I never lose sight of the marker that it should feel good and you should be sleeping. And if that's not happening, then something's wrong.
So firstly, I want to welcome the new listeners to the show, and also very grateful to you longtime listeners of this podcast for supporting the show. I'd like to hear from you. Is there someone that you would like me to interview? Or is there a topic that you would like me to do a solo episode and kind of deep dive into the research on you can let me know by heading over to the platform you're listening on and leaving a review and in there writing in what you'd like to hear from us on or who you'd like us to interview and we will do our very best to fulfil that request. In this week's bite size bio hacks I am sharing a clip from my interview with the amazing Dr. Laura Bryden. We talk about stress hormones, PCOS, insulin resistance and sleep just in this short clip. Now if you'd like to listen to the full episode, it is episode 102. Dr. Laura isn't was an incredible guest and her books are absolutely brilliant. Both the period repair manual and the hormone repair manual are like Bibles on my own bookshelves. And I'll link to both of those books in the show notes below this episode. Enjoy this. And if you'd like to listen to the full interview, it's episode 102. In women with things like PCOS, this is likely to have a bit more of a resurgence is it in terms of her ability to manage blood sugar during those pre menopausal years? Yeah,
yes. And so And also, just to clarify, insulin resistance is about having chronically elevated insulin, the hormone insulin, that's actually how I testified as to measure the hormone. So you've got the double whammy. With insulin resistance, you've got the situation that this, the cells in the body that everywhere in particular, the brain in this case, are not getting the energy they need, because as you say, insulin is just kind of shuttling it into fat rather than allowing it into cells. So that's where you get this, what they've measured, actually as a 25% reduction in brain energy and some of the later phases of perimenopause and the shift to insulin resistance. So the brain needs to be able to eat burn ketones as an alternative. And when there's when you have insulin resistance, it's difficult to have that what's called metabolic flexibility to burn ketones as an alternative to glucose. When we're healthy, we can do both. We can burn glucose we can the cells can switch back and forth. That's all happening in the mitochondria. And with chronically elevated insulin, insulin resistance that's not happening. And to answer your question about women with a history of PCOS, it's a few things it's if you have a history of PCOS, you'd likely have a history of insulin resistance because as you know, those they sort of go hand in hand although not always. Also, tending to higher androgens or male hormones generally increases insulin resistance. So we all of us have different levels of it is that it's normal to have some androgens or testosterone, and women have different levels of that. But if it starts to be in the category of you know, tending to higher levels, that can be a risk, a metabolic risk factor, and that can come through in our 40s Again, so that's what I just think it's in my analysis and with my patients, the simplest thing is not to guess just to test for insulin resistance, which I do by testing insulin. And also the other clues of insulin resistance would be things like high triglycerides on a blood test, especially if the other sort of markers are kind of normal. Hi al T on a liver function test, skin tags, and abdominal weight gain that the weight gain around the waist.
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analysis, it really depends on whether there's insulin resistance or not. So when you don't have insulin resistance, who are maybe already borderline under eating, who are very active, I think they need to be careful, because if they start fasting, or restricting the diet too much that they're, they're not gonna have the nutrition they need. The other difference is younger women. No, that's not what we're talking about today. But it's I just have to kind of get that make this point, that women under 35, their hormonal system, especially if they're under 30, especially if they're under 25, their hormonal system, female hormonal system is a lot more sensitive to food signals. And young women can lose their periods to a low carb diet or keto diet. So I just want to say that outright, I think my experience is that that's less likely to happen to women in their 40s. Although it can happen if with a severe, you know, extreme keto diet,
the balance is balance,
you know, the benefits of fasting and the benefits of lower carb versus stress hormones, right. So it's about with my patients, it's like you have the goal is to feel well, so if some part of it doesn't feel well, then it's not working and the marker, the barometer is sleep. So what I find is some women, if they go to low carb, especially low carb in the evening, they don't sleep. And, you know, I think I've put myself in that category. Like, I think if I don't have some starch with evening meal, I don't sleep as well. So that's where we can start to harness some of this. So my, the advice I give in the book with my patients is to maybe try to extend the bed, the benefits of the natural overnight fast of your sleep, by having a lower carb breakfast, get your protein, get some nutrition that you need, by hopefully 10am Because that signals circadian rhythm, which is also very important for all of this. And then potentially don't come in with, you know, starch until kind of later in the day. But at some point, most women are going to need something, I think just it's the the calming effect of starch for gut microbiome as well. All that said, I'm not anti the keto diet, I'm really not. So if there's someone who has severe insulin resistance and just feels well, you know, going full keto, for at least for several months, I have no problem with that. But it's always I never lose sight of the marker that it should feel good. And you should be sleeping. And if that's not happening, then something's wrong.
