Exercising brain is key to staying sharp
July 4th 2010 09:16
Signature Tune
Half a century into life, you still know the answers. It just takes, uh, longer to, uh, find the words to answer the questions.
Perhaps you need a minute, maybe two, to recall that, uh, thingamajig or whatchmacallit. And, as for your car keys, you’re still not sure where they are.
For baby boomers, the answers sometimes aren’t on the tip of your tongue. They’re in your mind, nestled in a brain that’s willing and still able to learn lots of new things and remembers the old as well, researchers have found.
“Boomers are worried. We’re worried because we (think) we’re going to lose our independence and that our memory will be impaired, particularly caregivers,” said Paul D. Nussbaum, a clinical neuropsychologist from Pine Township. “We worry that we are going to get what mom and dad has.”
Mom and dad are in their 70s or 80s and could be among the nearly 5 million Americans who have Alzheimer’s disease, the insidious dementia that rots the brain and robs that person of his or her life story.
Their children, now in their 40s and beyond, witness the cruel decline.
Chill, boomers. You’re not in jeopardy of Alzheimer’s just because you can no longer come up with the question before game show host Alex Trebek finishes his sentence.
Words can and do fail 50-year-olds. The word for that is dysnomia, a difficulty or inability to come up with a correct word or name from memory.
“That’s typical,” said Nussbaum, 47, an adjunct professor of Neurological Surgery at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine. “Your brain may not be as efficient (at 50), but it has a lot more that it is juggling than it was when you were 20.”
“I forget things,” concerned boomers tell Nussbaum.
“But the key is that you remember that you forgot,” the neuropsychologist answers.
Stress induced by life’s complications — bad relationships, job difficulties, unpaid bills — is usually what’s causing middle-age minds to muddle, not brain disease, Nussbaum said. A neuropsychological assessment will probably quell fears.
Worry won’t solve mental lapses. Taking better care of your brain can, Nussbaum said. He’s made brain health his business and claims that a brain-healthy lifestyle can do for the brain what a heart-healthy lifestyle has done for the heart.
The human brain, which weighs two to four pounds and which Nussbaum claims is “the single greatest system ever designed in the history of the universe” is largely ignored.
Advertisement “I just think that it’s seen as too complicated. We exert all of our energy on the heart,” Nussbaum said. The old adage was that brain cells died as the years go on. That changed about a decade ago.
“Research has shown that the brain can generate new cells and that the brain has plasticity. It can be shaped, and age doesn’t matter to a point,” Nussbaum said.
Nussbaum said people need to become proactive and make an effort throughout their lives to be open to new and different experiences.
Nussbaum outlines a brain-healthy lifestyle in his new book, “Save Your Brain, the 5 Things You Must Do to Keep Your Mind Young and Sharp.” His tack is to turn fear into motivation.
The book focuses on five critical areas, what he calls “the slices to the brain health pie” — socialization, physical activity, mental stimulation, nutrition and spirituality.
He addresses each and uses simple words to explain complicated brain processes. The book includes brain-healthy recipes. Nussbaum’s style is upbeat, not preachy.
“One (of the five things) is not more important than the other,” he said. For now, but more research could determine an importance ladder, Nussbaum said.
He speculated, “Spirituality may be.”
“The brain is able to turn inward and reduce stress,” he said. Relaxation and meditation help.
“Prayer and attending a formalized place of worship are very important for brain health. People who attend formalized services live happier and longer,” Nussbaum said.
Don’t sit. Do things that are new and complex. Learn a new language, sign language or musical instrument. Do crossword puzzles, play board games, knit, plant a garden. Take a computer class, and know that it will take adults longer to master a mouse and the keyboard than it does a 12-year-old.
For adults, it’s like learning a second language, he said.
Learning stimulates new brain cell growth that wards off dementia and memory loss, Nussbaum
“Passivity is a bad thing for the brain and the body,” Nussbaum said. The information he offers, he said, is not a cure. Better brain health, he said, is a way to combat the presence of disease such as dementia as best we can.
“The brain doesn’t know how old you are. It just wants to be stimulated,” Nussbaum said.
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