How to Hack your Sleep Issues
Episode 143
Feeling fatigued or never wake up feeling refreshed? Today on Integrative Wellness Radio, Dr. Nicole talks about how your sleep disorders might be connected to overwhelmed organs. She also discusses the different toxins, habits, and environmental factors that play a role in the quality and quantity of our sleep. The doctor then shares some real-life stories from her clinical practice and gives us an insight into how conventional medicine often overlooks the human body as a whole and takes the “one pill fits all” approach. Tune in to the whole episode to learn more. Interested in working with IWG? Book a complimentary consult call to learn more using this link: https://bit.ly/IWRcall2022 Noteworthy Time Stamps: 01:30 Sleep issues tied to your organ clock 04:15 There’s limited testing when it comes to sleep 07:11 We should not normalize our symptoms 14:57 A real patient’s story 18:23 3 things our brain needs 27:53 The role of toxicity with sleep issues 30:22 Darkness is your friend 35:39 Myths about mental health & sleep 47:33 Most of your serotonin is in your gut 54:03 EMFs and their effect on sleep 58:00 Healthcare is about answers & solutions
Topics: sleep, liver, unknown, dealing, issues, different, medicine, learn
Key takeaways from this episode
- So with that being said, when we talk about, you know, these different imbalances that can cause us to feel low, f- feel depressed, or even feel anxious, this is actually very tied to also some of the sleep disorders that we could be dealing with.
- Nick and Dr. **Unknown:** 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.
- So if you pop up at the same time every night or even if you crash the same time during the day, this is usually tied to an organ that's under a lot of stress.
- So the liver is constantly dealing with the brunt of so many different things, so it's really important to take care to your liver and also if you are popping up between 3:00 and 4:00 in the morning, kind of keeping that in mind.
- Okay. **Unknown:** So one of the big things that, um, is important is knowing that depression and anxiety are very different and that depression and anxiety can be linked to your sleep issues, but your sleep issues are not just about a melatonin deficiency.
Pull quotes
Imagine if medicine actually looked at you as a whole opposed to looking at you as a bunch of separate systems.
Nick and Dr. **Unknown:** 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.
So if you pop up at the same time every night or even if you crash the same time during the day, this is usually tied to an organ that's under a lot of stress.
Transcript
**Unknown:** I 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. Dive into Integrative Wellness Radio with Dr. Nick and Dr.
**Unknown:** 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 the- Hello. Hello, everyone. Uh, so today we're actually going to be piggybacking off of some of the things we've been talking about this month because unfortunately so many people are dealing with depression and anxiety, especially anxiety.
**Unknown:** I'm hearing it left and right and in very, very young ages as well. So with that being said, when we talk about, you know, these different imbalances that can cause us to feel low, f- feel depressed, or even feel anxious, this is actually very tied to also some of the sleep disorders that we could be dealing with. And I think that so many people are struggling with their sleep. You know, some people it's the full-blown insomnia, and then there's other people that are really just dealing with broken sleep or never necessarily waking up refreshed or popping up in the middle of the night.
**Unknown:** And what's really fascinating, too, is if you actually look at the Chinese medicine, uh, it's called the organ clock. Every two hours of the day you have different organs that are regenerating. So if you pop up at the same time every night or even if you crash the same time during the day, this is usually tied to an organ that's under a lot of stress. So one of the most common things that I hear in my clinical practice is people waking up between the, the times 3:00 and 4:00.
**Unknown:** So 3:00 and 4:00 AM is actually tied to your liver, which unfortunately in this day and age, um, most of us are dealing with some type of stress on our liver, and everybody thinks alcohol when I say this, and I'm not necessarily talking about alcohol. But, um, medications, caffeine, alcohol, pesticides, herbicides, uh, any type of toxin has to get filtered out of the body through the liver. So the liver is constantly dealing with the brunt of so many different things, so it's really important to take care to your liver and also if you are popping up between 3:00 and 4:00 in the morning, kind of keeping that in mind. For those of you that have no idea where the liver is, the liver is on your right...
**Unknown:** Like, it's right by your right ribcage. So some people have a lot of pain there, so sometimes it could be your liver, sometimes it could be your gallbladder, just so you know. Um, but, you know, the second most common time people are getting up is going to be after that. It's going to be between, say, 5:00, um, or I'm sorry, 4:00 and 5:00 AM, and that's actually more lung-related.
**Unknown:** So if you're someone who's had a history of upper respiratory infections, bronchitis, things like that, this can actually be tied to why you are waking up at that time in the middle of the night. So the body is so, so fascinating, and really what I want to uncover today is I wanna be able to talk more about these sleep issues because unfortunately what we're doing is we're usually grabbing for some type of medication, and then for those of us that are trying to go the more natural route, we're uti- utilizing things like melatonin. And then the more we use melatonin or even our medications, we usually need to up our dose or we eventually need to switch the, uh, what we're using because it stops working, and it stops working because we haven't necessarily been able to figure out or address the root cause. And really some of the things that I'll tell you tonight is that it's not super black and white.
**Unknown:** It's... There's no one rhyme or reason to why people have sleep issues. There are many, many reasons why, and as I go through the examples, you guys should be able to decipher, you know, which is maybe more appropriate for you, um, because everyone is going to be obviously a little bit different. We wanna talk about just understanding that you don't know what you don't know.
**Unknown:** There's very, very limited testing when it comes to sleep. Doctors know transmitters. They're not necessarily going to the lengths of doing any type of MRIs or CAT scans or imaging to look at the brain to see if that's associated with sleep. So really what it comes down to is, "Oh, you have bad sleep?
**Unknown:** Here's your sleeping pill." And there's not a lot of testing, so it's very difficult for people to understand why. Secondarily is if you're trying to fix your sleep, it's not always about what you do or what you take, but it's also about how you do it because you have to consider there might be various factors playing into why your sleep is off. And then we also want to really look at some of the, the limitations to the approaches. So I've already kind of mentioned how, you know, it's, it's usually going to be something natural like a melatonin or it's going to be a sleeping pill, um, there are so many other ways that we can go about really helping our sleep.
