vagus nerve

Why social anxiety, introversion and loneliness can be lethal and a simple nutritional solution

January 10, 2020 By Trudy Scott 36 Comments

It was an honor to be selected as one of fifteen participants for The Future of Health presentations at Mindshare in August 2019. I presented this to my peers in the integrative health and nutrition space but it’s applicable to everyone and I’d like to share it with you today.

Here is my video presentation: Why social anxiety, introversion and loneliness can be lethal and a simple nutritional solution (click below to watch the video)

Here are some additional reading resources on much of what I cover in my 5 minute presentation:

Pyroluria is a social anxiety condition that is not well recognized in the medical community. It responds really well to a few key nutrients, with zinc and vitamin B6 forming the foundation. I cover this in this blog post: Pyroluria, high mauve, pyrrole disorder, malvaria, elevated kryptopyrroles and social anxiety.
Here is a link to the Pyroluria Questionnaire from my book The Antianxiety Food Solution (which has an entire chapter on the topic). I created this questionnaire using the work of Carl Pfeiffer and Joan Mathews-Larson, modifying it based on feedback I receive from my clients.
I discuss how I first discovered the pyroluria-introversion connection here – Am I an anxious introvert because of low zinc and vitamin B6? My response to Huffington Post blog. I wrote this in response to the Huffington Post article, “23 Signs You’re Secretly An Introvert”, by Carolyn Gregoire.
Here is the webmd loneliness article with this quote: “Loneliness has the same impact on mortality as smoking 15 cigarettes a day, making it even more dangerous than obesity” ~ Douglas Nemecek, MD, chief medical officer for behavioral health, Cigna
And this loneliness paper, Loneliness and Social Isolation as Risk Factors for Mortality: A Meta-Analytic Review
In this blog I write about how Increased sociability improves vagus nerve function: the role of social anxiety, pyroluria and low zinc

This is the the amazing and inspiring group of speakers who I shared the stage with:

Amie Apigan – Why Attachment is the New Field of Medicine
Lauryn Lax – Eating Healthy is Killing You
Jess Sherman – Raising Resilient Kids in a Complex World: Will we Rise to the Challenge
Terry Wahls – Creating an Epidemic of Health – My Radical Path
Susanne Bennett – The Kimchi Revolution: How an Ancient Food Can Transform the Future of Health
Razi Berry – Love is Medicine
Kaylea Boutwell – I’ve Got Your Back: Novel Pain Therapies Transforming Spinal Care Outcomes
Dana Cohen – Hydration: 8 Glasses a Day is not the Way!
Elisa Song – Breathing Life into Your Kids
Joel Sprechman – Creating 1M Super Poopers & Evolving Crohn’s Colitis
Katy Kimball – My Plan to Empty Your Waiting Rooms (the Real Root Cause of Poor Health)
Heather Paulson – Why Choose? Using the Best of Both Worlds to Experience Health with Cancer
James Maskell – Group Visits: How Functional Medicine Reaches the Vulnerable
Mehgan Walker – Life, Liberty and the Pursuit of Chronic Disease: Why Chasing Happiness is Making us Sick

(do let me know if you’d like me to share any of these presentations in the follow-up blog)

Mindshare 2019 green room — Here are some of us in the backstage “green room” and getting ready to go on stage!

We each had a maximum of 5 minutes to present and were not allowed slides or notes. The last time I had memorized my talks and had them timed was 15 years ago when I was in Toastmasters. Before that it was when I was in school. I wasn’t even sure if I could do it when I entered my proposal to speak. When practicing the day before I was still unsure I could manage. Because of my Lyme disease, my memory and word recall isn’t as great as it used to be.

If you pay close attention and you’ll notice the spot where I almost freeze – everything just went out of my head! I simply breathed in calmly, made an attempt to look like I had paused and was fortunate that most of the ending came back to me! Whew!

