Why Am I Like This?!
We are a therapist and a psychiatric nurse practitioner and we want to share a simplified view of these complex concepts that are often misunderstood, avoided, and even feared.
This is a podcast about being human, adapting to life, and learning from our unique experience.
We try to provide the answers to question: Why am I like this?
Why Am I Like This?!
Why am I so Tired?!
Ever wondered why you still feel tired after a full night's sleep? Join us on "Why Am I Like This?" as we uncover the hidden factors behind fatigue and share effective strategies for managing it. We'll explore the nuances of sleep quality, from the impact of substances like alcohol and marijuana to the importance of REM sleep and proper sleep hygiene. You’ll also gain insights into how mental health can influence your physical energy, and why maintaining a structured bedtime routine can make all the difference.
In this episode, we delve into the significance of sleep for children and how bedtime routines can foster a sense of security and self-soothing behaviors. Laura Wood and Michelle Bieber discuss the bonding hormones released during nighttime rituals and the challenges posed by childhood trauma. They also emphasize the need to rule out medical conditions like thyroid issues and sleep apnea when addressing persistent fatigue, ensuring that you have a comprehensive approach to improving sleep quality and overall well-being.
Finally, we'll tackle the often-overlooked aspects of dietary sensitivities and chronic stress on your energy levels. Learn practical methods for identifying food sensitivities and the critical role of gut health. Discover how chronic stress can lead to adrenal fatigue and effective strategies for managing it, from behavioral activation to engaging in hobbies and social connections. With valuable tips on recognizing and combating fatigue, this episode promises to equip you with the tools to boost your energy and enrich your life.
Laura's Free Course on Emotional Development and Regulation:
https://benavieri.com/neuroception-sign-up/
This show is sponsored by:
Benavieri Counseling & Coaching
www.benavieri.com
Active Healing Psychiatric Services
www.activehealingpsych.com
Hello and welcome to. Why Am I Like this? The podcast for those who didn't get enough hugs as a child? I'm Laura Wood and I'm a trauma therapist.
Michaela:Hi and I'm MishMayla. I am a psychiatric nurse practitioner.
Laura :So, M, why are we doing this podcast?
Michaela:I'm so glad you asked. We want to help you understand yourself a little bit better, like how the things you learned about yourself and the world and childhood are still affecting you today. We want to figure out why are we like this, those random things about ourselves that we might wonder like why am I so jumpy, why am I so anxious? Why do I take everything personally? Why are my thoughts so negative? Why do I feel like I have to fix everything all the time?
Laura :Yes, so we are trying to dig into fatigue today, so we're going to try to answer the following question why am I so tired all the time? How do I get more energy and what else can we do to learn about the root cause of our fatigue why are we so tired? This?
Michaela:is such an interesting question and I feel like, well, what is fatigue right? Like, is it that we just feel sleepy, right? So I think that there's different things and different pieces of this. Right, there's like the I feel sleepy part and there's also the I don't have like the physical energy part of fatigue, right, um, but I think I think that there's multiple causes for fatigue.
Michaela:Um, the first thing that we normally like think about is like, are you sleeping Right? Tell me about your sleep at night, and trying to understand, like, what is the quality of sleep that you are getting? So, are you having trouble falling asleep? Are you having trouble staying asleep? Are you getting up like 800 times in the night to go to the bathroom, or because you have a kid waking you up? So you know, sleep quality is really important.
Michaela:Another thing that we talk about is having good sleep hygiene, because you know we don't always think about, like you know, tv or things like that, having you actually like you think like, oh, it's just, I'm not going to be able to fall asleep, but why am I waking up in the middle of the night? Well, maybe the TV, and that you know that adrenaline is still contributing to you waking up in the middle of the night? Did you drink alcohol before bed? Sometimes alcohol will kind of wear off in the middle of the night, make us wake up and not get very good sleep.