**Unknown:** And some of the difficulties with our sleep can come down to the way our bedroom is set up and some of the things that we do before we go to bed, which we're gonna cover. So w- just a little bit about myself, a little bit about Integrative Wellness Group is, you know, we really have, uh, learned a lot over the course of our clinical practice, and we kept seeing a lot of limitations with the way that medicine is looking at the body. And what I mean by that is we look at the body as being a bunch of separate parts. So when you're complaining about your sleep, it's kind of just thought that, oh, you just have a sleep problem and that there's no other possibility that there's other organs involved, um, or there's more of a root cause to it.
**Unknown:** It's usually just like, "Oh, well, change your schedule. Oh, get to bed earlier."And it's not usually that simple, and especially because we are so overly stimulated in this day and age. So we really kind of push the boundaries, and we're always digging, digging, digging to just try to understand, you know, some of the origins to why people feel the way they, they do, and we've uncovered that there is a lot of limitations with the testing, and there's also a lot of limitations with the treatment protocols. So we really opted to spend more time, ask better questions, dig deeper so that we can truly uncover what is the cause and then be able to obviously give you a solution 'cause that's the most important.
**Unknown:** So it's not about, you know, naming and blaming and just saying, "Oh, this is your diagnosis. This is what you have wrong with you." It's really a matter of what caused it, what... You know, where are these symptoms coming from? And when you do the right testing, you can do that with confidence and then be able to know exactly how to help this person.
**Unknown:** So a little bit about why I even do what I do. Um, I don't do what I do because I was really sick. Um, I actually thought that I was a pretty healthy individual. I really thought that I ate well.
**Unknown:** I was conscious. You know, I was definitely healthier than a lot of the people around me, and when I actually got into this field and I started doing my own testing, I realized that I wasn't actually very healthy. And I realized that a lot of the things that I dealt with on a day-to-day, some people, you know, or some of my symptoms were on a week-to-week basis, I found that I just normalized them. So, you know, occasionally having a stuffy nose was my normal.
**Unknown:** You know, having a headache occasionally was my normal. Um, having an upset stomach when I ate the wrong thing was normal. Having brain fog was normal. And this is the common thing for many of us is we normalize the different symptoms because maybe they come and they go but also because our blood work is usually saying that everything looks fine, and that's one of the biggest things that I've learned is there is a lot of limitations with our more traditional testing.
**Unknown:** And because I did more comprehensive testing, it really revealed that I actually had massive mercury toxicity because I was a pescatarian for 10 years, meaning I only ate fish. I didn't know any better. I thought all fish was created equal, and it was super healthy and good for your brain. Little did I know that I was eating tons of swordfish and tons of tuna, which is very, very high in mercury.
**Unknown:** Um, and then on top of that, because I was eating so much fish, I actually had a lot of infections in my gastrointestinal system because I was eating a lot of raw fish doing sushi. So really the biggest thing is, is that you don't know what you don't know until you do your testing, and I think the biggest thing that I, I advocate for is don't settle for feeling mediocre and especially because people that I work with are... You know, they're young. They're in their 20s.
**Unknown:** They're in their 30s sometimes, and they're sitting there being like, "Oh, yeah, I can't remember anything," or, "I have... always have to have a pad on me because literally my memory is shot," or, "I can barely get out of bed in the morning. You know, on the weekends I just try to sleep so I can recover from my week." This is not a way to live. We really need to start asking for more and demanding more out of our healthcare because feeling like that now, how are we gonna feel in a few years?
**Unknown:** So first and foremost, before we start talking more so about sleep, is I want you to know that it's not your fault that you don't know what you don't know. If you've failed at trying to get yourself better and you've failed at trying to choose the diet that's right for you or you've failed at, you know, trying to pick the right supplements, medications, et cetera, it's not your fault. There is a ton of information out there. There is a ton of conflicting information out there.
**Unknown:** It gets very, very, very confusing on what is what, what is right for you, and even how to get started. So it's really just a matter of don't blame yourself. Don't kind of allow that to make you paralyzed. It's really just being able to get the right information and be able to use it in the right way.
**Unknown:** I personally think that one of the biggest detriments to what's happening in medicine right now is the fact that we look at the body as a bunch of separate parts. We're in the mindset of always wanting to work with a specialist or being told that we need to go see a specialist. And if you really think about it, we have a cardiologist that's going to help us with our heart. We have a neurologist for our brain, psychiatrist for our, our mood and our mental health, and we're assuming that all of our systems are actually...
**Unknown:** They're working independently and not working together, and that is one of the things that keeps us confused, it keeps us paralyzed, and it keeps us from actually getting better because nobody is piecing the puzzle together, and nobody is actually necessarily being able to tell us, "Hey, this is the root to the umbrella of different symptoms that you have going on." Okay, so this kind of brings me to my second point is I just mentioned that, you know, if you have something going on with your brain, then you're gonna see a neurologist. If you have something going on with your gut, you're gonna see a gastroenterologist. If you have depression, you're gonna see a psychiatrist or a psychologist. So this is really just everything being separate, number one, and number two, this is just overlooking basic physiology.
**Unknown:** And really on the topic of sleep, so 90 to 95% of your serotonin is made in your gut. The precursor to melatonin is serotonin. So that alone gives us tremendous insight as to why we might be dealing with a sleep issue, also feeling depressed. Maybe it's low level, but then we also might be dealing with a low-level gut issue that comes and goes, or we blame it on I ate too much pasta, I ate a big meal, I ate out, I ate too much dairy, whatever the case may be.So there is a huge, huge connection amongst all of our organ systems, let alone just the gut to the brain.
**Unknown:** So another big thing that I hear on a day-to-day basis is, "Why doesn't everybody do what you guys do? Why doesn't everybody use this type of testing? Why doesn't everybody, you know, look at the body from an integrated standpoint?" And the way that I answer that question is, if you think about the most common testing that we do on an annual basis, the most common testing that we do is blood work, and blood work is a chemistry-based test. So when we have compromised chemistry or a compromised biochemical pathway, then the way that we fix that is by utilizing chemistry-altering substances, which is what?
