Sara Gottfried - Younger: A Breakthrough Program to Reset Your Genes, Reverse Aging, and Turn Back the Clock 10 Years

CONTENTS

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The Hormone Reset Diet

The Hormone Cure

This book contains advice and information relating to health care. It should be used to supplement rather than replace the advice of your doctor or another trained health professional. If you know or suspect you have a health problem, it is recommended that you seek your physicians advice before embarking on any medical program or treatment. All efforts have been made to assure the accuracy of the information contained in this book as of the date of publication. This publisher and the author disclaim liability for any medical outcomes that may occur as a result of applying the methods suggested in this book.

YOUNGER. Copyright 2017 by Sara Gottfried. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

FIRST EDITION

Art by Kevin Plottner and Sara Gottfried

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Gottfried, Sara, author.

Title: Younger : a breakthrough program to reset your genes, reverse aging, and turn back the clock 10 years / Sara Gottfried, M.D.

Description: First edition. | New York, NY : HarperOne, [2017] | Includes index.

Identifiers: LCCN 2016028319 (print) | LCCN 2016031008 (ebook) | ISBN 9780062316271 (hardback) | ISBN 9780062659897 (audio) | ISBN 9780062316295 (e-book)

EPub Edition March 2017 ISBN 9780062316295

Subjects: LCSH: Older peopleHealth and hygienePopular works. | AgingPrevention Popular works. | LongevityPopular works. | Medicine, PreventivePopular works. | Self-care, HealthPopular works. | BISAC: HEALTH & FITNESS / Healthy Living. | MEDICAL / Genetics. | MEDICAL / Preventive Medicine.

Classification: LCC RA777.6 G684 2017 (print) | LCC RA777.6 (ebook) | DDC 613/.0438dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016028319

Dedicated to my beloved patients
and community.

Thank you for teaching me the mysteries
of the human body.

The laws of genetics apply even if you refuse to learn them.

Alison Plowden

I m no supermodel. In fact, obesity, hair loss, anxiety, and Alzheimers disease run in my familynot a pretty genetic picture for middle age and later life. My mother ate sparingly while pregnant with me, as was the fashion in 1967, an era of Twiggy and miniskirts. Moms diet turned on my famine genes while my chromosomes were being knit in her womb, meaning that Ive had a lifelong struggle with blood-sugar problems and rapid weight gain (a lot more on these topics later). Ive grown up idolizing actresses such as Katharine Hepburn, Sigourney Weaver, Diane Keaton, and Julia Roberts. They were slim and tall, but I was pudgy and short.

Now, when I start to wonder why its so freaking hard to stay mentally and physically fit at fifty, I remind myself that my genes program me to be a two-hundred-pound anxious diabetic with thinning hair. All things considered, maybe Im not doing so badly.

Think about Angelina Jolie, Jennifer Lopez, Julianne Moore, Gisele Bndchen, and Helen Mirren. Its easy to believe they won the genetic lottery. Perhaps they hail from a long line of superwomen with flawless skin, flat bellies, perfectly balanced hormones, and fast metabolisms.

Its their job to look amazing, and they are extremely motivated to look good as long as possible as they age. Their taut abdominals and gravity-defying posteriors grace billboards, Victorias Secret catalogs, and Sports Illustrated covers. They have proportionally similar metrics: Gisele Bndchen, the worlds highest-paid model, is five feet eleven and weighs 126 pounds, and her bust-waist-hip measurements (in inches) are 352335. Angelina Jolie is five feet eight, weighs 128 pounds, and measures 362736. Their paychecks and magazine gigs depend on their enviable measurements. Even in her sixties, at five feet four and with 372738 measurements, Helen Mirren rocked a coral bikini on a beach in Italy, looking better than me and most of my girlfriends.

Thats great for those women, but the rest of us flounder. I dont know about you, but sometimes I feel like I was born to wrestle with my weight, skin, energy, and sex drive. In college, my weight ballooned. In medical school, my skin broke out and my adrenals broke down because of stress. I craved sugar and carbs and rarely ate vegetables. I drank gallons of coffee, hardly slept for a decade, and bought fat jeans. Then I had two kids. Need I go on?

Maybe youve been told that your muffin top or memory problems arent your fault; they are simply programmed by your genes. It doesnt seem fair. When I was in my forties, my battle only seemed to get harder as I navigated the challenges of crazy work hours, perimenopause, grief, breast lumps, aging parents, tight clothes, travel, and stress. Eventually, I learned that theres a spiritual lesson in my battle with age and that my mess is my message.

The female body is magnificent, but it doesnt come with a lifetime warranty or an owners manual. Youre the result of millions of years of evolution, but many of the adaptations that helped your ancestors survive are now making you fat and wrinkly and are no longer needed. But your genetic codethe DNA sequence that is the biochemical basis of heredity in all living organismsis only a small part of the story. Your DNA is a unique, one-of-a-kind blueprint that is specific to you. Even if you havent been dealt platinum genes, you can still look great and age more slowly.

The fact is that scientists have found new ways for us to take control of our genes. For example, the naughty aging genes usually associated with fat and wrinkles can be altered with diet, exercise, and other lifestyle choices. Simply put, by turning your good genes on and your bad genes off, you can actually prevent agingno matter how old you are.

Giseles measurements are unattainable for the average American womanwho is five four and 164 pounds with a thirty-eight-inch waist but even if you have fewer of the good genes and more of the bad genes, you can still lose weight, improve your skin, and change how your DNA controls your body and mind. You dont even need a large staff of trainers and chefs to hold you to your exercise regimen and diet; you can appear to have lucky genes whether or not you actually have them.