Boost Your Brain Power: 6 Tips to Clear Brain Fog

Hey there, everybody, and welcome to this video on Six Tips to Clear Brain Fog. I'm your host, Dr. Donnelly Snipes. So what is brain fog? Well, most of us have experienced it, and it's not a clinical term, but in general, it refers to a constellation of symptoms that include reduced cognition or difficulty thinking, inability to concentrate and multitask, as well as a loss of short and and or long term memory. You know those days where you just feel like every time you want to say something is right on the tip of your tongue, but you can't come up with it, or you try to remember something and it just goes in one ear and out the other? That may be brain fog. Brain fog can be observed in people with autism spectrum disorders, celiac disease, chronic fatigue syndrome, fibromyalgia, mastocytosis, prostitute postural tachycardia syndrome, or pots, as well as psychiatric disorders like anxiety, depression, ptsd, hormone imbalances, or even systemic inflammation. So our brain is really susceptible to fog. Let's just put it that way. Tip one for clearing brain fog is to pay attention to your circadian rhythms. They're important, and it's not just about sleep. Sleep circadian rhythms regulate the flow and and amounts of hormones throughout our system. It regulates just about every part of our body. One of the things that can happen when our circadian rhythms get out of whack is that adenosine can build up. And adenosine is kind of like what you might think of as the garbage that builds up from, from the activity of the day. When we get good, deep sleep, then that adenosine is cleared out. But when we don't, the adenosine just builds up. Now, we know that some people, when they wake up and they feel kind of foggy, they'll drink caffeine and it gives them energy and they feel a little bit better. Well, that's true. Caffeine can b bind to some of those adenosine receptors. But the research has repeatedly shown that while it makes us feel a little bit more energetic, it actually does nothing. Caffeine does nothing to improve our cognitive functioning, our higher order thinking. We just feel a little more energetic. Cortisol and neurotransmitter changes from time changes or being exposed to too much blue light too late in the day or a lack of sunlight can also contribute to changes in circadian rhythms. So what's the intervention? How do we address this? Well, have a routine, generally do the same things at roughly the same time. Now, it doesn't mean you need to be Rigid. I know a lot of people like to be way more spontaneous than I do, but try to go to sleep about the same time each night most of the time. And get up about the same time each day most of the time. And try to have a sleep routine. So you do the same two or three things each night before going to bed that cues your brain in that, hey, it's time to start winding down. Just like with kids, they come home from school, they play, they eat, they bathe, they read a story, and then they go to sleep. So when they come home from school, their body is starting to get the cue from that. Those social activities, not just the light level, not just the temperature level, but from those social activities that, hey, we're on the wind down. Blue light blockers can be really helpful. You can get non prescription clear glasses that have blue light blockers in them that can help. You can also get filters for your television, your computer, your mobile devices that start blocking blue light at a certain time of day. Generally you want to start doing it at least two hours before bed. That can really help prevent disruption of your circadian rhythms. Bright light therapy can be really helpful. If you're having a set of particularly gray or foggy days like we've had in Tennessee for like the past two weeks, I don't think we've seen the sun and it's kind of gloomy outside. And you, I feel and, and I know a lot of other people feel somewhat sluggish. Bright light therapy can be helpful. It doesn't mean you've got to have one of those light boxes, but making sure that during the day, when it's supposed to be daytime, you are in an area that has bright light. And pay attention to your sleep hygiene. Now, circadian rhythms are, as I said, are not just about sleep. They're about, they're, they are also tuned by, when you eat, when you do certain activities, which is why that routine is so important. Tip number two, hydrate. This is another easy one. One percent dehydration can result in up to a 5% loss in cognitive performance. Now, most of us don't even realize we're dehydrated until we're at least 3% dehydrated. So, you know, that is a pretty significant loss in cognitive performance. If you're trying to clear brain fog, then we want to make sure that we stay hydrated. Children, elderly, and people on certain medications are particularly vulnerable to dehydration. Children may want to drink sugary drinks or may just get so caught up Playing that they don't think to drink. Elderly people may not think to drink a lot, but they also may be on medications that can contribute to dehydration. We know people who are older tend to get dehydrated more easily. And then certain medications are duretics, they cause dehydration and they also. There are also other medications that make it more difficult for people to regulate their body temperature, so they may sweat more, which can lead to dehydration. Interventions Keep a water bottle with you. You