**Unknown:** Medication, pharmacology. So the majority of the testing that is being used on a regular basis is to look for broken chemistry that can be fixed with chemistry. So when you start to look beyond that and you start to use other modalities of testing, looking at DNA and looking at genetics and looking at diet and looking at neurology, it becomes a little bit different with your approach, and you can definitely get to the root and then be able to have a more comprehensive and specific approach. So this kind of also brings me to the last point.
**Unknown:** We look for the broken chemistry to fix it, and then we also are always seeking out what is gonna be the one fix, what is the one pill? You know, think about every commercial. I-- like, it, it actually makes me cringe when I watch TV nowadays because the commercials are just almost so ridiculous when you really, really listen in, and it's pretty much proposing that, you know, one day there's gonna be one pill that cures a, a disease, which is just such an unrealistic, um, expectation, but also secondary to that is, you know, none of these one-pill cures, they all come with side effects. So with that being said, you know, it's not that the healing process has to be crazy complex, but it's more important to understand that it's multifaceted.
**Unknown:** We are multifaceted people. Like, think about, you know, just the amount of feelings that we feel on a day-to-day basis. Like, how many emotions do we run through by walking around, going to work, you know, seeing an email, looking on social media? You know, we just kind of ignore those things and think stress is stress, and we think that stress isn't gonna actually play a factor in our physical body.
**Unknown:** But at the end of the day, we as complex beings, there's so many layers to why we feel the wa-way we do. So a very interesting story is, um, we had a patient who had three major symptoms which are crazy common: depression, anxiety, and insomnia. Insomnia came and went. It was...
**Unknown:** You know, she would have insomnia for, you know, a couple of days, and then it would get better, and then it would come back, and it was really, really up and down. So what's so fascinating about this is that when we dug in and started doing her testing, um, one of the primary things that showed up was not necessarily that this person just had a lot of trauma in their life and a bunch of gut issues that maybe threw off, you know, their serotonin levels. It actually was more so related to her vascular system, and this is something that is off of the radar so much of the time because our brain needs three things, which I'm gonna talk a little bit more depth on, but one of those things is the brain needs oxygen. The way your brain gets oxygen is by proper blood flow.
**Unknown:** So this was a person who actually had quite a few head injuries. She was a professional skier. And her head injuries were everything from just very minor bumps to two concussions and then what they now presume to be post-concussive syndrome and also CTEs, which is a chronic traumatic encephalopathy which they're actually acknowledging now, especially in the NFL and foot- with football players. So pretty much what it means is that there's inflammation in the brain way, way, way after the, uh, concussion or head injury.
**Unknown:** So what happened from all of these different injuries that she had, not only to the head but also to the neck, is it started to alter the amount of blood flow to the head, and because of this, she started to have the early, early onset of what is actually called vascular dementia. So because her brain was not getting proper amounts of oxygen, her pineal gland was not getting proper amounts of oxygen, and this was actually leading to the inability to, um, make melatonin. So this was a huge, huge culprit for her serotonin and melatonin, um, being really, really low. So at the end of the day, for me to start trying to manipulate those pathways was never gonna serve this person.
**Unknown:** It was about helping her actually recover from her head injuries. Um, so it's just really important to understand that there is a lot of things to be considered if you're dealing with insomnia. It's not always necessarily just, "Oh, this runs in my family, this is genetic, this is hereditary," or, you know, "I, um, I, I'm a poor sleeper." So one of the really cool things about what I do on a day-to-day basis is I get to really blow people's minds. I really love to see their mouths drop.
**Unknown:** And, uh, the reason why this happens a lot is because when I am talking with my patient, especially on their initial, initial consultation, I'm digging. I'm digging and almost acting as an investigator because I want to tru- really try to understand, you know, what got them where they are. You know, what was all of the sequence of events that led up to it? Okay.
**Unknown:** So one of the big things that, um, is important is knowing that depression and anxiety are very different and that depression and anxiety can be linked to your sleep issues, but your sleep issues are not just about a melatonin deficiency. It could be a lot more complex than that, and that the brain needs three things, so I've already started to talk about this a little bit. So your brain needs oxygen, which means it needs to get that oxygen from proper blood flow.The other thing that your brain needs is stable blood sugar. This is not about being a diabetic.
**Unknown:** This, your brain is also in trouble if you're hypoglycemic, meaning you have low blood sugar. And if you're the person who gets hangry and you want to hurt people because you didn't eat, that also means you're probably hypoglycemic or you're becoming insulin resistant. So with that being said, your brain needs stable blood sugar to function properly. And I'm going to tie that back into sleep.
**Unknown:** The other thing that your brain needs is stimulation. Um, for those of you that are just kind of stuck, you feel very stuck in your job, you feel very stuck in your life, you haven't learned something new, you're not exercising, you know, you sit a lot for work, you're constantly on a computer, you're probably lacking tremendous stimulation for your brain. You might also be noticing that if you have to do a long drive, maybe it's two hours, maybe it's three hours or four, that you're feeling physically fatigued from doing a long drive. And that's not physical.
**Unknown:** That's a neurological fatigue that's creating a pattern in your body. So it's very important to notice those subtleties. If you're the person that's like, "Oh, you know, let me read a book," and then you start reading and you're passed out within like two pages, that also means you have very sensitive neurons. It means your neurons are close to threshold.
**Unknown:** So the way that I, I classify that is think about like if somebody slammed a book on a, on a table, you'd jump. But if somebody dropped a pen, you probably wouldn't jump. When your neurons are very close to threshold, that little pin drop will fire. This is also people that tend to get ringing in their ears.
**Unknown:** It's what's called tinnitus. Um, so you have to start taking these signs from your body and your brain to say, "Oh, crap, I got to fix this," especially if you're young, because these are all signs that your brain is starting to, I hate to say it, but degenerate. I'm not trying to scare anybody, but it's the reality of it. So blood sugar.
