Quick, when should you start taking your social security withdrawal payments?  Age 62? Age 66? How about age 70? Which will give you the most money in your remaining life? Which will give you the largest monthly payment? What about your surviving spouse, when should you start payments for his/her benefit?

Lots of questions to consider. Don’t just, willy nilly, start taking money from Uncle Sam just because suddenly free money became available to you, you have to look at a bigger picture.

We understand, who doesn’t want free money? The temptation is overwhelming to start taking it as early as possible. But a little bit of knowledge and discipline could make for a lot more financial security in the long run.

Also, imagine a world where the most powerful country with the most robust economy will pay you a monthly check for life!  And, it’s transferrable to your spouse should you die. Hello Santa Clause. But then again you (and your employers) have been contributing into the system your entire working years, now it’s time to get smart about when to start pulling it out.

So, the challenge becomes how to maximize that funding for your unique circumstances. It may mean taking it just as soon as you turn 62, or it may mean waiting until your 70, or somewhere in between. We’ll help you to do the math.

Social Security Basics

Why Social Security Exists

Just a little perspective as to why social security exists in the first place because it wasn’t always the case.

 Franklin Roosevelt and the Depression Era

Originally Meant to Open up Jobs to Young Unemployed Men

In the midst of the Great Depression, no not the one in 2008 but the one in the 1930’s, there was rampant unemployment running as high as 20%. People were destitute.

Many of those unemployed were young strong capable men. The last thing a leader wants is a huge cohort of unemployed, starving, bitter men, it’s what revolutions are made of.  One way to open up jobs for these young men was to retire old men that were usurping jobs because they had no other means of sustaining themselves.

FDR needed a program to provide income to these old workers and get them gainfully retired. Rumor has it that he looked at the precedent set by Otto Von Bismarck in Prussia/Germany where Bismarck introduced the” Old Age and Disability Insurance Bill of 1889”. It was an old age pension program, financed by a tax on workers, designed to provide a pension annuity for workers who reached the age of 70 so they could retire.

Bismarck was in no danger of his pension program financially tanking the government because the average life expectancy at the time was less than 50 years of age. So much for generosity.

Fast forward a couple of decades and The Social Security Act in the U.S. was signed into law by FDR in 1935 in the middle of that Great Depression. It would pay workers 65 and over continuing income after retirement and would be funded by payroll taxes.

The effect of this act was twofold, first it provided “security” to the aged and secondly it opened up jobs for those restless young males. Mission accomplished.

Not Meant for a Cozy Retirement on the Government’s Coffers.

Retirement via social security was never meant to be a life among the palm trees in winter and constant golfing. It was merely a stop gap so that the elderly could help meet their basic living expenses.

In fact it wasn’t supposed to be a heavy financial burden by the U.S. government because most retired workers didn’t live that long.

Life expectancy at birth in 1930 advanced to only 58 for men and 62 for women. Since this was actually less than the social security retirement age of 65, people weren’t drawing down from the system for very long.

Today it’s a totally different story with much longer life expectancies. Many boomers will live to their eighties and nineties. Those a lot of years to have to finance and you need to make sure you don’t outlive your money.  And, having a substantial social security check will help you get there.

 Know your Eligibility Age

Federal Insurance Contribution Act Taxes

Recall looking at your paycheck stub and there was a withdrawal for FICA, which is your contribution into the social security pot. Since you were old enough to be employed you’ve been paying into the system. Today that rate for both you and your employer is 6.2% to social security and an additional 1.45% toward Medicare. At the end of a long career it all amounts to a sizable chunk of change.

You earn credits based on those withholdings — up to 4 credits per year. When you reach 40 credits and you’re of age, you get to start making withdrawals.

Social Security Math

The Social Security Administration will automatically send you an estimate of your anticipated retirement payments on a scale ranging between the ages of 62 and 70.

 Start with what you Will Earn at Minimum Eligibility

There are many situation of older American struggling financially as they enter their sixties and can barely make ends meet. As a stopgap in 1961, social security was amended to provide benefits beginning at age 62 albeit at a much reduced rate than at the full retirement age.

So a single person that is unemployed, underemployed, or otherwise barely meeting living expenses may be forced to start taking social security at the earliest, at age 62. That will add another income stream to whatever they currently have and that makes total sense for these special circumstances.

However, those people turning 62 and do have their living expenses covered by other means and see this largess as “play money” should probably rethink.

Should your full retirement age be 66, filing for Social Security at 62 will slash your monthly benefit by roughly 25%.  Using simple math, if you’re scheduled to receive $2,000 a month at age 66 but choose to start receiving at age 62, you will receive the reduced amount of $,1500.

So you would have $500 less income per month for the rest of your, and possibly your spouse’s, life. Would you really want to leave that much on the table? What if you live to age 90? That’s a lot of mula.

 Set a Goal to Wait Until at Least Your Full Retirement Age

So assuming you’re still gainfully employed and can meet all your living expenses, it is best to wait before starting your social security withdrawals.  Below is a table to calculate your full retirement age:

Tax consequences

In addition to your social security payments being lower before your full retirement age, if you are working as much as 85% of your social security income is taxable if you earn over $34,000. So it pays to wait especially if you plan to stop working altogether at your full retirement age.

 A Penalty to Your Spouse if you Start your Claim Before Your Full Retirement Age

It’s difficult to think about death but highly necessary. There is a penalty to your spouse in two ways: (1) if you don’t max out your social security payments, that lesser amount will be the amount they will receive for the rest of their lives (assuming they don’t have their own high level social security). (2) Should they be younger than their full retirement age (they can apply for reduced benefits as early as age 60), the number is further reduced on a sliding scale beginning at only 71.5% and incrementing up each year.

The best case scenario is for you to attain your full retirement age or higher before receiving benefits. Then if the widow or widower has reached their own full retirement age, they can get their deceased spouse’s full benefit.

  Make an All-out Effort to Reach Full Retirement Age

In the case where you were downsized out of your career job at roughly age 62, you may be tempted to hang up your spikes and just retire from the workforce and initiate your social security withdrawals – stop, get creative and think of alternatives.

Again, you have the most stable institution in the world ready to pay you for the rest of your life, try your best to bump that up. Consider taking on “any job” to make ends meet for the 2-4 years it will take to reach full retirement age, even if it means becoming a Wal-Mart greeter.

  It pays to Take Social Security Payments Even Later than Full Retirement Age

In the year 2000 the Social Security Administration allowed for the delay in taking social security benefits in exchange for a higher monthly payout. It increases anywhere from 6.5% to 8% per year and then caps off when you turn 70.

Let’s say at age 66 you’re doing O.K. financially and can meet all your living expenses by other means, you should consider delaying receiving payments so that you get an even higher monthly payment.  The Social Security Administration will increase the payout by a certain percentage based on your age according to the below table.

So, in our example if you’re a boomer and you’re scheduled to receive $2,000 per month in payments at full retirement at age 66, for each year you delay, you will receive 8% more money in your pocket. It looks like the below:

So, if you can hang in there until age 70, you will enjoy an additional $721 per month, sweet.

  When are you going to die? Who the hell knows

It’s too bad we all know our birth date, but none of us can project our death date. If you start taking social security payments at age 70 and suddenly drop dead of a brain aneurysm at age 71, the government wins, and you only get a 1 year payout (again, your spouse may enjoy the benefit for many years to come).

The above chart shows a comparison of 3 scenarios of beginning social security withdrawals.  The Green line represents what a standard payout of $2,000 a month would look like at full retirement age of 66.

The green line represents starting the payout at age 62 but starting with a lower payout of $1,500 per month.

The red line represents a starting payout at age 70 with a monthly payout of $2,721.

At age 70 the green line full retirement age cumulative payout of roughly $288,00 equals that of the blue line age 62 cumulative payout and then the line crosses to be greater for the rest of your life.

At age 81, the red line retirement payments began at age 70 crosses the line of both the full retirement age green line and the blue line of those taken at age 62 and will remain greater going forward.

In other words at about age 81 you would have maximized you possible take-out value from Uncle Sam. Not an outlandish possibility.

 Take Health into Consideration When Choosing When to Retire

Even Las Vegas bookies can’t predict just when you’re going to die, but there are correlates. Perhaps you have severe chronic conditions related to heart disease or diabetes. Perhaps longevity just didn’t run in your family. These are very strong facts to consider when deciding not to shoot for a 70-year-old retirement, but at the least shoot for age 66.