Michaela:Interestingly, the other thing that I talk a lot about with people is weed. So people are very commonly using marijuana to try to get to sleep. That's a thing that people do very often, right, and it works Right. It actually helps them. You know, we talked about like they're stoning the hamster, right, so the hamster is running on the wheel, running on the wheel and they can't get their brain to stop. So they stone the hamster, right, so we're shutting down our brain and we're letting ourselves calm down so we can get sleep.
Michaela:But what people don't know about it is is that it's actually impairing your ability to get into REM sleep. So I don't know a lot of my patients that I talk to. I'm like they tell me they use weed to go to sleep and I'm like do you dream at night? And the answer typically like 90% of the time I would say is no, and that's because they're not getting into that REM sleep and thus they're not getting that the full sleep cycle and then they wake up feeling tired. Even though they could get to sleep, they're still tired throughout the day because they didn't get quality sleep. So that's number one thing that I kind of talk about and look at.
Laura :Yeah, that's so interesting. So you're saying that if you don't get the full sleep cycle, then that can be a reason why you wake up tired. So what is so important about REM sleep?
Michaela:Well, I'm not like a Freudian person, but I think that there's a lot of ideas about what happens in REM and how our dreams are a big piece of us being able to process things.
Laura :Yeah, when we're dreaming, we're processing information right, we're learning.
Laura :We're moving information from our short-term memory to our long-term storage. We are like clearing out. It's kind of like clearing your cash and cookies on your computer. Yeah, I'm terrible at that. Yeah, so you got to remember to do that, otherwise all this stuff just gets built up and that's why, like if you don't sleep for like a significant period of time, like you'll just start to glitch, like you'll just start to not work properly anymore, like your brain doesn't work properly, like.
Laura :So when I think about fatigue, sleep is a good one. I think sleep hygiene is often overlooked. We don't think about like how much, what is our bedtime routine? Like going into the evening with a plan to relax and wind down and actually make the best of your nighttime routine could be really helpful. But I also think about depression. Fatigue to me is just linked to depression, and I don't know if that's the same like, if you feel that same way.
Laura :But the DSM, the Diagnostic Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, is what we use to like diagnose and categorize different disorders, so like if you have anxiety disorder or depression or you know one of these things. Fatigue is a symptom of a lot of different disorders, but it can be mental, it can be about not being able to shut your mind down, not being able to recover from the shutdown. So, like with depression and fatigue, and depression is shutting down your body and shutting down your mind to probably avoid things that are difficult. So, even if we're not consciously avoiding them, we're avoiding difficult experiences that lead to our depression or that are triggers for our depression. So, for example, going to work, getting out of bed, you know, taking a shower, getting ready in the morning, if we're feeling depressed, all of that stuff is really difficult to do. We're avoiding all of that stuff because it just doesn't seem like it's going to be satisfying or give us joy in any way. We talked about that when we talked about procrastination too.
Michaela:Right, don't you think that being sleepy is actually an avoidance technique for trying to not have to deal with the things? Right, that's what you're saying, yeah.
Laura :I do believe that that's true. Being sleepy and shut down is a way of just avoiding distress. I'd rather be sleepy than sad. I'd rather be sleepy than upset or dysregulated in some way, and so it is a sign of dysregulation when we're super fatigued all the time. It could be a sense that could be derived from trauma as well. Yeah, trauma can cause this.
Michaela:The other thing that I was thinking about too, that something that you said made my brain go there, was you're talking about sleep hygiene and I'm thinking, isn't that something that we probably developed to like as a kid, like our ability to be able to learn to shut down our brain, and how we learned how to fall asleep in childhood, like if we didn't ever learn that skill? You know, maybe we were able to just watch TV until we fell asleep and that seemed to work, and so, you know, we just that's what our parents let us do, but you know, then we didn't really ever learn how to clear our brains, to allow ourselves to self-soothe, to be able to go to sleep.
Laura :Yes, I think absolutely. We learned this in childhood. We learn the process, but I think we also learn the importance of it too. So we're not only we're learning how to fall asleep and if that's through using the TV or using unhealthy ways to go to sleep we're learning that in childhood but we're also learning. Is it important for us to take care of our sleep? Is it important for us to focus on our sleep and get enough sleep and recognize the impact of our sleep?
