My Statin Story Continues…

In the Friday issue, I wrote about the chronic fatigue and bouts of brain fog I’ve been experiencing since I began taking statins. I met with Dr. B to talk about my concerns. He didn’t seem surprised. He wrote me a script for a different brand. “This one might work better,” he said.

“What if it doesn’t?” I asked.

“If it doesn’t, I can prescribe something else. It’s not a statin. You take it every two weeks by injection. It works as well as – or better than – statins, but with zero side effects.”

“So, why not just start me on that?”

“Well, it’s very expensive. Insurance won’t cover it until you’ve tried two statins. And statins do work about 50% of the time.”

“Why haven’t I ever heard of it?”

He shrugged. “Actually, I take it myself.”

“You what? You take it yourself!”

I looked at him like I wanted to say… well, you know what I wanted to say!

So, now I’m doing more research, including following up on all sorts of tips and suggestions I’ve been receiving from readers.

Of all the emails I received, the one from KI was the most immediately helpful. She said that she was “surprised” I hadn’t run into the work that had been done by Maryanne Demasi, a scientist/journalist that has been focused on statin drugs for several years.

Do yourself a favor. Watch any videos you can find that Demasi has done about statins. (Click here for one of them.) You will be impressed by her seriousness, her control of the facts, and her dispassionate way of collecting and presenting them.

One of the many things that Demasi did to advance the scientific inquiry was review the studies that compared the conditions and fatality rates of people that had been prescribed statin drugs (for abnormally high total cholesterol counts) with those that didn’t take them. What she discovered – and it was crystal clear from the evidence – was that statins did not increase lifespan. (Click here to read a recent article by Demasi on her analysis of the data.)

I’m going to keep reading everything I can find about statins. But from everything I’ve learned so far, I don’t believe that taking them will help me live longer. Nor do I believe it will do anything significant for improving my health. The only discernable benefit may be that it will dramatically bring down my overall cholesterol levels.

And since I also think – no, since I know for certain – that the fatigue I’ve been experiencing since I started on statins has reduced my productivity by 30% – from about 18 hours to 12 on weekdays and from about nine hours to six on weekends – I’m going to try out those injections Dr. B mentioned. And if they have the same negative effect on my energy and clarity of mind as the statin, I’m going “bare” starting next month.

I’ll keep you posted!

A Fitness Program for 2023

Good for the Young as Well as the Older

Since my stroke three months ago, I’ve been trying to get back into my former physical shape. I want to reclaim my strength, speed, flexibility, and stamina – the things that make it possible to play Brazilian Jiu Jitsu. Enjoying my favorite sport is a good reason to get fit again. But a better reason, thanks to surviving the stroke, is the recognition that achieving certain levels of physical performance health should not only extend but also enhance the quality of my life.

I’ve been reading about and reporting on fitness and longevity regularly since early 2000. In that time, there has been an unending stream of studies on those topics with a variety of findings. (As you might expect.) But of everything I’ve read, including many meta-studies, there are two objectives that matter more than any of the others.

They are not, as one might expect, those things that one notices most about aging: the diminishing flexibility, stamina, and balance. Those are important. But the studies show that the thing that matters most is strength: muscular strength, skeletal strength, and the strength of the heart and lungs.

If you are younger than 50, my approach to exercise may be similar to the one you are doing now. I exercise all the muscle groups and my lungs pretty hard. People 50 and over are typically advised to (or feel comfortable with) exercise that is less intense. When it comes to training my heart, my approach would have been considered radical for anyone over 40 and downright dangerous for anyone in his 70s. And many doctors and fitness experts that are not familiar with all the recent studies (like the one below) would have that view today. So, find someone that you trust, who is also up to date on fitness studies, to advise you personally.

My exercise routine is based on the notion that to make your body stronger – and that includes not only your muscles but your skeleton, your heart, and your lungs – you have to stress it by pushing yourself harder than you probably want to. It means lifting more weight, sprinting faster, and generally pushing yourself towards exhaustion.

This is what I do:

Although I schedule six hour and a half workouts a week, I do fewer than that at least one week a month. Four of those sessions are doing Brazilian Jiu Jitsu. The way I train (hard for an hour of the 90 minutes), it exercises my entire body, inside and out, and leaves me exhausted. Two days a week I do a physical fitness training. This consists of about 40 to 50 minutes of heavy and intense weightlifting, 20 minutes of intense cardiovascular exercise (usually four 5-minute bike sprints), and 20 to 30 minutes of stretching.

My goal in weightlifting is to exhaust my muscles. That means lifting like a power lifter or an Olympic lifter (hard and fast), rather than a body builder (less weight and more control). And I try to get stronger, either in terms of maximum strength or stamina.

My goal in cardiovascular exercise is to do at least three bike sprints (on an Aerodyne bike) in 30 minutes. Given the condition of my knees these days, it’s tough. (Believe me!) I don’t do a single five-minute ride at a moderate pace. I sprint as hard as I can for 15 seconds, continue at a moderate rate for 10 seconds, and repeat. I monitor my heart while I bike. My goal is to get my heart to its maximum level, which in my condition these days is about 170 beats.

If I have a good workout:

* I will have achieved a heart rate of 170 beats at least once.

* I will feel physically exhausted – like I could not climb a flight of stairs.

* I will have sweated off at least 2% of my body weight – i.e., more than four pounds.

* I will feel very good.

