Immunity and Mental Health: PACER Integrative Behavioral HEalth

Foreign. I'd like to welcome everybody today's presentation of integrated behavioral health. I'm your host, Dr. Donnelly Snipes. Today we are talking about immunity and mental health. What's the connection and what can we do to improve both of them? Foreign let's briefly talk about the effects of poor immunity on mental health and health and then we'll move on to what we can do about it. When we are sick, our HPA axis is activated. Unfortunately, when our HPA axis is activated, our immune system goes down. So it, it's an interesting kind of turn of events. And if you remember, your HPA axis is your threat response. So when you are sick, your body registers that as something's broken in the factory and we need all hands on deck to get it fixed. So that HPA axis is activated in order to protect you. But unfortunately, part of that when cortisol is released, it acts to suppress temporarily the immune system. When the HPA axis is activated for too long or chronically, it has long standing effects, causing inflammation and also reduced immunity. So that HPA axis always comes back to either support us or bite us in the butt. We need to make friends with it. There can be an illness cascade. When we have poor immunity, you can get a virus and then you're more susceptible to other things. When we have a low immunity, we are also more susceptible to things like cancer and bacterial infections. And you may be like cancer? Yes. When we're under stress because of illness or because of, you know, just stress that HPA axis is activated, our body is actively, you know, running hot, if you want to think about it that way, and creating a plethora of oxidative stress. And that oxidative stress can contribute to cancer. If our body can't clear it out effectively, it can also. There are also a lot of other things that can contribute to cancer. But one of the most fabulous findings that they have discovered over the past, I don't know, decade is that there are treatments now that actually serve to activate or enhance the immune system to target those cancer cells. So we know that there is a relationship between cancer and immunity, and we know that there is a relationship between stress and immunity, which is one of the reasons, if you go on the American Cancer Society page, stress is one of those things that people can do in order to help prevent cancer. Is it going to do everything? No, but it's certainly one of those ways to assist yourself and, and not work against your, your body. When you have poor immunity, you have slow recovery from injury, your immune system is designed to take care of pathological invaders, but it's also designed to help you recover when you get a cut, when you break your arm, when you, you know, do any of those things. When your immunity is low, it exacerbates current physical issues. If you've got autoimmune issues, then as your immune system decreases, those autoimmune systems issues can get worse. Your diabetes, when you are ill, when your immune system is low and you're getting more of these infections, that HPA axis is activated, which makes it more difficult to control blood sugar, chronic HPA axis activation and poor immunity can also contribute to systemic inflammation, which we know not only impacts the immune system. When there's inflammation, the immune system kind of goes into overdrive. But we know when people have systemic inflammation, there's also a link between that and the development of clinical depression as well as it increases your risk for dementia. Autoimmune issues get worse. When your immune system is not healthy, it impairs your sleep. Now, this is sort of indirect, but when you have poor immunity and you're getting sick, think about how well you sleep when you're sick or even when your allergies are really bothering you a lot, when you can't breathe, when your body factory is not running at 100%, it does impair your sleep. When that HPA axis is activated, it impairs your sleep because of impaired sleep, but also because your body is directing energy towards that immune system. When you're sick, you'll have likely low energy and it can disrupt your circadian rhythms. When you have poor immunity and you're getting sick frequently, then you're probably not keeping to that same schedule that you normally do, which disrupts your circadian rhythms, which may disrupt your sleep, which contributes to HPA axis activation. It goes back to that stress response. Your body trying to balance and protect itself as much as possible. And when it thinks there's a threat, viral, bacterial, physical, emotional, cognitive, it's going to activate affectively when we are. When our immune system is poor, then that low energy, that difficulty sleeping and those frequent illnesses and increased inflammation can make depression worse or can trigger depressive episodes. When we have poor immunity and we're frequently getting sick, it increases anxiety, it increases anxiety about getting sick. When you're healthy, it increases anxiety about things getting worse or getting bad illnesses. When you do get sick, you know, you start having a sniffle and you think, oh my gosh, is it Covid or is it tuberculosis or is it something else? So it can increase health Anxiety, and it can also increase anxiety about getting others sick. When you frequently get sick, you may think twice about going to visit your elderly relatives or your grandbaby that was just born. It can contribute to grief. Because you're frequently sick. You. You may not be able to engage in the things that you wanted to engage in. You may not be able to do some of the things that you wanted to or engage with people like you wanted