Finding the ideal diet is more difficult than you would imagine.
There is no shortage of dietary recommendations for better aging when it comes to nutrition, to the point where sorting through all of this “advice” might feel a little bit daunting and occasionally even deceptive. It’s difficult to know who is telling the “truth” and which diet will be most effective for your unique situation when you see one expert on Instagram swear fiercely by a diet that excludes meat and another expert on a podcast swear vehemently by a diet that prioritizes meat.
The only hard and fast truth to take away from nutritional counsel, unfortunately (or perhaps happily), is that there isn’t any. It may take years to settle on eating practices that satisfy your needs because nutrition is such a very personal aspect of your life.
That being said, we talked to four top experts who have spent years researching longevity about how you may utilize diet to attain those goals — and the realistic limitations of doing so. We’re always seeking for ways to make our lives longer, healthier, and happier. You’ll see that each expert has a unique perspective on this subject, and we believe that is a good thing. You can select the ideas that best suit your needs by hearing four distinct points of view.
Is there an ideal diet for extending life, if so, what is it?
Physician and author of Outlive: The Science & Art of Longevity, Canadian-American Peter Attia, M.D., is quick to recognise the fundamentals of nutrition. “Eating too much food is bad for you, and eating too little food is bad for you, too,” he asserts. Additionally, it is true that several vitamins, minerals, amino acids, and fatty acids are necessary for human health.
Dr. Attia observes that aside from one crucial fact about America, there is really no one-size-fits-all solution for the best way to approach nutrition for aging beyond those principles.
According to Dr. Attia, the majority of people in this nation are overweight. “That statement doesn’t contain any judgment. It’s just a fact, really. It boils down to a simple—yet difficult—problem, according to Attia: People are using DNA from a prehistoric past in a modern world.
According to Dr. Attia, “up until around 150 years ago, there was no concern connected with that. We have genes that literally spent millions of years optimizing for energy storage. But suddenly the food supply grew so plentiful…and we have this epidemic [of unhealthiness] when you combine such food availability with all the other things that came with it, like less movement, fewer sleep, and more stress.
In an effort to address these problems, there have been several diet fads that have come and gone, but according to Dr. Attia, every single one of them incorporates some mixture of dietary restriction, time restriction, and caloric restriction. According to Dr. Attia, these are only technical means of expressing what individuals already understand and have been doing.
If you follow Dr. Attia’s advice, you should concentrate on your total nutrient levels. Consider any diet you follow as a tool to achieve a goal—your overall health—rather than the goal itself. Find the restriction method that works best for you by utilizing all three. Perhaps you prefer to monitor your daily caloric intake. Perhaps you’d rather focus on a plant-based diet and less on calories. You might want to try with time-related nutritional structuring techniques like intermittent fasting.
Whatever route you take, keep in mind not to stress too much when you see the next nutritional news. “There’s always a new fad, diet, and trend,” claims Dr. Attia. It is somewhat embarrassing.
What vitamins in diet should you seek out to promote longevity?
Nutrition, according to American geriatric neuropsychiatrist Dilip Jeste, M.D., who researches the process of good aging, is not always about what exact food you put in your mouth. It involves keeping track of the vitamins and nutrients you consume.
In general, Dr. Jeste advises taking a reliable multivitamin every day. “Calcium, iron, and a lot of fiber do need special attention,”
Omega-3 fatty acids and vitamin E, according to Dr. Jeste, are frequently beneficial for maintaining brain function, albeit the precise dosages advised fluctuate and not all information concerning vitamins is infallible. “Vitamin D has received a lot of publicity, but some of the claims are not fact-based,” he said. It has long been regarded as a well-liked vitamin for treating conditions ranging from mood disorders to heart disease prevention. However, recent studies indicate that it might not be as effective for some of these conditions as previously believed.
Dr. Jeste argues that this should serve as a reminder that no single vitamin can serve as a panacea for your health. It does not, however, imply that you should completely disregard Vitamin D.
How food can extend your life and what the boundaries are between nutrition and aging
If you ask Laura Carstensen, Ph.D., what diet is the “best,” she will quickly respond that the majority of studies on the subject are not worth taking seriously to begin with. She is the founding director of the Stanford Center on Longevity and the principal investigator for the Stanford Life-Span Development Laboratory.
Only a few things in the subject of nutrition are currently certain, according to Dr. Carstensen. With a grin, she continues, “We know it matters, of course, but not much beyond that. The majority of our diet research is fundamentally erroneous.
Why, then, are these studies so deficient? Dr. Carstensen notes, “Almost all nutrition studies rely on self-reported information because we’re not very good at reporting the quantities and amounts of what we eat. Therefore, you should always keep in mind that you won’t have a particularly accurate nutrition study unless the study researchers lock study participants in a hospital and keep them there for six months while monitoring everything they consume.
Dr. Carstensen agrees that, despite the limitations of her research, there are some diets that she prefers to others.
A Mediterranean diet seems to sound so wonderful right now, she claims. Nobody I know believes that is a bad idea.
Why the Mediterranean diet is your best option for nutrition-based longer life
According to Elissa Epel, Ph.D., an American health psychologist and the head of the Aging, Metabolism, and Emotion Center at the University of California, San Francisco, “the most effective advice is the simplest” when it comes to eating for life. Aim towards the Mediterranean diet and make an effort to eat whole foods. According to the majority of studies, this diet promotes longevity.
The Mediterranean diet is frequently discussed, but what precisely does it entail? a focus on fish, good fats, and other foods (see the full list below).
This diet may be ideal for you if you want a straightforward, uncomplicated approach to nutrition. One of its benefits is that most Mediterranean recipes are quite simple to make (is there anything simpler than tossing a piece of salmon on a baking sheet and sticking it in the oven? ), so going out to eat is still an option. After all, there are many restaurants that provide flavorful vegetarian or seafood dishes.
If you want to get started, try this recipe for chickpea salad from the Mediterranean.
foods to eat to prolong life
Our researchers’ top picks for foods are included below, but keep in mind that there is no foolproof plan for eating your way to a longer life. We appreciate that all this expert expertise may be difficult for you to stomach (pun intended).
Give foods high in the aforementioned vitamins priority.
Regarding omega-3s, the following foods are high in fatty acids:
fat fish, such as salmon
Walnuts
the chia seed
Flaxseeds
Try these foods for vitamin E:
Almond butter
Pumpkin
peppers that are red
Almonds
additional plant oils and nuts
Prioritize plant-based foods and healthy fats for the Mediterranean diet:
a lot of seafood, especially omega-3-rich fish
A nutritious daily serving of nuts
whole grains
Veggies
Almond oil
In the end, don’t be reluctant to customize your eating strategy. Dr. Jeste has spent decades researching the aging process in an effort to understand what it takes to “successfully age”; what he has discovered is that personalisation is key.
He notes that numerous diet manuals claim that following their recommendations will extend everyone’s life expectancy to 100 years. Sadly, that is not the case. The sort of diet to chose depends on the individual’s health requirements as well as factors like cost and availability that are related to daily life.
Dr. Jeste underlines that the most crucial rule is to see your own doctor. “Something that is toxic to one person may work wonders for another.”
