Leading an overall healthy life is the best place to start from, but still if you have a family history of heart diseases and want to know how to reduce the risk of developing heart related diseases, Listed below are some of the small changes you can make to help you heart stay healthy.

Do not smoke

The best thing you can do for your heart is to quit smoking and if you do not smoke, but are staying with some either your family or friends who smokes can also help.

Managing healthy blood cholesterol levels

A fatty substance in your blood is called cholesterol is something your body needs a healthy amount of, but consumption of large about of food building to fat can imbalance the ratio of cholesterol leading to a stroke or a heart attack.

Blood Pressure

Maintaining blood pressure is crucial as you do not feel it when it fluctuates but can lead to a lot of damage to your body as high blood pressure can cause your heart to work hard and low blood pressure leads to your heart seizing to work. It is essential you always check your blood pressure and maintain.

Manage diabetes

Diabetes can cause a heart attack or a stroke leading to death, managing your blood sugar level can help you combat this risk.

 

 

Be active

Physical fitness should be given utmost importance as a regular physical activity helps work your heart rate and then lowers it leading to a healthier heart. Also, sitting for a long period of time increases the accumulation of cholesterol in the heart resulting in blockage of arteries.

Maintain a healthy weight

A healthy weight leads to a healthy heart as it does not put pressure on the heart to work harder that which strains the heart leading to a heart failure.

Enjoy a variety of nutrition rich food

Nutrition rich food helps you maintain health, weight, blood pressure, cholesterol all that can be harmful to your heart health. Some specific changes you can include in your diet to help your heart include eating less salt, replacing unhealthy fats with healthy fats like saturated fats and trans fats are unhealthy to try replacing it with unsaturated fats, and also, limit your alcohol intake.

Look after your mental health

You are at a greater risk of developing heart disease as people suffering from depression are socially isolated and do not have social support. A social life with family and friends can help you towards a better lifestyle, which is good for your heart and overall health. Depression is more than feeling sad or taking to a doctor will help you with your mental health

We are leading a generally unhealthy lifestyle which includes stressing and eating food which is unhealthy to fill your stomach and get on with your day and not to nourish your body, not caring about the long term consequences of these actions. Although you do not see the harm you are causing your body but your body might be hinting that there is something wrong. If you see some the signs mentioned below it is your body telling you to accept a much healthier lifestyle for your well being.

Bad Skin

Start by inspecting your skin, the quality of your skin is one of the best ways to tell the overall quality of your health. A bad lifestyle really shows on your skin in the form of acne, dryness, and peeling as an unhealthy lifestyle leads to decreased quality of skin. If you see a blemish that resembles a stretch mark, it is your wake up call.

Bad sleep

Another common but mostly ignored sign is bad sleep. If you are not able to get a peaceful sleep or you sleep too much it is a sign that you need some lifestyle changes. this can be due to what you eat or drinking as coffee close to your sleeping time and not expelling enough energy during the day can also lead to sleepless nights.

Bathroom issues

It is an embarrassing issue, but one cannot ignore but notice that there are changes in your bathroom habits as the colour of your urine might have changed. The regularity of bowel moments also tell a lot about your bodies functioning.

Dry Lips

Lips are very delicate and are easily compromised when there is something wrong with the body. Specifically, it indicates the level of vitamins in your body. If you constantly see that your lips are chapped and don’t seem to repair itself, you must be vitamin strapped, and the best way to resolve this issue is to diversify your diet by including nutrient-rich foods.

Your finger and toenails

If you notice discolouration, ridges, bumps in and around your fingernails, these are all red flags. If something strange is happening to your nails, do not ignore them.

Body temperature fluctuation

If you have icy feet, excluding the environmental factors, can be a sign of cardiovascular problems. If you are feeling cold, especially on your hands and feet, you might be dealing with circulation issues, and the body is not getting blood where it needs to go.

Forgetful

Our brain health and body health are interconnected, meaning your body fat will have a significant impact on our ability to think and reason. If you are having difficulty making a decision, it might be a sign that you need to drop some weight that is hindering your brains ability to thing.

