The hormone that makes us brave?

When I first read about the description for this hormone I thought first of testosterone, adrenaline, or even cortisol. But I was mistaken.

This hormone is the hormone that I have been speaking about as the under-appreciated giant hormone personality in our lives and health.

This hormone has the ability to destroy the negative effects and high levels of chronic stress hormones like cortisol.

The way this hormone works and why it is considered the courage hormone is that when this hormone is stimulated it down regulates our fear response and can stop the fight or flight response of freeze or flee. When activated it amps up our social awareness and lights up areas of the brain associated with meaning and value and has been shown to make people more trusting, be more trust worthy and help others.

The hormone I am talking about is oxytocin. Oxytocin drives our mental awareness to what is important to us, opens our thinking to include others and promote empathy as it stimulates trust and therefor gives us courage to act in our social world and makes us brave with less fear and more compassion.

Oxytocin has been called the "bonding" hormone or the "love" hormone and is strongly stimulated during breast feeding, intimacy, and in close familiar relationships. It is also stimulated when you get or receive a compliment, play with your kids, when you hug or shake someones hand, when you pet your dog or cat, when you talk and when you journal.

The biggest social evidence of the power of oxytocin is how it changes our physiology through laughter. We have all heard that laughter is the best medicine and we can thank oxytocin for that.

Men in particular I hope you are reading and hearing this message. Many men experience mild to moderate depression and write it off under the guise of stress, corporate living, being the provider, having an "A" personality or being a "driver." These are issues I speak about in my presentation on the "Irritable Male Syndrome," and they are very real, and at these levels very responsive to oxytocin "therapy." Keep it in mind my brothers.

My friends I extend a virtual hug and mental handshake as I tell you all that I love and appreciate you and hope you join me today in seeking out a little extra humor and together we can all build up a little bit more courage and live the life of the brave!

Dr. Don

It appears......not.

When you transplant healthy genes into a cancer cell it still produces more cancer cells when it divides. AND if you take cancer genes and put them into a healthy cell that cell still produces more healthy cells when it divides.

If cancer was purely genetic, as in our DNA housed in the nucleus of each cell, when you remove the nucleus and transplant it into another cell then the new cells that get replicated from that cell with the cancer genes should have cancer as well if cancer is genetic. But, as it turns out, THEY DON'T.

In the medical research text book, "Cancer as a Metabolic Disease," the 3 plus decades of collective cancer research lead by Thomas Seyfried, the book's author, shows that cancer is not a genetic disease but rather a metabolic disease.

Now, are there genetics at play that make one more susceptible to cancer, I would say yes. Are there genetic variants that effect our metabolic pathway that plays into cancer, yes. But is cancer a purely genetic disease, it seems not.

This should be very exciting! This means no one, no matter what gene they might have, even if that gene is believed to cause cancer, is determined to get cancer.

What this means is that the environment and how we live our life and our lifestyle is what is the driving force behind the development of cancer and how our genes respond. AND this is something we can change, improve, and effect. We not only have a say in this, but we have a very high level of control.

If cancer truly is a metabolic disease, and I believe it is, and this research does too, then how we chose to fuel and care for our body becomes extremely important.

The basic, fundamental first tier step is deciding to become a fat burner rather than a sugar burner. That is the the fundamental summary concept. You influence this by what you eat, when you eat, and how you move. As you do this you need to keep a healthy balance of your body's coordination systems so it can play nice and be as strong and effective as possible. The body's communication system primarily breaks down to 2 sides:

Nervous System and the Hormonal System

So, here is the focus:

1. Become a fat burner over a sugar burner
2. Keep you Nervous system tuned up and in proper healthy repairing tone
3. Be hormone focused and stay hormonally sensitive

Everything I post here and write about is trying to drive those 3 point above. Go back check them out and keep learning, when you do, share what you have learned with me please!

Health is Freedom!

Dr. Don

Low testosterone.

