by Debbie Potts | Oct 29, 2016 | podcasts, The WHOLE Athlete Podcast
Today I am excited to talk to Dr. Wilson of the “Adrenal Fatigue Solution” and the author of one of the best books required in my “Nutritional Therapy Practitioner” program (www.nta.com)
Dr. Wilson is an acknowledged expert in alternative medicine. He holds three doctorates and two Masters degrees, including a PhD in in Human Nutrition from the University of Arizona, and a doctorate in Chriopractic Medicine and Naturopathic Medicine from the Canadian Memorial Chiropractic College. He is one of the founder members of the Ontario College of Naturopathic Medicine.
During his career as a chiropractor and naturopath, Dr Wilson spent more than 25 years practicing medicine in both the US and Canada. He now spends much of his time delivering lectures and consulting on Adrenal Fatigue.
Dr. Wilson is most famous for his 2001 book, Adrenal Fatigue: The 21st Century Stress Syndrome. This was published a few years after he first coined the phrase ‘Adrenal Fatigue’, and summarizes his experience with Adrenal Fatigue patients in his private practice. Although his book remains an excellent introduction to the subject of Adrenal Fatigue, these days the focus has moved towards more general HPA axis dysfunction.
Dr. James Wilson
What is HPA Axis and the HPA Dysfunction?
What is adrenal fatigue now looked at more of a dysregulation or dysfunction of the HPA Axis?
What does the adrenal gland do for us?
Which hormones are compromised from living life as a race or chronic stress?
What are symptoms of HPA dysfunction and adrenal issues?
What do we get fat from stress?
Why do people feel depressed?
Why do so many of us feel fatigued daily and have difficulty sleeping at night?
How does stress impact our gut health?
How can we test ourselves if we have adrenal dysfunction?
How do we improve our HPA Axis?
What are solutions to prevent getting to where I have been the last four years? As I share my ideas in my book LIFE IS NOT A Race (on Amazon 11-29-16).
Dr. Wilson is an acknowledged expert in alternative medicine. He holds three doctorates and two Masters degrees, including a PhD in in Human Nutrition from the University of Arizona, and a doctorate in Chriopractic Medicine and Naturopathic Medicine from the Canadian Memorial Chiropractic College. He is one of the founder members of the Ontario College of Naturopathic Medicine.
During his career as a chiropractor and naturopath, Dr Wilson spent more than 25 years practicing medicine in both the US and Canada. He now spends much of his time delivering lectures and consulting on Adrenal Fatigue.
Dr. Wilson is most famous for his 2001 book, Adrenal Fatigue: The 21st Century Stress Syndrome. This was published a few years after he first coined the phrase ‘Adrenal Fatigue’, and summarizes his experience with Adrenal Fatigue patients in his private practice. Although his book remains an excellent introduction to the subject of Adrenal Fatigue, these days the focus has moved towards more general HPA axis dysfunction.
by Debbie Potts | Oct 25, 2016 | podcasts, The WHOLE Athlete Podcast, Uncategorized
Michol Dalcourt is an expert in human movement and performance. He is the founder of Institute of Motion, inventor of fitness device called VIPR and also a cofounder of PTA global which is for fitness professionals. As an international lecturer and educator, Michol has authored numerous articles on human design and function, developed a series of performance videos and created and athletic model for high performance training (the RMA model). -https://instituteofmotion.com/about-iom/professional-accomplishments/
Michol is more focusing on physical innovation strategies but not only for performance but also for management and sustainability of biological functions. There are also some pros and cons of training if the training dosage and exposure is too high, all of us need a healthy baseline so we can get better results and high performance.
When asked about the meaning of stress Michol replied that we all are under stress including animals. If you put an animal in the cage and provide it food daily even then you will see that it would be out of balance because it can’t move anymore and will be in stress about its food, movement etc. In the same way we have personal stress, work related stress and physical stress.
How can a person improve its performance? In response to this point Michol told that movement itself is a stress. It’s a mechanical stress and we need mechanical stress because that signals things to happen in our body. So we do know that lack of movement doesn’t facilitate the right signaling pathways. From movement perspective we would know that lack of movement and lack of exposure to mechanical stress is going to affect muscles and so muscles get smaller that’s called atrophy, our blood volume decreases and so we have frail tissues.
