Whether you’re celebrating a professional milestone, a birthday, or saying goodbye to another hectic Friday, you know how good a glass of cool, red wine can be. We associate the taste with festivities, family gatherings, impromptu bubble baths, you name it, wine is our finest guilty pleasure. But how guilty is it?
While alcohol consumption is regarded as harmful, striking that fine balance and enjoying wine in moderation can actually be beneficial for your health.
As you prepare to savor another glass of your favorite vintage, let’s cover some of the most healthful reasons to appreciate this beverage and make the most of it within our healthy lifestyle!
Keeping your heart in check
Cardiovascular diseases have been the leading cause of death for a very long time, so improving your heart health should be your top priority. If you’re willing to include a light jog into your schedule to keep your heart healthy, not to mention all those omega-3s found in Algae Omega to reinforce your diet, we can safely say that a glass of wine should be no trouble at all, right?
Research has shown that enjoying a moderate amount of wine is good for your heart. The antioxidants found in wine have protective properties, but only when you stay within the CDC guidelines that allow for one glass of wine per day for the ladies, and two for gents! Wine will lower your blood pressure, too, which also contributes to keeping your heart strong.
Packed with antioxidants
A good bottle of wine packs quite an antioxidant punch, which means that you should pick your vintage wisely if you want your body and health to reap the rewards. Not all wines are created equal, as you need rich, organic wines made to preserve their antioxidant content – the main compounds found in wine with healthy properties to prevent free radical damage.
In our very own California, sustainably-made, organic wines by Castoro Cellars, for example, leverage the local climate and superb fruit to ensure a high level of antioxidants that benefit your health, not just your palate. Both whites and reds contain antioxidants, albeit in different amounts, so you can definitely look for a bottle that will be as delicious as it is healthy.
Boosting your immune health
Among so many other tasty, nutrient-dense treats and supplements that protect your immune system and help your body to ward off all kinds of pathogens, wine can contribute, too. When consumed in moderation, which means sticking to that one glass, wine gives you a better chance to avoid infections.
The flavonoids from wine support your defenses and help minimize the symptoms of a viral infection, and they work to give your system a much-needed boost.
Maintaining a healthy brain
The antioxidants we’ve mentioned are true lifesavers when it comes to your heart health, but they also work in favor of your brain. Wine’s stress-busting properties alone help us retain sharpness and reduce body-wide inflammation which can be bad for the brain.
By lowering your blood pressure and thus keeping your arteries strong, and with the help of resveratrol, which boosts protection from free radical damage, wine helps prevent stroke. That same compound, resveratrol, has the potential to reduce nervous tissue inflammation, thus protecting your brain from cognitive decline and Alzheimer’s disease.
Protecting against cancer
As we age, our bodies begin to lose some of their natural resilience, and the exposure to all kinds of harmful influences paired with genetics can lead to the infamous big C – cancer. Doctors will always adapt a patient’s diet in order to improve their reaction to chemotherapy and to help them fight cancer.
It turns out that a glass of wine can be good in this battle, too! Its healthy antioxidants, including the mentioned resveratrol help your body destroy cancer cells, and it protects your healthy cells from the harmful effects of radiation. What’s vital to remember is that all these perks are associated with consuming wine in moderation, which means limiting your consumption to that one allowed glass!
When you can stay on that single glass with your dinner and genuinely avoid excessive consumption, wine can be an ally in achieving greater resilience in terms of your immune system, cardiovascular wellbeing, and longevity. For the results to truly be measurable, you need to make other, equally healthy decisions in your nutrition, so reach out to us for a consultation, and we’ll find the most optimal solution together.