A tiny lifestyle change can help you lead a happier and healthier life. Some simple hacks to help you achieve that include

Sleeping for seven hours

A simple yet very easily ignores hack is to sleep at least seven hours daily. This sleep can help you keep your brain sharp and keep your energy high all day every day. Getting the proper amount of rest every day reduces insulin levels leading to reduced stress and also radiant skin

Switch to a standing desk

Standing helps burn more calories than sitting. Also, sitting for six hours straight can put pressure on your spine, leading to issues such as chronic back pain or herniated disks. Stand for at least half an hour a day at your workplace and shifting the pressure from your lower back to the pelvis.

Exercise

If you cannot exercise every day, try to exercise for at least three times per week. Exercise not only increases your physical fitness but also improves your mood, reduces stress, also reduces anxiety and depression.

Eating vegetable

Not just any vegetable but raw vegetables, consuming vegetables raw is the best way to intake nutrients from your food. According to research consuming raw vegetables decreases the feeling of depression.

Vitamin D supplements

Vitamin D is directly liked to serotonin, the happy hormone. It has also shown to strengthen bones, keep your neuromuscular system running smoothly and also help prevent breast cancer

Wake up early

Waking up early is known to help people who are suffering from respiratory or gastrointestinal disease or even psychological disorders such as depression and anxiety.

 

Meditation

Meditation reduces blood pressure, helps with anxiety and also help you sleep better. It is among the best step you can take to keep yourself feeling better on a day to day basis. Just meditate for 10 minutes a day away from everything. Meditation helps you focus better all day long.

Get a new pillow

The most filthiest place in your bed is the pillow you sleep in as when the headrest more than sixteen various species of fungal spores seeps into the pillow. These spores can induce respiratory infection, immunodeficiency. The national sleep foundation recommends that you change your pillow every two years to stay away from any potential health risks

Move you healthy snacks towards the middle

Healthy snacks such as apples, baby carrots, sliced bell pepper it kept in the middle of the fridge get noticed more often which most likely will tempt you to eat healthy snakes

Eat chocolate

Eating chocolate helps to boost your mood and is delicious. It also has some surprising health benefits as eating 150 calories of dark chocolate can reduce the risk of heart disease by 30%

There are many myths surrounding the health industry from detox to alkaline diets. We are here to help you debunk some of these myths you believe in.

Detox

A popular word in the dieting world, where the idea is to flush all the harmful toxins out of your bodies. Detox diets involve Fasting, consumption of fruits and vegetables, cutting on wheat and dairy, limited range of foods, avoiding caffeinated drinks, alcohol. Except, the idea of detox is unscientific. If you keep yourself starving for a long amount of times a chemical build-up kicks in called ketones. This chemical will build up and cause nausea, dehydration, weakness, lightheadedness and irritability also the lack of protein can result in you breaking down your muscle and can compromise your immune system.

A food intolerance test

Many pharmacies offer a food intolerance test that measures IgG antibodies and confirm if you have a food intolerance or not.Now, HPRA has banned the selling of these test as they do not provide scientific or accurate evidence of you having any kind of food intolerance. Unless said by a medical professional do not trust these test as it is a waste of energy and money.

BCAAs are the best source to take amino acids

Branched Chain Amino Acid plays an important role in rehydrating, providing protein and energy after a workout. But BCAAs alone cannot support the increased rate of muscle protein synthesis as the body needs nine kinds of essential amino acids, but BCAAs have just three.

Charcoal

Charcoal has become a trend as it is one of the main ingredients that is added in the food and drinks to make it Instagram worthy. Charcoal is most commonly used to filter against undigested toxins to help remove from your body, but charcoal can bind nutrients and prevent the absorption of some useful nutrients.

Daily Probiotics

Probiotics have provided us with many health benefits for our gut, oral, and mental well being, but it is not necessary to consume them every day. As a body can produce its own probiotics and your body does not need more of it. If you are a healthy person who eats balanced meals, you have no need for a probiotic everyday.

Alkaline diet any good?

A very trendy diet these days is the Alkaline diet where the trend involves you eating alkaline foods to stop the food turning acidic. Our blood PH has to remain in between 7.35 and 7.45 if it is above or below this range you will probably die. Our bodies maintain the blood ph level and make sure it remains constant. Although Alkaline foods consist of mainly fruits and vegetables, it is a healthy diet, but the foo causing a change in our blood PH is nonsense.