 The higher the beginning rate, the higher future COLA

The bane of senior citizens on fixed income is inflation. Inflation silently erodes purchasing power. Knowing this, the government instituted a “Cost of Living Allowance” or COLA. COLAs were first paid in 1975 as a result of a 1972 law.

Prior to 1972, COLA benefits were increased irregularly by special acts of Congress. Today it is based on the consumer price index (CPI).

For example the COLA increase in 2021 is 1.25%.

Another reason to max out your retirement is that each year you’ll receive a higher bogey. Right now inflation is under control but later on in your retirement it can flare up and the more protection you have the better.

The Decline in Pensions

Pensions are rapidly taking place aside museums with buggy whips. Oh they’ll be around for a while in the public sector for teachers, firemen, police and state workers especially. But in the private sector – sayonara!

Private sector pensions gained traction during the boom decades that followed World War II. Large corporate employers took a paternal approach to their workers and offered pensions as part of their talent recruitment and retention efforts.

And it worked. It was not uncommon for workers to spend their entire careers at the same company back then. You may remember your grandfather working at a single company his entire life and then retired with a pension.

With the demise of pensions that onus of financial independence in retirement rests solely on the individual. With aggressive savings and investing in your IRAs and 401(k)s, and with your new found knowledge of maxing out your social security payments, you’re on your way to a world class retirement.

Don’t Mess up the End Game

Congratulations, you worked hard your entire life and contributed to the social security fund, don’t mess up that all that hard work by fumbling at the end. Your task now is to maximize your take-out value and that will require a little bit of creativity and a lot of disciplined. But, one day beginning at age 66 or 70 you will have a larger deposit to your account for the rest of your days – what a security blanket.

O.K., you’re over 65 years of age and your mortality is staring you in the face. You’ve had good health habits during your life, and heaven known you’ve also

had poor ones. But, is there anything you can do at this late stage in life to extend your healthspan and hopefully your lifespan. The answer is a resounding “yes”, and it it’s called fasting.

Fasting won’t cost you a cent, if fact, you’ll save on your food bill, it just takes a little discipline and adherence to a program. If you can visualize the goodness you’re doing to your body while fasting, hopefully it will encourage you to stick with the program.

Fasting for Better Health

Fasting is definitely in vogue these days. Many people, of all ages, practice it primarily to lose weight but there is a far greater reason for regular fasting sessions namely to reduce “Inflammaging” and to live a longer and healthier life.

Inflammaging is a condition of chronic inflammation which speeds up the normal aging process and all the related age related diseases. If we can control the contributors to inflammaging we can extend lifespan and healthspan.

There are many contributors to inflammaging: obesity, smoking, over-nutrition, leaky gut, changes in microbiota. But the key one we want to deal with is “cellular senescence”.

Senescent cells are oftentimes referred to as “zombie” cells since they’re no longer vibrantly alive and functioning, nor are they dead. If they were dead the normal course of apoptosis would clean them out. But, in that halfway state they cause a cascade of issues.

Senescent cells affect their immediate microenvironment (the cells around them) via the production of inflammatory mediators. Their presence causes neighboring healthy cells to give off an inflammatory response. The trend line can go in a couple of directions: the body can rid itself of these nasty zombie cells or failing to do that, more and more cells become senescent and increase the inflammation. This results in rapid aging and reduced healthspan.

Autophagy

Luckily, there’s a very natural way to induce the body to remove these insidious senescent cells – that is to enhance “autophagy”.

Think of autophagy as cleaning house. It rids your body of accumulated junk and puts it in the recycle bin for reuse. The word “autophagy” derives from the Greek auto (self) and phagein (to eat). So the word literally means to eat oneself. Essentially, this is the body’s mechanism of getting rid of all the broken down cell parts and creating new ones.

Fasting is a key activator of autophagy. When we stop eating the body no longer secrets insulin and its counterpart, “glucagon” takes its place. This increase in glucagon is what stimulates the process of autophagy.

Although autophagy to a small degree is omnipresent in our cells, it is heightened during periods of fasting. Most importantly during autophagy, cells destroy senescent cells, viruses and bacteria and get rid of damaged structures. It’s a process that is critical for cell health, renewal, and survival. And, healthy cells extend overall health and longevity.

Intermittent Fasting vs Prolonged Fasting

A lot of the popular approaches to fasting is the restricted time eating regiment. That is, you don’t necessarily eat any less, but you only eat during a certain window, perhaps limited to 8 hours or less.

For example, upon awakening you do not immediately eat breakfast, but delay that first meal until 11:00 am. Then, your last meal would be completed at 7:00 pm. That’s an 8 hour window, thus you would have effectively fasted for 16 hours.

But to really clear out those senescent cells, the state of autophagy should be longer. Ideally 3-4 days entirely without food, just water. But you would only have to do this a few times a year depending upon your physical state.  Most people should shoot for a fast every 2 months.

Ancient Starvation Was a Survival Mechanism

So, why do we have to fast to trigger heightened state of autophagy?  Why doesn’t the body just do it on its own?

Scientists feel it dates back to our early hunter-gatherer days. The body can be primarily in one of two modes: (a) cell reproduction and growth, or (b) survival. The survival mode is the one that fosters resistance to disease and induces

longevity.

For our ancestors during periods when food was plentiful their cells were programmed to flourish and grow. The body sensed a goodly supply of glucose and amino acids and went forth and multiplied.

But when the spigot was shut off and the body now had a scarcity of glucose and amino acids, it shifted gears from growth to survival. In survival mode it knew there was no food coming in and it had to tune the body up so that it could find or catch its next meal.

This is what we evolved into.

But there’s a modern day monkey wrench in the system. Today food is plentiful all the time and we hardly go for without eating for prolonged hours, let alone for an entire day.  So our housekeeping system never gets turned on. And all that cellular debris just builds up and causes havoc such as inflammaging.

The Longevity Bonus

For decades, scientists have known that calorie restriction extends life. There have been number studies on yeast, worms, and mice. When these lifeforms were starved, they actually lived longer.

Although there are no clinical studies, it is believed that the same effect happens to humans. It goes beyond the cell cleansing, removing pathogens and starving cancer cells to actually adding years to life.

But the really good news is that scientists believe that not only will you extend your lifespan but you’ll also extend your “healthspan”. Healthspan are those additional vibrant, disease-free years of life. After all who wants to live longer if they’re debilitated?

The Prescription

The prescription for a full-body tune-up is a 3-4 day, water only fast every 2 months or so.

Is there anything that I can eat or drink during fasting you may ask?  No, you shouldn’t eat or drink anything that has calories. The whole mission is to deplete your system of blood sugar and allow your insulin level to drop and stay there.  We do recommend staying fully hydrated by drinking water at regular intervals. If you need a caffeine fix, drink either black coffee or green tea (obviously with no milk or sugar).

Feeling Hungry is not Cumulative

Most people feel that because they have experienced hunger pains in the past when they skipped a meal that the huger feeling will grow and grow until it becomes totally unbearable. Rest assured that will not happen.

Ghrelin is the hunger hormone that makes you feel hungry. Its release is not cumulative but is actually cyclical. It rises during normal meal times, then drops.

What will happen is that you will feel hungry right around your normal meal times, then it will subside until the next meal time, in a cyclical nature. So, when you feel hungry drink a glass of water, just that oral exercise will make you feel somewhat satiated.

The Goodness to your Body During Fasting on a day by day Basis

Now that we’ve convinced you to take up fasting, here is a play by play of what

happens to your body with each succeeding day. Visualize the goodness you’re doing to your body, and this will get you to commit to finish

Day 1 — Upon Awakening

Nothing unusual happening here. This has been your pattern perhaps your entire life. Your body is naturally assuming you’re going have breakfast right on schedule. But wait, all you have is black coffee and water from there on.

During the first day you’re still in an anabolic growth phase. Your body is using up the energy of last night’s meal to power your current activity and a bias toward cellular and tissue growth.

The glucose remaining in your bloodstream triggers your pancreas to produce the hormone insulin. The insulin allows your body to use the glucose for immediate energy and to store any unneeded glucose as fat in your adipose tissue.

Day 1 — Afternoon

We skipped breakfast and lunch and our body has burned off the glucose in our bloodstream we’re now powering off our body’s stored “glycogen”. Glycogen is fuel that is stored in our muscles for quick energy. It’s also stored in our liver glucose for use throughout the body, particularly the central nervous system.

