Unwrinkled

Can you stop—-genuinely stop-—the progress, the ravages, of aging? Is it possible to arrest skin thinning and sagging, bone loss, muscle atrophy, impaired healing, hormonal depletion, i.e., all the trappings of aging and stay somewhere around 40 until you reach 100? Can you continue to ride a bicycle, dance the samba, remain slender, vigorous, energetic, smooth and unwrinkled well after peers have given into gravity and age?

Or, if you are already beyond age 40, can you turn the clock back 10 or 20 years and regain the vigor, strength, health, and smooth skin that you were misled into thinking you’d regain by eating well or applying wrinkle cream?

Can youth and life be resurrected or restored?

I believe we are seeing this happen. It starts with our basic prescriptive program, as articulated in the Wheat Belly Total Health and Undoctored Wild, Naked, Unwashed programs. These efforts alone—wheat/grain elimination, capping net carbs; restoring vitamin D to a 25-hydroxy vitamin D level of 60-70 ng/ml; omega-3 fatty acids; magnesium supplementation; iodine and thyroid optimization; efforts to cultivate bowel flora—get you off to a powerful start by reversing inflammation, reversing insulin resistance, restoring skin health, reversing hundreds of health conditions such as most instances of type 2 diabetes, acid reflux, and irritable bowel syndrome.

But you can take it even further. Among the additional strategies you can add is our Lactobacillus reuteri yogurt. Recall that the benefits have nothing to do with yogurt; yogurt is just a vehicle for amplifying bacterial counts. We also use extended fermentation in the presence of prebiotic fibers to increase counts even further. Much of the benefits of L. reuteri yogurt come from its capacity to boost hypothalamic release of oxytocin (via the vagus nerve) that, in turn:

Increases dermal collagen—This is a huge effect, one that explains why many people (though not all, oddly) experience reduced wrinkles within several weeks to months.
Accelerates healing dramatically
Increases strength and muscle mass (especially if you strength train)—If we view muscle mass as a biomarker for youthfulness, you regain lost muscle (atrophy of aging), turning the clock back considerably. I am far stronger today at age 61 than I was in my thirties.
Preserves bone density
Increases libido
Increases empathy and connectedness to other people

Take a look at some of the shared before/afters on the Wheat Belly Facebook page and you will see that people are looking younger and younger even if the “after” photo is 3, 4, or 5 years later.

I believe that the L. reuteri effect is just one among many more such insights that will emerge, many of them coming from study of the microbiome. If you have been consuming the yogurt and have before/after photos, please share with us. Or, if you are just about the start, take a “before” selfie, then again in 4-8 weeks and compare. Once again, please feel free to share with us on the Wheat Belly Facebook page.

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