How Addiction is linked to Dopamine Deficiency
Episode 144
Addiction can come in all shapes and sizes: addiction to drugs, unhealthy foods, or even bad health practices. This week on Integrative Wellness Radio. Dr. Nicole is shedding light on the topic of addiction with the question of “How” & “Why” addiction happens. She links it with how people with dopamine and other hormonal deficiencies stand a greater risk of falling victim to all sorts of addiction. The doctor then explains how conventional medicine overlooks your body as a whole and why prescribing antidepressants in response to things like addiction can play a role in causing neurological issues in the long run. Tune in to this episode to get a better insight. Interested in working with IWG? Book a complimentary consult call to learn more using this link: https://bit.ly/IWRcall2022 Noteworthy Time Stamps: 02:35 You don’t know what you don’t know 04:33 Your symptoms are real 07:18 It’s not your fault 11:48 A patient’s story 17:34 The 3 things your brain needs 27:43 Addiction is not normal brain function 33:20 What happens when dopamine gets too high? 40:35 How Bioresonance technology helps 51: Healthcare should be about answers
Topics: addiction, brain, unknown, dopamine, different, deficiency, testing, integrative
Key takeaways from this episode
- Nicole to learn more about the top trends in integrative medicine to learn about what the limitations are with testing and what you can do to start your health journey.
- If anything, depression and anxiety are almost thought to be the same thing, and there's also a lot of assumptions that everything is a serotonin deficiency, which usually results in antidepressants.
- Because very rarely do people even know that you can test for neurotransmitter levels, which is serotonin, dopamine, and I'm really gonna be discussing like what is the difference between the deficiencies in those different neurotransmitters.
- This month, we're shedding light on a variety of different neurological conditions, and it's unfortunate that we're living in such an epidemic of depression and anxiety.
- We can obviously blame it on stress, we can blame it on a serotonin deficiency, but you don't really know unless you do the right testing and really uncover what is the testing that exists that is not being used conventionally.
Pull quotes
Imagine if medicine actually looked at you as a whole, opposed to looking at you as a bunch of separate systems.
Nicole to learn more about the top trends in integrative medicine to learn about what the limitations are with testing and what you can do to start your health journey.
This month, we're shedding light on a variety of different neurological conditions, and it's unfortunate that we're living in such an epidemic of depression and anxiety.
Transcript
**Unknown:** I've been up all night, no sleep. Imagine if medicine actually looked at you as a whole, opposed to looking at you as a bunch of separate systems. No sleep. Dive into Integrative Wellness Radio with Dr.
**Unknown:** Nick and Dr. Nicole to learn more about the top trends in integrative medicine to learn about what the limitations are with testing and what you can do to start your health journey. Sometimes I tend to lose myself when I'm out here on my own. Hello.
**Unknown:** Hello, everyone. We have a really, really good topic that we're talking about today. This month, we're shedding light on a variety of different neurological conditions, and it's unfortunate that we're living in such an epidemic of depression and anxiety. And for those of us especially living in the northeast right now, a lot of us are really feeling the brunt of the winter blues, which is also known as seasonal affective disorder.
**Unknown:** And then I know this personally hits home for me is, um, addiction. And there is a huge, huge epidemic of addiction right now as well. Um, personally, just in the hometown that I grew up in, um, since I've moved home, which has been about eight years now, uh, there's been thirty people that have passed away from heroin overdose. And this is not necessarily good friends, but just people that I know that I went to school with.
**Unknown:** So this is a pretty scary number, and that's just people that I know, let alone other people that are also dealing with the same thing. So the goal of tonight is to really be able to talk a little bit more about what are the limitations with the conventional approach, um, 'cause unfortunately there's really not much testing being done. If anything, depression and anxiety are almost thought to be the same thing, and there's also a lot of assumptions that everything is a serotonin deficiency, which usually results in antidepressants. So it's a very, very linear approach for people that are very, very different, that all have different needs, all have different traumas, all have different biochemistry, and my goal is to really help you understand some of the imbalances that can happen, um, some of the infections that can cause us to have issues neurologically and really just the top three things that our brain needs to function optimally.
**Unknown:** So, um, as we kind of get into the topic, just to kind of reiterate, I wanna go into really understanding or having people understand that you really don't know what you don't know when it comes to your anxiety and depression. We can obviously blame it on stress, we can blame it on a serotonin deficiency, but you don't really know unless you do the right testing and really uncover what is the testing that exists that is not being used conventionally. Because very rarely do people even know that you can test for neurotransmitter levels, which is serotonin, dopamine, and I'm really gonna be discussing like what is the difference between the deficiencies in those different neurotransmitters. Because having a dopamine deficiency is actually very different than have a ser- having a serotonin deficiency from, first of all, how you support it, but second of all, the symptoms that you have.
**Unknown:** And then, of course, I do wanna give you some really basic tools to be able to start changing the biochemistry of your brain or even the biochemistry of your gut if that's part of the reason why you feel the way you do. Um, but for those of you that are kind of new to this world of integrative medicine, myself, my name is Dr. Nicole Rivera. Um, I run a practice called Integrative Wellness Group.
**Unknown:** And, you know, the biggest thing that I feel like allows us to stand apart is that we always kind of question what was readily available, and we... because of the voice that we saw, not only with what was happening conventionally, and I mean this just like the traditional medicine approach, but in addition, just the plateaus that we hit with our patient care, and this really came down to not everybody's the same, everybody needs a more personalized approach, and it led us to digging deeper and deeper and deeper with the right type of testing. So that's kind of how we evolved into who we are today, but at the same time is I don't even act as a physician. Some days I'm acting more as an investigator, and I'm really digging, digging, digging and asking the right questions to really be able to uncover what's going on with the person because that's step number one is, first of all, acknowledging that your symptoms are real.