I’d love to hear what you think of my message and if it resonates with you or a loved one. Feel free to share your pyroluria score and how you score on the introvert questionnaire.

Please also share if you’ve seen the benefits of no social anxiety, introversion and/or loneliness (or much less) when on the pyroluria protocol.

Increased sociability improves vagus nerve function: the role of social anxiety, pyroluria and low zinc

December 13, 2019 By Trudy Scott 14 Comments

With the objective of taking a deeper dive into some of the favorite topics of the recent Anxiety Summit: Gut-Brain Axis, today’s blog is about the vagus nerve since Dr. Navaz Habib’s interview, Vagus Nerve Activation to Reduce Anxiety, was voted one of the favorites. I’m focusing on one tool that improves vagus nerve function that we didn’t have time to get into in great detail – and that is how increased sociability helps. It’s all good and well to recommend getting out and hanging out with more people but if you have the social anxiety condition called pyroluria it’s really challenging, hard work and very stressful. Added stress makes pyroluria worse so it becomes a vicious cycle.

Let’s start with the research that supports the connection between the vagus nerve and increased anxiety and mood problems. In the interview with Dr Navaz, we discussed this paper: Vagus Nerve as Modulator of the Brain–Gut Axis in Psychiatric and Inflammatory Disorders which states that “vagus nerve stimulation is a promising add-on treatment for treatment-refractory depression, posttraumatic stress disorder, and inflammatory bowel disease” and how stimulation of vagal fibers that go from the gut to the brain (afferent fibers) influences neurotransmitter production and “play crucial roles in major psychiatric conditions, such as mood and anxiety disorders.” The gut bacteria play a major role too, “partly by affecting the activity of the vagus nerve.”

In our interview we end with very practical ways to activate your vagus nerve

Deep breathing exercises (mentioned in the above paper, together with yoga and meditation) and cold showers (which makes you breathe harder)
Gargling and using the gag reflex
Humming, chanting and singing (I used these approaches for my vagus nerve issue – more here on that)
Auricular acupuncture (which is also very effective for addictions)
And finally, social interaction or increased sociability, which I want to cover today

The research on the vagus nerve and being more social

Let’s look at the research on the vagus nerve or vagal tone and being more social. This paper, Upward spirals of the heart: autonomic flexibility, as indexed by vagal tone, reciprocally and prospectively predicts positive emotions and social connectedness, reports that that vagal tone and connectedness or being more social is a two-way street i.e. it’s reciprocal

“…increases in connectedness and positive emotions predicted increases in vagal tone” and
“Adults who possessed higher initial levels of vagal tone increased in connectedness and positive emotions more rapidly than others”

In summary, the more social and happy you are, the healthier your vagus nerve is and a healthier vagus nerve leads to feeling more connected and happy.

This study was done with adults in a community-dwelling setting over 9 weeks: “adults were asked to monitor and report their positive emotions and the degree to which they felt socially connected each day.”

Address pyroluria in those who have social anxiety

Pyroluria, the social anxiety condition, was not part of the study because it’s under-recognized as a factor in anxiety. I’d like to propose that we address pyroluria in those who have social anxiety in order to further improve social connectedness and their vagus nerve function.

Many folks with pyroluria put on a brave face in social settings and even “extrovert” which is extremely stressful. The added stress makes pyroluria worse (zinc and vitamin B6 are dumped in much higher amounts) so it becomes a vicious cycle.

Others, who are not willing to even show up because of their severe social anxiety, are not getting that social interaction and connectedness that is so crucial for improved vagus nerve function and better overall health.

Here is the pyroluria questionnaire and the pyroluria/introvert connection.