What is movement training and what is its impact on the sports training we do? Michol explained that we should adopt those exercises which are suitable to our body and our body easily accept them. People try to do heavy exercises in the gym all day and they get nothing except body loss and sometimes muscle injuries. Exercises should be variable and sustainability and keeping in view four quadrants. Always try to do variable exercises so your body gets nourished. Sending your children to farm instead of gym is better because you only get stress in gym as in the farm you get different positions as well as exercises.
What precautionary measures should we take to avoid injuries? In reply to this question he told us that our body cannot do same task for long time like, someone can dig a ditch whole day because his body movement, position vary every time but if we do gym exercise repeatedly we will not be able to perform it for longer period. He is not against the gym exercises but he suggested that other exercises must be a part of our routine.
What are four quadrants and how they are used in training sessions? Michol explained all quadrants through examples. Bench-press exercise for the chest, so the first quadrant is loaded and linear. Bench-press is the great example of loaded linear strength building exercise for the chest. We put load repeatedly and it leads to hypertrophy. Second quadrant is unloaded linear training consideration that might be a body weight linear part. Push-ups are different from bench-press because our body is moving and hands are static in push-ups and vice versa. Most of life depends on body and motion, in most of the gym exercises our body is static and hands are in a motion and in our life hands are still and body is in motion. Third quadrant is unloaded movement or multi planer training, crawling base push-ups is an example of this quadrant. Last quadrant is loaded multi planer training. Grabbing cable at shoulder side and so all the body parts like our hands, body and feet all have different positions at every step. So these are four exercises; a Bench-Press, a Push-ups, a Crawling Push-ups and a standing cable press, these all are chest based, they are all pushing based, they are all strength based but there is high degree of variability and we have to do all of them to improve our heath. Most of the athletes have common injuries and those all are due to heavy loadings and they wear and tear their body instead of making it good.
Find Michol at:
https://instituteofmotion.com/
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by Debbie Potts | Oct 18, 2016 | podcasts, The WHOLE Athlete Podcast
How to flatten your abs with Angie Chek:
What is your passion, mission and purpose? I was a very sick child and I was born with croup and which turned into asthma and bronchitis and doctors always give me injections and shots and things to help make me healthier and I felt worse. So developed my passion in learning natural healing and when I was in college I was like a little medicine woman. I was eating big giant corporate meals with the company and my health started fade and I started having problems with the blood sugar handling and I was diagnosed with diabetic and that’s why I started learning about what it means really to eat healthy and through that process I realized that I was eating everything in moderation which almost everything was toxic to me. So I started learning about organic food which is free from pesticides and toxins. So my mission is to spread a word and what it really means to be healthy. When people saw me as a sick child so I am getting healthier and healthier and they saw my total transformation and they say what is going on so I get an opportunity to tell them my experience.
Why do we have to teach people how to move, why do have to talk about hydration? 6 billion biochemical reactions per second going on in our body and all are water dependent. People do not know the importance of water and we have to tell them. How do we have a flatter belly? It is not just exercise, first comes nutrition, genetics and then exercise. If your ancestors were from polar region where it’s mostly cold and snow on the ground chances are they ate mostly protein and fats because they could not grow plants but if your ancestors were from the equatorial region which is sunny all day chances are they are more on vegetarian diet.
How long do you think you should feel full satisfied? If you are feeling good for three to four hours and then you need another meal that’s usually proper. If you are hungry within hour or two chances are you did not eat properly. Never ever diet so you always want to eat regularly, every three to four hours you should be eating another meal. If you are taking artificial food before going for work out you are not making body but destroying muscles because your body cannot burn off chemicals. So never diet, never eat fake food and just listen to your body if you are feeling hungry, eat. If you are feeling under stress do not add ore food to your stomach because it is not going to digest it.
Eat real food, no processed food, no preservatives just fresh and naturally produced food because naturally grown animals have higher level of omega 3 on the other hand omega 6 is not too good for health. Is you detoxification system healthy? The liver, kidneys, lungs and skin are the major organ of detoxification. If you have unhealthy face, acne and rashes the reason is your body is packed up in detoxification so the key here is drink plenty of water, eat less chemicals and beware what you are putting in your mouth and spraying in your room.
