Baby boomers, who were just now hitting the "memory barrier" of their late forties and early fifties, were consulting me with increasing frequency. They were shocked by the sudden onset of age-associated memory impairment, and by the corresponding declines in their hormonal systems. They were suddenly losing the mental sharpness that had propelled their careers, and had allowed them to juggle families and jobs. They were also losing their endocrinological spark as their "youth hormones" dried up. Their sexual urges were flattening out, they were gaining weight, losing muscle and hair, and needing more and stronger coffee just to slog through the day. The boomers' loss was Starbuck's gain.

Most of them had the "dual curse": memory impairment, combined with decreased ability to concentrate. Each of these problems exacerbated the other, and both impaired learning ability. My midlife patients often told me that they just couldn't "soak up" facts as they had during their peak learning years. And they missed this wonderfully vital state of mind, just as much as they missed other aspects of their younger years.

But the worst thing of all, according to many of them, was that they were losing the inner fire that had once made them jump out of bed in the morning ready for action and full of fun. Now they pushed the "snooze" button, and got up grudgingly. Their lives had become dull. Fun was too much trouble. So was sex. Action was a chore. Life was...work.

Many of them had tried to rationalize their recent declines with talk about "acceptance" and "maturity" and "lowered expectations." Others had tried to deny their deterioration by pumping weights, dyeing their hair, and getting their tummies tucked. Many were self-medicating with caffeine, nicotine, alcohol, and megadoses of vitamins.

Nonetheless, what I saw was a frightened generation.

And they had good reason to be scared. For years they'd struggled to build a foundation of security and prosperity for the last half of their lives, but now they were smacking headlong into an unexpected roadblock: the decline of their brain power an energy at the very peak of their career curves and family demands. Early burnout was not something they'd planned for. In addition, I had discovered, almost all baby boomers with age-associated memory impairment were haunted by a dark fear: the specter of Alzheimer's disease. They knew that Alzheimer's-which usually takes about twenty years to develop fully-reduces people to virtual infancy. It renders them unable to speak, use the toilet, remember family members, or even smile. They also often become paranoid and hostile. And in that pathetic condition, patients often survive for up to ten years.

When these baby boomers had gone to their local doctors for help, however, they'd been told that no medical protocol existed for arresting or preventing Alzheimer's disease, or for treating age-associated memory impairment.

In general, the medical profession takes a lamentably passive approach to cognitive decline. According to long-standing conventional wisdom, nothing can stop Alzheimer's, or relieve age-associated memory impairment.

Supposedly, some memory loss is inevitable for virtually everyone, starting at about age forty-five to fifty. Age-associated memory impairment is one of the most common medical problems of people in midlife.

Alzheimer's disease is also commonly considered inevitable for a great many people. Today, Alzheimer's strikes up to 50 percent of all people who live to age eighty-five. Because of this high incidence, Alzheimer's is the third-highest cause of death by disease in America, after cardiovascular disease and cancer.

But I don't accept the inescapability of Alzheimer's, or of age-associated memory impairment.

I believe that Alzheimer's disease can be delayed and prevented.

I believe that age-associated memory impairment can be eradicated.

I believe that people in their forties, fifties, sixties-and beyond-can retain not only an almost perfect memory, but can also have "youthful minds," characterized by the dynamic brain power, learning ability, creativity, and emotional zest usually found only in young people.

These beliefs of mine-now shared by other cutting-edge researchers and clinicians-are absolutely revolutionary. Ten years ago almost no one in medicine subscribed to these ideas, I certainly didn't. But now I'm positive they're true, for one central reason: the clinical results I have achieved. For a number of years I have been applying to the brain a unique medical regeneration program that is at the white-hot forefront of anti-aging medicine. This program employs complementary medicine, a relatively new clinical approach that combines Western technological medicine with the most powerful proven techniques from Eastern medicine.

I have become, to some extent, a medical pioneer, implementing a program that creates "mental fitness" and "brain longevity." The results have been astounding. My patients have, quite literally, achieved the impossible.

I have helped people regain the minds they once had. Rejecting the assumption that all minds must deteriorate with age, I have helped many patients regain "youthful minds."

I have been able to achieve this, in part, because I have begun addressing an element of memory loss that has only recently emerged from the laboratories of brain research: the "cortisol connection."

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© 1997 by Dharma Singh Khalsa, M.D.

Tags: Memory Improvement, Alzheimer's Disease

About the Author

Dharma Singh Khalsa, M.D. was born in Cleveland, Ohio and raised in Miami Beach, Florida. After travelling the USA for educational purposes (Omaha, San Francisco), he settled in Albuquerque, New Mexico in 1978. In 1979 he started practicing Kundalini Yoga with Yogi Bhajan and in 1981 converted to the Sikh lifestyle replete with full beard and turban. More

CAMERON STAUTH is the author of nine critically acclaimed books, a former editor in chief of the Journal of Health Science, and a journalist who has written more than a hundred articles for the New York Times Magazine, Prevention, Natural Health, and other publications. More