Role of Free Radicals and Antioxidants
Free Radicals and Antioxidants should become household words for Americans – particularly those over 50. Free radicals and antioxidants are major players in the body’s aging process. As it turns out, free radicals are the bad guys that attack cells, weaken them, and advance aging. It’s sometimes hard to remember this because free radicals do this with air – oxygen molecules. Antioxidants are the good guys, but they slow down aging by neutralizing oxygen. Since we thrive on oxygen, we would expect users of oxygen to be the heroes.
But not all oxygen use is for good. Cut an apple and leave it to the open air – to oxygen, and the apple turns brown. This is analogous to what free radicals do inside the human body. If you squeeze lemon juice on the apple soon after cutting, it takes much longer for the apple to start turning brown. Also once the apple begins turning brown, you can ‘erase’ the brown by rubbing the lemon over the brown spot. And the spot returns to its original color. This is the role that antioxidants play inside the body.
The Body’s Need for Antioxidant Supplement
I heard a doctor say that people over 50 ought to be taking nutritional supplement that had a strong antioxidant component. He said taking a multivitamin is not enough. In fact, in the face of the relentless attacks of free radicals, taking a multivitamin without a strong antioxidant supplement is like rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic.
What’s at stake are the diseases of aging. They may show up as wrinkled skin, digestive problems like acid reflux, joint pain (arthritis) , slow circulation, hypertension, high cholesterol, brain dysfunction, unbalanced sugar. These disorders can become more serious like diabetes, heart disease, or cancer.
Antioxidant supplement benefits
A strong antioxidant supplement can shore up the body’s decreasing ability to garner its own antioxidants from digestion and cell division. A strong antioxidant can provide the body with the extra “troops” it needs to fight, neutralize the oxygen carrying free radicals. With free radicals held in check, the body can then shore up its immune system and self healing properties.
The result of such antioxidant use is a slowing of the aging process. But sometimes there is reversal in aging damage. Sometimes skins smoothes, pain eases, healing happens faster, energy surges. And some people report getting good report cards from doctors on their lower cholesterol, lower blood pressure, much better control of sugar, better memory, and the like. An antioxidant supplement can help the body live and operate the way it was designed to work.
Some companies have made a great effort to slow the aging process
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