Can You Get Your Collagen Back?

Is it too late to get your collagen back? As a nutritionist and collagen expert, I can tell you everyone who’s aging. So that’s pretty much everyone is losing collagen. But can you do anything to get it back? Yes. Sort of let’s dive into a few ways. Let’s Illustrate it this way. If you’re like me and you love plants, you know that plants need three main things to survive, water, the right environment, or light and fertilizer. If your plant is dying, you usually can adjust one of these three things to revive it, and the same principle applies to collagen. To get your collagen back or to revive your collagen, you need to focus on three main things, nutrition, lifestyle, and supplements. So the first is nutrition. We can think of this as the water that’s necessary for our plants. We wanna eat what we can to support collagen production. So eating protein rich foods, for example, are gonna give your body the building blocks that it needs to make collagen. Some protein rich foods we know are lean meats, fish or eggs, and even a good variety of plant-based sources like organic soy and legumes can provide a nice amino acid supply. Vitamin C is also important, so it’s an antioxidant that helps support healthy collagen levels. In fact, your body needs vitamin C to make collagen. It’s a rate limiting ingredient in collagen production, so it’s absolutely necessary to make sure that you have enough vitamin C in your diet. Some examples, as we know, are citrus, bell, peppers, kiwi, and berries. So good nutrition is definitely going to help us to build collagen. The second is lifestyle. So we can think of this as the right environment for our plants. We need to provide the right environment to protect our collagen. For example, we wanna protect ourselves from the sun, quit smoking, manage stress. We know that the sun’s UV rays can degrade collagen. So sunscreen can definitely help to preserve our collagen. And it goes without saying, but we wanna avoid smoking because among other things, smoking is gonna cause collagen to break down. I don’t think I need to say much more on smoking. We all know that it’s not good for us. Also, stress management. This is a big factor here, and I know this is easier said than done. You’ve probably heard it before that stress is so bad for your health, but did you know that stress can also affect your skin health? Clinical studies show that an increase in stress levels stimulates an elevation in cortisol, which in turn can degrade collagen and cause a more pronounced skin wrinkling. But there are plenty of things that you can do to cope with stress as we know. Even some simple things like deep breathing exercise, cognitive behavioral therapy, speaking with a professional can be really helpful regardless of the strategy that you choose. There’s no doubt that managing stress is easier said than done, but it is well worth the effort, especially for the sake of your health or even for the sake of your vanity. So these lifestyle adjustments may not help us to get our collagen back, but they can help to preserve our collagen as we get older. And the third area is supplements. So we can think of this as the nutrients or fertilizer that extra boosts that our plants need to survive and thrive. So why are supplements important? Well, around our early twenties, our bodies start to slow down in terms of collagen production. So supplements can be those extra nutrients to help fill in that gap to signal ourselves to start producing more collagen. There’s plenty of studies that really support the beneficial effects of collagen supplements, which is why we’re seeing more experts recommending collagen supplements. Collagen supplements actually can help your body to produce more collagen. So can you get your collagen back? Like I said, sort of, you’re never going to completely reverse aging naturally, but you can mind your nutrition, namely with protein and vitamin C intake, wear sunscreen, stop smoking, and manage your stress and take collagen supplements. All of these inks together are going to support your collagen levels as you age. Now, if I lost you at the supplement part and you’re wondering, why can’t I just get all the collagen I need through food or bone broth, check out the links in the description down below for more information.