**Unknown:** Because unfortunately a lot of you that are listening to this are probably been told that everything's in your head, and all of your testing looks good, and nobody knows what's wrong with you, so you're just depressed, or you're just an anxious person. And unfortunately, that's just bad medicine in my opinion. But I dig deeper and find out it's not in your head. You're not crazy.
**Unknown:** You're not just depressed. You have a whole slew of things that are causing you to feel the way that you do. And that kind of brings me to, you know, what do I do? I classify myself as an integrative medicine physician, and I classify myself as that because it's...
**Unknown:** I can work with a variety of different conditions, including anxiety, including depression, including bipolar, including seasonal affective disorder, but it's not because I'm just the master expert in, in that and I only treat that. It's because I do testing to actually decipher what is the root to why you feel that way. And once you figure that out, it just allows the person to just have that aha moment to be like, "Oh my gosh, that makes so much sense." And it also frees you from feeling so guilty about you feeling the way that you do and feeling low or feeling depressed because there's usually a re-- it's not there's usually, there's always a reason. There is always a reason for why you feel the way you do.
**Unknown:** So with that being said, you know, some of you might be also wondering like, "How did I even get into this in the first place?" And I didn't get into this because I had a lot of problems. At the end of the day, I actually thought I was really healthy, and when I did my testing, it uncovered that I had a slew of issues. And what I realized at that moment was that I just normalized those issues. The occasional depression, I blamed it on, "Oh, I was busy this week.
**Unknown:** I didn't get enough sleep. Oh, I have a lot of stress going on. Oh, I don't like my job."Or if I had anxiety, it was just like, "Oh, well, my mom's like that," and, you know, "Oh, I, I have a reason to worry because, you know, everyone should be worried about that." And there were all these different things that I just settled for being my complete normal, and I realized that they weren't normal, they were all an effect and a result. So that was very empowering to me, and that's why I do this, because I want you to understand that this is not something that's just in your head.
**Unknown:** We have so many different things that are working against us in our current environment, and there is a lot of contributing factors to why we are dealing with depression and anxiety and seasonal affective disorder and all of the other mental health disorders. So first and foremost, I want all of you to know is it's not your fault if you have not been able to get better. It is not your fault if you've had relationships that you've compromised because you've been depressed and anxious. It is not your fault that you're maybe not talking to a family member right now because you just don't feel like yourself.
**Unknown:** At the end of the day, you have to decipher what is the root of why you feel the way you do, and then you need a strategy. This is not about just putting a Band-Aid on it. This is about strategy, and it takes time. It takes strategy to get strategy, and you have to have the right testing to, to do that in the first place.
**Unknown:** So just kind of a preliminary before we really dive into all of the things in relation to mental health is I just want you to understand that there are a couple of reasons why you haven't been able to-- you haven't been able to get the answers. And I'm going to just kind of lead with that the fact that our entire system is built on specialists and experts is segregating out your mental health from all of your other body systems, and that's not in reality how it works. You can easily have a variety of different mental health issues, maybe if they're-- they come and go, maybe if they're there all the time, that are due to infections, that are due to your circulation, that are due to your blood sugar. How many of us get hangry if we didn't eat for a while?
**Unknown:** And we think, "Oh, well, you know, I just need to eat, so no big deal." That's actually a warning sign that you're having massive pancreatic stress that is not giving your brain glucose. So the fact that we have to work with all separate specialists to deal with our blood sugar issues as well as our cardiovascular system, as well as our neurological system, and then our mental health, that is never going to serve us, and it is not going to give us the root cause to why we feel the way we do. And the basic most simple example is that ninety to ninety-five percent of your serotonin is made in your gut. So if you have a gut problem, you go to a gastroenterologist.
**Unknown:** But if you have a depression problem, you're going to go to a psychiatrist or a psychologist. So to think that those systems are completely separate is bad science. And the other question that I get on a regular basis is, "Why doesn't everybody do what you do? Why doesn't everybody look at the body the way you do?
**Unknown:** Why doesn't everybody use this technology?" And at the end of the day, I think a lot of us know that medicine is for profit in, in the US especially. And when you're talking about the way the system is designed is the system is designed on chemistry. So the most basic thing that we do on an annual basis is get blood work. Blood work is a chemistry-based test because if your chemistry is altered, compromised, off, whatever you want to call it, then the way that we are going to essentially try to put it back into range is by manipulating that pathway with chemistry, which is pharmacology.
**Unknown:** So the whole system is based off of broken chemistry gets fixed with chemistry, which is the foundation of the med- of medicine in the US, which is drugs. So when you step outside of just relying on that, there's this whole other world of integrative medicine, and you realize there are many, many strategies out there, or I should say many tools out there, but the biggest thing that we do is create strategy with the resources that exist. And that is super, super important because maybe you do need an antidepressant, but to think that that's gonna solve your problem and that you're just gonna numb yourself and not deal with your underlying trauma, that's not gonna serve you in the long run. And I'm also gonna talk to you about neurotransmitters like serotonin, they have to be in perfect balance.
**Unknown:** If you have too low a serotonin, you're gonna have depression. If you have too high of serotonin, you're gonna have anxiety. So for us to think that we could just pound these medications over the long term, and don't be wrong, this is not your fault. Like, you're just being told this is your solution.
**Unknown:** But when you look at serotonin toxicity or excess serotonin, that actually leads to anxiety. So we need to get away from this concept of the, the one pill or the, the one-size-fits-all treatment because this is what's gotten us in trouble in the first place. So I want to tell you a story. I think this is really relevant for this more of the information we're gonna talk about.