Unless I have business or family requirements that make it impossible, I am pretty good about finding time to exercise six times a week. But I can’t say that I achieve the goal of exercising to exhaustion every time.

In fact, it’s not unusual – and lately, it’s quite common – for me to walk into my gym with a head full of reasons why my trainer should take it easy on me. I don’t beat myself up about this impulse to shirk the work. I accept it as a natural and inevitable product of getting older. But what has been working for me is that I’ve told my trainers to agree with whatever BS I tell them and get me moving slowly at first… and then gradually push me as hard as I’ll go for the rest of the time.

If you don’t have a trainer, that will be more difficult. But you can still do it. Just start off easy and increase the pace and intensity gradually. As your body warms up, you will find that you can do more than you might believe.

Comedy Censorship: The Penultimate Step Before Totalitarianism

Over the last 10 years or so, ideas about fairness and equality have changed drastically in Europe and America. Almost all of it germinated in colleges and universities. And most of it mind-bogglingly stupid. When I hear about it, I feel afraid for my grandchildren. What kind of Orwellian world will they have to live in?

I tell myself to calm down. Not to worry. These new ideas are so contrary to the actual experience of living in the real world, that they can’t possibly last much longer. But if they do last, what then?

For someone like me, someone who is not comfortable doing and thinking what I’m told, the thought of a world where my grandkids are deprived of not just freedom of speech, but freedom of thought… that scares me.

And it’s not like it can’t happen. It has. And it has always preceded totalitarianism. Because there is nothing more effective in establishing control over a population than establishing laws that restrict speech.

The best way to do that is to convince the population that certain types of speech should be illegal. So, they begin with the most offensive forms of speech and move outward from there. First, they outlaw racist, antireligious, and xenophobic speech. Then sexist and homophobic speech. Then any speech that is dubbed “hateful,” including anything that might be offensive to fat people, to short people, to sick and disabled people, and – what we see happening now – even to pedophiles.

The final hurdle in controlling speech and thereby controlling thought is to regulate humor.

Humor has always been the refuge for speech that would otherwise be politically and socially unacceptable. That’s because political and social humor has a message that totalitarians cannot abide. The message is: Relax. Stop fuming. None of us is perfect. All of us are flawed. Our flaws are human. They unite us. Let’s poke fun at our differences and, by doing so, recognize our common humanity.

In Europe and in America, the totalitarians have made good progress in recent years in their campaign against humor. Click here and here.

And here’s a way for you to judge for yourself: Could any of these very funny bits have been included in The Office if it were produced today?

I came down with something… 

It was on my penultimate day in Nicaragua. It began with a dry cough and progressed to a wet cough. I’m fatigued. Otherwise, okay. I’m treating it by drinking liquids and resting. It feels like it will be over in a few more days.

What I haven’t done is get a COVID test. And I’m wondering why. If I had the same symptoms a year ago – even six months ago – I would have been tested. But I don’t feel the need to be tested now. I don’t feel in mortal danger. Nor do I believe I’m a danger to anyone else. When I’m with other people, I take the precautions I have always taken when sick. I bump fists and keep my distance. I stay away from old people and sick people.

Is it a cold? What is a cold? Is it the flu? Isn’t the flu a virus? And aren’t most viruses coronaviruses? I don’t know. What I have feels very much like an ordinary cold or flu. Nothing much to worry about. But is that true? Should I take a test? I don’t know. I’ll see how I feel tomorrow. In the meantime, I’m continuing my research on how we responded to the initial COVID outbreak, and on all the “facts” we were told that just weren’t true. (See “Worth Considering,” below.)

Last Saturday Was a Special Day at Rancho Santana…

It was my last day at Rancho Santana after a three-week stay. And I participated in two events that made it extra special.

In the afternoon, I attended a sixth-grade graduation ceremony at a local grammar school.

I’d been asked by a former employee of the ranch to “chaperone” her daughter. I had no idea what the duties of a chaperone would consist of, but I felt honored by the invitation and accepted.

I met the girl and her mom at the school, and we joined a procession traveling from the schoolhouse to a church about a quarter-mile up the road. At the church, I listened to two energetic sermons by two local preachers and two horrendously off-key arias sung by a woman dressed for a discotheque. We then traipsed back to the school, where I sat for another hour, listening to other speeches before the certificates of completion were distributed and more speeches were made. It was as elaborate as any college graduation I’ve ever attended.

(In Nicaragua, for some reason, first-grade and sixth-grade graduations are a big deal. And they are taken seriously. The kids are spotless in their freshly washed and ironed uniforms. And the parents – particularly the mothers – are dressed up, too.)

Afterwards, I was invited back to their house for a family party. I demurred, because I had another important event to get to: a 25th anniversary party for Rancho Santana, which would be commencing in about half an hour.

This, too, was a fancy affair. The central courtyard between the pool and clubhouse was lit up brightly and festooned with decorations. The dress code was black, white, or silver, and nearly everyone in attendance complied. Most of the women wore dresses. Some wore gowns. Most of the men wore jackets. Some wore tuxedos. There must have been 200 people there, a third of whom I’d never seen before.

About two hours into the evening, it was time for speeches. I was the last to go. After noticing the crowd getting more and more fidgety as the previous speakers droned on, I abandoned my prepared remarks and simply told everyone that the secret to Rancho Santana’s success was our policy to sell property only to good-looking people. It was the shortest speech of the evening, and many people said it was the best.