LOVE YOUR HEART

The health of the vascular system (the heart, the blood, and the arteries and veins) is highly influenced by daily lifestyle choices, thus there is a lot that you can do to keep your heart, blood and blood vessels strong and treat or prevent the onset of heart disease.

The biggest predator to the vascular system is its increased exposure to ‘free-radicals.’ Free-radicals are naturally made by the body; however preventable free-radicals come from poor lifestyle choices such as smoking, eating high saturated fat and processed food, alcohol, chemical exposure such as that found in household cleaning products, cosmetics and pesticides use on our food.

There are two ways free-radicals damage the vascular system; first, free-radicals breakdown the walls of the arteries which increases risk of atherosclerosis (thickening of the arteries). Secondly, free-radicals also transform LDL cholesterol (bad cholesterol) into a more dangerous form which deposits into the artery walls and contributes to plaque build-up. Anti-oxidants are molecules that help reduce the free-radical exposure to the body. Below is a list of ways to help increase the antioxidants in your body. (more…)