Laura :When we're kids, one of the most difficult times in our day is bedtime, because we don't want to have to miss out. We don't want to miss out. We don't want to have to be separated from our caregivers. We want to stay connected with them. We don't want to, you know, be alone. So we want our caregiver to be part of that bedtime routine. And sometimes, if it's not part of our bedtime routine and we're just left to our own devices, as a little kid we might not ever have learned how to self-soothe. We've never had that opportunity to learn how to lay down and feel safe and rest. You know, nighttime can also be really triggering for those who've experienced childhood trauma and who were abused at night.
Laura :You know, nighttime can represent a time that is not safe for people and that can be a really big issue when it comes to getting good sleep.
Michaela:Yeah, that's a very good point. I have conversations with parents all the time and they're like, oh my kid, they just want to keep coming back out and asking for water. And can I get another story, or can I have some snack? And one of the things that we talk about is like, well, could this be a cry for attention? Right, is this actually them, you know, struggling for falling asleep, or is it just that they're looking for you and needing connection?
Laura :Most of the time it is that connection. And so there's a handful of times in a child's life that are really difficult and that require a lot of connection, because that's when they get the most the secretion of the most bonding hormones, which is bedtime. I get the most the secretion of the most bonding hormones, which is bedtime. So nighttime feeding behaviors, so like when we're feeding our children and when they're eating they're getting nourished by us, so they're feeling really. They're feeling really connected. And we also feel really connected when we're being groomed by our caregiver, so like hair brushing, teeth brushing, showering, bathing, all of that stuff. Those are the three most difficult times of any kid's day is feeding, grooming and nighttime. That's when we needed more support as kids.
Michaela:Well, and I always thought, or I was thinking, that like part of the fact that they don't want to brush their teeth and do all that stuff is because they know what's coming next. They're like if I get in the bath, then I have to go to bed, and I don't want to go to bed because that means I'm alone.
Laura :Yeah, that's possible too. It's like leading up to those kinds of things and, you know, we learn these things as kids, whether or not we're going to be cared for or whether we're going to be left on our own, and so we might have some like residual stuff about going to bed and ending our day. You know, I think about people who say have you ever heard people say like, oh, you'll sleep when you're dead? Like I don't want to miss out, like I want to stay up, I want to maximize my day, I want to, you know, be awake and do fun things, and I don't want to stay up. I want to maximize my day, I want to be awake and do fun things and I don't want to miss out on the hours. So that's something I think we learn in childhood. I think that's a habit, that is a rollover, for sure.
Michaela:Yeah, I could see that definitely being a case. Well, and you know, as you were talking about the depression and how that can play a role in us feeling fatigued, I was thinking like, when it comes to medication management of, you know, depression, medication management of, you know, depression, the focus and the sleepiness or fatigue are probably the harder things to treat. They linger for a longer time, they can be more challenging, but it's very important that we make sure that we rule out medical causes before we just assume that it's all mental health right. So we're doing a lot of checking for thyroid issues Anemia is another one Testosterone hormone issues, sleep apnea, right, or even narcolepsy.
Michaela:I know people think that it's silly when I talk about narcolepsy because they're like, well, I'm not just like passing out while like doing things, I don't have narcolepsy, but actually there is a narcolepsy without cataplexy, and so you know, that's where you cataplexy is, where you just, you know, fall asleep, and so I think that like it is worthwhile to get checked out, especially if you're one of those people that if I sit down and relax for too long in the afternoon, I'm asleep and I dream right away. Right, if I just go right into dreaming and I'm into REM really quickly. That could be an indicator that there could be something there. Right, like that, early entrance into dreaming is not normal, right, we're going. We usually take, you know, a little while to get into that phase, even with a nap, and so if you're kind of having that presentation, it's worth getting checked out from a sleep medicine doctor who can diagnose narcolepsy.
Laura :That's really interesting. I had no idea.