Approximately 4 grams of glucose are present in the blood at all times; during fasting, blood glucose is maintained constant at this level by drawing down these glycogen stores in the liver and muscle.

Day 1 — Evening

Great job, you skipped supper and perhaps in addition to water, you had a cup of green tea (it actually helps to suppress Ghrelin, the hunger hormone, so drink up).

The body now enters that desired state of “ketosis”, slowly at first but it builds up during the remainder of the fast. With diminishing glucose and glycogen, the body begins to access body fat and breaks it down into usable fatty acids.

Fatty acids will feed most of the body, but the brain cannot feed on fatty acids. So it converts fatty acids to special ketone bodies in the liver primarily to feed the brain.

Two specific ketone bodies B-Hydroxybutyrate and Acetoacitate have been shown to benefit the brain by reducing neuro-inflammation and increasing BDNF.

Day 2 — Morning

Congratulations, you’re doing great, you skipped breakfast and perhaps had a cup of black coffee. You’re now entering that beneficial state of “autophagy” in earnest.

Autophagy is triggered by a reduction in a growth regulator enzyme called MTOR, and this process is basically a spring cleaning for your cells. It gets rid of any senescent, dead or damaged cellular material, which can otherwise contribute to aging, cancer, and chronic disease.

The production of another chemical, AMP-activated protein kinase (AMPK), is also triggered at this point. This really increases the amount of autophagy happening all around your body.

Day 2 Evening

By now your brain is receiving a boost from an increase in production of brain-derived nootropic factor (BDNF).

BDNF supports the growth of brain neurons and enhances neuroplasticity. Not only is it correlated with improvements in long-term memory, coordination, and learning, but it’s also thought to be key in reducing the risk of developing Alzheimer’s disease in later life. Good stuff!

Day 3 – the Home Stretch

Keep going, you’re now firing on all 8. You’re burning fat, creating beneficial ketone bodies, developing BDNF, and autophagy is doing a complete makeover of all your cells and using them for spare parts for new healthy cells.

The divine intelligence of your body now starts generating more stem cells.   The circulating stem cells in your body will go up as much as fivefold from .2% to 1%.

The damaged cells throughout the body that were killed off by autophagy are now being replaced by fresh stem cells and the rebuilding can begin.

Day 4 — Breaking Fast

Stop and declare victory, you did it.

Lots of good things happen during the initial refeeding upon ending a fast.  This will start the process replacing damaged cells with fresh new ones that are healthy.

You lost between 1/2 and a full pound of body fat which will not return when you start eating again.  Plus that fat loss tends to be from abdominal fat. Having large amounts of abdominal fat (which is also visceral fat) increases your risk of cardiovascular disease and certain cancers.

Although you lost some muscle during fasting, it is quickly rebuilt during refeeding. Relative lean body mass actually goes up.

Congratulations, you are now a lot healthier, now put it on your calendar to repeat in 2 months. .

Life just isn’t fair, is it? We know our birth date, just look at your driver’s license, but we don’t know our expiration date, that is, our last day on earth. It would be so much easier when we left the hospital as a baby that our wristband said: “expiration date is July 22, 2029.

Boy that would make life’s planning so much easier and make financial spending forecasts even easier.  But alas we’re all facing a roulette wheel, unknowingly we could die tomorrow or 50 years from now and that’s why there is a multi-trillion business called life insurance.

But, along with our remaining life expectancy,  the amount of life insurance we need will vary in accordance with our age, wealth and status of dependents.

Life’s Natural Progression

There are way too many variables to discuss every permutation. But it’s safe to say that in your early twenties, you can’t even spell “life insurance”, the world is all about you. O.K. your employer may give you a policy as a bennie, so you’ll name your parents as your beneficiaries. If and when you get married, you’ll shift it to your spouse, otherwise not a lot of mental energy is wasted thinking about life insurance.

 Baby Changes Everything

A cusp in life happens with the birth of your first born. Suddenly, you’re responsible for a life. “That’s O.K.”, you say, “I’ll straighten out my act, do good at work, not take chances, maybe give up bungee jumping.”

That’s all well and good provided you live until they’re emancipated, but what if you unexpectedly get hit by the proverbial beer truck?  Two small kids that the surviving spouse has to raise alone, can he/she work and still raise the kids properly? Finance their education? Finance their special needs?

When you lie awake one night thinking about that eventuality, that’s when you start doing the math: 2 kids, 4 years of college each, possible orthodontists, sports, ballet lessons, etc., etc. Oh, and we bought that McMansion and there’s a heavy mortgage.

At this early life stage, your net worth is only 4 digits.

That meager policy you currently have through your employer won’t last 5 years after you’re gone. Good news, you’re still young and your company’s plan allows you to add more than enough coverage but on your nickel.

Income and Wealth Producing Years

Hopefully in your thirties and forties your career is moving along swimmingly, you’re getting promotions and periodic raises. The kids are growing up, your salary has grown, you’ve never missed a mortgage payment and you met the max for 401(k) matching by your employer. Your wealth is growing, life is good.

You’re healthy and that group life insurance policy at your age is still affordable.

Barring any calamities in detrimental health or job loss you’re in a period of wealth accumulation between growing retirement savings and home equity.

The Kids are Alright

One day you’ll just came back from the college graduation of your youngest, she landed a great job in corporate America. Both your kids are now grown, gainfully employed and out of the nest. Your child rearing costs just plummeted.

With your spouse also now working full time, the earnings after-burners are on. You’re rapidly building assets and wealth.

If you had a term life insurance policy for your children’s education trust fund, you can now allow that to lapse.  You now just have to have enough insurance coverage for your spouse to survive and to bury you.

Retirement Changes Everything

Another cusp in life occurs at retirement. Some magical date when you’ve reached nirvana. A couple of financial factors occur on that day.

• Job salary has come to a hard stop.
• Job bennies like employer supplied life insurance stops.
• 401(k) contributions stop – cash is no longer going into your retirement fund.

In essence there’s a seismic shift in income sources. Earnings from work are gone to be replaced by:

• Social security
• Retirement savings withdrawals

We’re purposely not including pensions in this example since, other than for government workers, pensions are going out with the buggy whip.

In parallel, your expenses should be dramatically reduced:

• • Your home mortgage is paid off and the entire home equity you built up is all yours.
  • Those student loans you co-signed are paid off.
  • Child rearing costs are a thing of the past.

Hmm, expenses are down and passive income is up, you’re now living in a state of eudaimonic bliss. All your worries are over, right? Well, not quite.

What do you Want to Happen after you’re Dead?

There is a stoic practice called “premeditatio malorum” which in a nutshell is thinking about horrible things that could occur before they actually do. It’s an exercise that prepares you in advance for any number of life’s outcomes.

When considering whether you need life insurance in your seventies and eighties, you need to ponder a couple of outcomes.

One is that you and your spouse have been enjoying spending down your investment savings on world travel and those 3-month winter escapes to the Sunbelt. The balance is dwindling.

What if you drop dead tomorrow and your spouse goes on to live another 20 years? Is there enough money for him/her to live on?  What about not just “live” but maintain the same “standard of living”?  That may be a horse of a different color.

Should your monthly social security benefit be larger than your surviving spouse’s, then, due to an allowed100% survivor’s benefit after the age of retirement, they will now receive it. But the smaller one does drop off and there’s a net loss of steady income to the household.  The gap has to be made up via retirement savings withdrawals. Will there be enough.

Self-Insure in Your Later Years?

In the case where it’s just you and your spouse, no other dependents, the house if fully paid for and there is no debt, you have social security and your retirement account is in seven figures. It means you don’t need to take out life insurance at this late stage in life. But maybe you want to.

In your early seventies you can get a 10-year $100K term policy for around $120 per month. The total outlay will be $120 /month x 12 = $1,440. a year. Seems like a worthy investment.

This of course is dependent on you passing a medical exam.  You may, or may not, qualify depending upon any pre-existing conditions you may have and, in the later years, there are many:  high cholesterol, high blood pressure, Type 2 diabetes are the common conditions.

Assuming you qualify, that extra insurance money can go into end of life costs which can be short or prolonged. It’s best to plan for the worst scenario.

Don’t Outlive your Money in Retirement

The Unknowns

The hardest part of savings withdrawal budgeting is dealing with the unknowns. Can the stock market crash in a 2008 style? Will we have a calamity to our house that’s not covered by insurance? Our grandchild contracts a rare disease and needs $500,000 for an experimental treatment not covered by medical insurance, etc.