It is becoming rampant and our men's health is paying the price. It has been estimated that men today have one third of the testosterone that our great grandfathers had. Why?

Diet, stress and inactivity.

First, it is important to know that men have a hormonal cycle as much as women, but not the same. A man's testosterone levels cycle every 15-20 minutes.....that's right, 3-4 times an hour. They also fluctuate daily with the highest levels being in the morning around 8 am and the lowest in the afternoon about 3. Men have a monthly testosterone variance that changes from man to man, and we men have a yearly cycle that is highest in October and lowest in April.

So men, if you think you are not hormonal, your just delusional. In fact when given surveys where female identifier questions are removed men report experiencing PMS symptoms as much as women!

DIET: Insulin resistance is connected with low T. As a man becomes more insulin resistant his testosterone drops. Eating. Each time a man eats his testosterone drops sharply. So frequent (5-7) meals a day on a moderate to high carb diet really hits us men where it hurts. Oh, and soy products, alcohol, licorice, and stevia have all shown to lower a mans T levels. FYI

STRESS: Cortisol and testosterone seem to have an inverse relationship, when one is up, the other is down. So the regular stress response, hyper stress reactions, poor emotional management, sugar and caffeinated drinks, excess belly circumference and body fat will all contribute to a drop in T.

INACTIVITY: Human Growth Hormone and testosterone are tightly connected in the man's body. Weight lifting and High Intensity Interval Training have been shown to boost HGH 2,000% and raise T. Walking, or what I call stress release cardio has shown to drop cortisol levels, lower insulin resistance, and raise T.

Here is a bonus: Sleep. Sleep is when our hormones do most of their action, build us up, repair, recovery, and reset. No sleep, no hope at stable hormones or T levels.

Fasting: Fasting has been shown to raise T levels 180% in just a short term (one day) fast and keep them high and even higher after the 3rd day of a fast.

Sharp T fluctuations and overall reduced T levels in men have been connected to irritability, anger issues, moodiness, and even depression. Take this seriously.

So there you go my brethren, you have the info, now take the action!

Dr. Don

Part 5 of 5

The condition of the body, or the health of the cells, balance of the hormones, and quality of the brain chemistry is what will determine our tipping point and where our water level of our glass is, while it is the mental beliefs we have when we are confronted by any given life stress that drive our emotions and determine the result of our spillage. This is how our body physiology can set the stage for our mental reactions and outcomes to the life stress events we encounter.

It is through addressing all 4 components of this equation, at the cellular level, hormonal level, brain chemistry level, and by re-framing our expectations at the mental level that we build real-life, tangible, qualitative, resilience to stress.

The way we do this is though learning. Awareness is the first step, then we have to learn all we can so we can look at this whole thing differently and approach it from an angle that makes the most sense for each of us, according to our own values, beliefs and goals. A sick body can have sick thoughts and as we do the things day in and day out that change our habits and physiology for the better the body will heal and get healthy and strong and we then express healthier and happier thoughts. As you go through what you need to, in time you will bring back your own thinking, return to your happy, optimistic self, and when things get hard, and let’s face it, life tends to do that, then you will be in physical “shape” and have the mental strength and appropriate expectations to handle what comes your way and effectively change the physiology of stress into the biology of courage.

Imagine that you commit to this work and you apply yourself to it daily. In time as you follow your plan and keep at your goal you may even come to welcome stress and seek it out once you have seen how you can grow from it in ways that very few people can even comprehend. That my friends, is freedom. That my friends, is how I want to live. That my friends, is the legacy I want to leave for my kids and grandkids. That my friends, is what I want to offer you.

Thank you for being a part of this journey and for contributing to my evolution and growth. I appreciate you and the opportunity to share with you along the way.

We can do better! Here is to being better! Here’s to a friction-less life for us all!

Read Part 1
Read Part 2
Read Part 3
Read Part 4

Dr. Don