Download Is your workout making you stress out?

Is your workout making you stress out?
Written by by Ann Quasarano D’Adamo Personalized Nutrition
Monday, 10 January 2011 06:00
Many people are making new year’s resolutions to get fit. And most fitness plans include
exercise.
Not only does it help you get fit, exercise is considered by health professionals as an antidote to
stress. But what if the type of exercise program you choose is causing your stress?
Dr. Peter D’Adamo, a naturopathic physician based in Wilton, and author of the New York
Times best-selling book, Eat Right 4 Your Type, believes that individuals have a different
physiological response to various types of exercise. In other words, the spinning class that
energizes your best friend and makes her feel great may be causing your body to overproduce
stress hormones, leaving you feeling agitated and stressed out — not a good feeling. Perhaps
this may be the reason many people enthusiastically begin exercise programs, but quit after just
a few weeks.
Dr. D’Adamo says many factors interact to determine your tolerance for various types of
exercise. He says proper nutrition, prior training, fitness level, and stress in other parts of your
life all play a role and should be taken into consideration when choosing an exercise program.
Dr. D’Adamo also suggests there is another factor that should be considered — blood type.
Dr. D’Adamo has researched the connection between digestion, exercise, and blood type and
published his findings in his book, Eat Right 4 Your Type. He says the blood type-exercise
connection has to do with the way our bodies process the stress hormones adrenaline and
cortisol.
“People are biologically ‘wired’ to react differently to stress, and our blood type plays a
significant role in the basal levels of the stress hormones that we produce,” explains Dr.
D’Adamo.
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Is your workout making you stress out?
Written by by Ann Quasarano D’Adamo Personalized Nutrition
Monday, 10 January 2011 06:00
When you engage in intense physical exercise, he says, you are provoking a heightened
physiological response, which results in the production of adrenaline and cortisol. Dr. D’Adamo
cites research that found that people with blood type A have higher resting levels of cortisol.
“When a person with blood type A chooses calming exercises like yoga, their cortisol levels go
down. When they engage in intense aerobic exercise, more cortisol is released into the
bloodstream,” he says.
Dr. D’Adamo says that people with type O blood are at the opposite end of the spectrum.
“Although it takes more to initiate the stress response, it takes them longer to come into balance
again. They are more susceptible to prolonged stress or the build-up of adrenaline, and this can
lead to adrenal-neurological exhaustion.”
He recommends brisk, regular exercise for people with O blood type and suggests intense
physical exercises such as aerobics, running and resistance training help type O’s to prevent
the build-up of stress hormones.
Dr. D’Adamo says that blood types B and AB fall somewhere in the middle of types A and O in
their stress response; with type B being more “O-like” in their stress response and type AB
having a similar reaction to people with blood type A. However, blood types B and AB have the
unique ability to respond quickly to stress-reducing techniques.
“This ability to recover from stress may be due to the fact that people who possess the B
antigen (types B and AB) appear to clear the nitric oxide molecule from their bodies more
rapidly than the other blood types,” says Dr. D’Adamo.
A study in the medical journal, Lancet, confirms that the ability to rapidly clear nitric oxide can
be highly beneficial to the cardiovascular system and also found implications for the activity of
neurotransmitters, enabling faster recovery from stress. Although the study did not provide a
specific reason as to why people with the B antigen processed nitric oxide more efficiently, Dr.
D’Adamo believes the answer may lie in their genes.
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Is your workout making you stress out?
Written by by Ann Quasarano D’Adamo Personalized Nutrition
Monday, 10 January 2011 06:00
“The scientific community agrees that genes that are close together influence each other, and
the gene that is responsible for generating an enzyme that converts nitric oxide lies immediately
next to the gene responsible for blood type. I believe there is a strong connection in this case,”
he says.
Dr. D’Adamo suggests that people with blood types B and AB adopt an exercise program that
blends moderate physical exercise with calming, centering activities. “My B and AB patients
thrive on golf, tennis, hiking and cycling,” he says.
All of this may seem a bit far-fetched, but results don’t lie. Justin Gelband, a personal trainer
responsible for the toned bodies of celebrities like Anne Hathaway, Josh Duhamel, and many of
the Victoria’s Secret runway and catalog models, employs Dr. D’Adamo’s blood type theory in
his training. “Everyone is different,” says Mr. Gelband. “What works for you may not work for
someone else.”
Will working out according to your blood type help you to keep your new year’s resolutions?
Maybe, maybe not, but it’s worth a try. If what you did last year worked, you would not be
making a resolution to start an exercise program again this year.
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