know that's a pretty easy intervention. If you've got it with you, you're more likely to periodically drink from it. Reduce caffeine and alcohol, which are both diuretics and caffeine can be found in coffee. It can be found in pre workout supplements, it can be found in chocolate. It can be found in a lot of things. It's important to recognize when you are ingesting caffeine or alcohol that you need to drink more water and do something that I call doubling up. Whenever I make coffee, I also have with me a glass of ice water. So for every cup of coffee I drink, I drink a cup of water and it helps balance it out. Even if I'm drinking decaf, I still do this, partly because it's good to rinse the coffee off your teeth. But doubling up can also help. If you love coffee but really hate water, then you combine the two and it makes it a little bit less unpleasant. You can also flavor your water and do other things but stay hydrated. That's the takeaway message. Tip number three. Oxygenate. Who would have thunk breathing will help clear brain fog. They found that sedentariness sitting on your butt all day. Everybody's saying sitting is the new smoking. Sedentariness reduces your heart rate and corresponding circulation and oxygenation. When your heart rate slows the rate that your blood moves through your system slows the rate at which your blood moves through and picks up new oxygen and carries it around your body slows down. All this contributes potentially to increased pain because you get stiff and things and cognitive errors. They found that sedentary people who sit for long periods of time actually make more mistakes. Interventions Periodic breaks with movement. If you need to have a push notification on your phone. I know I on my, on my fitness watch it used to remind me periodically to get up and move around because I was being sedentary for too long. Whatever you need to do to remind you to move doesn't mean you have to get up and do jumping jacks. You can stretch, you can walk around the house or walk around the office. Whatever it is, just get up and move for 30 seconds, for a minute. It doesn't have to be a long period. Isotonic exercises. These are exercises that cause a change in limb length. So like bicep curls or squats or a desk cycle. A desk cycle is wonderful for people who have difficulty with mobility. But if I used to have one under my desk and you can use it while you're working on the computer and it doesn't, you don't have to stay balanced. It's not like walking on a treadmill and trying to work on the computer where I would fall, I'd break my neck. But a desk cycle can be useful. You can also get desk cycles that you can put on top of your desk. If you don't want to use your legs, use your arms. All you've got to do is get that blood moving and anytime you move a limb, you're moving blood. Deep breathing exercises also increase oxygenation in the blood. Now when you breathe deeply and slowly, you generally slow your heart rate, but you're also increasing dramatically the volume of oxygen you're taking in and making available in the blood. So it can go both ways. Help us continue to make practical tools available to everybody by supporting the channel. You can donate any amount and any amount really helps@docsnipes.com donate or on cash app Doc Snipes. You can join the YouTube channel@docsnipes.com join. You can purchase a super thanks on videos that are particularly helpful or if you happen to need continuing education, you can get that@allce.com so back to the presentation. Tip number four. Stress reduction. Stress triggers the HPA axis or the stress response system triggers that fight or flight response. When you're in fight or flight, your higher order thinking is replaced with survival behaviors. So if you are mentally or physically stressed, you are not going to think as clearly. You're going to have more brain fog. So managing your stress can be helpful. Long term stress. If you are stressed for a long period of time, then you actually will cause your your body changes and you're actually going to see an increase in systemic inflammation which we know is associated with with brain fog interventions. Identify your sources of physical and mental stress. Got to know what what you're dealing with first and then make a plan to begin eliminating or minimizing one at a time. You're not going to change everything overnight. Minimize or eliminate one at a time. So for example, if one of your Sources of physical stress is you have a bad ergonomic setup at work, so you're uncomfortable a lot of the time. Okay, well let's figure out how to address that because when you're uncomfortable, it's frustrating. Frustration is a sign that that HPA axis is activated. Mindfulness. This goes with prevention. Be aware of what your stress triggers are. You've already identified what most of them are and be mindful. So when you know you're going into a stressful situation, you can best figure out how to handle it before you go there. That way you can stay, as Linehan would say, in your wise mind. You can reduce HPA axis or stress activation, which can also help keep inflammation down and keep your thinking higher. If you need to set aside stress out time, instead of stressing about everything all day long, set aside an hour, 30 minutes a day. That's your stress out time. If you start thinking about something that's stressful, say, okay, this, you know, I will deal with this later and you can deal with it