**Unknown:** I want to go back to this. Um, so when you're talking about blood sugar, high blood sugar is going to be people that are either pre-diabetic, diabetic, or they have insulin resistance. Insulin resistance, all that that means is that when you get sugar in, if it's from pasta, if it's from fruit, if it's from candy, whatever it is, um, the insulin allows your brain and your body to use the sugar. But if your insulin is not working properly, then you have a bunch of sugar floating around in your blood that is making you inflamed, opposed to your body actually using it as fuel.
**Unknown:** So becoming insulin resistant is so common nowadays, and it's becoming more common because there's so much hidden sugar in all of the different things that we are eating. Even if you go and you're getting your almond milk latte that is, you know, no added sugar, no syrup, no vanilla, no mocha, there is still a very high content of sugar just in the milk. So it's very, very important to know and be conscious of the amount of sugar you're being exposed to, and also considering that crackers and chips and pastas and breads all also break down into sugar as well. So the other piece of this is going to be the hypoglycemia, which is the low blood sugar.
**Unknown:** And I know that my whole life I was on the hypoglycemic side, and everybody told me that, "Oh, that's good you have low blood sugar." And in reality, my brain was not getting the fuel that it needed. So the way that hypoglycemia looks is you're the person who wakes up in the morning, you have no appetite, so you don't eat. You usually grab for caffeine because you're a little foggy and you need the caffeine to kind of clear you up and make you be able to, you know, get your crap together to get to work. Then, you know, the coffee suppresses your appetite, gets to lunchtime, you're starving, and now you want to eat, you know, as much as you can.
**Unknown:** So you'll usually grab for like a sandwich or a rice bowl or something that's going to give you glucose to spike your blood sugar fast because it's so low. Then you spike, then you crash, then you get tired middle of the day, you eat dinner, and then you want sugar after dinner. I say this scenario to many people, and they go, "I think you just told me my biography." So with that being, uh, said is it's very important for you to acknowledge, are you the person not eating in the morning? Are you the person that sa- that says you're not eating in the morning because now intermittent fasting is a good thing for you?
**Unknown:** By the way, you're only supposed to intermittent fast three days a week max. Don't intermittent fast every day because now you're pushing your body into hypoglycemia, and you're going to actually further stress your neurological system. So outside of that, the other things to consider, if you're the person listening and you're like, "You know what? I don't eat sugar.
**Unknown:** I'm super careful about it, but I relate to some of the symptoms that you're describing." So the other thing that you have to consider is you might have something stressing your pancreas that is affecting your gut. So what I mean by that is your stomach on your left rib cage, that's where you get, um... You can have bacteria get into your stomach that causes indigestion and heartburn, burping, things like that. But your stomach and your pancreas are embedded together.
**Unknown:** So very easily, if you've had bacteria get into your stomach, you can have that start to affect your pancreas and start to throw off your blood sugar. So then you're the person that goes to the doctor, you get your blood work drawn, and they tell you you're pre-diabetic, but you're sitting there being like, "I don't get it. I don't even eat sugar. How is this possible?" So it's more so that your pancreas is stressed for other reasons opposed to it just being dietary.
**Unknown:** So that's a very important thing to, to understand. So number two is oxygen. So the oxygenation to the brain comes from blood flow.There are a lot of different factors that play in. So the person who has the low blood pressure, this is also the person that's being told, "Oh, that's good.
**Unknown:** It's good to have low blood pressure." If you have low blood pressure, then chances are it's very difficult for your heart to pump blood against gravity into your head. So having low blood pressure could be leading you to having Raynaud's, um, bad circulation in your hands and feet, AKA you always have cold hands and feet. And that means if you're not getting blood to your hands and feet, you're also not getting proper blood to your head. So it's very, very important to understand that having low blood pressure, cold hands and feet or Raynaud's is also playing a very big role in why your brain not-- might not be working at its best, and you might be having sleep issues.
**Unknown:** On the flip side to that, we also then deal with hypertension, which is the high blood pressure. The people that have migraines, headaches, pressure in the head, those are people that are actually dealing with high blood pressure in the vessels of the brain. There's a lot of reasons why this happens, and I don't have enough time to go into it in depth, but some of the most common causes of hypertension in the head has to do with a lot of congestion in the neck. A lot of this congestion comes from the people that had a lot of strep as a kid, had a lot of ear infections, they constantly get swollen glands, or they're always getting upper respiratory infections.
**Unknown:** All of those things can play a very big role on creating a lot of issues with the blood flow in and the blood flow out. So these things can play a massive role in people that have migraines, headaches, visual issues, dizziness, vertigo, ringing in the ear, also known as tinnitus, in addition to sleep issues. So lastly here, we have stimulation. So I've kinda gave this away already, but for those of you that are getting physically fatigued by reading a book, by driving a long distance, this is showing that your neurons are very, very close to threshold.
**Unknown:** So again, instead of you being, you know, jumping because somebody slammed the book, now the pin drops, and you're jumping. That's what I mean is that the, your neurons are super, super, super sensitive, so you're gonna fatigue them very easily. So if you're the person that, like, is getting extremely fatigued by doing the most minor things, it's neurological, it's not physical. And you need to start thinking about what is-- or if you can think .
**Unknown:** But you need to seek out what is going on with your neurological system. So exercise is such a key thing to utilize when it comes to stimulating the brain and improving some of the neurotransmitters, but also learning something new. Read a new book, um, you know, take a, take a dance class or whatever, you know, feels good to you. But learning something new is just so, so important for the longevity of our brains and also reducing the risk of dementia and Alzheimer's.
**Unknown:** So last but not least is role of toxicity. So some of the major things that also stress out our neurons and our neurological system is toxins. So I mentioned earlier, for those of you that have been listening the whole time, that one of my primary things that was revealed through my testing was I had massive mercury toxicity. So mercury, um, as well as aluminum and many other heavy metals are neurotoxic.