Hormones are important for fat burning and if our hormones are off indicating that something is wrong with our diet. Clean up your diet, drink plenty of water, and remove your stress. If you see hormone imbalances do not just reach for pills but pay attention to all these things we are talking about. Stress cortisol is a stress hormone in our body and when it starts increasing it shuts down our growth repair hormones particularly DHEA.
http://angiesworld.com/
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by Debbie Potts | Oct 11, 2016 | podcasts, The WHOLE Athlete Podcast
Today we have Laura Kunces back on the show to discuss fat burner, ketosis and fasting.
If we want to use fat for fuel, how do we use fat not glucose and do we need to be in ketosis to be burning fat?
Everybody burns fats in different amounts all day long. You first wake up in the morning, to keep breathing normal, going out of bed, take a shower, so your body is actually running out of fat and in ketosis you train your body to really only run off of fat. Some people are training to burn fat for little bit longer from 16-20 hours a day and really only consuming food for 8 hours a day.
What does fasting means typically?
Purposefully not consuming any food of any kind other than water. It is just a practice and its main purpose is to prevent you from food.
Why people do and who needs to do all this?
Anybody can do this because it is beneficial for health and is helpful in controlling glucose level in your body; it also stabilizes the blood sugar level. You probably won’t get into ketosis just through fasting. Insulin release in high glucose level and carbohydrates stores in lever and muscles; and rest goes into fats. Your body need to get proper ratio of nutrients but not the eating food for six to seven times a day is essential. When your body is in ketosis you often don’t experience those crazy things like hunger feelings etc.
If we have glucose level up and down then what may we use, glucose or ketosis?
Yes, you can use both, pure ketosis is really the state of your body and running out of ketones and so being in the state of ketosis typically takes anywhere from a few week or may be from few months so get somebody in to ketosis.
What you suggest blood sugar level be throughout the day?
Blood sugar level should not be less or even too high, it depends on the nature and requirement of the body. It is usually around 80/90 but after exercise or workout blood or sugar level may fluctuate but if increases, it would be the process called gluconeogenesis. In gluconeogenesis body may produce blood glucose through different sources like fats etc.
So if we are burning fats than why would our blood sugar level go higher?
It is because of gluconeogenesis process, your body making new glucose from other sources. If you are low in calories, then gluconeogenesis process has ability to bring up your blood sugar level internally. You need to very much aware of what you are taking and what is better for you. It also depends on that what you are taking in your diet and how much you burn fats and calories amount from your body. Some of the people often use protein shakes to recover the deficiencies from their body. Your body give you signals that your body need, whatever your body feel it may give you strong signals of that requirement. So, you have to listen your body and its requirements.
There are ketone supplements available in the market and you can use them with proper diet. Other things that you also need to maintain is your weight, care about your fitness level and use proper ratios of proteins.
Contact Laura and follow her blog at:
http://nutrition.exosfuel.com/author/lkunces/
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by Debbie Potts | Oct 4, 2016 | podcasts, The WHOLE Athlete Podcast
Anna Vocino is a comic, voice “overer”, actor, podcaster and now a cookbook writer. The focus on our conversation today is to discuss Anna’s new cookbook “Eat Happy”. Anna points out that people eat because they want to make themselves happy. When questioned about the fact that what brought her towards writing a cookbook? When Anna was 28, she was diagnosed with celiac disease and she had to give up gluten -that was the only thing to do for celiac disease. So, after that she had decided to introduce gluten free versions in her all recipes, sugar and grain free to make life worth living.
Anna wanted to introduce sugar free food and make people realize that processed food was not good for health. Mostly, people find it convenient to buy processed food from the grocery stores as it does not take much time …but there are food recipes that can be cooked at home in less than hour except few ones which can be called as “Sunday Food”. Anna created the cookbook to make people happy with amazing food that supports the “NSNG” way of living that Vinnie Tortorich and Anna discuss on their podcast. Anna and Vinnie for years have discussed the important of “NSNG” …avoid sugar and grains if you want to feel good, look good and be happy on the inside and out!
