Stop Aging, Start Living

Chapter 1

Stop Aging—One Cell at a Time

Not long ago, Susan, a tall fair-skinned lawyer in her late forties, walked into my office and asked me to help her look younger. “I want to look better. I don’t know what’s wrong. I think I’m doing everything right, but my skin just doesn’t look great,” she told me.

Like so many patients, Susan had done just about everything before seeking my advice. She had willingly undergone numerous cosmetic procedures with various doctors and aesthetic specialists, her face alternately lasered, lifted, injected with Botox, and filled with collagen. Although these procedures had erased any hint of a wrinkle, they hadn’t given Susan the youthful appearance she sought. Susan wanted radiance and smoothness, yet her skin was dull, dry, and pale.

I invited Susan to sit down with me for a few minutes and asked her about her diet, lifestyle, and skin care practices. She told me she had spent the past few months on a low-carbohydrate diet, which meant that most days she ate from two food groups: chicken breast and Diet Coke. Each morning, she took a long, hot shower. “It’s the only way I can wake up,” she told me. After a stressful day at work, she hit the gym, running on the treadmill, taking kick-boxing classes, and making her way around the Nautilus circuit. She then showered, dressed, and drove home, where, after more chicken and Diet Coke, she plopped down in front of the TV, watching gory crime dramas, until she finally dragged herself to bed.

I asked Susan how she felt. She told me that she felt tired a lot of the time. She frequently suffered from gas and bloating. She had trouble sleeping at night.

“What do you do for fun?” I asked.

“What do you mean?” she replied. I learned that Susan’s days were filled with work, volunteer work, and family responsibilities. She didn’t have time for “fun.”

I nodded. Her symptoms, habits, and lifestyle sounded so familiar, I hardly needed to make notes in her chart. “I would like to try something with you,” I told her.

I pulled a pH strip from a supply cabinet and asked Susan to place it on her tongue. After a few seconds, I removed the strip. Sure enough, Susan’s saliva pH of 6.0 indicated to me that the pH levels of the fluids in her body were probably far too acidic for the optimal functioning of the cells in her skin.

That’s when I knew there was little I could do with fillers, peels, and other office procedures to create the vibrancy, radiance, and smoothness Susan sought. For these results, Susan would have to make some dietary and lifestyle changes. Susan’s diet was causing acids to build up in her organs, tissues, and cells—including the important cells in the inner layer of her skin. Her diet also led to poor digestion, which prevented important nutrients from getting to her skin. Her excessive showering was stripping the outer layer of her skin of moisture, making it appear thin and brittle. Her stressful lifestyle only magnified her problems.

As I explained all of this to Susan, I mixed an Alkalinizing Cocktail. I stirred a packet of greens powder into a glass of water, along with a scoop of fiber and spirulina (blue-green algae).

“You want me to drink that?” Susan asked.

I laughed. “You’ve endured knives and needles trying to get the skin of your dreams,” I reminded her. “I know this doesn’t look appetizing, but it actually tastes sweet. More important, it’s full of fiber, antioxidants, plant nutrients, and enzymes. One glass provides the body with the equivalent nutrition of ten servings of organic fruits and vegetables.”
Susan finished the drink easily while I described the principles of my simple skin program. After a few minutes, I asked Susan to look in the mirror. Her skin and eyes had begun to brighten. Although Susan had arrived at my office tired and stressed—this doctor visit just one more task in her busy day—her body responded instantly when we gave it what it needed. She was pleasantly surprised. I gave Susan the ingredients for the Alkalinizing Cocktail so she could make it at home. I also gave her a few skin care products to use each morning and night. Finally, I encouraged her to do something really fun that night.

The following morning, as soon as I walked into the office, Susan was on the phone. “Everyone tells me that I look radiant, that my eyes are brighter,” she said. “I have more energy, too!” That day Susan embarked on my comprehensive 2-Week Plan, and she’s been referring friends and colleagues to me ever since.