Michaela:There's also idiopathic hypersomnia, which is a thing. There's really not a cause, but they're just very tired all the time. And then there's chronic fatigue syndrome, which I believe can be a symptom of complex trauma as well as, potentially, you know some of the viral infections that you know. Epstein-barr virus reactivation is a thing, a mono, and there's other, you know different. You know Lyme disease and things like that. Now, I'm not a specialist in those areas, but I do try to identify those things so that we can refer out to those specialists, so they can get the help they need so that they don't feel so tired all the time.
Laura :That's really interesting that you can have a virus affect your fatigue, not just when you are sick. So I think about when I have a cold, like of course I have fatigue right, but once my cold is done I would think that I would be back, you know, up and at them.
Michaela:It's usually not that kind of cold virus that would be causing that chronic fatigue. I mean there you think about COVID, though people are having long COVID and they're having a lot of problems with brain fog because of long COVID.
Laura :Yeah, yeah, all of these things make us so tired. How do we get more energy? How do we flip the script and say, okay, I've got this fatigue. How do I combat it? What do I do?
Michaela:okay, I've got this fatigue. How do I combat it? What do I do? Yeah, that's a good question. So unfortunately, the answer isn't very simple, right? So we have to identify what the underlying cause is, and that's what the reason for the lab work and the workup and all those things Cause. If it's thyroid, that's easy to treat, right, um. If it's testosterone, that's not too hard to treat. If it's sleep apnea, you get a CPAP. Um, so, medically, we treat the medical problems, um.
Michaela:And if it's a nutrition related thing, you know, I think of like, um, if I don't have enough nutrition, then I'm just thinking that I'm going to need to get more nutrition and be very conscious of that. You know, I talk a lot with clients about their circadian rhythm of your gut and your gut has its own circadian rhythm and so, you know, you hear people say I'm just not a breakfast person, I just don't eat breakfast. Well, yeah, of course, because you, you've never really eaten breakfast and your gut hasn't gotten into the routine of doing that. But unfortunately, if you don't have the calories, some, some people do intermittent fasting and they, you know, there's evidence that they, or there's ideas that they feel good with it and they have more energy, um, but that's not always the case with everybody. And so if you're not getting that breakfast in your, your crashing by the afternoon. You're feeling grouchy, you're feeling tired. If you ate too many high carbohydrate or sugary things like a donut for breakfast, right, there's lots of sugar, lots of carbs, and you're going to get this really big insulin surge and then you're going to get a crash.
Michaela:And so things that you can do is I'm not saying you can't ever have a donut for breakfast, but maybe eat some almonds or some nuts with it, get some protein in with it.
Michaela:Maybe that's not your go to every day. I'm not recommending that that's what you should eat, but if you want, if you're going, you know we're not going to say don't ever eat that stuff, right, but pair it with some protein, and that's going to help with you feeling more full, you're getting a little bit more balance in and you're slowing down the digestion, right, and so you're not having that really big spike of your blood sugar and insulin and then that crash later, and that's going to help you. And then you know some people you know, as they're getting, they're changing these things they might need to eat every protein every three hours, sometimes not a huge meal, but they might need to get something in them so that their body can start getting used to having more nutrition and then preventing that crash that's happening and then, as their body gets more used to it, then they don't have to quite eat that that frequently. They can go back to three meals a day and making sure they're getting that balance in their diet.
Laura :Yeah, I feel like I've heard to eat five to six times a day. Is that to keep my blood sugar steady and stable, so that I'm not having those crashes, and so I'm not having that tiredness throughout the day?
Michaela:If you're eating the right things, then yes, that could be helpful. You're saying it's?
Michaela:six donuts a day is not going to be the solution to my problem, probably not, but you know, I think that it can be, you know, very helpful, especially as you're getting into that, trying to heal your gut, you know, trying to develop that circadian rhythm, and it will help with decreasing that, that crashing um, or even overeating, I think. Like you know, there's I've heard it said a number of different times that, like hypoglycemia is when people make the worst decisions right. That's when, like we, we really mess up when we're blood sugar is low because our brain doesn't have what it needs right Glucose to function properly, and so it doesn't have that, and so we're not going to be at our best when we're we're having those crashing.