Then there are “unknown unknowns”, risks that we’ve never thought about, nobody has because they never occurred. How about a revolution where you lose everything? It’s a low probability but with a cataclysmic effect – labeled a “black swan”.

End of Life Costs to Consider

“The best you can hope for is to die in your sleep”

— Kenny Rogers in “The Gambler”

In addition to knowing our expiration date, wouldn’t it be great to die quickly. No drawn out affair, no hospitals, no nursing homes, and no hospice, just bam, drop dead. Other than a burial, that is the least strain on retirement finances.

Are you concerned that if you die, and your spouse contracts dementia, will there be enough money for his/her long term care?

Hospice terms vary but the median is about 24 days.  Medicare will pay for medical services but not occupancy.  The average room and board fee is around $320 a day that you’ll need above what Medicare will pay. Therefore a 90 day stay will most likely cost in excess of $30,000.

Adding it all up to fund a terminal illness, hospice, burial, and estate settlement, you should have a minimum of $60,000 remaining in your savings when you check out. Your spouse will need the same.

Alzheimer’s Makes it Worse

At age 85 about 50% of the population has Alzheimer’s. Medicare will only pay for up to 100 days of skilled nursing home care under limited circumstances. However, custodial long-term nursing home care is not covered. And the national average cost for nursing home care is about $86,000 a year. .

The average life expectancy after diagnosis of Alzheimer’s is 8-10 years.  If you budget for 6 years, it’ll cost $516,000 to get to end of life.  And, Medicare’s 100 days of coverage won’t amount to a row of beans.

The Reverse Mortgage Safety Net

If the above worst case scenario plays out. Your spouse and family are sitting

on a huge asset – your house.  Normally we don’t recommend a reverse mortgage to fund lifestyle. But as you can see if the above unanticipated event occurs, it’s a card that can be played.

Quick, what’s your biggest worry about getting old?

1. Outliving your retirement money.
2. Moving into a retirement home.
3. Losing your independence.
4. Contracting Alzheimer’s.

If you’re like most people, you dread contracting Alzheimer’s the most. Who wants to lose their mental faculties? Who wants their diaper changed by their spouse, partner, friend, child, or total stranger? There’s no way around it, it totally sucks.

Dementia has an Ugly Trend line

The good news is we’re all living longer. The bad news is we’re all living longer.  It’s only bad because it means more of us will enter the high probability years of Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s. Age is the biggest risk factor for dementia. People entering their mid-eighties have a 50% chance of contracting dementia, that’s a flip of a coin.

It is estimated by the National Institute of Health that by the year 2050 cases of Alzheimer’s will triple from the today’s 5 million cases to 15 million…pretty sobering.

How Alzheimer’s Affects the Brain

We have all these cognitive functions: thinking, remembering, analyzing, etc. To accomplish all this in the brain, signals are transmitted across synapses. The average brain has over 100 trillion synapses. And it’s primarily within these synapses is where Alzheimer’s happens.

There’s a small peptide (a compound consisting of two or more amino acids) called amyloid-B which start to build up between synapses. The amyloid gums up the works and interferes with the signaling. However, they’re usually cleared away and metabolized by microglia, natural cells resident in the brain and spinal cord which clears away unwanted cells.

Of course when we’re young, the machinery works just fine. But as we age we can hit a tipping point. That’s when too much amyloid-B builds up and the microglia gets overwhelmed and can’t keep up with the cleaning process.

Worse, it’s possible for the microglia to also go amuck could actually be eating away at the synapses themselves. Instead of being the savior, it becomes part of the problem.

There can also be a parallel problem caused by tau in the brain.  Tau’s normal role is to stabilize internal microtubule transport systems to all parts of the neuron. Sometimes as we age, tau is caused to separate from the microtubules causing them to fall apart. Then strands of tau combine to form tangles which disable the transport system and destroys the cell. Neurons then disconnect from each other and eventually die. This is what causes memory loss. The brain actually shrinks and loses function.

No cure for Alzheimer’s.

As this is written, there is no cure for Alzheimer’s and there’s nothing imminent in the drug pipeline. So, don’t bank on a cure should you be misfortunate enough to contract it, but don’t despair, there are proactive steps you can take beginning today to delay Alzheimer’s onset.

The strategy to Alzheimer’s prevention is to keep that wretched amyloid plaque from reaching that previously mentioned tipping point. So, what’s in your control? Develop good habits for brain health now, it’s never too late.

Another avenue is to stimulate brain growth to replace neuron loss. Throughout our lives we gain new neurons and synapses through the process of “neurogenesis” which declines with age. However, older folks can take positive steps to promote neurogenesis as well as decrease amyloid plaque. We’ll discuss 4 strategies for doing such:

1. Exercise
2. Fasting
3. Intellectual Stimulation
4. Nutrition

Exercise for Brain Health

Brain loves oxygen so anything you can do to promote good oxygen flow will foster good brain health. The best way is exercise.

In addition to all the other positive attributes exercise has on your body, there are several ways it helps the brain. It reduces inflammation, and improves neurogenesis (the growth of new brain cells) in the hippocampus. Most compelling evidence is that physical exercise will upregulate brain growth factors.  It will secrete BDNF (Brain-Derived Neurotrophic Factor) that will actually grow your brain. Some scientists refer to BDNF as “miracle grow for the brain”

Exercise also stimulates neurons to respond adaptively by increasing the number of mitochondria. Mitochondria are organelles within all most of our cells that generate the energy for the cell.  In the brain, that energy allows more neurons to develop which increases learning and memory.

From studies at UC San Diego, we learn that moderate exercise even in later life reduce risk of cognitive decline. Exercise essentially results in 20% reduction in risk of cognitive impairment.  Higher levels of cardiovascular fitness result in even less age related loss in frontal, parietal and temporal lobes. So, crank it up.

But even just walking has been shown to help. Walking is most popular activity with older seniors. Walking increase functional connectivity in brain.  Walking has been measured by UCSD to increases average hippocampal volumes in women by 0.2% to 1.4%. Since we lose 1% to 2% per year after the age of 65, it’s a good offset.  Never too late to begin – walk at least 4 hours/week.

However, the more you can crank up your aerobic activity, the better. Remember we’re trying to get oxygen to the brain and to trigger an adaptive response by the mitochondria.

Adding strength training to your routine will also improve brain health. Strength training has been shown to improve performance on working memory and executive functioning. There is added benefit to doing both aerobics and strength training.

Supplement Exercise with Everyday Movement

It’s been shown that general daily activity promotes better cognition. Even if you remove purposeful aerobic exercise, just physical movement is also beneficial. So get out there and garden, rake leaves, clean house, walk up stairs, whatever, and just move. You’ll be smarter for it.

Fasting for Brain Health

We’ll talk about beneficial nutrition for brain health later, but paradoxically non-eating is also beneficial for brain health. Fasting reduces inflammation and oxidative stress.

With every meal you eat, energy is stored in the liver and muscles as glycogen.  Glycogen is quickly converted to glucose as the body requires it. The glucose triggers insulin to allow cells to absorb it.

The brain is a glucose hog, pound per pound it the greatest user of glucose. As we eat 3 meals a day the brain is never at a want for glucose, consequently it’s never challenged to stimulate growth, times are good.

But, should that steady flow of glucose to the brain be interrupted, it will trigger an adaptive response where the brain is stimulated into neurogenesis. This can be achieved through regular fasting.

When you fast, the glycogen stores are tapped into first until they’re all depleted. Then the body switches to burning body fat to keep feeding the brain, but now instead of glucose, through a conversion process feeding the brain beneficial ketone bodies.

This process challenges the brain and it responds with “adaptive stress response pathways” to help it cope with stress and resist disease. This is a product of thousands of years of evolution for us to survive during periods of famine.

As with exercise, fasting stimulate the production of neurotrophic factors such as BDNF and FGF to promote the growth of new axons and dendrites, the formation and strengthening of synapses and the production of new neurons from stem cells. Additionally it increases the number of beneficial mitochondria in your nerve cells.

More info on fasting for brain health:

Starving for Brain Health

By the way, being overweight is a higher risk factor for Alzheimer’s Fasting will also help to keep your weight under control so you get a double benefit.

Intellectual Stimulation for Brain Health.

Whenever we stimulate the brain through intellectual challenges, we are creating and strengthening neural connections. When be build enough of these be create what’s called a “cognitive reserve”.