to. And those are all things to grief. Remember, grief is not just about death. It is about not getting to access something that's important to you, having something that's important to you taken away. When people develop chronic immune issues, it can. People can develop grief because they have to acknowledge that, okay, now I've got this chronic illness, and that's going to change what I envisioned the rest of my life like. Being like doesn't mean it has to be bad. Recognizing we can live in the. And we can have an autoimmune issue. You know, diabetes, rheumatoid arthritis, lupus, any of those things. You know, there are lots and lots of autoimmune issues and still have a rich and meaningful life. But part of that is going to revolve around doing as much as we can to reduce our stress, regulate that HPA axis, reduce inflammation, and bolster the immune system. Loneliness can also happen because of immunity. If you can't go see all those people, then you might start feeling lonely because you're isolating in your own house. And loneliness leads to reductions in oxytocin, leads to feelings sometimes of depression, which again goes back to our old friend the HPA axis. Increasing stress. Cognitively, when you're sick, you have difficulty concentrating when you are not sick, and even when you are sick, a lot of times you may have preoccupation with either preventing getting sick or, you know, noticing every single symptom. Like, I've got a little bit of a runny nose. I wonder if that means I'm getting sick or preoccupation with trying to avoid getting sick. So you spend a lot of time and anxiety and emotional energy worried about getting sick. Whereas if your immune system. Think about it as your armor. If your immune system or your armor were intact, if it were, you know, fully functioning, you might not have to worry about that as much. Environmentally, when we get sick a lot, we have reduced productivity. Even if you are going to work, you're probably not getting as much done. But a lot of times you start having days off from work and, you know, having difficulty with that increased medical Bills, even if it's not going to the doctor, even if it's buying over the counter medications. You know, a lot of times if you're getting sick frequently, you're going to have increases in medical bills. And environmentally, again, you're going to have more safety concerns. If you know that your immune system's in the crapper. You're going to have more anxiety about exposing yourself to the general public, about going grocery shopping, about going to Walmart, about going anywhere where you might encounter bugaboos. Relationally, you may have voluntary or forced social withdrawal. You may withdraw and choose not to interact with other people because afraid that they'll get you sick. Or you may have forced social withdrawal because you're sick and you don't want to get other people sick, so you have to stay home. The more frequently that you're sick, the less interaction that you're going to have, which can contribute to, you know, difficulty in nurturing relationships. If you don't feel like you can ever go visit your grandchildren or your elderly parent or, or whomever because you're afraid of getting them sick or because you're sick all the time, you don't have energy, then you may start feeling, you know, isolated. So what do we do about it? Regulate that dagum HPA axis. And that is easier said than done because remember, any sort of stress is going to activate that axis. So we need to do as much as we can to infuse pleasantry, pleasantness into our life and to bolster our system, to enhance it, to make it feel stronger. First, if you do have medications, take all of your medications. You don't want to develop bacterial or bacteria or viruses that are resistant to certain medications. That is so important whether you're talking about taking antibiotics for an ear infection or for tuberculosis. If you're prescribed antibiotics or antivirals, it is important to take them as prescribed. The doctor when my son was very little, because when I was little, they didn't have this idea. But when my son was very little explained to me that it's important not to overdo antibiotics. When we take antibiotics, it doesn't, when you take it, it doesn't say, oh, there's that little germ that's causing her to be sick. It goes in and starts wiping out entire colonies of either gram negative, gram positive, or both types of bacteria. And you need bacteria in your gut in order to break down food, in order to make hormones and neurotransmitters, in order to regulate your system, in order to regulate that HPA axis. When your gut's unhealthy, it communicates to your brain through the vagus nerve and it says, something's not right here. And when that happens, then the HPA axis again activates. So antibiotics are important sometimes when your body can't do its job. But our pediatrician, and I'm not a medical doctor, so I'm not making recommendations, but most doctors now are relatively hesitant to prescribe antibiotics if you don't have a super high fever or haven't had the illness for, you know, a certain period of time. So the first time you wake up and you have the sniffles and a low grade fever, they may not give you antibiotics right away. And it's important to really consider the cost benefit of if I take these. You know, number one, a lot of times when people get a cold, it's actually a virus and antibiotics do nothing for a virus. And number two, you know, is it worth taking the antibiotics and wiping out the bacterial colonies in my gut? That's, that's a consideration. Now obviously at a certain point it's important if your body can't fight off the bacteria on its own, but that is a