones
Here’s Why Understanding the Role of Glucagon Is Vital for Type II Diabetes.
Here’s How to Lose Fat and Retain Lean Muscles with CCK Hormone.
Make the Body Leptin-Sensitive to Lose Visceral Fat With a Simple Metabolic Shift.
Some elderlies might need bioavailable hormone replacement therapy. Therefore, getting our hormones to get checked by hormone specialists (endocrinologists) can be valuable. They might diagnose and treat hormonal issues. For example, testosterone is required for muscle synthesis in men.
Stress and unpleasant emotions adversely affect the hormones causing hormonal imbalance. I cover emotions in the next section.
5 — Enhance emotional resilience with mindfulness
Our thoughts and emotions have a significant effect on our biology. The key mechanism is stress production by unpleasant emotions and anxious thoughts.
As I documented in an article, our anxiety increases as we age. Reducing anxiety, preventing chronic stress, and lowering chronic inflammation can help us balance our hormones. Cognitive flexibility and emotional regulation are necessary as we age.
From my experience, mindfulness practices such as daily meditation, self-talk, and expressive writing can help us to regulate our emotions, increase our emotional intelligence, and make us more mature and resilient to emotional stress.
6 — Initiate self-healing mechanisms of the body diligently.
Our muscle cells and mitochondria are affected by toxins, pathogens, and damaged proteins.
Refraining from these harmful substances is essential. However, we cannot get rid of all toxins and pathogens. We might use detoxifying supplements such as n-acetyl-cysteine and activated charcoal. However, supplements cannot entirely get rid of them.
When our self-defense cannot handle the toxins and pathogens, the viable solution is to activate our self-healing capability to eliminate them naturally. We call these natural processes autophagy and mitophagy.
When we activate the autophagy process, the body can consume pathogens, biological toxins, and damaged proteins to create cellular power when it senses energy deficiency in cells.
Nevertheless, older adults must be careful as activating autophagy is a catabolic process that might cause muscle loss. Therefore, we need to do it with medical supervision and diligently.
Time-restricted eating can increase growth hormone. Therefore, some professionals consider it for their clients. However, long-term fasting as a catabolic event can be risky for the elderly. Nevertheless, skipping a meal and increasing bioavailable protein intake in the other two main meals can be an option for some.
For example, Adrian advised Lawrence and Jill to skip their breakfast once a week. He monitored their blood glucose and pressure on those days. Fortunately, they did not have any side effects.
It seems possible to initiate mild autophagy and mitophagy by skipping meals occasionally. Time-restricted eating and fasting require medical support and supervision for the elderly and those with underlying health conditions.
As these topics are comprehensive and highly complex, I simplified them and documented my findings, observations, and experiences in the attached articles.
Here Is What Happened When I Experimentally Initiated Autophagy.
Here’s How I Initiate Mitophagy and Make My Mitochondria Denser in 7 Steps
Uncouple Mitochondria and Increase the Chance of Living Longer via 6 Lifestyle Choices
7 — Leverage Physiotherapy and Other Therapies
When I asked Adrian about the additional support he provided his clients, he mentioned the importance of physiotherapy, osteopathy, and kinesiology.
These therapies helped his clients to improve their postures and enabled them to exercise better. For example, Lawrence and Jill particularly found physiotherapy helpful in enhancing their skeletal muscles. I also used physiotherapy to improve my posture.
I documented my findings in an article titled Here’s How to Defeat Back Pain with Three Postural Tips by a Physiotherapist.
Conclusions and Takeaways
After insulin resistance (affecting the metabolism of millions of adults globally), anabolic resistance and the effects of sarcopenia are other elephants in the room that we must accept, understand, discuss, and address for our aging population.
Sarcopenia is real and can affect every aging person. In addition, this condition is also accompanied by functional decline, causing metabolic imbalances and making our lives more difficult as we age.
However, it is possible to address sarcopenia by increasing anabolic sensitivity. The typical lifestyle factors are consuming bioavailable proteins and nutrient-rich food, undertaking personalized resistance training, and getting high-quality sleep.
These three fundamentals can reduce stress and inflammation and balance our hormones supporting anabolic sensitivity to prevent sarcopenia as we age.
Like many other elderlies in my circles, Lawrence and Jill eliminated their anabolic resistance and prevented the formation of sarcopenia. After the age of 70, they functioned as well as in their 50s with their healthy lifestyle habits and support from qualified and compassionate healthcare professionals.
As their story inspired me and many others in health communities, I thought it would be worthwhile to share it for awareness.
I desire affected readers or their loved ones experiencing sarcopenia to learn from these principles and discuss the options with their physicians, dieticians, physiotherapists, and other professionals for support.
Learning from the experiences of others might be invaluable. Therefore, I document stories of healthy and wise people in my circles and compile them in a collection titled Insightful Life Lessons from Personal Stories. I believe you might find some inspiring stories from this collection, covering more than 60 real-life stories.
As a new reader, you might check my holistic health and well-being stories reflecting on my reviews, observations, and decades of sensible experiments. I write about health as it matters. I believe health is all about homeostasis.
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As a new reader, please check my holistic health and well-being stories reflecting my reviews, observations, and decades of experiments optimizing my hormones and neurotransmitters. I write about health as it matters. I believe health is all about homeostasis.
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