Connecting the dots further we have

research that reports that vagus nerve stimulation has potential in autism treatment and we know pyroluria and social issues are common in autism
one of the key nutrients for pyroluria, zinc, plays a role in vagus nerve function
another key nutrient in pyroluria is vitamin B6 and it plays a role in reducing inflammation
according to the vagus nerve study above, the vagus nerve “plays important roles in the relationship between the gut, the brain, and inflammation”
both zinc and vitamin B6 are needed for neurotransmitter production, so increasing both GABA and serotonin will further improve mood and reduce anxiety
and finally, the more social and happy you are, the healthier your vagus nerve is and a healthier vagus nerve leads to feeling more connected and happy

By addressing the social anxiety called pyroluria with a foundation of zinc and vitamin B6, we can increase sociability and thereby improve vagus nerve function.

Have you got pyroluria and has addressing it nutritionally allowed you to be more sociable? Do you find you have better vagus nerve function when you are more sociable? What other avgus nerve exercises have you found helpful?

Vagus Nerve Activation to Reduce Anxiety with Dr. Navaz Habib: The Anxiety Summit 5

November 1, 2019 By Trudy Scott 2 Comments

Navaz Habib, DC, is one my guest experts on The Anxiety Summit 5: Gut-Brain Axis and our topic is: Vagus Nerve Activation to Reduce Anxiety. What You’ll Learn –

Using bowel transit time and heart rate variability to measure how your vagus nerve is working
How the vagus nerve becomes dysfunctional
Vagus nerve activation tools: gargling, auricular acupuncture, social interaction
and more

Dr. Navaz shares this about the vagus nerve and why good vagus nerve function is so important for both good digestion and for easing anxiety (and preventing it too):

the vagus nerve is one of many cranial nerves. So we have 12 pairs of cranial nerves, or nerves that begin within the head cavity, and they exit to the brainstem at that point.

The vagus nerve is the 10th pair of cranial nerves. So it’s called the 10th cranial nerve, as well. And there’s one on each side. There’s actually one on the left and one on the right. So it is a pair and is the vagus nerves in reality. But the vagus nerve is the only cranial nerve of those 12 pairs that will exit the cranium. Okay. So it does have some function in and around the face and the throat, but it does exit and go into other areas of the body.

And that’s what makes the vagus nerve so important. It is the only one that does so. And it goes to innervate so many different organs inside our body. This includes the heart, the lungs, stomach, gallbladder, liver, kidneys, every single part of our digestive tract, as well as our spleen. So all of these organs need to have a certain level of information that’s passed from the brain to those organs, but we also need all of those organs, especially the gut, to send that information back up to the brain. And the vagus nerve is very, very important in that specific function.

He shares the two tests he uses to ensure his clients have strong vagus nerve function:

the bowel transit time test: “how much time is it is actually going to take for the food that we ingest from our mouth to exit through the opposite end, to go through the entire digestive tract and leave”
heart rate variability test which measures vagus nerve function directly: “heart rate variability is actually the measurement of the amount of time in milliseconds between beats of the heart.”

We go into great detail on each of the above tools and how to use them and we also discuss some of the research. This paper is fascinating: Vagus Nerve as Modulator of the Brain-Gut Axis in Psychiatric and Inflammatory Disorders. Here are some highlights from our discussion:

how inflammatory disorders and psychiatric disorders are so interconnected through the vagus nerve function
gut-brain axis sends information/chemicals from gut bacteria, parasites, viruses, yeast etc. up through the vagus nerve to the brain.
it involves the inflammatory system or the cholinergic anti-inflammatory system and acetylcholine
if we have gut dysfunction that can lead to dysfunctional inflammatory control, immune dysfunction and autoimmune diseases
it’s going to lead to inflammation in the brain, and in the entire nervous system and that’s where a lot of mood disorders like anxiety and depression really start to come from because we now know that serotonin, dopamine, norepinephrine, and epinephrine levels are highest in the gut.
this can lead to depressive type symptoms, mood type symptoms, and significant fear and worry that we find in anxiety.

When I found out that Dr. Navaz had written a book called “Activate Your Vagus Nerve: Unleash Your Body’s Natural Ability to Heal” (my Amazon link), I reached out to him to speak on the summit, and I’m so glad I did. I know you’ll love this interview as much as I do and will get tons out of it!