Having a cognitive reserve is having an abundance of neural connections.   Even though you lose many connections, say through aging cognitive decline, you will have several more in reserve to still carry on. This can give you bonus years of mental aptitude even with dementia.

Cognitive reserves are built up by intellectual stimulation, in particular by learning new things that will pave new neural networks.

It’s not about merely doing crossword puzzles or Sudoku, those merely sharpen a skill you’ve already learned, it needs to be rich across all senses and emotions. The gold standard would be to learn a new language and travel to that country and practice using it.

Lifelong learning protects the brain. So, make a commitment to learn, educate, and train and it will keep you sharp.

Nutrition for Brain Health

Finally there are certain foods you can eat that will also promote better brain health.

Eating for a healthy microbiome will get you there as well, read more:

You’re Really Not Healthy Unless You Also Have a Healthy Gut — Here’s How

Assuming you’re eating a balanced diet anyway here are some menu tweaks for better brain health.

  Do:

• Eat flavonoids. Inflammation and oxidative stress play a role in the pathology

  

  of Parkinson’s disease and Alzheimer’s. Various properties of flavonoids, including their role in protecting vascular health have beneficial effects on the brain,

• Eat omega 3 fats. These are the beneficial fats in fish and nuts since your brain is also 70% fat.
• Eat blueberries. Blueberries are a powerful antioxidant for overall good health, a 2016 study found that blueberries can treat patients who already show signs of mental impairment.
• Eat foods high in folic acid like leafy green vegetables, they’re shown to reduce inflammation which aids in brain health.
• Add curcumin to your diet. Found in turmeric, it correlates to better brain health.
• Drink pomegranate juice. Clinical trials have shown increased cognition by subjects taking regular doses of pomegranate juice over those taking a placebo.
• Ginkgo Biloba supplementation will help increase blood flow to the brain.
• Drink green tea; the combined influence of both caffeine and l-theanine have been shown to improve cognition.

In contrast there are food sources you should shun for better brain health.

Don’t consume:

• Refined sugars
• Saturated Fats
• Processed Foods
• Too much alcohol – A little red wine has resveratrol which neutralizes the negative effects somewhat.
• Too much caffeine – A little green tea is beneficial

Brain Health Bonus Points:

In addition to the 4 strategies for promotion better brain health and staving off

Alzheimer’s, here are some additional steps for a healthier brain:

• Sleep is a “power cleanse” for the brain. Sleep deprivation increases amyloid-B, so get plenty of sleep.
• Treat depression. Patients with depression have lower levels of neurogenesis.

Read about self-help for depression:

Natural Ways to Combat Depression

• Manage stress. Chronic stress can lead to depression.
• Meditation – a great way to manage stress.
• Walk with friends. If you walk for exercise, then walk with a friend and talk openly about feelings, you get a double whammy in brain health.
• Treat hypertension and cholesterol, they both have negative effects on brain health.
• Use your fitness watch and get your 10,000 steps in each and every day. Keep moving.
• Address heart disease early – 80% of Alzheimer’s patients have heart disease.

Employing these four strategies plus all the bonus points may not stop you from forgetting where you put your keys, but it will stop you from unknowingly placing them in the refrigerator.

O.K. it’s late June here in the Northeast U.S. and we older folks have been sequestered since February when the coronavirus stuff hit the fan.

It’s really impacted peoples’ retirements in ways they never thought of before. What will now become of the ‘golden years’? Here are a few of our thoughts…

The Unknown Unknowns

The biggest concern is that we live in a country that prizes its liberties. ‘Hell no, we won’t wear a mask’.  But there’s a massive tradeoff in exercising those liberties and public safety to contain a deadly virus.

On the opposite spectrum, China with far less liberty was able to lock down the entire country and contain the virus. This is also extreme, the solution lies somewhere in the middle.

Those U.S. states who faced the brutal reality and shut everything down in a hurry are faring a lot better than those states who were willing to allow business as usual (and let the body count rise).

It seems everyone believes we’ll have an effective vaccine within a year. Do we have our ‘happy ears’ on?  In the past it’s taken multiple years, HIV been around since the early eighties and there’s still no vaccine. Hopefully it could be possible that advanced biotech and relaxing some regulations could allow us to fast track an early cure and/or vaccine. It remains to be seen.

As Winston Churchill would advise, we all have to stay positive and “keep buggering on”.

Nest Egg Risk

What will be the economic risks to your retirement nest egg?

Astonishingly the S&P 500 is only off 10% of its December 2019 all-time high.  In fact the NASDAQ is at an all-time high.  What is Wall Street thinking? A near term viable vaccine and a return to the old normal seems to be baked into the cake.

But the government has printed an awful lot of money. Unlike FDR’s new deal where he printed money to pay people but he put them to work to build dams and bridges. Today we’re printing money and paying people to stay home and do nothing.  We just don’t know the consequences of that.  It’s new ground.

The fact remains there’s a boatload of unemployment out there. In some cases those jobs are lost forever. Think mom & pop retail and local restaurants. The unemployment checks are sucking the states dry. There could be a federal bailout of some states – thus printing more money.

What if the stock market Tanks?

Retired people without a government pension and financing their retirement from social security and their IRA could be in a perilous position. Historically it has taken on average 4 years after a calamitous event like the years 2000 and 2008 for the market to resume its previous valuation. To a seventy-year-old, that cuts into precious few years left on earth.

Hopefully, their savings are properly allocated.

See:

Don’t Outlive your money in Retirement

Health Risks for Older Folks

The coronavirus is the biggest threat to all persons over the age of 65.  80% of all deaths from Covid-19 are within this group. So, naturally, it’s foremost on their minds.

It appears it would be best to stay away from medical facilities for non-urgent procedures.

What about elective medical procedures? Fuhgeddaboudit.

What about colonoscopy? Fuhgeddaboudit.

What about dental cleanings? Fuhgeddaboudit

Your home and yard are the safest places from coronavirus provided you didn’t hold a big drinking bash at your house recently. But it’s ironic that this same yard that is safe from coronavirus, may have other threats like Lyme disease, or worse, EEE. In Connecticut in 2019, there were 4 reported cases of Eastern Equine Encephalitis, not bad, but of those 4, three died, needs to be taken very seriously – pass the bug spray.

Travel

Since the deregulation of the airline industry way back in 1978, the cost to fly kept plummeting to where everyone was traveling by air in planes with full loads.

So, if you were thinking about a trip to Europe this summer, better think agai

n. As of this writing, Europe doesn’t even want us because the U.S. is coronavirus hot spot.

Air travel will most likely be sharply curtailed. It’s not just the plane ride, it’s also the car rental on the other side and the hotel room or Airbnb. A lot of risk of virus exposure.

Staycations may take precedent at least in the short run. There will be a lot of visitations to our beautiful national and state parks.  May be time to invest in a Winnebago and put your frequent flier miles on hold.

Visiting the Family

We love our adult children and our grandchildren. But, seniors are still high risk population and young grandchildren are natural carriers of every cold or virus running around. Sorry, we can no longer babysit.

Visitations will have to be either facetime, zooming, or summer outdoor gatherings on the back lawn with lots of social distancing. No kissing and hugging please.

Rethink Assisted Living

Were you planning one day to move into a senior community?

Regardless of when we finally develop a vaccine against coronavirus, the experiment of confining the elderly into retirement community has to be revisited.

Does it really make sense to place that many high risk individuals within close proximity of one another?  The death rate in these facilities by coronavirus has been staggering.

There needs to be an emphasis one of two trends: (a) aging in place or (b) living with extended families.

As to aging in place, we’ve amassed a wealth of knowledge as to how the

elderly can still function at home, even alone. With home deliveries, prescriptions by mail, visiting nurses, and best of all, new technologies to manage a home with a cell phone, we can push out the timeline for living independently at home.

In situations where consistent monitoring is required, we can revert back to a well-appointed in-law apartment in the basement, attic, over the garage, or wherever. The money that would be spent on assisted living can be spent refurbishing one of the adult children’s homes. Something to think about.

New Fitness

There will have to be shift in exercise modalities.

We know the virus loves a bunch of people in close quarters indoors. Add to that a high humidity of sweat and it’s ripe for transmission.

In deference to gyms and health clubs, they served their purpose in getting a lot of older people off the couch and moving. But it’s questionable if that model of fitness has a future. Several gym chains have already gone out of business.

