Being Heart Healthy at Any Age

It’s never too early to start thinking about your heart and following heart healthy guidelines. This is because the nidus of heart disease starts in your youth and if you can do something to stop the progression or even the beginning of heart disease before it creates arterial damage, you will live longer and healthier throughout your life.

Being heart healthy begins with keeping your weight down. This means that you eat around 2000 to 2500 calories per day and exercise at least three to four times per week at about thirty to sixty minutes per session. This needs to be part of your daily routine—not something you do when things have gotten out of control and you’re fighting the battle of the bulge.

See your doctor regularly in order to have your weight and blood pressure checked. Most doctors will eventually check your cholesterol and follow it more closely if you have a strong family history of heart disease or high initial levels. The same is true of your blood pressure. A strong family history of high blood pressure means you’ll have to have your blood pressure checked more often, especially if you have high readings yourself.

Your diet should reflect a heart healthy diet. This means you don’t eat a lot of processed foods, fried foods and lots of red meat. Instead, think of fruits, vegetables, whole grains, high fiber foods, lean meat, fish, skinless chicken, broiled or baked foods, low fat dairy products and foods without trans fats in them. Read the nutrition labels so that you don’t find yourself taking in too many calories or too much fat in whatever product you’re contemplating.

Don’t even consider taking up smoking as this is a big risk factor for heart disease. If you already smoke, stop smoking. There are many ways to stop smoking in this day and age and you can use them to your advantage to stop smoking. Drinking should be very moderate with about one drink per day for women and two drinks per day (maximum) for men. Daily drinking should probably not be okay with the exception of a glass of red wine with dinner. Red wine has some heart healthy benefits that may make it worthwhile to drink at one glass per day.

Check your heart healthy family history very carefully. If you have uncles, parents or grandparents with strokes and heart attacks, especially at a young age, this should be a red flag for you to watch your own risk factors.

Be wary of diabetes, especially diabetes type II because you have an increased risk of getting heart disease with diabetes type II. Type I diabetes is bad enough but there are many more cases of completely preventable diabetes type II around. If your blood sugars are too high, it triggers atherosclerosis of the arteries and you run the risk of heart disease. Again, watch your weight, exercise, and eat right so that you can avoid this complication.