consideration. Consider vaccinations. And I know some people are very anti vax and some people are very pro vax. I'm not saying either way, but it's important to consider your health, your situation, your beliefs about vaccinations and then make decisions from there. Eat colorfully. Antioxidants are in colorful foods. Antioxidants help get rid of that and clear out all of that oxidative stuff, all of the oxidative stress in our body. So antioxidants can reduce physiological stress. Eat colorfully. Yellows, reds, purples and even greens. Green apples, green grapes. There are greens that you can get even if you don't like broccoli. But leafy greens are some of your healthiest foods. They have figured out ways to dehydrate them and turn them into superfood powders or even capsules. Now some people are choosing to do that in order to get some of their antioxidants in. You know, I prefer to get it as fresh as possible myself, but I happen to love green leafy vegetables, so. But eating colorfully is really important. Every day, try to aim to have three colors on your plate at every single meal. Consider eating an anti inflammatory diet. When your body is inflamed, when there is are things causing inflammation, it activates that HPA axis and suppresses your immunity. Things that increase inflammation can be like Omega 6s as well as highly processed foods. You can go online and read about anti inflammatory diets, but consider minimizing some of those things that are known to cause inflammation in order to, you know, give your body the best, best shot possible. Don't add to its stress if you don't do anything, you know, if you're neutral, that's better than adding to stress. Now, of course, every once in a while people are probably going to eat processed foods and that is entirely, Entirely okay. When we drink water, our hydration helps our kidneys and our liver, but particularly our kidneys, filter out some of the toxins. If we don't have the water pushing through, then our body has a hard time getting the sludge out. Think about it that way. Think about the sludge. If you have a house and you have the gutters up there, you have a harder time getting the sludge through the gutters if it hasn't rained in a while. So make sure you stay hydrated. Gut health is important. Paying attention to your gut when your HPA axis is active, it's going to speed the rate that everything goes through your system because it's saying it's not time to rest and digest, it is time to fight or flee. Which means you're not going to absorb the nutrients that you need as, as effectively. Vitamin D is super important for immune health. You get vitamin D from the sun and you get it in. A lot of the foods that you eat are enriched with vitamin D. Your doctor can do a blood test to assess your level of vitamin D, because low levels of vitamin D are associated with depression, seasonal affective disorder, inflammation and reduced immunity. So this is one of those that we want to get. But vitamin D is not water soluble, so you can overdose on it, so to speak. And it's important not to do that. So that's why you don't want to start taking like super mega doses of vitamins because it can throw everything else out of whack. Sleep hygiene is important. If you have poor sleep, then you are going to have difficulty functioning during the day, you're going to be fatigued, and that HPA axis is activated. Cortisol levels have been shown to be significantly higher in people who are sleep deprived. And interestingly enough, exercise can actually help. Low, low and moderate exercise, not super intense, but low and moderate exercise can actually help reduce inflammation in the body. So exercise can be helpful. Exercise also helps keep our joints mobile so we don't develop stiffness. Exercise at low levels can help reduce cortisol levels, which can be beneficial. Remember, cortisol is your stress hormone. And when we're under stress, our immune system is suppressed. Oh, that kind of, kind of rhymes. Anyhow, exercise can be good. When we exercise, it also increases our level of oxygenation because we're breathing more. And a lot of times when we exercise, we tend to drink more water and that can help us with hydration effectively. It's important to do what we can to regulate that HPA axis. Meditation can be super helpful for giving your body basically a timeout for putting that HPA axis sort of on pause in order to meditate. The first thing that I recommend doing in all of my meditation videos is make sure you feel safe. And one of the reasons that our HPA axis is often activated is because of a lack of a sense of safety. So when we meditate, the first thing we do is make sure we feel safe, make sure we're in an environment that safe, and then we are helping ourselves quiet the mental noise one way or another through guided imagery, through progressive muscular relaxation. There are a lot of different ways to meditate, but meditation has been shown to reduce cortisol levels and increase serotonin, dopamine and GABA levels in people. So meditation can be super helpful. Mindfulness is also important. Being aware of how you feel on a moment to moment. If you're mindful, you can pick up on little signs that you might be starting to get sick and you can start taking better care of yourself. It's important to pay attention to what you're doing as well. When I was in college, I had a bad habit during finals week of not sleeping much and eating like crap, which are two things that activate that HPA axis and reduce my immune system. And almost inevitably after finals were over, I'd end up getting sick. And if you look back at your habits, you will often notice if you're not being mindful and to of your health and doing things