**Unknown:** So I had a patient, and this is many patients, but this specific woman, she, you know... I had to actually get on a call with her to even get office because she's been to tons of doctors, and she was just like, "I don't really have any hope left. You're kind of my last resort, and I, you know, I don't even really know if I want to come 'cause I don't-- I can't imagine you're gonna do anything different than what I've had done already." And she decided to come in, and we uncovered, you know, a variety of different things, but her biggest complaints was depression, anxiety. I personally felt that she had a lot of rumination.
**Unknown:** She pretty much said things over and over and over. So if you've ever had, um, like a fight with a relative or a spouse, and you s- you replayed it over and over in your mind, that's rumination. A lot of us do that on a daily basis and are not even aware of it 'cause it's our normal.But she also had a history of a lot of trauma, um, a lot of loss, a lot of abandonment. And this was, you know, all things that she was aware of, that she was dealing with, and she was dealing with it for a very, very long time.
**Unknown:** And then as she got older, she was then, uh, diagnosed with POTS syndrome. POTS syndrome is when you're having a lot of circulatory issues that cause you to be lightheaded, dizzy. It can even lead to fainting. So she was told that these-- all of her issues were completely separate.
**Unknown:** And when we were digging into all of her testing, what it really turned out to be is that the biggest culprit behind her, um, actual neurological stress was the fact that her brain was getting zero oxygen because she had such a poor circulatory system. And then when we dug deeper, one of her losses in her life was her mother, who passed away from an aortic aneurysm, which is pretty much a rupture in the aorta, which is part of your cardiovascular system. So genetically, she had a more fragile cardiovascular system, but she didn't know how to take care of it because nobody actually educated her on that. So she had these long-standing issues that wasn't allowing for her to get proper blood supply to the brain, which changed her neurotransmitters and caused her to actually be depressed, anxious, and also just replay her trauma over and over and over in her mind.
**Unknown:** So for me to sit there and try to mend her neurotransmitter pathways but never address the root cause of her circulatory system, I would have never helped her. So it was a completely different approach than she expected. She was happy because I didn't give her the same run-of-the-mill that everybody else did. But this is really a matter of piecing the puzzle together and looking at the body from an integrative perspective.
**Unknown:** So one of the most fun things about my job is I get to blow minds every day. I usually love when I get to see at least one mouth drop a day. But, um, I think that a couple of really important things about this topic is number one is depression has many faces, and those of you that are listening probably know that. You know, you can have someone who completely can't get out of bed.
**Unknown:** There's other people that are fully functioning but are kind of depressed behind closed doors. There's other people that just stuff it down and suppress it and internalize it. And then there's other people that just lash out when it gets too much. And a lot of times too is we kind of confuse depression and anxiety, or those terms get used interchangeably, and we think that they're the same thing, or we get told that they're the same thing, when in reality, they're very, very different.
**Unknown:** We also think that addiction runs in our families and that it's genetic and it's just m-lack of discipline and poor behavior. Um, there's actually a root cause to addiction that stems from imbalances in the brain. And another thing too is a lot of our programming clouds our confidence, and it makes us very reactive. Um, how many of us have had a reactive situation that we got super annoyed at something somebody said, you know?
**Unknown:** We're like, "I'm not gonna hang out with them anymore. I don't like them. I'm gonna ignore them. This person's written off." And, you know, one of the most fascinating things that I felt l-was very liberating to me in this, you know, uh, evolution of my life is, you know, those judgments and resentments that we have towards others are really just a matter of us instilling our value system onto them or them instilling their value system onto us and us being annoyed about it.
**Unknown:** So at the end of the day, we are always going to have people in our lives that are there to challenge us, and we're not gonna always be around people that have the same value system, and that's okay, and we need to understand that. So if you inject your values onto someone else and you tell somebody how they should eat and how they should live their life, they're going to be resentful to you, and they're gonna lash out at you. And the same thing g-it goes the other way. If you're being highly triggered or affected by someone, it's because they're instilling their values, and you're being triggered by that.
**Unknown:** And, you know, at the end of the day, you just have to sit back and be like, "That's cool that that's your values. It's not mine. But thank you for your opinion." 'Cause at the end of the day, it's all people's opinions. You know, we are living in this digital world that there's a million comments, and people can say whatever they want, and they have their keyboard confidence.
**Unknown:** And, you know, I had a conversation today is, "That's your opinion. That's great that that's your opinion. But everybody's entitled to one, but it doesn't necessarily hold validity in my life, and it shouldn't hold validity, validity in your life." Everyone is entitled to their opinion, and at the end of the day, it's just an opinion. It doesn't define us.
**Unknown:** So really coming back to more of this biochemistry piece and some of these physiological things that we can be dealing with that are affecting our neurological system is your brain needs three things, and those three things, one of them is stable blood sugar. So if you're a diabetic, if you're hypoglycemic, um, if you have either Type 1 or Type 2 diabetes, if you're hyperglycemic, whatever it is, you have an issue with blood sugar, and maybe you haven't been diagnosed, but maybe you're that person who gets super hangry if you don't eat for a while. That is a blood sugar issue. Then the other thing that your brain needs is oxygen, and that comes from proper blood flow.
**Unknown:** So if you're a person who gets migraines, headaches, pressure, or you have cold hands and feet, chances are you don't have proper amounts of blood flow to your head, and you are not going to necessarily have proper oxygenation of your brain tissue. The next one is stimulation. So stimulation is exercise. Many of us are living a sedentary lifestyle.
**Unknown:** We're not making time to exercise, or we feel like too much of crap to actually exercise. And then the other thing too is after we get out of high school, get out of college...We kind of stop learning unless, you know, that's our passion or that's one of our values, is we get very stuck in our jobs. You know, we don't learn new things. We don't stimulate our brains in, you know, in a very productive way.
**Unknown:** Our brains become very stagnant, and our pathways become stagnant as well. Because you could be developing new pathways in your brain that make your brain healthier, or you could be actually shutting down pathways because you're only using certain ones in a day. So it's really, really important for you to figure out what you get excited about and read a book. Learn something new and read a book, a physical book.