We cover how vagus nerve function can be impacted – lack of sleep and hormonal imbalances can be factors. A big trigger is trauma and I share my traumatic plane ride and how it affected my vagus nerve, voice and throat. I blogged about this and if you missed all that be sure to check the blog and videos in advance of our interview: Vagus nerve rehab with GABA, breathing, humming, gargling and key nutrients. The amino acid GABA was central in relaxing the throat spasms I experienced.

And we end with very practical ways to activate your vagus nerve

Deep breathing exercises and cold showers (“cold showers are a really great way to make our breathing a little bit more difficult. It’s like adding a weight onto the breath/onto the chest so that we’re forcing ourselves to breathe as well as we possibly can even under stressful circumstances”)
Gargling and using the gag reflex
Humming, chanting and singing (I used these approaches for my vagus nerve issue)
Auricular acupuncture (which is also very effective for addictions)
And finally, social interaction (I love this one and we talk about pyroluria and why addressing this social anxiety condition with nutrients is also so important for vagus nerve

Be sure to listen to Dr Navaz’s wonderful interview to get a complete picture of the importance of the vagus nerve, how it can start to function poorly and how to reactivate it to improve gut health and help with anxiety and mood issues.

It will lay a great foundation for the mentions of vagus nerve in many of the other interviews.

Please join us and listen to this interview and all the others on The Anxiety Summit 5: Gut-Brain Axis.

When you register now you’ll get access to there 3 interviews right away:

Fix the Brain to Fix the Gut – Datis Kharrazian, DHSc, DC, MS, FACN, CNS
MTHFR, B12 Genes and Anxiety – Carolyn Ledowsky, ND
Why Bile is the Key to Anxiety & Hormone Havoc – Ann Louise Gittleman, PhD, CNS

If you have already signed up for the summit, I hope you enjoy these interview highlights.

If you have yet to sign up, please do come and join us and learn.

If you’re considering purchasing the summit to keep for your learning library, you have a number of options that include:

Online only or flash drive or both
A PDF or printed transcripts of all the interviews
The Best of Anxiety-Gut interviews from previous Anxiety Summits
GABA Quickstart Program (a group program with me on how to actually use GABA for your physical anxiety, with a private Facebook group and live Q & A call)

Purchase options

If you’re already familiar with the importance of the vagus nerve and already do work on activation (to improve gut health and help with anxiety) please share what you find works for you. That way we can all learn.

If you’d like to ask a question, please post in the comments below.

I’d also love to hear from you once you’ve listened in to Dr. Navaz’s interview and the others.

How much GABA should I use and which GABA product is best?

December 8, 2017 By Trudy Scott 44 Comments

The most common question I get about GABA (gamma-amino butyric acid) is the one about the blood-brain barrier and does it even work (it certainly does – read here for information on this one).

The next most common question I get about GABA is this one:

How much GABA should I use and which GABA product is best?

This exact question was actually asked of me a number of times last week after I published: Herbal therapy is equivalent to rifaximin for the treatment of small intestinal bacterial overgrowth (SIBO). In this blog I share about my trials of using sublingual GABA for the visceral pain and muscle tension in my gut caused by the bloating symptoms of SIBO.

There is no simple answer! It requires a blog post to provide a good answer because we are all unique, have different needs and these needs can even differ at different times depending on the issue and what is going on in our lives at the moment.

Let’s first do a quick recap of GABA (gamma-amino butyric acid) in case this is new to you. GABA is a calming amino acid that can be used as a supplement to raise GABA levels (GABA is also a neurotransmitter. It’s one of the amino acids I use most frequently with my anxious clients (together with tryptophan). GABA helps with the physical anxiety and tension, as well as panic attacks. New research shows it also helps with inhibition of unwanted thoughts and may also offer gut protection after alcohol consumption. It also helps with stiff and tense muscles and muscle pain and spasms.