**Unknown:** They are extremely toxic to the neurological system. So if you just think about, um, dental work. So those silver fillings that go into your teeth or even the silver fillings that you had for twenty years that were removed, um, that was, um, that was silver amalgam, also known as mercury. So think about the proximity of that mercury to your brain, and that is going to play a very significant role on some of the toxicity that can actually affect us from a neurological standpoint.
**Unknown:** So taking into consideration what are some of the things you're being exposed to just from dental work and fillings and implants and dental infections that can play a role in our brains. So going back to sleep, um, so I mentioned already, serotonin makes your melatonin. So for those of you that are on, say, an antidepressant, you might think you're in the clear. But unfortunately, that's not necessarily how antidepressants work.
**Unknown:** They're called SSRIs. So all that they're doing is they're trying to keep excess serotonin in the synapse, the synapse, so that neurons pick it up. So just because you have excess serotonin does not mean that it will have the ability to convert into more melatonin. The conversion actually happens in your pineal gland.
**Unknown:** So some of you may be aware, but there has been a lot of research that has revealed one of the major stressors on the pineal gland is fluoride. I know there's a lot of controversy on fluoride, but at the end of the day, everything in moderation. For us, getting, mm, a lot of fluoride treatments, getting them, you know, every couple of months, it might be a bit excessive in addition to fluoride is in your mouthwash, fluoride is in your toothpaste. So all of this exposure can definitely play a role in the pineal gland.
**Unknown:** Um, during autopsies, they've actually found crystals of fluoride in the pineal gland of people that have had Alzheimer's and dementia. So this is just really significant to understand, um, because this little change can really help you to potentially improve your sleep. So another big thing that is absolutely required for you to have melatonin production, darkness. So for those of you that are on your Kindle, you're on your phone, you're on your laptop, you're doing your emails till two in the morning, you can't do it.
**Unknown:** I know it's a techy world. I know it's super easy and convenient, and you gotta get stuff done.But you're screwing up your sleep. You need to take into consideration that it's not just about dark, it's not about the room being dark. The blue light that comes in through your devices is playing a significant role in altering your brain's ability to make melatonin.
**Unknown:** So you really need to consider are you on these devices too close to the time you're trying to go to bed. Another big one is methyl donors. So in order to take serotonin and convert it into melatonin, you need a bunch of friends. You need a bunch of support.
**Unknown:** Um, those are classified as methyl donors. It's your folate, your B12, um, you also need things like zinc. So folate and B12 are actually absorbed in your stomach. So people that have had gut infections, they've had indigestion, they've had H.
**Unknown:** pylori, they've had GERD, chances are you're not absorbing any of those nutrients. And if you're the person taking B12 and you're peeing fluorescent colors, you're not absorbing it. You pretty much have very expensive urine, by the way. So it's very important to kind of know that it's not just about taking melatonin.
**Unknown:** If you are gonna take melatonin, then you really need to make sure that you're getting your folate and your B12 and the other co-factors. The other thing that depletes you of folate is birth control. Um, so a lot of us are depleted in folate just based off of that reason, um, because most women have been on birth control at some point or are on it as well. So another big thing too is the perfect balance of seroton- or, I'm sorry, melatonin and cortisol.
**Unknown:** So they actually work inversely. So what's gonna happen is going to be that you need to have cortisol going up in the morning to get you up so you're actually awake, but cortisol going low at night so that your melatonin kicks in so you fall asleep. So a lot of us are in this complete, like, adrenal crisis because your adrenals make your cortisol. But something else that plays a significant role in your cortisol levels, which is one of your stress hormones, is insulin.
**Unknown:** So if your blood sugar is a mess, you will never fix your cortisol. So for those of you that are listening that you're, like, on the adrenal fatigue train, and you're taking all the adrenal supplements in the world, you need to consider is your blood sugar part of the puzzle. It's very, very important to address that. So another thing about adrenals and the cortisol levels and also another hormone called norepinephrine, 'cause that's a very important hormone for your sleep, is your adrenals become very compromised by caffeine, nicotine as well, nicotine from cigarettes.
**Unknown:** So I know that it's this vicious cycle because we're tired, so we're drinking caffeine, um, to try to get us through our day, but we're actually creating this massive negative feedback loop. So one of the ways that I transitioned from coffee is I started to use matcha, which does not necessarily give you that spike the way that coffee does, and that is a great segue to try to give your adrenals a little bit of a break. So it's really, really important to take that into consideration. So if you haven't realized by now, um, it's really a matter of you don't know what you don't know.
**Unknown:** Because if you don't do the testing and you don't know that your blood pressure and your blood sugar and the fact that you're not learning something new is all could be playing a role in your brain and in your sleep, you know, you just don't know what you don't know. It's a matter of somebody, you know, taking a look at you, doing better testing to uncover these things. So a big, big thing is that we need to stop accepting our crappy sleep and our fatigue and our poor memory and our brain fog as being our normal. We're just adapting our lives around these new symptoms, and we're not even asking for answers.
**Unknown:** We're just accepting that this is part of the aging process, and that it's just kind of we're doomed to feel a certain way. And unfortunately, what normalizes it more is the fact that most of our friends and family also feel like crap. So you don't really have anything good to compare it to. So it's really, you know, it's really interesting because all of my, you know, friends and family, they're like, "Wow, you know, you're the only one who's energetic and sleeps well and, you know, feels good." And I'm just like, "Well, I'm the only one also doing something different." So it's really a matter of if you know what is going on with your body, your body can bounce back.
**Unknown:** So a couple of myths about mental health and sleep is that depression is always going to be caused by a serotonin deficiency, that there's also no reason for your insomnia, or the only reason is your melatonin. Um, anxiety is hereditary, and that you've also had all the proper testing to know where your sleep and your mental health lies. And then the other big one is that we have no control over our mental health because it's probably just genetic. So myth number one, depression is always caused by a serotonin deficiency.