**Unknown:** Do not read on your Kindle. You're activating completely different pathways, um, that are not necessarily healthy pathways. You need to get back to the basics and start picking up paper. Write.
**Unknown:** Even if it's just, like, you write notes for yourself. Um, get off the technology at least for a little while because we're just... it's so linear the way that we're using our brains, and we're not branching out. So I wanna kind of dive into these topics a little bit more.
**Unknown:** So blood sugar. There's a couple of reasons why you can have abnormal blood sugar, but one of my personal relatable situations is hypoglycemia. So how many of you that are listening don't eat breakfast in the morning? And even if you do, you eat breakfast after you drink coffee or some type of caffeinated beverage.
**Unknown:** Probably many of you. So you wake up. You don't really eat. It perpetuates to the point that you almost are, like, offended by food in the morning.
**Unknown:** You're just like, "Ugh, I cannot eat anything 'cause I feel, like, a little nauseous, or I'm just totally not hungry." Then you drink some type of caffeine, and you suppress your appetite. Then it gets to, like, between twelve and two, and you're ravenous, and you're like, "Give me anything." And then you find yourself eating carbs to spike your blood sugar. You're not doing this consciously. You're doing this unconsciously, by the way.
**Unknown:** You spike your blood sugar 'cause it's so low at this point. Then you crave caffeine in the afternoon because now you're tired. And then after that, you go home. You eat dinner.
**Unknown:** You're usually snacking on cheese and crackers and all these things before you-- a- because you're so hungry as you're making dinner. Then you make dinner. You overeat, and then you want sugar. I think many of you can relate to that.
**Unknown:** Like, throw a hand up if you can. So this is something that we call hypoglycemia. So if your blood sugar is low, that's equally as bad as you being a diabetic because what's happening is your blood-- your, your brain runs on glucose. So if the glucose is too low, your brain can't use it.
**Unknown:** And then if you're diabetic, you become insulin resistant, meaning your insulin is what allows your brain to use the glucose. And now the insulin doesn't work, so your brain can't even get the glucose. So now you have a bunch of glucose floating around in your blood just causing a boatload of problems. So it doesn't matter if your blood sugar is high or if your blood sugar is low, it is going to cause massive problems to your brain.
**Unknown:** And they found that in diabetics, your brain is shrinking, AKA it is degenerating. So it is no joke to be a diabetic. I can't tell you how many diabetics I work with, and they're just like, "Oh, I just take my medicine, and that's it." And, like, literally, you're on your way to dementia. And I know that that is a harsh reality, but that is reality.
**Unknown:** So for your kids who are eating like crap, and you're like, "Ugh, it's too difficult. I can't deal with it. They don't-- they have a picky diet." They're eating sugar, processed food. E- everything's out of a box.
**Unknown:** They're going to Chipotle. Yeah, Chipotle's not that healthy. They're just constantly eating sugar and carbs. And you think, "Well, they're young.
**Unknown:** Their bodies are more resilient." They're literally deteriorating their brains, and this is why we have so much ADD and so many learning disabilities, and we have autism, and we have Asperger's. Don't me wrong, there are a lot of reasons for these things, but sugar is definitely a recipe for disaster. So in addition to that, um, some other things that cause pancreatic stress also comes down to your gut. Your pancreas is part of your gut, so if you have infections in your gut, maybe you have IBS, maybe you have indigestion, heartburn, you could easily have infections that are now affecting your pancreas that are throwing off your blood sugar.
**Unknown:** So it's not always about what you put in. Sometimes it is just about the stress that your pancreas is under because of infections, and that is very, very common. Oxygen. So again, I already kinda gave this away.
**Unknown:** If you have low blood pressure, if you have migraines, if you have headaches, if you have visual issues, if you have, um, ocular migraines, if you have dizziness, if you have vertigo, if you have cold hands and feet, chances are you have blood supply issues to your brain. Your brain is not getting enough oxygen. Oxygen and glucose are the two nutrients that your brain needs, and this is going to cause you to be foggy and depressed and anxious, and that could perpetuate into bigger things later, like schizophrenia and bipolar and seizure disorder, et cetera. So this is no joke about getting proper oxygenation to your brain.
**Unknown:** Um, one of the very simple things is doing something like yoga that puts you in an inverted position that allows your blood flow to work with gravity to get to your head. This is something that's super simple. Um, but obviously, if you have Raynaud's, uh, phenomenon, you probably have a very significant cardiovascular issue that is not being diagnosed properly because it's thought that Raynaud's just happens, and it's no big deal. But think about it.
**Unknown:** Your hands and your feet are farthest from your heart. Not only is your brain far from your heart, but also your blood has to pump against gravity. So getting your blood into your brain is actually more difficult than you think. So if you have any type of roadblocks, or you have, you know, a, a poor heart muscle or anything like that, that is going to make it even more difficult.
**Unknown:** So stimulation, again, we've kinda scratched the surface on this, is... You know, some of you might be relating to this. If you drive a long distance, maybe you drive two hours, three hours, and you get really fatigued, like physically fatigued, that is-Not your body, that is your mental fatigue because you are-- if you're someone who doesn't drive a lot, and then you drive this long distance, you're activating pathways that are not stimulated, and you're getting massive neurological fatigue that is actually manifesting as physical fatigue. So this comes down to you're in the same groove every day.
**Unknown:** You're not doing a new type of exercise. You're not doing a new hobby. You're not getting out and learning something new. You're just in the day-to-day, same job, boring, same tasks.