How I have benefited from GABA

Here is a quick summary of how I’ve benefited from GABA supplements. I use this information to inform my use of GABA to help with the visceral pain I now experience due to my SIBO (more on that below).

If you have never used GABA or if you’ve used it once or twice, reading this should give you a clue as to why there is no one answer and how we need to use a trial approach to figure out what is best for each situation.

This also illustrates that there is no one size fits all for everyone and even for the same person under different situations.

The anxiety and panic attacks I experienced 15 years ago:
1. I used 1-2 GABA Calm three times a day and a combination GABA product at night. GABA Calm contains 125mg GABA and the GABA product contains 200mg GABA. My anxiety eased and my panic attacks stopped in a few days, giving me immediate relief and hope while I started to address all the other root causes like gluten sensitivity, adrenal issues, low zinc, gut health, low vitamin B6 and more
2. The doses of GABA I used for my anxiety and panic attacks are typical amounts my clients benefit from and I would not have someone start on 500mg.
3. If someone is a “pixie-dust” person and very sensitive I’d have them start with a pinch/dab or ¼ of 125 mg GABA Calm.

The “ice-pick” headaches on the top of the skull that I discovered were caused by neck spasms:
1. Physical therapy, high doses of GABA and high doses of magnesium were essential.
2. Because of the low doses of GABA I had used for my anxiety years before this, I started with low doses of GABA increasing slowly from 200mg up to 1000mg GABA. This higher amount worked for me at this time for this injury.

Throat spasms and the loss of my voice due to vagus nerve issues caused by a terrifying plane ride:
1. Based on my prior ice-pick headache experience I now knew I could tolerate higher doses and started with 500mg GABA and used more as needed.
2. I must have been really low in GABA because I was actually able to use upwards of 5 (and sometime more) doses of 500mg a day and not feel too wiped out, even during the day.
3. That’s a lot of GABA for me – as I mentioned above 125mg to 250mg used to be enough for the anxiety I experienced 15 years ago.
4. I write more about all this here: Vagus nerve rehab with GABA, breathing, humming, gargling and key nutrients (with videos to demonstrate immediate effects when using GABA sublingually)

Rectal spasms/proctalgia fugax. These seem to be related to SIBO/IBS and I still experience these from time to time.
1. I have found that 250mg to 500mg GABA opened onto my tongue works best for me for this particular muscle spasm.
2. Again, it eases the spasms and pain in a few minutes. I write more about this here: How GABA eases agonizing rectal pain and spasms in under 2 minutes

A back injury in August causing severe muscle spasms and pain.
1. Again, based on my previous experiences using GABA, right after my fall I started taking 1000mg of GABA powder every few hours (held in my mouth for 1-2 minutes) and then reduced it to 2 or 3 times a day as needed.
2. I share more in this blog: Acupuncture boosts GABA to reduce back pain and oral GABA further reduces the pain
3. In the above blog you can also read some research about the mechanism of how GABA supplements ease inflammation and tracheal spasms associated with asthma.

Visceral pain caused by SIBO.
1. My SIBO is really well-controlled with diet but I’ve been having pain, bloating and insomnia while doing this herbal SIBO protocol. I suspect the cellulose in one of the herbal products is causing this bloating and pain after dinner. It was getting so bad it was keeping me awake (this is typical when I am accidently exposed to problematic foods and get a flare-up).
2. SIBO patients can have visceral hypersensitivity where their pain can be due to the pressure of the gas that is produced and the muscles in the digestive system actually contracting against this pressure.
3. It got me thinking about how effective GABA is for relieving muscle tension and how much it’s helped me in the past. I also use GABA with my clients all the time for relief of their physical anxiety and stiff and tense muscles. There are GABA receptors all over the gut and I recently discovered that GABA is important for motility.
4. Over the last 2 weeks I’ve trialed 300mg GABA (opened on to the tongue) a few times to ease the pain and pressure and it’s been amazing at how much it’s helped and how quickly it’s eased the pain. I’ve used it as soon as I notice the bloating starting and it GABA helps me sleep too (as does the tryptophan I’ve also added). I suspect I could safely double this dose in the evening and may do this if the lower dose isn’t enough some evenings. I’ve also used it some days the next morning when I wake with the bloated ache in my belly.