Witness the surge in Peloton, a fun high-tech way to get an intense cardio workout in the safety of your own home. Now there is also Mirror, and soon more innovative home workout technologies will appear in this time of need.

There are a zillion YouTube videos on how to best exercise at home. Dig out those dumbbells and kettlebells you promised you would someday use and put them to good use.  Yoga with Adrian on YouTube has scores of yoga workouts for every level.

See:

Inflection Points in Fitness

Are the kids Alright?

Our biggest worry is about the financial condition of our adult children. Will they remain gainfully employed? Are they in a job like restaurant service that may never bounce back? If they go totally broke they may have to move in with us, do we have the room for all those grandkids?

Then, if they are employed what about their retirement?  The golden ticket has always been that beautiful employer match of 401(k)’s, and now there is talk by many corporations to suspend such. I guess they’ll just have to cut back on their lifestyle to assure they’re making sufficient deposits for the future.

Future Outlook

Can Homo Sapiens save themselves? Can they do what it takes to defeat something that’s so small it’s invisible.

It’s amazing, the boomer generation was the one that was instructed by their elementary teachers to crawl under their desks in the event of a nuclear attack. Why did we bother going to school that week in October of 1962, we were all going to be blown up by missiles from Cuba.

But alas, we dodged annihilation by nuclear bomb, but can we defeat this microscopic contagion? Can we do what it takes to stop the spread? What if it mutates faster than we can create a credible vaccine?

Our species survived 1918, it remains to be see if we can outlive this one. Be smart, stay safe and keep buggering on.

People who are at highest risk of vitamin D deficiency — those with underlying chronic disease, overweight, and older age — are also the same people at highest risk of dying from Covid-19.

But, if you heard taking megadoses vitamin D can prevent Covid-19, forgetaboutit? It can’t. But intelligent vitamin D intake can improve your overall health, mitigate other morbidities and improve your overall immunity, so, God forbid, you do catch Covid-19, your recovery process could have a far better outcome.

It’s late spring…

… and we survived a long winter time now to get out in the sun to improve our health, right?  Well, it all depends on your point of view. If your exposure to the ‘sun gives you skin cancer’ then, no. However, if you’re in it for natural vitamin D, then yes.  Who to believe?

And, as this article is posted, let’s exacerbate the issue with a coronavirus pandemic that’s sweeping the globe. It begs the question – to keep our personal immunity level up, should we get into the sun, or stay the hell out of it?

We love our dermatologists, they want nothing but the best for us and they view sunlight as evil, it is the cause of skin cancer. If they have their way, we would all be living in dark caves with zero chance of skin cancer.

However, there’s mounting evidence that sunshine is good for us and may prevent cancers, even skin cancer. What?

Swedish Study of Sunbathers

A Swedish study published in 2016 actually found that women sunbathers lived longer than those who avoided the sun. It found that among nearly 30,000 women in Sweden, who were each monitored for about 20 years, those who spent more time in the sun actually lived longer and had less heart disease and had fewer non-cancer deaths than those who reported less sun exposure.

Although the sunbathers did have an increased risk of skin cancer, their skin cancers had “better prognosis” than those non-sunbathers who were in the control group and also contracted skin cancer, seems counter intuitive.

Further, these sunbathing women had less morbidity and mortality by “all causes: than the control group. They also lived longer by up to 2 years. What’s going on here? What’s with the sun?

The result of the tests found correlation but not necessarily causation. The reason why more sun exposure might prolong life or prevent heart disease deaths could not be unequivocally concluded from this study.

The World Health Organization has compiled a number of other trend line studies. Some studies have shown a higher incident of mortality in winter than in summer. Also lower blood pressure in summer than in winter.

The assumption is that it’s because the sun’s ultraviolet light triggers chemical reactions in the skin that lead to the production of vitamin D. People up north just get less sun during winter. It’s therefore highly probably that vitamin D is responsible for thede health benefits.

Just what is vitamin D anyway?

Scientists know that vitamin D is highly necessary for proper gene expression. It’s a steroid hormone the affects the expression of a 900 – 1,000 different genes. You can’t stay healthy without it.

Therefore Vitamin D is considered “conditionally essential” — if you’re not exposed to the sun, you must get your vitamin D from other means.

Some researchers claim that vitamin D is technically not even a vitamin, its primary metabolic product, calcitriol, is a hormone

There are actually 5 forms of vitamin D: vitamins D1 – D5

Two major forms are:

D2: “ergocalciferol”

D3: “cholecalciferol”

Vitamin D2 is not produced by human body, it’s vitamin D3 that is manufactured by our skin and which gives the major health benefits.

Human skin converts sunshine to active vitamin D through a multistep process into a form your body can best use. The first transformation occurs in the liver. Here, your body converts vitamin D3 to a chemical known as 25-hydroxy vitamin D, also called calcidiol.

Then the kidneys conduct a 2^nd step converting 25-hydroxy vitamin D into 1,25 dihydroxyvitamin D (1,25 (OH)2D), known as calcitriol. This plays a crucial role in the maintenance of blood calcium and phosphorus levels and in normal skeletal mineralization.

Benefits of Vitamin D

It All Began with Rickets

We don’t hear of that insidious disease, rickets, anymore. But back in the 17^th century it affected a lot of children. But then an inverse relationship between sunshine and rickets was discovered. The more sun exposure, the less chance of children contracting rickets. Doctors deduced that it was the natural vitamin D that prevented rickets.

That is why milk became fortified with vitamin D.  According to the U.S. National Institutes of Health almost all of the U.S. milk supply is fortified with 400 IU of vitamin D per quart. Rickets today is under control in most countries with some form of vitamin D solution.

Protects from Osteoporosis

Most women are fully aware of the need to supplement with calcium to promote strong bone growth, but that’s only half the equation, they also need vitamin D to aid in the absorption of the calcium and thus stave off osteoporosis. We can can’t absorb calcium or phosphorous without vitamin D.

Reduced Cancer

In June of 2018 the National Institute of Health conducted a 5 year study and found that participants who were vitamin D deficient had a 31% higher chance of developing colorectal cancer than those with sufficient levels of vitamin D.

Reduced Heart Disease

Those with the lowest vitamin D levels have more than double the risk of dying from heart disease and other causes over an eight-year period compared to those with the highest vitamin D levels.

Reduced Depression

Fewer symptoms of depression may be reported after spending time in the sun. In particular, it regulates Tryptophan hydroxylase which is an enzyme involved in the synthesis of the neurotransmitter serotonin, the “feel good” hormone which may explain why many people are happy on sunny days.  Sunlight can boost mood and promote feelings of calm. Even without depression, spending time in the sunshine will likely boost mood.

Strengthens the Immune System

But vitamin D does much more than protect bone and muscle development. It helps brain nerve cells carry messages, and helps the immune system fight off invading bacteria and viruses.

Studies have shown that vitamin D deficiency impairs the immune system, and some older studies found that vitamin D supplements may reduce the risk of respiratory virus infections and immune system overreaction.

Anti-aging Affects

Telomeres are the end caps of chromosomes. Every time cells divide telomeres shorten slightly, in our later years that’s a lot of cell divisions. Telomere length is a biomarker for aging. The anti-inflammatory properties of Vitamin D mitigate the shortening of telomeres.  The longer the telomere, the longer the life expectancy.

Unfortunately, aging affects the natural vitamin D production in skin. 75% less vitamin D is produced by the skin of a 70-year-old vs a 20-year-old. Something to keep in mind if you want to keep those telomeres at a healthy length.

Low vitamin D can lead to higher incidences of:

• Infections and cancers
• Rheumatoid arthritis
• Diabetes
• Multiple sclerosis
• Hypertension
• Heart disease

Most Americans are low in vitamin D

In northern latitudes, Americans are not exposed to enough sunshine to manufacture enough vitamin D for half the year. We’re stuck indoors and wear heavy clothes when we do go outside.

For those of you above latitude 32° north or higher take heed (around Atlanta, Georgia and northward), you will not get enough sun, and therefore vitamin D, in winter.

Also, during those summer sunshine months there is an overuse of sunscreen.  Sunscreens are very effective in blocking UVB radiation and therefore preventing natural vitamin D production.

Take the Weight Off

Being overweight will affect your vitamin D availability. Vitamin D is fat soluble and carrying too much body fat will affect its bioavailability because it’s being stored in the fat and not released into the bloodstream.

Dark Skin Shields UVB

Darker skinned people will naturally block sunlight and UVB. So, if they want to absorb more vitamin D naturally from sunshine, they need to spend more time in the sun than white counterparts.