**Unknown:** Um, you're literally going to have a huge portion of your brain that is not being stimulated and then other parts of your brain that are overly developed that can lead you to being anxious and depressed because certain pathways, depending on what they are, especially if you work on a computer all day, you could be strengthening pathways that induce more negative behaviors and feelings. So it's important for you to branch out and stimulate your brain in different ways. So the role of toxicity is also significant in this. Um, if we think about just anatomy, our mouth is very close to our brain, and we are dealing with fillings in our teeth.
**Unknown:** We're getting fluoride cleanings. We're getting, uh, root canals, which is dead matter in your mouth, receding gum lines, bleeding gums. All of these things are toxic to us, and this can get into the nerves of your face, which can then go right back into your brain. So if you have a boatload of silver in your mouth, chances are you are having some level of mercury that could be affecting your neurological system as well.
**Unknown:** So this is not just about the oxygenation, stimulation, and glucose or blood sugar. This is also we live in a very, very toxic world, and we need to consider this piece because I know for me, I was extremely toxic with mercury, and it had nothing to do with fillings in my teeth 'cause I still to this day have never had one, but I was a pescatarian for ten years, and all I ate was fish. So I primarily ended up giving myself mercury toxicity by consumption of fish. So if you haven't learned by now, you don't know what you don't know, um, because I would have never known that I had mercury toxicity if I didn't test it, and that's not a conventional test.
**Unknown:** Nobody's testing that in your blood. Nobody's testing that when you go for your annual checkup. But these are very real things that I see a lot that are a huge culprit behind our brains being stressed. So the point of all of this is we need to take a step back.
**Unknown:** We need to acknowledge what we are accepting as our norm because if we feel depressed and we go, as women, "Oh, well, it's just around my menstrual cycle," this is all not normal. Feeling depressed, feeling anxious, having addiction, none of these things are normal brain function, and we need to stop settling for it and just thinking that there's something wrong with us. "Oh, there's-- that's just me. Oh, it runs in my family.
**Unknown:** It's just genetic." Because there is so much out there that we can actually do about it. So some of the top myths that I personally feel like are in relation to mental health is, one, depression is always caused by a serotonin deficiency. Um, addiction is solely behavioral or even genetic. Anxiety is genetic or hereditary, um, that you've had test-- the proper testing for your mental health issues, and that you have no control over your mental health.
**Unknown:** So as we kind of go in, starting first and foremost with, uh, depression is always caused by a serotonin deficiency. This is really, really important. So if you have a true serotonin deficiency, then you potentially have lost enjoyment in things that you've once loved. Um, you're finding very hard to find joy being around your family.
**Unknown:** You're finding hard to find joy in hobbies you used to like. Um, you're really just-- nothing is making you happy, and you can have all the money in the world and the beau-- most beautiful house and all these great things, and you just are not happy. Another thing is, is you might find that you're kind of snapping into rage or, or anger, and you probably are not able to really sleep deeply. But on the flip side, there's dopamine, and dopamine is a little bit different.
**Unknown:** Dopamine is when you feel very hopeless and very worthless. Um, it's easy to lose your temper. You find it's really hard to cope with stress, um, hard to get motivated, and you kinda just stop caring 'cause you just feel so hopeless. And there is-- these are very different symptoms that indicate two very different deficiencies, and they need to be worked with very differently.
**Unknown:** Um, number one, when it comes to serotonin, most of your serotonin is made in your gut but also your frontal cortex. So if you've had a bad head injury to the front of your head, and you're that person that now has lost joy in many of the things, yeah, you probably do actually have a serotonin deficiency. But if it's from an injury, then you probably need to heal your brain and give it the nutrients that it needs as opposed to thinking that an SSRI is just gonna fix the problem. And like I said before is that if you go the route of taking an antidepressant, it's a very fine line because if your serotonin is too low, you're depressed, but if your serotonin is too high, you then shift into becoming anxious.
**Unknown:** So it's very important to know that these look different, and you have to be strategic in the treatment. So secondary to that is, uh, seasonal affective disorder. So all of us that are in our complete winter slump right now, and we're hating the winter and trying to run for the hills, this is actually due to serotonin deficiency.Interesting enough is we have serotonin receptors in our skin that the sun activates. So when we're in the sun, we activate the serotonin in the skin, and then it helps to boost our, uh, level in our bodies.
**Unknown:** So this plays a very big role in feeling less depressed in the summer. So there are many ways that you could support serotonin without necessarily antidepressants. But step number one is balance your blood sugar. So if you are the person who does not eat breakfast or you eat breakfast after drinking coffee or some other type of caffeine, you need to eat thirty minutes within waking up, and you need to eat something that is protein and fat-based.
**Unknown:** Stop with the oatmeal, the cereals, the granola. Stop with all of that. And I'm not saying long term, but you need to eat something almost like keto-esque in the morning before caffeine to balance your blood sugar to start to boost your serotonin levels. So on the flip side, when you're dealing with dopamine.
**Unknown:** So dopamine is interesting because dopamine has a lot to do with pleasure-seeking. So when we see massive dopamine deficiency, this has a lot to do with our addictive behaviors. So if you're... And, and I should clarify, I'm not talking about heroin.
**Unknown:** I'm not talking about alcohol per se. Yes, those are part of it. But I know for me, I had a dopamine deficiency, I had no idea that I did, but I used to get stressed and I was like, "Give me a mocha latte." So it doesn't need to be drugs or cigarettes or wine, but it could be sugar, it could be carbs, it could be fried food, it could be speeding, it could be gambling, it could be a variety of different things. But when your dopamine is, is suppressed, you will seek out these pleasure-seeking, um, stimulus.
**Unknown:** But unfortunately, if you smoke the cigarette, it only gives you a short-term high, and if you drink the mocha latte, it gives you a short-term high. And that's why you're always going back for those same types of pleasures. So it's a matter of if you can get your dopamine boosted, then you don't necessarily-- you can move away from those addictive behaviors. So the other thing, again, the same way serotonin, if it gets too high, it can make you anxious.