Yeah, I absolutely agree with you. I think that is the best marker. And I'm absolutely the same as you I find that carbohydrates a small amount in the evening. Yes, they contribute to better sleep. And I just there's a sense of calm that coupled with magnesium, which I want to come on to because you talk about magnesium being very important. And also taurine as well. You mentioned in the book, I think that's worth talking about here. Yeah, yeah,
let's stay on the topic of keto a little bit because that will lead us into the magnesium and touring. Just for anyone listening who doesn't already know this. It's not like we there's not like there's a a keto diet or the non keto diet, right? Like we, we would naturally go in and out of nutritional ketosis all the time, like, you know, overnight with exercise or a little bit of fasting. So that's cultivating metabolic flexibility. I guess what I'm saying is you don't, you don't have to get the benefits of ketosis. You don't have to be in ketosis all the time. Right? Like you can be in ketosis some of the time, overnight or after a big after a big walk or something, but then you come out of it. And that's okay. That's still a healthy thing to have done that. So just I say that because certainly what I've seen with some of my patients is it feels like it's very much all or nothing. Like I've had patients tell me Oh, I tried keto for a while. But then it didn't feel good. So I just went back to eating everything like including desserts, like I'm just like, wow, so there was no for them. There was no middle ground, right? It was just all one extreme
or the other. Yeah. So there's
that. And then to answer your question about magnesium and taurine, that nutrient duo, improved insulin sensitivity. I perhaps could have made that a little bit more clear in the book. I mean, it has many benefits, which is why I talked about it multiple times in different ways, but fundamentally For our conversation right now, Maggie's inventorying support the mitochondria, which, as you know, are the powerhouses in the cell, the little parts of the cell that turn glucose or ketones into energy, and magnesium and taurine helps with that they also both directly calm the nervous system, which is extremely helpful. For sleep for anxiety for migraines. Yeah,
and what have you found in terms of the magnesium? Is that something that you would recommend having twice a day morning and evening? Or just in the evening? What have you found works best there?
Yeah, I think it's it's flexible. There's all different ways I mean, myself personally and using with usually with my patients, I have a makeup what we can access in Australia and New Zealand quite easily on these gorgeous powders that have both magnesium glycinate and taurine and a few activated B vitamins, and they just are really quite nice. So myself, I will have that usually about four or five o'clock and would normally be having it now. But I'm talking to you instead. So yeah, that's kind of a pre dinner like just to relax. So that's when that's why I use it. Some of my patients prefer to take magnesium closer to bedtime, because they find it actually directly promote sleep I find is in terms of sleep, I find the main thing is just to get the nervous system calming down several hours before sleep, and then that together with everything that helps to promote good sleep.
Yeah, for sure. And it's really interesting when you look at, like metabolic flexibility, because I think it's funny, like I learned so much from my children full stop, that they just naturally do this. So well, you know, they they stop eating in the evening, they have relatively early dinner, they go to bed, they're completely fasted overnight, they wake up, they just want to kind of play then they break their fast have breakfast, they have many fasts between meals, which I always encourage people to do, because some people, as you say, eating constantly, and they're kind of almost absorbed in other things. And they're constantly cycling between, you know, burning more ketones and burning more glucose. And I just think we can learn a lot from them. And children as young as five are very naturally doing a 12 to 14 hour overnight fast without any problems.
That's true. Yeah, it shouldn't be hard. The other message to like, if you're metabolically healthy, and if you've had enough protein, a lot of it comes down to that. You the fasting is not, it's not a hardship, like you won't feel hungry. So I think some people have this idea that it's going to okay, this is this thing you have to endure, it's going to be hard. But no, it should be like, you're not actually hungry until it comes around time to eat again. And then you have a very satiating meal with lots of protein, and then you're not going to be hungry for four or five hours. That's a that's a normal. That's what the normal human body would do.
Yeah, that's absolutely true. And then the protein is so effective for helping in muscle mass, which we're naturally losing, isn't it?
And it's very satiating, as well. It's our primary appetite. Do you know that? I talked about it in the book a little bit? Do you know the thing it's called the protein leverage hypothesis, which is this idea that because protein is our main appetite, we will keep eating until we get enough protein. So whether just eating everything like it's looking so we can harness that we can work that.
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