Caucasians that have deep tans are actually putting up a barrier to absorbing natural vitamin D. So, it’s a double whammy, not only are they aging their skin, but they’re putting a barrier up between them and the benefits of sunshine.

Know your Numbers

The only real way to know if you have healthy levels of vitamin D in your system is to get tested. If you have an annual physical with blood tests, be sure to discuss having your vitamin D levels tested by your doctor.

The medical community uses a scale of nanograms (ng) per milliliter (ml). Vitamin D tests generally assess the total volume of 25-Hydroxyvitamin D (25OHD), which is the form of Vitamin D circulating in blood.

Optimum levels are between 30-80 ng/ml.

<10.0 ng/ml.: Deficient
10.0 – 30.0 ng/ml.: Insufficient
30.1 – 100 ng/ml.: Sufficient
>100 ng/ml.: Toxic

Optimal Sunbathing

The UV index is linear scale running from 0 to 11+.  You really need a UV index reading of at least 3 for your skin to make vitamin D.

So, the challenge is to get that goldilocks level of sun exposure for good health but not burn your skin or damage your eyes.

Never get sunburned, that’s what can lead to melanoma.

Allow about 20 minutes or so of unprotected sun exposure to your arms, legs, abdomen and back. After that, follow up with good sun protection, like a 30-SPF or higher sunblock. The mission is to generate natural vitamin D and not to damage the skin.

The irony of tanning. If you have a dark tan, it actually reduces your skin’s ability to product vitamin D. The lighter you are, the more efficient at producing vitamin D.

If your shadow is longer than your body height, you can’t make any vitamin D, high noon will be too intense, aim for the window of 10:00am – 11:00am or 2:00pm to 3:00pm.

UVB does not penetrate through glass or plastic, you have to be outside, unobstructed.

Foods high in vitamin D

During winter, when you’re no longer exposed to beneficial sunshine, you’ll need other means to get necessary vitamin D. One way is through diet.

Fatty cold water fish contain vitamin D. Eat the small fish and not the mercury ridden large ones like tuna. Wild Alaska salmon is ideal. Farm raised salmon are lower in vitamin D.  Other fish like mackerel and sardines are also good.

Other food sources of vitamin D are:

• Beef live
• Whole eggs
• UV exposed mushrooms. (Yes, mushrooms exposed to the sun also manufacture and store vitamin D).

Need to supplement in winter during the winter

Vitamin D is rare in most foods and many people simply cannot get enough of it from these food sources alone. So, if you cannot expose your skin to sunshine, you must supplement.

The NIH guidelines for vitamin D supplementation is 600 IU for adults and 800 IU for seniors over 70 years of age.

However, most medical experts feel these levels are too low for maximum benefit. They suggest 4,000 IU per day.

Can you take too much vitamin D?

Yes, supplementing too much vitamin D is possible but not common. Toxic doses of vitamin D can result in exceedingly high serum levels of calcium, known as hypercalcemia and have been reported at doses higher than 50,000 IU.

Data compiled from several different vitamin D supplementation studies reveal that vitamin D toxicity is obtained at doses much higher than 10,000 IU.  So, 4,000 IU is safe and offers major benefits.

How Does Your Body Make It?

Vitamin D3 is made by cholesterol in the skin when 7-dehydrocholesterol reacts with ultraviolet-B radiation (UVB) at wavelengths between 290-315 nm. Supplements are typically made through UVB irradiation of 7-dehydrocholesterol in lanolin of sheep.

Most of you are familiar that sunlight is composed of wavelength bands, we can only see the middle light bands, but the lower frequency comprises ultraviolet and the higher frequency comprises infrared.

But the UV frequency also has three parts:

• 

  UVA

• UVB
• UVC

The UVC frequencies are almost completely absorbed by the earth’s atmosphere and don’t reach the earth and are therefore inconsequential.

UVB is the radiation that both generates beneficial vitamin D in the skin and if excessive can cause skin damage and skin cancer. However, in mornings and late afternoon, due to the angle of the sun, the radiation passes through more ozone. It’s the ozone layer which reduces the intensity of the UVB radiation to where it causes less damage.

UVA, on the other hand, penetrates the ozone layer all day long and reaches our skin. But it’s not the radiation that produces vitamin D.

There are theories that it’s not necessarily the vitamin D converted from UVB that gives us all of our anti-aging and health benefits but the benefits of the UVA radiation. UVA causes the skin to produce Nitric Oxide which some medical experts feel has positive healthy benefits.

In Summary
Vitamin D is not a magic bullet against Covid-19 but it is a key component of overall good health which could help us to survive an episode.

Sunlight is not a villain. We need its exposure on our skin on a regular basis. In fact, the very reason why some humans have white skin at all is because early in our existence some homo sapiens left Africa and migrated to norther Europe.  In time they lost pigments in the skin so as to generate beneficial vitamin D with so little sunlight. It’s all natural and highly necessary to our optimal health.

Today, in modern times, those of us living in the north during winter, must therefore get our necessary vitamin D through diet and supplementation.

O.K. for most of your life you’ve been exercising, eating properly, getting enough sleep, supplementing, and limiting toxins in your life so you’re set to live to a ripe old age, right? Wrong.

It turns out there’s a major influence on our health that we were totally ignorant of until it came to the forefront about a decade ago– microbiome health. You’re not truly healthy unless you also have a healthy microbiome, those trillions of bacteria residing in your large intestines. Conversely a unhealthy microbiome predisposes us to many modern western diseases. It’s a contributing factor in higher prevalence of those diseases of aging.

Don’t despair, the biggest contributor to a healthy microbiome is merely to properly feed it. But, our current day western diet is actually starving them. Feed them well and they’ll feed you with beneficial compounds, starve them and they will actually eat you!

The Human Microbiome Project

This new awareness emerged after the completion of the pivotal Human Genome Project in 2008 when the NIH launched an equally enlightening project called “The Human Microbiome Project”. It first identified what comprised the human microbial flora and then went on to elucidate the roles of these microbes in health and disease states. The project was completed in 2016.  Today, we’re still sorting out what all of this means. But there has been a lot of lab studies on mice and even humans confirming this human/microbiome symbiosis and the best practices to optimize it.

Just what is the Microbiome?

You heard the expression that pregnant women are ‘eating for two’, well how about all of us are eating for 100 trillion. That’s about how many microorganisms occupy our large intestines. Sounds gross, but it’s actually a good thing.

Not only that, but a healthy adult has approximately 1,200 different species of

bacteria residing in his or her gut, some are bad, but most are good. These microbial residents have 100 times more genes than we do thus making us actually more microbial than human.

You may recall from high school anatomy that we have two types of intestines, the small and the large – the large is commonly referred to as the “colon”. The microbiome mostly reside in the colon, which contains about 10,000 times more bacteria than the small intestine. This places them at the very end of the food line. Most non-fibrous foods are consumed by us in the small intestines and never make it to the colon.

Consequently a healthy microbiota requires fiber by which to live and thrive. Since humans cannot digest fiber, it’s the only food that makes it all the way to the colon to feed the microbiome and they gladly feast on it.

But in our Western societies we’re just not eating enough fiber to feed these critters.  The average American consumes around 10-15 grams of dietary fiber per day. The USDA actually recommends 30-35 grams per day. By those measures we’re eating a third less fiber than the dietary experts say we should.

And that USDA number may be understated. After 200,000 years of evolution, it is believed by scientists that our ancient hunter-gatherer forebears, from which we co-evolved, ate on the order of 100- 150 grams of fiber per day. So, by those measures we’re consuming about 10% of what we’ve evolved to. We probably don’t want to consume the copious quantities of those tough fibrous roots those hunter-gathers did, but we do need to ‘up our game’.

An Incredible Symbiosis

O.K., so we have these bugs in our gut, but how does that possibly affect our health?  After all, we are at the nascent stages of our understanding our relationship with them. What scientists do know is that the microbiome affect our digestive health, our metabolism, our systemic immune function, our central nervous system, just about every part of our biology is affected by these microbes. Scientists further believe that many autoimmune diseases can be ameliorated by a healthy microbiome.

Inflammation is the Culprit of a Myriad of Diseases and It’s Affected by Your Microbiome

We coexist in close proximity to our bug friends, very close. In fact, the epithelial lining of our colon is only a single cell thick. That’s the barrier that keeps theses trillions of bugs within the gut from not invading our body.  Unfortunately, there are instances where this protective layer has breaches and is porous and allows bacteria to enter our body and trigger an array of immune responses.