Laura :So my nutrition, I think, is probably a big cause and possible solution, or at least like a supplement, supplemental solution. If I'm eating well, if I'm eating enough protein, I always recommend eating protein, like checking in on your protein intake with you know parents who come in and say their kids are, you know, lethargic and struggling intake with you know parents who come in and say their kids are, you know, lethargic and struggling.
Michaela:I'm always wondering hmm, are they?
Laura :getting enough protein and also water, drinking more water. I think we don't add enough. We don't. I don't know that everybody values water at the level that we should.
Michaela:Yeah, I believe that's true, Although we really like carrying around our Stanleys.
Laura :I know I love my Stanley, but I need to drink two of them every day in order to get enough water. Is that right?
Michaela:So you should drink probably about half your body weight in water. So if I fill up my Stanley cup and I have it filled with ice before I put water in there, I'm not getting whatever 40 ounces of water. I'm getting probably 20. So you need to be, you have to be careful. How much ice am I using? If you're drinking it just straight water, two is probably plenty, but two is probably not enough if there's a bunch of ice in there. So people think that they're doing a really good job. They're like. I drank two of these today, but it wasn't really full too if there was a bunch of ice in there, unfortunately, Good point.
Laura :I don't like ice, I like room temperature water, so if I drink two Stanleys, that's probably about right for me. You're golden, perfect, okay. So that's, I'm checking that box. I like the idea of doing almost like a food journal for a period of time, right, because I don't think that we really think that hard about what we're eating and how that's actually affecting us.
Michaela:Oh, 100% no, well, and I think that I like this idea. I'm glad that you brought it up, because I think that we underestimate our food sensitivities, right, so we have allergies and we're not. You get these major reactions, but food sensitivities may not be so obvious, and so that's one of the other reasons why we can have inflammation in our body, and that inflammation is causing our brain to be foggy as well. Right, and so we can reduce the things that we're sensitive to, that we're consuming hard to get rid of. You know, if you're sensitive to dairy, it's in everything. Right, it's added into stuff that you wouldn't even think. But, but for for sure, if you can eliminate, but if not, if you can just dramatically reduce, you're going to feel a lot better, and that that brain fog is going to get better as well. How can?
Laura :we find out? Are there tests that we can do to determine our food sensitivities or like our best nutrition plan? Is that something possible to determine with like labs?
Michaela:or something like that. There is a food sensitivity test. So you have your IgE mediated response. That's your allergies, right? That's what's going to come back on an allergy test. There are IgG testing for food sensitivities.
Michaela:Now I say this with a caveat and I tell this to my clients. I think that they can be very helpful, especially if you don't want to like, figure it out on your own right. It's a good place to start. So just a simple food log. You do not have to go get this testing done. You can do a simple food log and mark what you're when you're having symptoms and see if you can correlate it.
Michaela:Maybe you're like, OK, that's not enough. I'm not sure my, my symptoms are there all the time. Ok, let's try getting rid of the most common things dairy wheat, like the for the gluten. You know, those are, those are some good eggs, right, Like those are some of the really common things. So we're going to talk about what, what things we want to try to avoid. Okay, we're going to start with eggs. All right, cool, we're going to get rid of eggs and we're going to see how we do. We're going to do that for a few weeks and then we're going to try to reintroduce eggs one time and see what happens.
Michaela:And then, if you get symptoms, you're like, oh OK, this could be a thing, Right, so that's a way. But you can do this IgG mediated testing and then just now, you kind of have an idea. Now the caveat with this is that when we have dysbiosis of the gut, when we have our gut lining, you know, when we don't have a healthy gut right, we have something maybe that we're calling leaky gut now right, or that mucosal lining gets thin. Things are crossing through that barrier that normally wouldn't. And so just because you have a sensitivity to something right now doesn't mean that you will always be sensitive to it, right. If you can heal that lining of the gut by avoiding the things that you should avoid and you know, take eating, you know upping your nutrition and getting good bacterial balance back in your gut, if you can, if you can achieve that, you may not be sensitive to that anymore.