A Few Simple Principles Backed by Science
If you have doubts that a strange-looking drink, some moisturizer, and a little bit of fun can produce any results, not to mention overnight results, please rest assured that I am a board-certified physician who makes only nutritional, lifestyle, and skin care recommendations that are backed by good science. I began my career in the laboratories of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), so I am familiar with the scientific method and have relied on it, along with scores of reputable studies, to guide and support my advice. While at the NIH, I was a research scientist. I spent my days peering into microscopes to see skin cells up close. My studies, done at the NIH and elsewhere, have appeared in a number of prestigious scientific journals such as Cell, Science, the Journal of Cell Biology, the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, and Biochemistry. I even won an Outstanding Achievement Award for one of my discoveries. So please understand that I do know the difference between true science and marketing-driven quackery. All of my recommendations are based on research.

I’ve also worked with thousands of patients during my more than fifteen years in private practice. I didn’t create the plan you’ll find in this book overnight. It came to me after treating patient after patient who, on the surface, seemed to be doing everything right. These patients had excellent cosmetic results with various topical treatments that I prescribed or formulated, as well as with Botox, collagen, and Restylane, but they didn’t look great. They were missing vibrancy and luster.

I also noticed that some other patients who had not undergone as many procedures actually looked more alive and vibrant. I wanted to know what these naturally younger-looking patients were doing that my other patients were not, so I began asking questions about their diet, lifestyle, and skin care habits.
I also began an intense study of available skin care research. I examined more than one hundred years of studies, some of them Nobel Prize–winning. Each study provided a nugget of information that I then tested on my patients and on myself.

From my patients and my own trial and error, I’ve learned many important lessons. Not only have I learned what skin care and lifestyle practices are most important for skin health, I’ve also learned which practices everyday folks such as yourself will likely adopt, and which ones you’ll find too cumbersome to deal with. For instance, eating ten servings daily of organic, raw vegetables is undoubtedly good for your skin. Yet most people just can’t and won’t make such a huge lifestyle change. Coffee isn’t the greatest for your skin. Will you give it up if you are a die-hard espresso fan? I doubt it. I certainly haven’t.

I realized that my patients needed a realistic way to balance their bad habits with realistic good habits. During the past few years, my discoveries gelled into a specific, realistic, and effective program, the one you will find in this book. It works. I know, because I’ve seen it work for every single patient who has tried it.

It has also worked for me. I’m a working mom with two teenage kids and an aging father who is in and out of the hospital. I travel. I have a busy private practice. I consult with cosmetic companies. I write books. Is it stressful? You bet! Do I have lots of time to grow organic vegetables in my backyard, chop and dice, or follow a raw food diet? Not if my life depended on it! I’m busy. I focus on lifestyle changes that provide me with the maximum benefit for my time.

I also love coffee and red wine—both of which are no-no’s when it comes to beautiful skin (you’ll soon learn why). I also frequently get too little sleep. These are all facts of my life, yet this program has worked for me. That’s why I’m convinced it will work for you.

Will you have to make some changes in order to stop aging and start living? Of course, but those changes will be realistic changes. This program doesn’t ask you to do anything that I personally couldn’t do myself. If I can sustain this lifestyle, so can you. If you don’t believe me, believe the stories of the many patients you’ll read about throughout the pages of this book. They, too, had real lives with real problems and hard-to-part-with bad habits. Yet they were able to stop aging and start living. You can, too.

I call this the Stop Aging, Start Living Plan because that’s what it does. Not only does this program help you to look more youthful on the outside, it also slows the aging of every cell in your body on the inside. As a result, you not only appear younger, you grow younger. Your cholesterol level, blood pressure, and blood sugar will drop. Digestion will improve, so you will no longer suffer from gas, bloating, or constipation. Headaches will diminish. You may even find that your cravings for unhealthful foods diminishes, and continue to diminish the longer you follow this plan. Today you may not be able to get by without your cigarettes, sugary treats, or soft drinks, but these foods and substances will eventually lose their appeal.

Most important, you will feel amazing. Most of my patients were stunned by how much more they could accomplish each day simply because they felt so much better.