How much should I use and which GABA product is best?

I have a blog post listing the products I use with clients: The Antianxiety Food Solution Amino Acid and Pyroluria Supplements

Always read the precautions (there is a link on the above blog) and do the amino acid questionnaire (the link is also on the above blog) before starting a trial. I also recommend reading the amino acids chapter in my book The Antianxiety Food Solution so you are a well-informed savvy consumer.

If you’re doing a trial for anxiety and panic attacks:

If you can use tyrosine the Source Naturals GABA Calm product is the one I use with most of my anxious clients.
The other GABA products listed on the supplements blog need to be opened onto the tongue and started with a low dose (100-200mg is a good starting dose) and increase based on symptom relief. More can often be used at night, especially if sleep is also an issue – sometimes up to 500mg.

If you have SIBO/IBS and are doing a trial for visceral pain:

I’d suggest NOT starting with the Source Naturals GABA Calm because the sugar alcohols can be problematic for some individuals. Or if you do, be aware that it may not help and may make things worse in the short-term. Personally, I have not found this product to be an issue with my SIBO and I have very few clients report an issue.
The other GABA products listed on the supplements blog need to be opened onto the tongue and started with a low dose and increased based on symptom relief.
For a client totally new to GABA I’d start with 100-200mg in the evening and also increase slowly over a few weeks based on symptom relief, up to 500-1000mg.
For early morning belly pain I’d start a client on 100-200mg because too much in the day can make you feel tired.

If you have other pain issues:

For a client totally new to GABA I’d start with 100-200mg in the evening and increase slowly over a few weeks based on symptom relief, up to 500-1000mg. Depending on the pain more may often be needed and higher doses can often be tolerated during the day.
Keep in mind that pain can have any many root causes and it may be more than low just GABA or may not be due to low GABA at all. Other factors to consider include but are not limited to: low serotonin, low magnesium, low endorphins, inflammation, structural damage, low omega-3s, gluten issues, Lyme disease etc. Physical therapy and acupuncture are wonderful approaches to include too.

As you can see from my experiences above it’s a matter of doing trials to find the ideal amount for you for your particular situation.

If you’ve used GABA supplements for anxiety, visceral pain or other muscles spasms I’d love to hear from you.

This GABA-pain connection is not well recognized and I’d love to have more people know about this as a possible option. The more we share our experiences the more we all learn.

If you plan a trial similar to any of the above I’d also love to hear your questions and feedback.

Anxiety, depression, GABA and cortisol: effects of Lactobacillus ingestion

April 14, 2017 By Trudy Scott 20 Comments

We now know that good bacteria or probiotics have the potential to alter brain chemistry and have an impact on anxiety and depression. You may recall my interview with Professor Ted Dinan on a prior Anxiety Summit – Microbes in the gut and psychobiotics as a potential treatment for anxiety and depression. He shared his paper and this definition of Psychobiotics: a novel class of psychotropic.

…we define a psychobiotic as a live organism that, when ingested in adequate amounts, produces a health benefit in patients suffering from psychiatric illness. As a class of probiotic, these bacteria are capable of producing and delivering neuroactive substances such as gamma-aminobutyric acid and serotonin, which act on the brain-gut axis.

Research published by Dinan, Cryan and their teams also found benefits of Lactobacillus rhamnosus on stress, anxiety and depression type behaviors in mice. This is older research (published in 2011) but it’s the first time I’ve shared it on the blog. I talk about this paper in the upcoming Microbiome Medicine 2 Summit so I like to share study excerpts and links to the study.