Laura :That's so interesting. I didn't know that you could change your sensitivity.
Michaela:Even stress is something that can actually. You know, all of a sudden I'm having this big stressful thing, and now I can't eat this food right, like it bothers my stomach, and now I feel sick every time I eat it, and so stress is tied to this as well, and so then, once you can get the stress calmed back down, then our body is fine again and we can tolerate that food again.
Laura :Hmm, okay, stress also can cause quite a bit of fatigue. Yeah, because our brains are wired and tired, right? You told me that phrase. When we're stressed, we are constantly using so much energy on all of the wrong things. Our bodies can't keep up with our nutrition, our bodies can't keep up with our digestion that our bodies can't keep up with the normal everyday things that we're supposed to be doing, and so it's just expending all this energy trying to. It's's not working efficiently, right. And when we're in fight or flight, we're doing the same thing.
Laura :So stress increases our chances of being in fight or flight mode, right? Well, the more stress we have, the more likely we are to be spending more time in fight or flight mode, and fight or flight mode is exhausting. Yes, it is a high energy usage mode. It is not one that is efficient at all. It's not advantageous for us to maintain this fight or flight mode, and then often what will happen is, when we're in fight or flight, fight or flight, fight or flight then our body switches into shutdown, and that's when we get that shutdown sleepy. I'm over it. I'm going to bed. I just want to lay down I don't have any energy to do anything and we feel like we want to get up and go do something, but we just don't have the energy for it.
Michaela:Yeah, people who are in fight or flight for years can end up in something called adrenal fatigue. Right, they're producing all this cortisol, cortisol, cortisol. And you know, our bodies come to a point where sometimes they can't keep up anymore and then our cortisol actually drops really low and isn't responding like it should to the situations. Right, and that's exhausting, right we? If we don't have cortisol to help give us what we need, we're not getting that adrenaline type of stuff, then we're tired, then it feels like too much to respond to things.
Laura :Yeah, everything feels like too much. When we feel really overwhelmed, it's an indicator that your fatigue is maybe taking over. If you're starting to feel this way, if you're noticing that you're feeling overwhelmed a lot, if you're noticing you're feeling like things are just too much like regular, menial, everyday tasks are just so difficult or seem kind of out of reach or seem like they would be really really energy consuming more so than they really would be right, like something like going for a walk. I'm not talking about doing like a serious exercise routine, but just to go for a walk around the neighborhood or do something active generally every day. If you're feeling so fatigued that you're not doing that, like you might be, that might be something to consider. That you want to reevaluate your nutrition, your sleep, all of those things.
Michaela:Absolutely yeah, and um, when, when I think some of the things that I'm thinking about too is like, um, when we're highly stressed, like our brain doesn't work as well, right, we can't remember things as well. You know, there's cortisol in our brain, like there's cortisol receptors on the hippocampus of the brain, and so kind of going back to that, like we, that is toxic to that brain and makes us kind of not remember things as well, which is contributing to more stress.
Laura :And the brain fog, and when we feel foggy and just not quite right, we're not doing our best, we're not able to perform at our best, we're not able to manage our day quite as well. We're not able to stay as organized. We're not able to manage our day quite as well. We're not able to stay as organized. We're not able to maintain focus. All of those things contribute to our stress and it's sort of a vicious cycle. It sounds like.
Michaela:Also, when people have adrenal fatigue, I tell them not to exercise strenuously, right, because it actually can make them feel so much worse because they don't have the cortisol to respond to that heavy exercise and so it can be even more depleting for them.
Michaela:But I do think that, you know, I think about the upward spiral or the downward spiral of depression.
Michaela:So maybe we've talked about this here before, but you know, I think that, like when we feel depressed, we don't want to do things and then we don't do things, so then we feel more depressed and don't want to do more things and it just kind of digs this hole down, down, down, and we end up feeling so much worse.