**Unknown:** So I think this is really important because when we're dealing with sleep issues, a lot of times we're dealing with a low level of depression because the serotonin and the melatonin are so linked up. But it's important to know the difference between what a serotonin deficiency actually looks like and what a dopamine deficiency actually looks like. Because the people that are s- actually deficient in serotonin are the people that have kind of lost joy in everything. They ha- they, nothing's making them happy.
**Unknown:** Nothing's making them excited. They have a great life on paper. You know, they have a beautiful family and a great house and a great job, but they're not happy.Those are the people that truly have a serotonin deficiency. And then there's people on the flip side that have more of a dopamine deficiency.
**Unknown:** These are people that are really, um... they're not very motivated. They kind of are a little bit numb. They have a lot of a-- they have a lack of concern for others.
**Unknown:** They feel very hopeless, very worthless, and they tend to kind of isolate themselves for that reason. The other interesting part about this, though, is that dopamine also has a huge tie to pleasure, uh, producing effects. So what I mean by that is dopamine deficiencies are usually tied to addictive behaviors. So when we have a dopamine deficiency, we're the person who's like, "Oh my God, I'm having a terrible day.
**Unknown:** Where's the chocolate?" "Oh my gosh, I can't wait to have a glass of wine." "I need to go on my break because I need a cigarette, I'm so stressed." And everybody's different. Some people it's, you know, wine, cigarettes. Some people-- uh, for me, it used to be a mocha latte . So it's not that it has to be, you know, a bad behavior.
**Unknown:** You might be just using food, you might be using sugar, you might be using exercise, but you're utilizing those to try to mend a deficiency. The reason why I-- they're called addictive behaviors is because obviously we keep going back to them, and the reason we do that is because the, the mocha latte or the cigarette or the wine gives us a very short-term dopamine high, and then once we crash back down, we wanna go back to whatever gave us that high. So it's very important to kind of take those symptoms into consideration because if you actually fix your dopamine, you might be able to quit the cigarettes, or you might be able to, you know, give up that glass of wine every night, or you may be able to cut the sugar out of your diet. So it's very, very important to be able to decipher that.
**Unknown:** And on the flip side, when we're dealing with the serotonin, um, the serotonin, you know, if you truly have a serotonin deficiency, most of the time what we're gonna do is we're going to go on something to supplement, and that is usually going to be an antidepressant if we're going prescription route. And then if somebody is going the natural route, they might be using something like five HTP. So with that being said, when you're talking about neurotransmitters, they have to be in perfect balance. If you have too high of serotonin, you will be anxious.
**Unknown:** If your serotonin is too low, you will be depressed. So it's not a matter of trying to just boost it, boost it, boost it. It's about doing the right testing so that you can actually monitor where your levels are at. And unfortunately, so much of the time when I'm working with somebody who...
**Unknown:** depressed, a lot of the times their depression is coming from another issue, which is sometimes oxygen issues to the brain, the blood sugar issues, and then a lot of people are dealing with this overload of serotonin, which is actually they're confusing their anxiety with depression as well. So another telltale sign that you have a serotonin deficiency is seasonal affective disorder. We're kind of in the midst of it right now. We're in the winter, especially living in the northeast, and a lot of people are, you know, really wanting to run for the islands, and which is okay, but one of the big things about sunshine is it actually activates serotonin receptors in our skin, and that is something that boosts our serotonin.
**Unknown:** So being able to get out into the sun, even if it is cold, is such a, is such a way to be proactive about getting your serotonin up in a very, um, natural way. And then the same thing really goes for dopamine. If your dopamine gets too high, you can actually start to induce almost more of a psychosis. You can feel, um, a, like you're losing your mind, or you can even be classified as schizophrenic.
**Unknown:** So it's very, very important to kind of know these signs because either if yourself or a loved one is on a prescription and they've been on it for a really long time and they're exhibiting, you know, massive anxiety, or they're exhibiting panic attacks or even psychotic behavior, you need to consider, you know, have their levels gotten too high and they need to consult with their physician. So an interesting patient presentation was, uh, there was a patient that, um, I was working with that had constipation for almost ten years. Um, patient also, uh, had depression and anxiety. So, you know, constipation, depression, anxiety, these are three things that are unfortunately way, way too common nowadays.
**Unknown:** So getting into the history with this person, um, turned out they had a bad snowboarding accident when they were, uh, I think they were in college. Um, resulted in a severe concussion, neck sprain, thirteen staples in the head, no helmet. Um, constipation started shortly after. No big deal.
**Unknown:** Kinda came and went. Uh, then they actually moved into feeling w- a little bit depressed, but it was more situational. It was just like, "Oh, well, you know, had a bad day," or, "Oh, you know, broke up with a boyfriend." So had a reason for why they were feeling low. Um, had this mild dizziness, mainly when getting up too fast.
**Unknown:** Uh, then actually started fainting around her menstrual cycle. Uh, nobody was really able to figure out what was going on with her. Um, just kind of had these random fainting spells. Didn't happen all the time, but, um, everything checked out normal in the testing.
**Unknown:** Um, soon after that, little bit of anxiety kicked in. Then memory loss. Um, the memory loss was a lot more related to the short-term memory opposed to long-term. Just kinda forgetting where the keys were, you know, couldn't, uh, really remember, you know, to-do lists and things like that.
**Unknown:** So with this person, it was multifaceted. It wasn't one thing, and I know it very well because it was me. And what primarily happened was a snowball effect, and this snowball effect happened over years. It was the injury, one of the biggest things the injury did, um, was it compromised a lot of blood supply to my brain.
**Unknown:** Um, and it was partly because I had massive whiplash, which created a lot of scar tissue in my neck.Um, I also had a lot of scar tissue from the scar on the back of my head where I had the thirteen staples. Um, in addition to that, because of my neck sprain, I had vagus nerve damage. So your vagus nerve comes from the brain, but it innervates your lungs, your heart, your gut, your reproductive organs. And your vagus nerves does all of the things that you don't think about consciously, like breathe, um, have a heartbeat, digest your food.
**Unknown:** These are not things you tell your body to do. It's done automatically through your autonomic nervous system. So with that being said, this is what triggered the constipation. Constipation then triggered the lower serotonin levels.