**Unknown:** If you have dopamine become too high, you can actually develop like psychosis or schizophrenia. So it's very, very important for you to understand this no matter what route you go. If you go pharmaceutical route or if you go natural route, is anytime you're working with the neurotransmitters, it should be r- uh, heavily regulated, and it also should never be permanent or long term. Because once you're able to fix the root, so maybe that's the oxygen, the blood flow, maybe it's the blood sugar, that will then allow your brain to function more optimally.
**Unknown:** So the other thing that, um, your dopamine does is it regulates your prolactin. So there are some women that get, uh, they have trouble with breastfeeding, and that's a prolactin issue, and it can be stemmed from dopamine. And then there are other people that have, uh, pituitary part of your brain enlargement, and that also comes back to dopamine deficiencies. So there is a lot of trickle-down effect that happens from these different, um, deficiencies and imbalances.
**Unknown:** So I wanna tell you a story. Um, had a patient, she had constipation for about ten years. Uh, as we took, uh, the history, turned out that there was anxiety, um, and depression in the mix as well that was going on for almost the same amount of time. Um, as we dug in, turns out, uh, patient had a snowboarding accident, resulted in a severe concussion, neck sprain, thirteen staples in the head.
**Unknown:** Constipation came and went, nothing too bad, but started shortly after. Intermittent depression, definitely felt like it was more situational, you know, oh, stress, a lot of stuff going on, you know, somebody was rude, et cetera. Then there was dizziness. Then there was full-on fainting around the menstrual cycle with physical activity, so running, exercise, something like that, um, which then eventually turned into more anxious feelings that were more internalized, um, meaning like no panic attacks, but just feeling very worried, a racy mind, and then eventually memory loss.
**Unknown:** So this was me, and it took a long time to piece the puzzle together because I didn't always know what I know now. And I had a lot of separate things that again, that I classified as my normal, um, you know, occasional constipation. Oh, it's because I traveled. Oh, I ate wrong.
**Unknown:** Oh, I ate gluten. Uh, depression. Oh, you know, I had a bad day, a lot of stress, you know, didn't sleep well. The dizziness was like, oh, I'm dehydrated.
**Unknown:** Um, fainting around the menstrual cycle, that was just kinda like, "No, I don't... Nobody could figure out what's wrong with me." So that was like, all right, I just gotta learn how to live with this, and I just stopped, uh, doing cardiovascular activity around my menstrual cycle. Uh, the anxiety was nothing that I ever probably would have admitted out loud, but had tons of internal worry, you know, racy mind, couldn't sleep well. And then the memory loss was really probably the scariest because of the nature of what I do.
**Unknown:** Not being able to remember, um, things was really a, a scary moment in my life. So it really came down to being super, super multifaceted. Um, what happened was, isMy injury caused a lot of, uh, scar tissue in my, uh, brain and a lot of alteration in my cerebral spinal fluid, which caused me to have a lot of, uh, blood supply issues to my brain. Uh, secondary to that, because I had bad, bad whiplash, I actually damaged my vagus nerve.
**Unknown:** Your vagus nerve controls your lungs, your heart rate, your gastrointestinal system, your reproductive system. Your vagus nerve does all of the things that you don't think about, like breathe, um, have your heart beat. So the vagus nerve was a big culprit in the constipation. Uh, the constipation then led to decreased serotonin levels.
**Unknown:** Um, I was really not eating properly. I was skipping breakfast. That story that I told you about, "Oh, um, wake up, don't wanna eat, drink the coffee, suppress the appetite," that was me. That was a hundred percent me.
**Unknown:** Like, slamming carbs when I would, like, get home from school because I was so hungry, and then I would want to eat sugar after. So my blood sugar was a mess. And then, uh, the vagus nerve, because it also innervates your reproductive system, that was inducing the response, the fainting response around my menstrual cycle. So this was something that, uh, was a snowball.
**Unknown:** It was a snowball over time, and it affected me greatly. Um, but because everything was a gradual onset, I just learned to live with it, adapt, and I normalized it. And also, my blood work looked great. I was super healthy according to all the conventional means.
**Unknown:** So really when it comes down to the second piece of the puzzle here is that, you know, when you are dealing with depression and anxiety, you obviously want your case to be handled with the m- utmost care, and you are in such a low, vulnerable place that you just want to trust that the doctor is gonna do exactly what is right for you. And I do think that they are, but they're doing what is best based off of their very, very small set of tools, which is pharmacology. And, you know, when we even talk about, uh, some of the testing like an EEG, an EEG, first of all, is never really done un- unless you have seizures. But there is something called a qEEG, and a qEEG is called a quantitative EEG, and this is something that actually maps the complete m- the complete hemispheres of your brain and all of the lobes of your brain, and it tells you what's active, what's o- what's underactive, what's overactive, what do your brain waves look like.
**Unknown:** Is the left hemisphere talking to the right hemisphere? Are your neurotransmitters off? Are there certain centers that are completely shut down? Do you have abnormal pathways that are very strong?
**Unknown:** Like, it literally gives you a map of your brain and a report that allows you to understand what that map is, is manifesting from a symptomatic standpoint. And then from there, the qEEG, the brain map, actually can dictate, um, a process called neurofeedback, which will actually retrain your brain to be balanced and healthy again. Like, this technology exists, and we are not using it in medicine. It is crazy to me.
**Unknown:** But even in addition to that is we assume that everybody has a serotonin problem. And what about the dopamine? W- I didn't even talk about acetylcholine and norepinephrine. I didn't even talk about the other neurotransmitters.
**Unknown:** There are so many neurotransmitters that can contribute to you feeling off. So neurotransmitter testing is done through the urine. You could easily get a baseline for what is going on. Are you truly serotonin deficient, or is there something else going on?