Michaela:And so sometimes, even when we don't want to do it, even when it sounds like not that much fun, even if we know that it's not going to be as fun as it used to be, I think that doing stuff, whatever it is your hobby, a walk, you know, spending time with friends, whatever that is that you are trying to avoid I think you need to go do it. I think that it's going to be hard and it's going to be not great, but it's not going to be as bad as what you assume that it's going to be, and so that is one way to get your energy back right. Like you think about, um, you know, doing things that give us energy, that help fill us up and give us positive feelings, and it's not like, oh, that was the most fun thing ever, but it's going to get us going in the right direction, and so the more we do things, the more fun they are and the less we feel sad and alone.
Laura :Yeah, behavioral activation doing a food log, getting on a routine, going for a walk each day, engaging in some kind of hobby, engaging in connection with others Once per day each of those things doesn't take that much time, right? You could do all of those things in a 30-minute period and I'm saying just do them each sometime throughout the day. That behavioral activation can actually give you more energy and give you a bigger sense of satisfaction. It can alleviate depression and activity. So, even not strenuous, but just walking, whatever activity, exercise is a very, very effective treatment for depression. In conjunction with all these other things that we're talking about here, if you are experiencing depression and you have medication for it and you have fatigue still, some of this stuff could be what it takes to take you over the edge of feeling a little bit better. Mm-hmm.
Michaela:Yep, I think morning sun is underappreciated as well. So we're talking about circadian rhythm of our gut and getting that back. We also want to get circadian rhythm of our brain back on track right. So, like getting out and feeling the sun on our skin and the light coming into our eyes helps start that circadian rhythm of decreasing that nap, that melatonin in our brain Right. But we get up and we're in a dark room and like our brain still is just seeing darkness, that melatonin is still going to be high, right, it's not going to be getting that, that light that tells us to go down. That helps with decreasing fatigue.
Laura :That's a really good point. I see those wake-up alarm clocks that kind of simulate the sunrise, and I think that's the science behind it If you can wake up in the morning with the sun I'm not saying wake up with the sunrise necessarily, but waking up and experiencing the sunshine that is available at the time that you wake up is a really good way to give yourself an energy boost. Also, there are foods that you can eat that do provide energy. I mean, we talked a little bit about protein, but I think I read somewhere once that an apple has more energy, like producing material, than than a cup of coffee. I didn't know that, but I don't know if it's that caffeinated. I don't know if apples are caffeinated, that's not what I'm saying, but like they create as much energy as like the caffeine in a cup of coffee. Yeah, an apple and some almonds An apple and some almonds, some energy producing apples and energy producing protein, and keep you full longer, and there's so many good things about that. That's a really good way to start your day.
Michaela:Back to the sun thing. So not everybody has time to like pop outside, sit and sip their coffee in the sunlight, right. We're busy human beings with jobs and kids and all that stuff, but we are all doing something in the morning that we can get these light therapy lamps and we can sell them on Amazon. They don't have they're not super expensive some of them and so you can get this light and you don't want to look directly at it, but you can like set it on your desk in the morning when you first start working, or you can set it up in your bathroom to kind of shine on you while you're getting ready in the morning, and that can be an alternative to the sunlight, right, getting that same thing going in the morning.
Laura :Yes, I love that. I actually have one of those and I love it. I think it works really well. It really does help me it has good data behind it. I've never used one, but yeah, I'm like a houseplant with feelings. I need light and I need water and that's pretty much it and I'm good to go. Some lab tests we mentioned a food log. We've talked through a couple of different ways. What other types of screenings can help us determine the root cause of our fatigue?
Michaela:I'm sure I'm missing something here, but, like, I feel like we covered a lot of the big, big things. I think the biggest thing is just meeting with a provider who is well-versed in, like, and looking for all the things. Right, I know we've all been to the provider where they're like, you know you have heart palpitations, you must be anxious or you know you must be depressed. This is just depression, right, like, and they're not looking at the person as a whole, right? So you're going to seek out somebody who is going to dig deep and look at you as a whole person? Um, because you are, you're dynamic.