Make the Cosmolecular Connection
My plan is based on what I call the cosmolecular connection. What do I mean by that? Perhaps you have heard of the term cosmeceutical, which combines the words cosmetic and pharmaceutical. First coined in the 1990s, this word applies to eye creams, anti-wrinkle agents, and other topical cosmetic products that contain biologically active ingredients that work the way medicines or pharmaceuticals do. I coined and trademarked the term cosmolecular to refer to nutrition, lifestyle, and skin care habits that promote beauty (and are therefore cosmetic) by producing real changes on the molecular level in the cells that form the human body.

We tend to think of our bodies as having a series of isolated compartments. The skin is one such compartment, the heart another, the liver another, and so on. I’d like to introduce you to a different understanding of the human body. Rather than thinking of it as a series of organs that function separately, I’d like you to think of it as a series of cells that function together. Human beings are a collection of cells—trillions of cells, to be precise. The smallest biological entities in the body that are capable of handling energy, cells group together to form organs—the eyes, the heart, the brain, and the skin, among others.

Every cell in your body is affected by every other cell in your body. For this reason, the largest organ in the human body, the skin, mirrors the health of the molecules, enzymes, proteins, and cells that form the body. Quite often we dermatologists are the first to notice the initial signs of internal physical ailments. People with liver disease look yellow, for example. By looking at the tongue, we can tell whether a patient has anemia. When someone has lupus, we recognize it by the butterfly rash on the skin. Studies have also linked poor digestion and low immunity to many types of skin rashes, including atopic dermatitis (often called eczema).

I’m willing to bet that this explanation probably makes perfect sense to you. I don’t need to cite study after study for you to believe that your skin mirrors your internal health. You already know this from looking in the mirror. You probably have noticed that your skin doesn’t look its best when you have a cold or flu. You may even have observed that your skin looks dull when you are constipated, have a headache or heartburn, or are exhausted after a stressful day. Your skin probably looks its best at a specific point in your menstrual cycle and its worst at yet another point in the cycle. If you pay close attention, you’ll probably notice that your skin looks fantastic at a certain time of day and not so wonderful at another point in the same day. You’ll even see that your skin appears more radiant when you feel joyful and more dull when you are angry, stressed, or sad. These are all examples of the skin reflecting changes going in inside the body.

Stop Aging Fact
The study of cell communication is one of the hottest areas of research. Thanks to the recent invention of highly specialized microscopes, scientists are now able to see live cells in action.

How Cells Age
As I’ve stated, each organ of the human body consists of groups of different types of cells, and these cells use chemical signals to “talk” to each other. These cellular communications are part of an immense and sophisticated communications network that no human-made telecommunications network can rival. Interestingly, telecommunications experts are closely studying cell communication in efforts to improve service provided by wireless phone networks.

In a healthy cellular environment, signals easily cross cell membranes, getting to their source. In an unhealthy environment, signals either don’t reach their source or become distorted. Think of it as static on a phone line or dropped calls on your cell phone. Important messages do not reach their destination, preventing important bodily reactions from taking place.

Just as you have trillions of cells in your body, you have even more enzymes that trigger reactions in these cells. Enzymes are important, as your cells use them to create energy. If cellular enzymes don’t function well—because your diet or lifestyle does not provide them with the optimal resources to thrive—then cells throughout your body manufacture less ATP, the energy storage molecule in all living cells. As a cell produces less ATP, it ages prematurely, causing cell mutations and increasing the formation of free radicals. This process happens everywhere in your body, including in the cells of your skin.

Enzymes all thrive within a very specific environment. If the fluids that form your body become too dry or too acidic, enzymes don’t trigger the right reactions inside your cells—in the skin and throughout your body—leading to loss of elasticity, premature wrinkling, dullness, and sagging.

How Your Skin Ages
Any cosmetic dermatologist can help you get rid of wrinkles, but it takes the right diet and lifestyle to recapture the softness, smoothness, and resiliency of the skin of your youth. The Stop Aging, Start Living Plan addresses these subtle aging concerns, the ones that no dermatologist or surgeon can fix for you. The Stop Aging, Start Living Plan stops skin aging at its source—on the cellular level.

To understand what accelerates skin aging—and what stops it—you need a basic understanding of skin physiology. Your skin is made of several layers, all of which affect how quickly or how slowly you age.