Is Muscle the Key to Longevity?

I take health, wellness, and longevity very seriously, Lately, I’ve been listening to interviews with Dr. Gabrielle Lyon, who is a board-certified family medicine doctor and expert in muscle health, nutrition, and exercise, and the founder of the Institute for Muscle-Centric Medicine®.

Dr. Lyon says that “muscle is really at our foundation of health and wellness” and in her book Forever Strong: A New, Science-Based Strategy for Aging Well, she says “The more healthy muscle you have, the greater ability your body has to stay in homeostasis or balance”.

Now, as we age, muscle becomes very important because it helps us maintain our quality of life, and gives us the ability to do everyday activities.

So, recently my doctor sent me for a DEXA scan in order to understand my bone and muscle, and a second one to measure my visceral fat, so we could have a baseline to see what’s going on inside my body. it was a very simple process.

The UC Davis Medicine website says that “Understanding your body composition is crucial for optimizing health and fitness. A DEXA scan provides a precise analysis of your body’s primary components: fat, muscle, and bone”.

My results revealed that I had no visceral fat, which is the bad fat that wraps around your internal organs. The scans also revealed that I was lower in muscle mass than I should be.

Sarcopenia!

When we lose muscle mass it’s called Sarcopenia which the Cleveland Clinic describes as “The age-related progressive loss of muscle mass and strength. The main symptom of the condition is muscle weakness. Sarcopenia is a type of muscle atrophy primarily caused by the natural aging process”.

One thing my doctor told me that I’ll never forget, he said “muscle is the key to longevity”.

I’d never heard that before, so I took it to heart and immediately started a journey to build muscle mass!

I’ve been disciplined and strength training for decades, but made the mistake of repeating the same routines without increasing resistance or adding variety.

I also wasn’t getting enough protein to maintain or build muscle mass.

My mission is to transform my body composition and gain back muscle mass, which takes a lot of planning and tweaking.

Increase Muscle Mass!

Here are a few things I personally started doing to increase muscle mass:

💪 Joined a gym, even though I have strength training equipment at home, just to mix it up and hang around other disciplined people.

💪🏽I upped my strength training workout to 5x per week that include heavier lifting routines with varied compound and isolated exercises.

💪 Cut down on the cardio.

💪🏽 Tracked meals on MyFitnessPal and kept track of and logged workouts.

💪 Consulted with different trainers and did lots of longevity research.

💪🏽 Experimented with different high protein, low fat recipes.

💪 Spoke to friends about my journey and some have actually hopped on the muscle mass band wagon with me. YAY!

💪🏽Tweaked my diet slowly increasing protein quantities and added more high protein plant based foods, as well as eggs, cottage cheese, and Greek yogurt, back into my diet.

In an interview that Level.com conducted with Dr. Gabrielle Lyon, she said that “Over 40% of women over the age of 60 are considered deficient in protein. Without enough protein, we don’t even have a chance of protecting skeletal muscle. Women on average are getting between 60 to 70 grams of protein a day. That’s not enough. If you are going through menopause, perimenopause, or postmenopause, this is not enough dietary protein. This is not enough to protect skeletal muscle. When you’re young, this is the prime opportunity to build, but it’s never too late”.

I admit that at first making these adjustments seemed daunting, but instead of freaking out over all the changes, I started slowly which made the process enjoyable and educational.

It’s Never Too Late!

Eating the right foods, getting enough sleep, exercising, and maintaining and building new muscle mass is key.

The process of building muscle mass is hard work and requires dedication and discipline.

There’s no immediate gratification here, it takes time and that’s OK!

If you’re trying to retain or gain muscle, check out this protein calculator.

Muscle mass is important because it slows age-related loss, boosts metabolism, and strengthens bones, reducing the risk of fractures.

Muscle supports joint health, and lowers the chance of falls.

It also speeds recovery from illness and injury, improves blood sugar control, supports heart health and contributes to a longer lifespan with fewer health complications!

It’s never too late to build muscle mass!