Michaela:There's not just one thing. It could be multiple things contributing to it, um, the. The other thing that just pops into my head is obesity, right? Um, there are, so there's so many, um, you know, options out there for people to help them and support them with, uh, managing their weight, right, and, um, the reason I mentioned this is because it creates inflammation in the body, and inflammation is a driving force of depression. So, not only do you feel depressed, you don't like how you look, or you feel uncomfortable in your skin, but it's also creating and wreaking havoc in your body from, like, an inflammatory standpoint and that's a major contributing factor of depression. They've tied having elevated CRP levels, which is an inflammatory marker in our body, to increased risk of depression.
Laura :Interesting yeah. That's a really good point.
Michaela:So I mean, even like lithium levels, like lithium is supposed to be in our soil, and I think that there's probably a varying range and it can be depleted in some areas. And they've really studied and looked around at lithium levels in the soil and the drinking water, right, and the risk of depression and suicidal suicide attempts? I think, or maybe, just yeah, I think it's suicide attempts maybe. And the lower the amount of lithium in our our drinking water and in our food, the higher rates of depression. Wow, our bodies are really connected. We are a whole person with it's very multifactorial, and so you need someone who's going to be able to you can find someone that's able to help you kind of figure out what's going on for you, then that's going to be the best bet.
Laura :And what about hormone testing?
Michaela:Yeah, you can do hormone testing and see what's going on there. I think you know, I know I'm I'm approaching my forties and I know that there are a lot of women that I see kind of getting into that perimenopausal time period and all of a sudden they're like man, I'm just so anxious all the time and I can't, I can't find anything and I'm distracted and I'm not sleeping at night, right, and a lot of times they'll go and get put on an SSRI, right Antidepressant for for their insomnia, anxiety, maybe depression that they're having. But ultimately it could be that the insomnia could be tied to low progesterone, right. That starts going down anywhere between you know, around 10 years, even before you start going through menopause, and so there very well could be a tie between that hormone imbalance and the insomnia and fatigue that they're feeling during that time of their life, specifically, probably in additional times of life, that hormones are imbalanced. So yeah, that's a good point, okay.
Laura :So we can get some labs. We can see a holistic provider who knows about more than just one thing and is looking at ourself as a whole person, and we can kind of monitor our food. We can take a look at our sleep hygiene and our bedtime routine and track whether or not we're dreaming. Those are really helpful.
Michaela:You can also go seek therapy right Like for depression, anxiety underlying trauma. There are really good therapists out there that can help with that Someone who's trained in cognitive behavioral therapy for insomnia right Specific treatment that helps with people developing better sleep habits and decreasing the anxiety around sleep, because I do feel like that's probably one of the biggest driving forces for continued insomnia. Everybody has a bad night of sleep, but sometimes people get so anxious about not sleeping and not feeling good the next day that it can drive that anxiety up at nighttime and make it more of a habitual thing.
Laura :So that's another thing that you can do habitual thing, so that's another thing that you can do. That's a good point. Therapy is always something that I recommend. Obviously, as a therapist, I find it to be very helpful, and when we talked about some trauma and we talked about depression and we talked about anxiety and all of these different things, you know, therapy can be really helpful for that, and so finding a good therapist who is well versed in all of those things is really really helpful for that, and so finding a good therapist who is well-versed in all of those things is really really helpful as well.
Laura :Absolutely Okay. Well, thank you so much for this conversation today. This is incredibly informative. Yeah, this was fun, and thank you for listening to. Why Am I Like this? If you like our show, please leave us a rating and review on your favorite podcast platform, Follow the show and share it with your friends. This episode was written and produced by me, Laura Wood and Michelle Bieber. Our theme song is Making Ends Meet by Thick as Thieves, and a special thanks to Benevery Counseling and Coaching and Active Healing Psychiatric Services for sponsoring this show.
