In a continuing series on stress, Nutritionist Belinda Rennie looks at how diet, lifestyle and stress rather than genes decide how your face and body age.

Recent research by the American Society of Plastic Surgeons involving identical twins suggests that despite genetic make-up, certain environmental factors can add years to a person's perceived age. Factors such as divorce or the use of antidepressants are the real culprits that cause facial aging. It seems that stress, as well as rapid weight gain or loss also shape the look of your face as you age, far more than your genes do.

It is wonderful news for plastic surgeons who performed more than 1.5 million injectable filler plastic surgery procedures in America with the trend booming in Dubai despite the economic downturn. It brings up issues of ageing gracefully and the lines on your face expressing the sum of your life experiences, revered and esteemed in many Eastern cultures. More importantly it highlights epigenetics; how environmental factors such as stress and diet influence the expression of your genes. It is the expression of your genes -- NOT the genes themselves -- that dictates whether you develop certain diseases or age prematurely.

How Stress Shapes Your Genes

As proven through the massive genetic study, the Genome Project, each one of your genes can create up to 30,000 proteins, any and all of which can create a different outcome. So the fact that you may have a genetic “predisposition” for facial wrinkles, for example, does not mean that you are doomed to develop a face full of wrinkles during middle-age.

Whether you are mentally stressed or able to maintain a more positive outlook can influence the expression of your genes, and thus directly impact how you age. Your face mirrors the stress of a big night out, days of sleep deprivation or when work pressure is getting to you. Stress lessens your skin's ability to function properly, heal wounds and fight disease and could put you at an increased risk of skin diseases like psoriasis or dermatitis. Chronic stress can speed up the aging process of your cells and cause them to die at a faster rate than normal.  

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What this means is your body’s ability to resist and adapt appropriately to both internal and external stresses is essential for good health. The solution, therefore, to preventing premature aging and having a youthful appearance on the outside is to effectively deal with your stress, and teach your body how to best tolerate it. This is great news, as it means that you have the ability to directly influence the way you age, simply based on your mental outlook.

Top Tips for Effectively Dealing With Stress

The key is not getting rid of stress completely, as we all face stressful situations from time to time (even exercise is a form of stress), but rather adjusting your body’s ability to tolerate stress. Along with supportive relationships between family and friends and giving up smoking here are some other good foundations for a less stressful life. 
• Exercise . Physical activity is an excellent way to relieve tension and ward off the physical consequences of stress. Studies have shown that during exercise, tranquilizing chemicals, endorphins, are released in your brain, making exercise a natural way to bring your body pleasurable relaxation and rejuvenation. Exercise modifies the effect of all hormones particularly stress hormones like cortisol and adrenaline, returning the body back to balance. Find something you love to do like kick boxing, yoga, salsa or simply walk.

• Get plenty of sleep.  Get your beauty sleep before midnight when the body’s circadian rhythm kicks into a cycle of repair and rejuvenation primarily between 11pm and 3am. Eating late at night and going to bed after midnight is the hallmark of premature ageing.

• Optimize your diet. Eat a diet rich in antioxidants to counteract the effects of free radicals from the food we eat, the water we drink and the air we breathe. Brightly coloured fresh - organic if possible - fruits and vegetables such as broccoli, tomatoes, spinach, beetroot, carrots, berries and pomegranates, many eaten raw and freshly juiced help to hold back the years.

Essential fats from raw, unsalted nuts, seeds and fish contain omega 3 fats which have a myriad of anti-ageing properties. Omega-3 fats help to normalize skin lipids and prevent dehydration in your cells. This keeps skin cells strong, flexible and full of moisture, which can help improve the texture of the skin and reduce the appearance of fine lines.
Cut back on sugar. Diets high in sugar increase blood sugar and insulin and it is the presence of excess sugar in the blood stream that acts as a free radical, leading to oxidative stress and signs of premature aging.

• Try stress reduction techniques. Quantum biofeedback is a non-invasive technique for balancing the body’s stressors – nutritional, lifestyle, emotional – blocking energy pathways. It trains a person to manage their stress and become aware of lifestyle changes that enhance health. Meditation, breathing techniques and having a positive mental outlook all help you to become more resilient to stress.

• See the sun. Vitamin D controls about 2,000-3,000 of your genes and can radically improve every system in your body -- including your appearance. One of the most important strategies you can possibly do is to optimize your vitamin D levels by appropriate sun exposure - 10 to 15 minutes a day, with at least 40 percent of your skin exposed. However excess exposure will not increase your vitamin D levels but it will increase premature aging of your skin - it is important not to overdo it.
Enjoy the benefits of turning back the years - looking and feeling younger! References www.mercola.com .

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