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Posts Tagged ‘men over 40’

My buddy Mike and I rode some steep hill intervals in Sedalia, Colorado this past Sunday. While we happen to love riding mountain bikes, it takes a little work to love riding up steep hills. You kind of need to convince yourself that pushing hard is fun.

But the truth is, this type of intensity is important for guys as they get older. Most of us rarely do anything that’s physically intense anymore. But letting that red-line stuff go is what starts the drop in testosterone that a lot of guys experience as they move into their 40s.

You might not realize it, but stress in your gut can cause cause fatigue and weight gain. It can even lead to lost sex drive. How is that possible?

Easy. Stress in the gut can cause cortisol to rise. Cortisol is basically a stress hormone. When cortisol is up, and when stress is up, testosterone can drop, especially over the long term. So guys with chronic stomach problems tend to experience the symptoms of lower testosterone in men- fatigue, weight gain and loss of sex drive.

Just remember this – guys over 40 need something to get away from the stress. The stress drives healthy hormones, the hobbies bring it back up. For me, it’s racing off-road triathlon (even if I’m not great at it). For you it can be whatever you want. But it does matter.

That’s me in the picture, running as fast as I ever have. You see, when I go in to these races, my main goal is to beat my time from the year before. And I knew it was going to be close that year.

“Toss my cookies?”

“Yes”

“Doc, say it ain’t so.”

This tough conversation that I had with Ron yesterday was for his own good. Ron’s a 54-year-old who came to me for natural help with fatigue and weight loss.