People spend a lot of time eating in restaurants and in hotels when traveling as a part of their eating habits -but they do not bother to cook food at home. In fact, there is a huge difference in restaurant food and the food cooked at home- quality wise. Anna’s cookbook is filled with food for every type of eater and their cravings that make them a happy camper…everyone can find dozens of tasty and delicious recipes in her “Eat Happy” cookbook.
Anna’s experience with having celiac disease motivated her to write the cookbook but also based on what sugar and grains actually does to people’s mood, gut and entire body. Honestly, most people are not aware on really know how messed up they are from eating sugar and grains. Anna used to have horrible seasonal allergies and when she took gluten out of her diet, she found that eventual her allergies cleared up when she eliminated sugar and grains. She was very appreciable thing that she got rid of health problems by just changing her “NSNG” eating plan, lifestyle and by avoiding staying on any medication.
Anna helps teach people to make cooking food at home fun- inviting friends and family over for happy gatherings. Anna was not satisfied with the oil used by restaurants for cooking food, she thought that most of the restaurants use low quality oil- restaurants keep cooking food all day in the same oil and do not even bother to change it. There are some restaurants using higher quality oil.
If we want to live a healthy life, free from diseases, then we have to start decreasing carbohydrates from our diet because they have a direct association with many of the cancers. A lot of oncologists recommend not to take much carbohydrates in daily diet. It would be better not to play with your health, no sugar no grains in our diet is better for our healthy lifestyle. No sugar no grain is just a foundation because it cuts out lot of processed food from your daily diet.
What made Anna to call her cookbook “Eat Happy?” It just might be happy to eat meals without sugar and grains. Anna felt like eating “NSNG” would make people’s life easier and happier. Cooking with Anna’s recommended recipes will bring happiness and joy in people’s life- mostly because they are off the blood sugar roller coaster and avoiding foods that make them feel crappy-which makes them feel unhappy!
If someone feels good and gets energized after eating food, then that person must be eating the right foods but if someone falls asleep, then they probably ate the wrong type of food. Happiness is a choice we have in life! No one else can make you happy -unless you decide to be make yourself happy. If you want to be happy and live a beautiful life, start by changing your food plan today- try avoiding sugar and grains (gluten). Choose what is good for your body- nourishment for the soul…good clean food will make you happy!
Order Anna’s “Eat Happy” on our shopping links on www.thewholesticmethod.com or find on Amazon!
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by Debbie Potts | Sep 27, 2016 | podcasts, The WHOLE Athlete Podcast
Ronda Collier came on “The WHOLE Athlete” podcast with me, your host Debbie Potts, to chat about the relationship between heart rate variability, sleep, recovery for athletes of all levels. We talk about how sleep is important for one’s health and discuss what is the HPA axis.
Human sleep is directly related to the level of stress- and any excess stress can result in adrenal fatigue issue. Our sympathetic nervous system activates the flight and fight hormones – including cortisol. If someone is being chased by a tiger- the “fight and flight” emergency response system in the body is activated- the stress hormones- until tiger is gone or killed. The stress hormones continue to be activated until we feel back to “normal” or rest. Similarly, in a modern living- traffic, our bosses, having children – are all stressors. The end result – we are in permanent state of “fight and flight” and we rarely take time to recover from our daily stress due to are constant busy schedules and fast moving life which leaves us living in a state of chronic “fight and flight” patterns.
When we activate our sympathetic nervous system -which then causes activation of HPA Axis (hypothalamus-pituitary-adrenal axis) then our stress hormones are released to respond to the situation including the hormone cortisol. When hypothalamus gets triggered, it causes CRH hormone to be released which acts directly on pituitary releasing ACTH (adrenocorticotropic hormone) which is also known as one of the stress hormones. ACTH travels through blood stream and acts on adrenal gland resulting in cortisol release, which is an inhibitor of ACTH and CRH. This whole mechanism of cascade is what is called feedback loop mechanism.