**Unknown:** Some of the more unique technologies that we do is the bioresonance testing. So bioresonance is a type of technology that we use that actually scans down to the DNA level, and we can actually scan not just the brain, but we can scan the vascular supply to the brain. We can scan the pancreas to see if the blood or the pancreas is stressed that's throwing off the blood sugar. Like, it's a fascinating technology that's only really being used in Europe.
**Unknown:** So this is a technology that we use regularly to piece the puzzle together, so we're not missing anything. And then the other really fascinating thing too is that the-- we have a different technology called BioScan. BioScan actually works as a digital version of acupuncture. So it actually looks at the meridians.
**Unknown:** So you have a bunch of meridians that actually come up into the head. So one simple example is the gallbladder, which is part of your digestive system. The, um, gallbladder meridian comes up and wraps around to the temples. So many people complain of temple pressure or headaches, and sometimes that actually is a meridian-based issue, and it comes from the gallbladder.
**Unknown:** It's not actually a head issue. So it's really, really significant to be able to understand the differences, um, behind, okay, is there something going on vascularly? Is this a meridian problem? And it's, it's really...
**Unknown:** The treatment protocols are gonna be completely different. Um, heavy metal testing is another big one. I mentioned how mercury can play such a big role in the brain. But another big one that I haven't even touched on, which is so, so important, is infectious disease testing.
**Unknown:** So those of you listening, how many have, have you heard that when a woman is pregnant, she should not change cat litter if she has a cat? So the reason why they say that is because of the risk of exposure to something called toxoplasmosis, which is a parasite that causes the capillaries of the brain to explode. Yes, they have proven this under specific types of diagnostic testing at UPenn. So when you're talking about different infections that can cause massive, massive neurological stress, we have things in the parasite family, toxoplasmosis, which is transmitted from cats, being one.
**Unknown:** Another one transmitted from cats being called bartonella.Which is also known as a co-infection to Lyme disease, and then there's Lyme disease. Lyme disease, in certain cases, does become neurological, and these are people-- They call it Lyme rage. Um, I've seen everything from Lyme rage to Lyme depression, to literally unable to form sentences, to seizures, to paralysis. I've had someone come to my office in a wheelchair because of paralysis from Lyme disease.
**Unknown:** So this is no joke, and this is being so overlooked by medicine. And another big one being overlooked is mold. Mold and mycotoxin illness. Uh, there is mold in our food.
**Unknown:** It's in some of our favorites. It's in chocolate, it's in coffee, it's in wine, it's in blue cheese, and then there's obviously mold that comes from our water-damaged buildings. So these are all things that need to be considered when you are struggling with depression or anxiety or seasonal affective disorder or addiction because these things could hijack you completely that you are not even yourself anymore. So with that being said, this is kind of a really good example of testing not always being able to reveal what's going on.
**Unknown:** So a patient came to us, uh, about eight years old. He had sensory issues. They were actually at the time deciding if he was technically classified as being on the s- the autistic spectrum. Um, he had a lot of gut complaints as well.
**Unknown:** So as we did testing-- At this time, I was using a lot more conventional tests. I was doing blood work and stool analysis. I did not have bioresonance technology. I didn't have bio scan technology at this time.
**Unknown:** So as we were using these conventional tests, we found that he had some fungal overgrowth from the stool sample. He had some heavy metal toxicity. So we started to work together, um, and because he had many sensory issues, he had a lot of, um, issues with, uh, his mouth. He wouldn't brush his teeth.
**Unknown:** Um, his mom found it impossible to try to give him any type of tinctures or supplements. So she agreed that it would be best to use a suppository, which a suppository is a little, um, detoxification supplement that can be put into the rectum to help to detox. So that was the route that we chose was best, and as we were going through, his mom said to me, um, "So, uh, I've seen-- I saw a worm." And I was like, "Okay. Well, nothing came up in the stool sample." So then we decided to do three different stool samples from three different companies, and every single time, they said he had no issues with parasites.
**Unknown:** And then at that point, after spending almost a thousand dollars, she looked at me and said, "I've seen worms three times. What are we gonna do about it?" And it really opened my eyes to understand that not all the testing is reliable, even when you're using these really high-quality labs, and I learned the hard way by one of my mentors, who's Dr. Klinghardt. He said-- He told me that-- Because he's a German physician, uh, he said that in Europe, they will actually have a patient stay in the office, and when they have a bowel movement, they will take the sample and put it under a microscope immediately to check for parasites because parasites will actually self-destruct twenty minutes after the bowel movement leaves the body.
**Unknown:** So it is very difficult for our labs in the US to pick up on parasite issues. So this is just very, very important because parasites will hijack your behaviors. So outside of that, I think that, you know, really walking away with some important things that you can apply right away, and one of them being that, you know, a lot of us don't feel in control of our mental health. We feel very powerless.
**Unknown:** And I think that it's important for you to understand that everything I'm talking about tonight is just trying to help you understand that there is better testing out there. There are better approaches out there, and once you understand the root, anything is possible. And chances are you're not depressed for no reason. Chances are there is a root cause.
**Unknown:** That could be an infection, it could be a blood supply issue, it could be a blood sugar issue, it could be a toxicity issue. Really, there are many, many possibilities. But also, we are living in this world of gluten, gluten sensitivity, celiac disease, et cetera. I will tell you that gluten is not always gonna cause a stomach ache, but if you start paying attention, you might notice that when you eat gluten, the next day, you are depressed or you are tired or you are foggy.
**Unknown:** So it's not always about, "Did this make my stomach hurt?" You have to start looking at, "Did this affect me neurologically?" Because chances are it is. You have to eat breakfast. You have to eat breakfast thirty minutes of waking up. Has to be protein and fat, and you also have to do it before you drink any caffeine.