**Unknown:** Then from there, um, started to kind of skip breakfast, was really busy, had a lot going on, started to move into this hypoglycemia, which started to now compromise the amount of glucose the brain was getting. And then last but not least was the vagus nerve also innervates the reproductive organs. So this was causing a lot of issues with the menstrual cycle. So when I was getting my menstrual cycle, the uterus technically inflames as it sloughs off the tissue.
**Unknown:** I know for the men listening, it's gross, but it's reality. Um, but as that was happening, it was actually further irritating the vagus nerve, which was then lowering the blood pressure and causing the fainting. So this took a long time for me to actually figure out, um, once I had the, the testing that I do. But, um, it was very, very fascinating because these were things that I learned to live with.
**Unknown:** I was really just normalizing and navigating my life around it. And, you know, literally I was fainting, and I was just like, "Oh, well, I just gotta be careful that I don't, you know, go for a run close to my menstrual cycle because I'm gonna faint." And this is such a common thing that I hear on a day-to-day basis is that, you know, something that extreme, we're just normalizing it. So another big thing that I wanted to touch on is that, um, you know, you've potentially had the best testing for your mental health or your sleep dis- uh, disorders. So when it comes to the type of testing that exists is that we're usually just looking at sleep studies or we're looking at blood work, and we're not going beyond that.
**Unknown:** But there are amazing modalities and technologies that exist, and one of them is something called a quantitative EEG. A quantitative EEG literally is a brain map. It maps out the hemispheres of your brain and tells you what's overactive, what's underactive, what's going on with your brain waves, because your brain waves will actually also dictate your sleep. So the q-- it's called a quantitative EEG.
**Unknown:** This is completely different than a traditional EEG. But the best part about it is a quantitative EEG actually then will give you the brain map and dictate how you can fix the brain through something called neurofeedback. And the best part is literally neurofeedback is a matter of wearing glasses, wearing headphones as the technology does the work as you're watching a movie. And it retrains the brain.
**Unknown:** It's almost like exercise for the brain to balance things out. So this is an amazing technology that's being underutilized, and it's something that completely transforms people's mental health as well as their sleep. The other thing too is we talked about serotonin, dopamine, you know, some of these neurotransmitters. There's neurotransmitter testing.
**Unknown:** It's as simple as doing a urine test. And this way we can actually look at somebody who is potentially taking a medication or trying to supplement to see are they actually deficient? Are they overabundant in the neurotransmitter? And, you know, there's many labs that do this, but again, it's as simple as a urinary test.
**Unknown:** Um, some of the other tests that we utilize specifically is something called bioresonance testing as well as bioscan testing. So we look down to the DNA level to see what is stressing the neurological system, but also more importantly is what's stressing the body because there's so many ties to sleep disorders. The gut can be a very simple connection. It's because serotonin makes melatonin.
**Unknown:** It has to convert into melatonin, but ninety to ninety-five percent of your serotonin is actually made in your gut. So we need to kind of utilize the modalities out there to look at these different things. Secondary to that is we have the different things that can stress our brain to throw off our melatonin production is heavy metals. Mercury is a huge one.
**Unknown:** Aluminum is another one. For those of you that don't know, every time you put on antiperspirant, you're putting aluminum into your lymph nodes. So if you think like, "How the heck in the world would I ever be exposed to heavy metals?" You're being exposed. It's just the reality of it.
**Unknown:** It's in our antiperspirant. The silver fillings in our teeth have metals in them. The white fillings in our teeth have cadmium in them. Um, almost any type of dental, um, composite has different types of chemicals in it.
**Unknown:** The other big thing, which is definitely one of my zones of genius, is, uh, infectious disease testing. So there are many things outside of toxins and heavy metals that can stress our neurological system and throw off our sleep. But some of the big ones, uh, when it comes to infections is Lyme disease. There's also parasite infections like toxoplasmosis.
**Unknown:** So for those of you that have ever been pregnant or you've ever heard this, when a woman is pregnant, they say, "Don't change the cat litter." And the reason why they tell you this is because you put yourself at risk for being exposed to a neurological parasite called toxoplasmosis.So this is not me just saying, oh, this is one in, you know, a million people. Like toxoplasmosis is very easy to come across and get exposed to. In addition to that, mold is another big, big trigger to neurological issues and sleep disorders. And then we also have infections like syphilis and bartonella.
**Unknown:** I know those of you listening are probably like, syphilis, isn't that like eradicated? Syphilis and Lyme disease are, they look almost identical under a microscope. And it is very, very easy to be diagnosed with Lyme disease. But syphilis is something that I actually do see in my practice through the testing that we do.
**Unknown:** So it is not as uncommon as you may think. The safest way to get rid of heavy metals in the brain. The biggest disclaimer I would make is that when you take, when you're trying to detox from anything, heavy metals, mold, any type of toxin, you absolutely need to make sure that your liver, your kidneys, and your lymph nodes are being supported. So that means usually you have to do a combination of supplements.
**Unknown:** You have to do a combination of infrared sauna. And you also have to do a combination of herbs for your kidneys. Drink a lot of water, stay hydrated, electrolytes. You cannot, you don't try to detox from heavy metals by yourself.
**Unknown:** Just don't do it. Use a professional because the last thing you want to do is make yourself sick. And that's really important too is if you are going through the detox process and you feel sick, you're not doing what's right for your body. It's not just you're supposed to be sick while you detox.
**Unknown:** It means that you're stirring things up that your body is not getting rid of and it is starting to just circulate through your tissues and your blood. So it's very, very important to make sure that all of those detox systems are being supported. Okay. So on the note of these infections and how they can play a role in our sleep and overall our mental health, had a patient, he presented with sensory issues and gut complaints.
**Unknown:** Patient was about eight years old. He had really bad sensory issues. Like it was impossible for his mom to even get him to brush his teeth. So getting him to take supplements was going to be very, very difficult, but we needed to use something to help him with his detox process.