Heart Rate Variability (HRV0 is used to measure the activity of autonomic nervous system including sympathetic and parasympathetic nervous system and vagal tone. Valgus nerve is 10th cranial nerve which is involved in mediating heart rate to slow it down. Strong vagal tone helps to encounter the effects of “fight and flight” hormones by decreasing heart rate. The hormones cortisol, along with helping react to “fight or flight” situations, is also a moderator of sleep cycles. Cortisol, as well as melatonin- has got a 24-hour circadian rhythm. Stress hormones are good for short term activation and but harmful when activated non-stop (dripping faucet) as it will eventually weaken the immune system and disrupts the 24 -hours circadian rhythm of cortisol. Stress once again disrupts another body system- as it throws off the circadian rhythm by increasing the cortisol in the evening-middle of the night when it is to be low and the melatonin should be higher.
At morning, cortisol is at its peak – around 9:00am and gradually decreases around noon then dips down at 3:00pm to 4:00pm when people feel sleepy – then there is continuous drop till midnight when it reaches its minimum value and it starts increasing again and peaks at 9:00am. That’s typical circadian 24-hour cortisol circadian rhythm. Chronic stress can cause cortisol dysregulation. Too much of anything as I say is toxic…and leads to dysregulation in the body including sleep and even your thyroid. The excessive activation of cortisol can affect the thyroid function because cortisol inactivates T3 thyroid hormone and shunts it into reverse T3- which then results in thyroid problems.
If thyroid hormones are low -and the body perceives stress- then the HPA Axis is activated, then again the stress hormone cortisol is released. We can get ourselves into a non- stop cycle which can make one insane. Once chronic thyroid and cortisol dysregulation happens, this can activate adrenaline acting as a substitute for cortisol which can result in a more dreadful panic feeling. So, this is a reason that many people wake up at 3:00am or 4:00am in a panic state -then they can’t go back to sleep again. Dysfunctional HPA Axis activity may play a role in some sleep disorders but in other cases HPA dysfunction is actually the result of poor sleep or sleep disorders, so it’s all an interconnected thing.
Now if we see deeply, there are 5 stages of sleep.
Stage 1: It’s a transition phase from waking to sleeping, consists of 5-10 minutes.
Stage 2: It is a stage of a light sleep. During this phase body temperature and heart rate decreases. This stage of sleep lasts for 20 minutes.
Stage 3: This stage is a mixture of light and deep sleep. During this period lower than 50%of slow delta brain waves are released.
Stage 4: In this stage of sleep, more than 50% of slow delta brain waves are released.
Stage 5: This is a stage of rim sleep. A person feels increased rate of respiration and increased or hyper brain activity and mixed frequency of brain waves are released.
One cycle of sleep lasts between 90-110 minutes and a normal person experiences 7-8 cycles in a single sleep.
Whenever there is increased secretion of cortisol and adrenaline during sleep, a person wakes up. Mind starts talking to itself and a state of anxiety is experienced and a person gets worried. When someone is having a good sleep and normal cortisol levels, the nervous system repairs itself in that time period along with muscular, hormonal as well as psychological repair.
It’s never good to sleep little as majority people feel proud or more cool to say that “oh man! I only sleep 4 hours a day and I feel fine the whole day.” It’s proven to be a genetic disorder in a very little percentage of the population who never sleep at all or sleep for a very little time. Scientifically proven, everyone needs 8-9 hours’ sleep a day. It’s only a super person who would never sleep. Similarly, it’s not a good idea for anyone to get up too early. The best way to stay fit and lose weight is not to have crazy workouts, it’s all about what you eat and what type of stress someone is facing. Too much stress causes craving for food, disturbed sleep resulting in more storage of fat inside body.
Ronda shared her personal experience that she is a good sleeper just because she has put stress out of her life, she’s having her own company, life is great for her. She had been doing meditation in 2005 and yoga for 10 years. She kept waking up suddenly before that time and after going through some book she took advice that she got rid of all the wireless things present in her house. She turned off the Wi-Fi, she got landline number, plugged in computer instead of laptop, turned off cellphone at night or activated airplane mode. After doing all that she never woke up in the middle of night. She’s having a good sleep now. One of the customers of Ronda who was measuring her night time HRV, her HRV was going down during night. When she used to go to the bed, she felt good but when she used to getup, she felt terrible. So she told her that maybe she was sleeping on something allergic and it came out to be true.
