Men’s Health Tips

Don’t hold back your urine, don’t endure it, and don’t take supplements blindly.

I just treated a 32-year-old online ride-hailing driver last week. He works the day shift to catch up with the morning rush hour and can’t bear to lose his order. Holding in his urine for 40 minutes is a common thing. He has been doing it for more than a year. Recently, he has been feeling pain in his lower abdomen. He has to run to the toilet every half an hour to urinate. He was diagnosed with chronic prostatitis. Many people always think, "I'm young, nothing will happen if I hold it in for a few times." However, the prostate and bladder are like balloons filled with water. If they are repeatedly stretched to the limit and then emptied, the elasticity will only become worse and worse. Chronic inflammation caused by long-term congestion will quietly come to the door. When you really feel uncomfortable, it often takes several months to recover. When you are really busy, going to the toilet two minutes in advance will not delay anything. Even if you lose a small order and miss a 10-minute meeting, it is better than running to the hospital over and over again.

Many people think that holding in urine is a trivial matter. However, compared with holding in urine, they always feel that "I am still young and can bear it" is the biggest drain on your energy. I’m not going to say extreme things like “you will die if you stay up late”. There are actually differences in the academic circles on this matter: some sleep studies believe that as long as the biological clock is stable, you sleep enough 7-8 hours a day, and sleep at 2 a.m. and start at 12 noon, the impact on your health will not be great. ； However, more clinical tracking data shows that for men who fall asleep after 23:00 for a long time, their testosterone levels are on average 10%-15% lower than those who go to bed before 23:00, and their energy recovery speed and skin condition are also generally worse. I used to have a friend who practiced fitness. He pushed his bench press and deadlift to the limit every day, but he loved to stay up late to play. After training for half a year, his muscles did not grow much. After training for three days, he was tired. Later, he forced himself to lie down before 11:30. In less than a month, his training status improved, and his weight increased by 3 pounds of pure muscle. If you really can't change your habit of staying up late, at least don't change your schedule randomly. Go to bed at 10 o'clock today and go to bed at 3 o'clock tomorrow. It's more harmful to your biological clock to jump around than to stay up late.

Let’s talk about the most easily misunderstood “tonics”. Many people label them as “kidney deficiency” when they feel backache and fatigue, and bring boxes of Liuwei Dihuang Pills, Lubian Pills, and internet-famous oyster slices to their homes. It must be said objectively here that supplements are not completely useless, but they must be symptomatic: if you go to a regular hospital and are diagnosed with kidney yin deficiency, taking Liuwei Dihuang Pills is indeed useful, but if you have kidney yang deficiency, taking this will only make you more deficient. There was a 28-year-old programmer who heard on the Internet that oyster tablets can replenish energy. He took them for three months, and his uric acid level soared to 600 in the physical test, almost causing a gout attack. In fact, except for the high zinc content, that product has little effect. If you eat two more oysters and two meals of lean beef every week, you will get more zinc than eating three boxes of supplements, and it is also cheaper. If you are really picky about food and often suffer from oral ulcers, it is perfectly fine to buy some regular multivitamins and take them. Don't believe the propaganda that "one pill lasts for three days" and "quickly nourishes the kidneys". If you really feel uncomfortable, seek medical advice first. Problems caused by eating supplements by yourself are sometimes more difficult to cure than the original problem.

Oh, by the way, there are still many people asking what kind of exercise to choose. Some say aerobic is good, others say strength is good. In fact, it really doesn’t matter that much: if you usually sit in an office and have a big belly and high blood lipids during physical examination, walking fast or swimming first is better than anything else to reduce visceral fat.； If you always feel weak and weak, take two hours a week to practice squats and pull-ups. The effect of promoting testosterone is more reliable than any supplement. Don't believe in the extreme statements that "aerobic exercise will cause muscle loss" and "too much strength training will hurt your waist." As long as the movements are standard and the intensity does not exceed what you can bear, any exercise is better than lying on the sofa scrolling through your phone.

There is another small detail that few people mention. Don’t wear tight jeans or tight sports pants every day. Especially in the summer when you sit for a long time, the crotch temperature will be two or three degrees higher than normal. Not only will it make you feel stuffy, but it will also have an impact on the prostate and sperm quality. I was chatting with a doctor in the reproductive department before, and he said that many young men in their twenties had poor sperm motility when tested for sperm motility. When asked, if they wear tight pants and sit at work for eight or nine hours every day without moving, then wear looser pants, stand up and walk for two minutes every hour, and the reexamination index will come up after half a month. You said it is not good?

In fact, men’s health really doesn’t have that many fancy tricks. Many people always look for shortcuts, but ignore the most basic things. Don't use your youth as capital to build things up. If you really wait for problems to arise before you adjust them, you will often suffer many times the consequences. Oh, by the way, don’t forget to take half a day for a routine physical examination every year. Don’t think it’s troublesome. Many problems are trivial things that can be cured by taking some medicine if they are discovered early. However, it becomes really troublesome if it takes a long time.