**Unknown:** If you make that one simple change, I guarantee you, you will start to feel better. Exercise. I know that some of you are so just-- You're so tired. You feel so low and so hopeless that exercise sounds like the biggest task in the world.
**Unknown:** Maybe it's not about doing physical exercise. Maybe it's about just learning something new. Maybe get yourself a good book, something positive, something that you can grow from, take something valuable away. It's not always necessarily about just exercising your physical body.
**Unknown:** Once you get-- you feel good enough to do that, that will be great, but it's just about even exercising your brain to learn something new. So at the end of the day, the most important thing for you to take away from this is that very rarely do things manifest like the textbook, and especially when you're dealing with mental health and you're dealing with an array of different experiences. Everybody has had a different upbringing. Everybody has had different experiences.
**Unknown:** Um, you know, some of us have had significant trauma. Some of us just feel ashamed of our past. Some of us feel abandoned. There's so many factors, let alone-If we have Lyme disease, let alone if we have parasites, let alone if we have toxicity because we have a boatload of silver fillings in our mouth.
**Unknown:** Um, there's so many factors to be considered, so for you to think that you are the textbook of depression, chances are you're not, and if you don't fit the textbook, then how do you expect to be treated with the textbook recommendations? It's time to look beyond and ask for more. So one of the things that I think is important to establish is really this old model versus the new models. So you can clearly see that when I, I listed out some of these tests that I think are very, very valuable to mental health, I didn't just sit there and list out all of these biochemistry-based tests.
**Unknown:** I didn't sit there and just say, "Oh, just test for heavy metals, just test for infections, just test for, uh, B12 and folate and MTHFR." This is about going beyond that. This is about looking at the person's emotional health, looking about-- looking at their, their environment. Do they hate their job? Do they hate their spouse?
**Unknown:** It's about looking at their meridians. It's about looking at their gut. It's about looking at so many different factors, and when I started practicing, I was functional medicine, and I did a lot of more comprehensive tests. I tested for heavy metals.
**Unknown:** I tested the stool samples. I did all those things, but I still hit plateaus, and that's why I have moved towards this concept of integrative medicine, and it's not just about the testing. It's also about the approach. There are some people that I work with that are severely depressed, and they literally just go through and do some detoxification, get the crap out of their body, and their mood completely stabilizes.
**Unknown:** And then there's other people that they just need to work on their meridians, and they get better. Every single person's approach is completely, completely different, and I have with the way that we do testing, I have the ability to know what your body needs as opposed to assuming and opposed to using trial and error, which is a lot of wasted time and a lot of wasted money. And I feel like we forget that healthcare is supposed to be about answers and solutions. We settle for little to no answers, and we settle for a blanketed solution, a linear solution, a one-size-fits-all solution, and we need more.
**Unknown:** So this is really our approach to figuring it all out. We use a variety of different technologies, um, that test for everything from chemical sensitivities, environmental sensitivities, food allergies. We look at the DNA, down to the DNA level. We look for infections.
**Unknown:** We look for mold. We look for heavy metals, mineral deficiencies, vitamin deficiencies. And then one of the absolute best things that we do is something called autonomic response testing, and the reason why I wanted to specifically talk about this is because one of the things that make us stand out or, or set us apart is that we don't just do all this fancy testing and then give you the same blanketed approach. We actually use this specific modality to figure out what supplements, what herbs, what remedies, what therapies does your body need to get better.
**Unknown:** So you may have been listening since we, you know, early on and heard about the, the brain map, the qEEG, and the neurofeedback, and you might be thinking, "Oh my gosh, that sounds amazing. I, I think I need that." We're gonna test you. Do you need that, or do you need to detox, or do you just need a dietary change? It's really a matter of what does your body need, and what does it need now?
**Unknown:** So everyone is different. Everybody has different needs, and you need to be specific so that you give the person what they need. And I always say to people, trying to put a value on, you know, getting these answers, getting this testing, it, it varies because it depends on your goals and what you can achieve. I have some people that are like, "I don't know what to eat.
**Unknown:** Everything makes me sick." Being able to know what they can and can't eat is priceless to them. Being depressed for ten years and not being able to get out of bed and, you know, losing all your hopes and dreams and aspirations and losing, you know, your relationships, being able to get your life back, that's priceless. So at the end of the day, you know, putting a true value on this was really difficult, and I do feel like depending on what your goal is, you know, what we can offer in the answers we can provide is priceless. But, um, thank you guys for being here, and I really, really hope that you can share this with others because I know that it is an epidemic of depression and anxiety, and it is like literally it really breaks my heart.
**Unknown:** Lastly, I just want you guys to know that this is an educational experience. I really, really hope you got a lot out of it, and you learned new things. Um, but at the end of the day, when you figure out what is the cause of your mental health issues, that's really when this becomes a breakthrough experience and then being able to know what you need to do to actually heal. So thank you guys for being here with me.
**Unknown:** I really, really appreciate it. Um, definitely check out our website or any additional information with our team if you want to learn a little bit more about working with me. All right, guys. I'll see you next week.
**Unknown:** We thank you for being a listener and subscriber to Integrative Wellness Radio. If you're looking to learn more about Integrative Wellness Group as well as Dr. Nick or Dr. Nicole, you can check out integrativewellnessgroup.com.
**Unknown:** All night, no sleep. 'Cause I feel like I'm always dreaming. Wide awake, that's okay
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About Integrative You Radio
Integrative You Radio is a root cause medicine and integrative medicine podcast hosted by Dr. Nicole Rivera and Dr. Nick Carruthers — two integrative doctors who build personalized wellness protocols from your DNA, minerals, hormones, gut, and nervous system rather than from a population template. Looking for an integrative doctor who reads your labs together instead of in isolation? This is the show.
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