Ronda recommends to use HRV. So how can HRV be turned on when phone is on airplane mode? Ronda told that when phone is on airplane mode, one can turn on the Bluetooth and then use the HRV. And that’s a good thing to track sleep according to Ronda. People don’t care about the time of the stages of their sleep, what they really care about is, is their nervous system getting repaired or is their body recovering. So how can one tell that what stage a person is having during HRV test. Ronda said that you can’t, as it took her years of research reading HRV. So the trend of HRV ideally to have a sound sleep throughout the night is that it goes up i.e. trend line should be up going. Let’s suppose, it’d be 50 when someone is about to sleep and 70 when one is awake. On asking about changing the room or pillow cases nightly like someone keeps one and others keep 4 pillows, about changing bedsheets. Ronda recommended that one should not focus or notice over the small things even about which one has never thought about. So first of all room should be changed and then HRV should be checked, if it’s increasing, then room is fine otherwise one should get back to his/her room and then pillow cases should be changed or mattresses, bedsheets, carpet etc. And the most important thing is to keep electronics out of the room.
It’s amazing that we have got several sleep cycles averaging 110 minutes every night, so how many cycles are we going to have every night is 6 or 7. When interviewer asked Ronda that she was going to the washroom at night more often even she doesn’t drink much water and doctor told her that when she woke up for washroom, it was not really for washroom which was keeping her up but it was something else which was there in her back of the mind, even sometimes in a dream when person needs to go to the toilet, one wakes up. And mostly this thing happens around 3:00am or 4:00am in the morning or at the end of stage 5 of the sleep.
When someone lays down in bed straight and even not sleeping, that’s also fine instead of starting panicking as laying perfectly still is also resting the body and relaxes it. Many people glorify themselves as to be staying busy i.e. they take it as a success for them but that’s not true. Ronda gives her own example that every day she wakes up at 7:30am or 8:00am, goes to office between 9:30am or 10:00am and then comes to bed at 11:00pm. She never sets alarms and also recommends never to set alarms. She advices to leave alarm thing up to your conscious because if we are dependent on alarms all the time then there is a chance that we might keep sleeping when we forget to set alarm one night accidently. That’s the reason that Ronda never sets alarms and gets up at 7:30am or 8:00am every day and she sets alarms only when she has to wake up earlier.
Also there are some online applications which can be used to wake up at perfect time from your sleep as no one wants to get up from deep sleep as it’s bad. Let’s suppose if someone wants to get up at 6:00am with alarm, then with the help of that application you can wake up at the perfect time around 6:00am, that can be 5:50am or 6:10am. So these applications wake up people from their sleep at the best possible time of their sleep cycle.
Summary of our sleep cycle:
Stage 1: it’s in and out sleep phase in which one can wake up easily
Stage 2: it’s the time when eyes movements stop and brain waves become slower with occasional bursts of rapid brain waves
Stage 3: it’s a period when there is release of extremely slow delta waves from the brain
Stage 4: during this phase, slower delta waves are released.
Stage 3 and stage 4 are also known as deeper sleep stage.
Stage 5 is also known as “REM” sleep.
Is there any way to have a longer deep sleep stage or is a bad thing?
Ronda said no- we can’t stay in it for long as it’s a short sleep period. Ronda stopped her research because of the duration of the stages of the sleep because no one can do anything about it. What we can do, is to make sure that we are not over training, that we are not in a state of chronic stress, we are going to bed at the same time every night after turning off all the electronics and also one can use blue filters, as they are really helpful and one can sleep earlier by using these blue filters. Also these blue filters are inexpensive i.e. one filter costs nearly $7 and they can easily be bought from amazon (see our shopping links on www.thewholesticmethod.com).
What are your questions for Ronda Collier? Post them on our Facebook page!
If you like what you are listening to- then please go to ITunes and give us a review…ideally five stars! Thank you for helping us grow the podcast and getting our show on the top of the Health & Fitness podcast list on ITunes. Spread the word…The WHOLESTIC Method approach to teaching your body to burn fat, optimize your health and improve your performance from the inside out. Your host – Debbie Potts.
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