No one likes aging.  In the US alone, over $9 million a year is spent on products and systems that claim to help stop or reverse the signs of aging.  That number only goes up more and more every year.

Collagen products have become a popular supplement recently.  Research has shown that even though supplemental collagen shouldn’t work, it does!  From repairing skin damage by reducing joint and muscle inflammation, collagen supplements can help.

What is Collagen?

Simplistically, collagen is a protein found throughout the body.  At 25-30% of all protein found in the body, it is the most popular kind.  The body produces it naturally, but production rates begin to drop by 1.5% a year once you hit 25 years old.  Over time, production cannot keep up with the body’s demand.  This is what causes our skin to slowly sag and not be as elastic as it used to be.

The collagen protein makes up long fibers that give it the strength to support our organs and other parts of the body, but it is also flexible at the same time.  It is strong but flexible at the same time.  This is something that is not normally found in the body.  Strong and flexible are usually on either end of a scale, but here they work together and their positive traits remain uncompromised.

There are over 20 different kinds of collagen in the body, all specialized to the part of the body they are working in.  They are inside organs, supporting muscle structures, on both the inside and outside of our blood vessels and heavily involved with our skin function and appearance.

When collagen combines with elastin, it makes it possible to be both flexible and elastic at the same time.  They need to be balanced for this to happen.  This is why trying to increase production of collagen in the body or decrease the amount of derogation is necessary to keep looking and feeling younger.