**Unknown:** So what mom decided would be best is if we would actually use a suppository, a suppository for detoxification. It was called a glutathione suppository that we used specifically for this patient. Suppositories are little inserts that go into the rectum. Yes, I know not the most glamorous, but that's what we needed to do.
**Unknown:** So as she was administering it one night, she reached out to me and she said, so I saw a worm and I was kind of confused. This was very early on in my practice, by the way. I was confused because I did a stool sample and it came up clear. And so at that point we decided to do another stool sample and another stool sample.
**Unknown:** And we did them from all three different companies and never did one of those stool samples reveal that there were parasites. But what happened was that he actually had pinworm. So the limitation with stool testing is that 20 minutes after a bowel movement leaves your body, the parasites will self-destruct. So by the time your sample reaches the lab, they're pretty much going to not be able to find the traces of the parasites.
**Unknown:** So with this being said, parasites have a massive tendency to affect your neurological system. So for those of you that are listening and feel very kooky today, it is a full moon and under a full moon is when parasites are the most active. So for those of you that have been moody today, your stomach has either been bothering you or you have terrible sleep tonight. It's time to get checked for parasites because you need to use more elaborate testing in order to find them because stool testing does not always reveal them.
**Unknown:** So it is very, very important to take that into consideration if you are dealing with depression, anxiety, or sleep issues. All right, guys. So last but not least, secret number three is you have no control over your mental health. So most importantly is when you know the root cause, anything is possible.
**Unknown:** And it's really just being able to be strategic in the process of getting better. And most of the time with the limitations in the testing that we've already established today, it's very difficult to figure out the root cause. Most of medicine is not necessarily digging for that. We're kind of just trying to acknowledge the symptoms and put a bandaid on them.
**Unknown:** So some of the things that are super important to get your sleep on track and to get your overall wellbeing on track is you have to consider the use of technology and the exposure to EMFs. So we are literally in wifi soup all day, every day. And one of the easiest and best things that we could do is try to cut down as much EMFs in our bedroom as possible. EMFs are electromagnetic frequencies.
**Unknown:** This is our wifi. This is Alexa. This is our cordless landline phones, our cell phones, our routers, all of these things. If you have cordless landline phones in your bedroom, get them out.
**Unknown:** If you have a smart TV in your bedroom, ideally get it out. If you have a router in your bedroom, get it out. All of those things are literally going to create massive stress on your neurological system. The other thing too, gluten.
**Unknown:** So I know gluten is such a hot topic and everyone is thinking about gluten in relation to their stomach. They're thinking, well, it doesn't bother my stomach, so I'm fine.Start paying attention to if it affects you neurologically. So if you eat gluten, you go out and, you know, you have pizza or you have pasta or whatever the case may be, start to notice if your sleep is off, if you're fatigued the next day, if you feel foggy the next day. I know that this was something that was happening to me.
**Unknown:** It never hurt my stomach, but it created a lot of issues with my cognitive function. And the only way you're really gonna notice is if you cut it out for at least a week, and then you bring it back in, and you start paying attention to those things. So, um, so it's not necessarily... If you're eating it every day, you're not gonna be able to notice it because you probably feeling tired and foggy is your normal.
**Unknown:** Um, the other big thing, going back to this hypoglycemia and balancing out your blood sugar, you need to eat breakfast. It is so, so, so essential to balance your blood sugar to then balance your brain and to get your circadian rhythms back on track. Um, exercise. Uh, exercising pretty late at night might throw you off more because you're pumping up your endorphins.
**Unknown:** But if you're waking up, and I know some of you are probably so freaking tired, but if you can just, like, be super diligent and disciplined and get yourself up and just try to do a little something in the exercise family in the morning, you will probably find that your sleep turns around more rapidly. And the other thing is learn something new. Um, being able to stimulate your brain in a new way is so, so important, and we need to do it going back to the basics. We need to grab a book.
**Unknown:** Uh, we need to read a newspaper. Um, trying to always learn on our computers or our Kindles and our tablets, it is going to further stress the brain, especially if you're doing it at night. So if you like to read before bed, try to transition over to an actual paper-based book. It will make a significant difference for you.
**Unknown:** So one of the biggest things that I've learned over the course of my clinical practice is that very, very rarely do things look like the textbook. And there is a lot of gray when it comes to medicine, diagnoses, and different conditions. Very rarely is it super black and white and that you fit the textbook. So this is usually where we start to have less and less options when it comes to getting better or bouncing back because if we don't fit the textbook, then we usually don't get a treatment recommendation because you have to match the textbook.
**Unknown:** So if you don't ma-match the textbook, then why should your treatment? So it's very, very important to dig deeper, to get better information, to really know what is the root cause to your sleep issues so that you can actually know how to fix it once and for all. So I think one of the biggest things that I realize on a day-to-day is that we forget that healthcare is about answers and solutions. We've kind of settled for getting a diagnosis, which is merely a description of our symptoms.
**Unknown:** Chronic fatigue syndrome, that means you're chronically fatigued. Irritable bowel syndrome, you have irritation in your bowels. We've settled for these diagnoses, and we've settled to kind of think that we just have to live with it or our only option is medication and then eventually surgery. So getting back to really knowing that you deserve to understand the root is most important to us, and that's why we do, um, all of these different types of tests on our onboarding process.
**Unknown:** But lastly, I just want you to know that when it comes down to you being able to figure out what's going on with you and being able to have a roadmap, that's when this becomes a breakthrough experience. This is, you know, I, I love doing these things because I love opening people's eyes to what's out there. But, you know, the transformations that we see on a day-to-day basis is just amazing, and I really just, uh, I can't tell you how, how much I love what I do. And being able to see people's lives transform, um, is really just...
**Unknown:** I, I feel very, very lucky and very grateful for that. Um, so I thank you guys for being with me. And, um, our website integrativewellnessgroup.com, check it out. So I will see you guys next week.
**Unknown:** Thank you again for joining. 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.
**Unknown:** Nicole, you can check out integrativewellnessgroup.com. 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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