In a healthy person, in addition to the epithelial lining there is a thick mucus lining that reinforces that epithelial barrier. So, the end goal is to keep that mucus lining as thick as possible.

Mother nature knows it’s risky to have trillions of bacteria only a thin layer away from our body, so it’s deployed a large number of immune cells along the tract. If fact there are more immune cells lining our gut than any other part of our body.

If we fail to feed the microbiome properly, those bugs will eat us. That is, they will take to eating that vital mucus lining.  Not that they want to harm their host, it’s the drastic measures they’ll take if they’re starving.  Whoops that’s a problem, they’re diminishing the very barrier that’s designed to keep them in the gut and not roam around our body.

When there’s a breech and living bacteria, or their dead parts pass through the barrier, our immune cells are activated and start to kill the invading microbes. The killing of the bacteria releases lipopolysaccharide endotoxins which gets into the bloodstream which causes a general inflammatory response within the entire body.

Many other diseases are also driven by this inflammation, such as cancer, metabolic syndrome, and many of the autoimmune diseases. Of note is that these diseases are less prevalent in societies where there is more fiber in the diet. It’s highly unlikely that of these different diseases each have their own unique cause. It’s highly probable that there may be just one upstream cause — inflammation.

In contrast, if there’s sufficient dietary fiber present, there’s plenty for these bugs to eat and they don’t touch the mucus lining – all is good in that aspect.

But a lot more benefit accrue to having a healthy, well fed microbiome. One benefit of feeding your bugs is that they’ll reward you with beneficial compounds, namely short chain fatty acids, or SCFAs. They eat the fiber and poop out the SCFA’s. Gut epithelial cells rely on SCFAs for energy.

The SCFA’s provide for a healthy epithelial lining thus keeping that barrier nice and tight, plus the mucus layer rebuilds to a healthy level providing more separation. General health improves with well-fed bugs that stay on their side of the barrier.

Some SCFAs will then enter the bloodstream which increase favorable T-regulatory cells which sets our immune response to a proper set point and not go haywire. Again, it’s an overactive immune system that can cause other diseases and autoimmune disease.  It turns out the same bacteria that can trigger an overreacting immune system can also calm it down. It all depends on what side of the fence they’re on and that’s determined by how well we feed them.

Shift to More of a Plant Based Diet

O.K., now that we’ve scared the bejesus out of you and you’re convinced you want a healthier gut, what to do?

The only real dial you have to turn is diet. That is, putting beneficial foods into your system and avoiding foods that are bad.

Since most plants are beneficial to the microbiome, it requires making a dramatic shift to a plant based diet. No, you don’t have to go totally vegetarian or vegan, it’s just that your plate should now be skewed with more vegetables than proteins and fats.

Don’t think you can just ingest copious quantities of Metamucil and get all your fiber. Science has shown that the more diverse a microbiome the better. Again, there can be as many as 1,200 different species of bacteria, each affecting us in a different manner and each requires a slightly different fiber to thrive on.

The way to foster a diverse microbiome is to eat a diverse array of vegetables and fiber. Each vegetable type will feed a different type of bacteria.

Brain Gut Connection

To orchestrate our whole digestive process, our gut has its own nervous system called the enteric nervous system is a massive web of 500 million neurons spread over the entire digestive tract often referred to as the ‘second brain’.

Further this brain system is also connected to our central nervous system through the vagus nerve, kind of a superhighway between the gut and the brain. Scientists are in the early stages of lab studies with mice to figure out what this all means.

Some lab studies find that mice with a microbiome have higher levels of Brain Derived Neurotrophic Factor, BDNF, than a control group of mice without a microbiome. BDNF is important for learning, memory, higher order thinking.

Of particular note is that up to 80% of serotonin is made in the gut. Serotonin

is a neurotransmitter that affects our mood.

The hypothesis derived from these mice studies is that mental performance and elevated mood could be highly influenced by our gut.

Avoiding “Leaky Gut”

We already explained the permeability of the gut lining and the importance of the mucus layer. But there are some bold assertions out there as to how to protect that barrier further.  There are assertions that certain foods, like those high in lectins and the nightshade family and dairy products can cause gut permeability, or more commonly referred to as “leaky gut”.

Again, leaky gut occurs when there is a compromised gut mucus lining augmented by separations in the epithelial lining causing the bacteria and its parts to enter the bloodstream. As mentioned gut permeability can lead to a severe immune response and is a major contributor to autoimmune diseases.

The theory is that living plants develop lectins to guard against insects eating them, so it’s somewhat toxic. Lectins are proteins that we do not digest, so they travel all the way to the colon. Because lectins are sticky proteins, they bind to the gut wall causing severe irritation and ultimate permeability.

The advice from those pundits on this matter are to avoid foods that are high in lectin. The major groupings are many foods that we’ve been taught are good for us: legumes, and whole wheat.  Here’s a list of foods that are purported to be harmful to your gut:

If one is not able to eliminate these foods, than any attempt to reduce the intake may lead to better health. In particular, if you’re suffering from any form of autoimmune disease like asthma and allergies, it may be worth a try.

At the very least, when preparing these riskier foods, be sure to totally boil them. Lectins are water-soluble and typically found on the outer surface of a food. The high wet heat will inactivate most of the harmful lectins.

Offsetting the above, here’s a list of foods that are low in lectin and are favorable to your microbiome. Eat more of these:

A Word about Antibiotics

Antibiotics are a wonder drug, they’ve saved millions of lives since we started its use. However, when your illness is borderline, discuss with your doctor if it’s possible to forego its usage to see if you’ll heal on your own. If not, by all means take the antibiotics.

If your doctor agrees, not taking antibiotics will do your microbiome a world of good. Antibiotics are broad based, they’ll kill every microbe it comes in contact including all those good bugs you’ve worked so hard to culture.

So, if your infection is not severe, omit the antibiotics and let your good bugs live to take care of you in other ways.

Let’s get Dirty

We hesitate to write this section. As of this writing, the coronavirus is raging throughout the U.S. and countless lives are lost.

The universal prophylactic is to wash your hands for 20 seconds with soap. And that’s a good thing, we need to wipe out this deadly virus.

Sans pandemics, the concept we’re trying to get across is this. Since the

enlightenment that diseases pathogens can spread and we’ve gone from one extreme to another. From filthy conditions in poor parts of cities with dirty water where disease readily spread to being “over-sanitized”.

Unless you live on Love Canal, the dirt in your back yard safe, if you ingested a little of it, you’re introducing new bugs to create a diverse microbiome. If you grow an organic vegetable garden, you can eat the veggies right off the plant without washing and actually be healthier as a result. Something to keep in mind, someday where there are no pandemics.

Also, your pet is introducing differing strains of bacteria and you you’re not even aware of it.

Prebiotics and Probiotics

In a nutshell, probiotics are living cultures that we eat to introduce good bacteria to our gut. Prebiotics are the foods we ingest that will feed our microbiome.

Now, you can spend a fortune on both prebiotics and probiotics in supplement form. The concern is that they are not regulated. You could be getting good stuff, or totally wasting your money.

A better way is to go natural. You can find beneficial probiotics in fermented foods like yogurt, kefir, pickles and sauerkraut. Unfortunately, it’s not a once and done affair. Those bacteria introduced via probiotics tend not to stay, they’re eliminated. But they do a whole lot of good while they’re in your system, so it’s best to take some form of “natural” probiotic daily.

As for prebiotics, these are all those high fiber foods we’ve been talking about. But there are a couple of high quality vegetables like onions, chicory root, garlic and Jerusalem artichokes that are high in inulin, a particularly high quality fiber for your gut. So, eat more of these.

The Takeaways

O.K., if you’ve found religion that nurturing your microbiome will lead to greater health for you, human. We’ve boiled it down to simple steps you can adopt today:

• You’re microbiome is starving, you have to consciously feed it.
• Skew your diet to being more plant based.
• Add more naturally fibrous plants to your plate.
• Up your game, men should consume minimally 30 grams of fiber every day, women 24.
• When thinking of high quality fiber, think root crops like our forebears ate.
• Improve the diversity of your microbiome, by eating a variety of vegetables.
• Improve the diversity of your microbiome by eating what’s available seasonally.
• Ingest natural probiotics daily.
• If your doctor agrees, avoid antibiotics.

Bon appetite.