The write up in Science Daily is a good one – Mind-Altering Microbes: Probiotic Bacteria May Lessen Anxiety and Depression

…mice fed with Lactobacillus rhamnosus JB-1 showed significantly fewer stress, anxiety and depression-related behaviours than those fed with just broth. Moreover, ingestion of the bacteria resulted in significantly lower levels of the stress-induced hormone, corticosterone.

The part that I find fascinating is the effects of Lactobacillus on GABA receptors in the brain (GABA is your main calming neurotransmitter):

The researchers also showed that regular feeding with the Lactobacillus strain caused changes in the expression of receptors for the neurotransmitter GABA in the mouse brain, which is the first time that it has been demonstrated that potential probiotics have a direct effect on brain chemistry in normal situations.

In this paper the authors discuss the vagus nerve and the three-way communication:

…the vagus nerve is the main relay between the microbiome (bacteria in the gut) and the brain. This three way communication system is known as the microbiome-gut-brain axis and these findings highlight the important role of bacteria in the communication between the gut and the brain, and suggest that certain probiotic organisms may prove to be useful adjunct therapies in stress-related psychiatric disorders.

What is even more fascinating is this:

the neurochemical and behavioral effects were not found in vagotomized mice

What does this mean? When the researchers severed the vagus nerve in the test mice – removing the communication between the gut and the brain – they found that the behaviors and stress hormone levels reverted back to the way they had been i.e. the vagotomized mice were more anxious, more stressed, more depressed and had higher corticosterone levels.

You can find the abstract of the paper here: Ingestion of Lactobacillus strain regulates emotional behavior and central GABA receptor expression in a mouse via the vagus nerve.

What does this mean for you? It means that good bacteria in your diet could well improve your anxiety and depression symptoms and even have an impact on your adrenals and cortisol levels. This could be in the form of a good probiotic and should always include fermented foods like sauerkraut, kimchi, kombucha, yogurt and kefir (if dairy is tolerated), water kefir (if dairy is not tolerated).

Have you observed an improvement in your anxiety and stress levels since adding a probiotic or fermented foods into your diet?

Stress, aging and turning off your bad genes: with Dr. Sara Gottfried

March 6, 2017 By Trudy Scott 23 Comments

At age 44, my friend and colleague Dr. Sara Gottfried, M.D., got a research opportunity few people would want. She performed a simple blood test of how fast she was aging, and she failed.

She was aging 20 years faster than her chronological years, as measured by her telomeres. Those are the protective caps on your chromosomes that determine how your cells age. You want telomeres that are long and lovely. Dr. Sara’s were short and stubby.

Despite what we’ve been told, it’s not normal to age fast, gain weight, feel anxious, and become disease-ridden. Just as the number on the bathroom scale isn’t always a simple reflection of calories consumed vs. calories burned, the number of years you’ve lived isn’t always a reflection of your biological age (meaning the age of your cells).

Dr. Sara’s telomeres and body needed rescuing, so she dove into the science and created a breakthrough protocol to slow down aging.

Dr. Sara also had adrenal fatigue, a slow thyroid, estrogen dominance, disrupted sleep, and insulin resistance. Because her cells were numb to insulin, her blood sugar was climbing. Not in the diabetes range, but prediabetes. These hormone problems added up to faster aging.

During the past five years of research, Dr. Sara discovered crucial truths locked in our genes—truths about how you age, how you gain weight, how your body handles stress, and so much more. In her new book, Younger: A Breakthrough Program to Reset Your Genes, Reverse Aging, and Turn Back the Clock 10 Years, she reveals important yet little-known truths to slow down aging and reverse anxiety. She helps you create hormonal harmony and turn on and off the appropriate longevity genes. Here are just a few highlights:

Breast cancer runs in her family, so she learned how to turn off her cancer-promoting genes using her fork and wine glass.
Sara doesn’t detox well—neither do half of Americans—so she needed to add a specific B vitamin to her daily regimen. Hint: we talk about the MTHFR gene and detox in our interview below).
Her grandmother died of Alzheimer’s disease, so Dr. Sara was thrilled to learn about the functional medicine protocol that preserves cognitive function regardless of age. Hint: it involves a specific way of eating, exercising, practicing yoga or meditation, flossing, brushing teeth, and sleeping.