during your stress out time. And I've had a lot of people have a lot of success success with that. You're not saying I'm not going to stress out about this. You're saying, okay, I'll figure out if I'm going to stress out about it later. I'm not ignoring it, I'm tabling it until the stress out meeting. And play the tape through using facts in context. Sometimes we can get stressed about things which in the current context really aren't any big deal. Maybe five years ago they were. Heck, maybe five minutes ago they were, but right now they're not. So paying attention to that and playing the tape through, if this happens, if I do this and then this happens, will it have a catastrophic consequence? And tip 5, I've already talked about inflammation a lot, but this, it's important enough that it bears its own slide. Neuroinflammation caused by illness, medication, autoimmune or mood disorders have been associated with brain fog. Now those mood disorders can include anxiety, depression, and even though it's not technically a mood disorder, ptsd. Chronic stress leads to systemic inflammation, which leads to brain fog interventions. Well, let's reduce that inflammation. How can you do that? Hydrate. Your body is something like 80% water. If you're dehydrated, not only does your cognitive functioning go down, but your body's ability to whisk away the toxins and the oxidative stress goes down significantly. So hydrated, that will help keep inflammation under control. Eat A diet that's high in antioxidants and omega 3s. If you eat a healthy diet, you can help your body more efficiently clear out the junk that is going to lead to inflammation, manage your stress. I know I talked about that so much already, I'm not going to belabor it. But ongoing stress leads to inflammation. Reduced stress, reduced inflammation. Address food sensitivities and allergens. Not everybody has a sensitivity to gluten, but if you do, don't eat it. You know, if there's something that you eat that causes an allergy, allergies represent. When we have an allergic reaction, we're having some sort of inflammatory response. Food sensitivities often represent some sort of inflammatory response. So pay attention to those things. Whatever. If you're eating something and it's causing inflammation, then it's likely go going to contribute to stress and can contribute to brain fog. So, you know, whether it's red dye number five or gluten or whatever it is, if you have a sensitivity, pay attention to it and address it. And finally, eat for a healthy gut. What you eat is broken down by the microbes or the workers in your gut in order to be disseminated to make the hormones, the neurotransmitters, repair tissues, anything it needs to do. So if those workers are not healthy, then they're not going to be able to break the food down and you're going to have more difficulty functioning. When your body has difficulty functioning, that triggers a stress response. And guess what, we've got that inflammatory response and brain fog coming up again. So a healthy gut actually helps with reducing brain fog. It helps with reducing inflammation. Now, you don't have to get crazy about it, but recognize what might be helpful to eat, what might be helpful to include in your diet, including fermented foods, including cheeses, including, if you can, yogurts. Now, I know not everybody is or is able to or willing to eat dairy. I get that. But talk with a nutritionist, talk with your doctor about what can I do to maintain a healthy gut. Fiber is great. That's another one of those things that most people can eat fiber. And finally, number six, get a blood test. This is not something that you can directly do. You can't test your own blood. But when you go in for your annual physical, have your doctor test your blood when your gonadal hormones, your estrogen, testosterone, progesterone, when they're out of whack, going to have brain fog when your thyroid's out of whack, whether it's too high or too low, you're going to have brain fog. When your vitamin D levels are out of whack, you're going to have inflammation and brain fog. So it's important. These are things that are typically tested for in most good annual physical blood panel. Blood panels. And there's a reason for that. Because imbalances in these three things are so common and contribute to so many different symptoms that we need to test and, and rule these things out. These are things that are easily addressed, but they need to be identified as problems first. So I know most of us hate doing it, but get that annual physical. Most people are going to struggle with brain fog at some point. Identifying what's causing your brain fog is the first step. Is it a medication you're taking? Is it hormone imbalance? Is it sleep disruption? Maybe you have sleep apnea. What's causing your brain fog? Brain fog prevention can be addressed through health related behaviors including diet. Eating a well rounded diet with, you know, adequate vitamins, antioxidants, omega 3s and hydration, exercise, hormone monitoring and stress and inflammation reduction. Although caffeine can help with some symptoms of brain fog, like being fatigued in in the short term, it can be detrimental in the long term and it does not address executive functioning. Caffeine again. I know I've said it like six times. I'm going to say it one more time. Caffeine will not improve your cognitive functioning. On higher level things it so we can't replace sleep with caffeine.