In her new book, you’ll learn what happened to Dr. Sara’s telomeres over the past 5 years as she tested and refined her protocol, first on herself, and then on 1,000 other women.

I was fortunate to receive an advance copy of Younger and loved it so much that I wrote the following endorsement:

The brilliant book, Younger, by Dr. Sara Gottfried MD is mesmerizing, cutting-edge and a must-read! It teaches how you can turn your good genes on and your bad genes off via a healthy mix of science and gene information, together with simple assessment tools and powerful lifestyle changes. You’ll feel happier and calmer, look and feel younger, and actually reverse age-related diseases – even if you have anxiety, depression, Alzheimer’s disease, breast cancer, heart disease or obesity in your family. Why wouldn’t you want to influence your genes for the better? I know I do and so do my community of anxious women. We will all benefit immensely from Dr. Gottfried’s wisdom!

~ Trudy Scott, nutritionist and author of The Antianxiety Food Solution

I also had the opportunity to interview Dr. Sara about this topic and you can watch and listen below as we discuss some of the following:

Telomeres and aging (at 44 Dr. Sara had the telomeres of a 64 year old woman)
Healthspan and feeling fantastic
Walking on the beach for the adrenals, earthing and vagal toning
Forest bathing and the effects on cortisol levels [this isn’t in the book]
Ikaria “the island where they forgot to die” – herbal teas, tight social community, long lunches, no watches, 7.5 hours of sleep
Date night and chanting in the infrared sauna
Finnish study: saunas, longevity and the FOXO3 gene (a panacea? and even a form of exercise for those with heart failure)
MTHFR “detox” or methylation gene (depression and alcohol detox)
We can impact how our genes talk to our bodies in such profound ways
The FKBP5 Gene is turned on by severe trauma (studied in Holocaust victims) and affects how we handle stress
The TH gene is turned on by the cold
rs6330 – NGF/nerve growth factor gene and vagal tone (CC form = more anxious females; TT form = more anxious males) [this isn’t in the book]
Genetic testing is optional but can be done with 23andme, Pathway and SmartDNA (in Australia)
Testing telomeres with Lifelength and SpectraCell
Vagus nerve and parasympathetic system – affects anxiety levels, the gut, voice and brain – improved with meditation, prayer, chanting, social connection, singing, call girlfriends, sleeping on your right side
7 day Younger challenge (most powerful levers from the book)
7 week Younger challenge
Thing about your 75 year old self: “I want to make decisions that are kind to her” and “How can you kind be to your future self”

If this resonates with you, I encourage you to join Dr. Sara’s slow aging revolution by ordering your copy of Younger.

I hope you’ll join Dr. Sara and me in our quest to continue resetting genes and reversing aging in 2017. The science is yours for the taking!

If you are like Dr. Sara and have issues with your adrenals, thyroid, insulin, or sleep, you could be aging too fast, as she was. And while the genetic hand you’ve been dealt may seem like a fait accompli, the greatest truth Dr. Sara discovered is that you can “turn on” good genes and “turn off” bad ones using the seven-week protocol she developed based on the latest research. Thankfully, she’s done all the research so you don’t have to!

When you order the new book, feel free to click here to submit your receipt and get several bonuses for a limited time, including Dr. Sara’s Younger Quick Start Guide. This guide includes an overview of the Younger Protocol, Dr. Sara’s Anti-Aging Prerequisites, and a sample menu so that you’re ready when the book arrives.