that you need to do, you are much more susceptible to illness. Because a lot of things that we want to do in excess may take away from the things that we need to do for health. Mindfulness is important. Mindfulness also helps you recognize, for example, if you didn't sleep well last night, I didn't sleep well. I got plenty of hours, but I felt really fatigued this morning when I got up. So I checked in with myself and I said, you know what, I'm going back to bed instead of going to the gym this morning. I felt that it was more prudent for me to go back to bed and try to, you know, clear up that fog a little bit. And when I woke up, I felt much better. When you're mindful, sometimes you can't go back to bed. So what do you do if you know that you're foggy? If you know that you're not on your A game in order to prevent adding additional stress throughout the day? How can you mitigate because you know life's going to happen? What things can you do to mitigate that? Happiness is important. Infuse happiness, which I'll just kind of jump down to laughter too. They've done studies that have actually shown that laughter enhances the immune system. It releases endorphins that help you feel better, that increase pleasure. And laughter, you know, does all kinds of positive things as well as increasing oxygenation. Do things, try to do something every single day that makes you laugh, you know, and, and I've told you before, whether it's going on YouTube and finding funny animal videos or listening to your favorite comedian or just watching your dog be a complete little derp. Whatever it is that makes you laugh, do that at least once a day, preferably more than that. It's good to laugh and develop distress tolerance skills because life does happen. And I've talked a lot in other videos about distress tolerance skills. You can watch up on those, read up on those later if you're not familiar. But it's important to recognize that sometimes unpleasant things happen. And having the skills to be able to tolerate that distress when it does happen, especially if it's not something that you can control, is really important. Cognitively focus on the facts. And I always ask, as evidenced by if you are going to say, you know, if my son was going to say, mom, this dinner sucks, okay, well, I can't fix it if I don't know what that means. So this dinner sucks. As evidenced by. Thankfully, he would never say that to me because it would hurt my feelings. But, you know, I need to understand what about it is problematic or I hate my job or my job is awful. Okay, if that's true, what about it is awful? You know, people can't adjust if they don't know specifically what's wrong. Address any cognitive distortions. Again, I've talked in multiple videos about cognitive distortions. If you want to read up on those. But especially catastrophizing, personalizing mind reading and all or none thinking and develop psychological flexibility so you can deal with life when it happens. You don't have to react immediately. You can be mindful Acknowledge how you feel in the moment and then evaluate your options and choose in your wise mind what the next best step is to improve the next moment. You don't have to stay stuck in anger. If you feel angry, you feel angry. Acknowledge it non judgmentally and then say, all right, what is the next best thing that I can do to address this situation? Environmentally wear a mask Socially distance regularly wipe down frequently touched surfaces, wash your hands. Those things we've been hearing for months on end, maybe years, depending on, you know, the environment you grew up in. But those are all really important. Wearing a mask if, if you have a reduced immune system. Wearing a mask right now, you're supposed to wear a mask, you know, constantly. But you know henceforth, you know in the future that may not be true. But when you are sick, wearing a mask can help prevent others from getting sick. Or if you have a reduced immune system, you know you're susceptible, especially if you are older or if you have autoimmune conditions. Wearing a mask, for example, during flu season may be prudent. That's something you need to think about for your own self and maybe discuss with your doctor. Regularly wiping down those frequently touched surfaces. We talked last week about things like our mobile devices, our purses, our briefcases, even door handles. And the knobs on the cabinets in the kitchen can be really disgusting harbingers of bacteria. So wiping those down frequently can help prevent the spread of, of disease. Wash your hands with soap for at least 20 seconds. But interestingly enough, it's also important to get dirty sometimes. Our bodies, our immune system is built up when it's exposed to bacteria, when it's exposed to viruses. I'm not saying go out and expose yourself to everything. What I'm saying is don't be afraid of occasionally getting dirty. In the 80s and the 70s, you know, we used to go out and get dirty and play in the dirt and play outside and there was not hand sanitizer everywhere. And when, you know, so, so we developed a, something of an innate immunity to certain really common bacteria out there. Now bacteria and viruses are always mutating and there's unfortunately new ones that occasionally occur. So you're not going to be immune to everything. But if your immune, if your immune system has a memory of certain viruses and certain bacteria, then it's primed, it's, it's able to scan for those invaders and notice them sooner and say, oh, I know how to deal with this. So that can be good to develop a little bit of immunological memory. My point being, again, I am not saying by any means go out and try to get sick. But recognize that you also don't have to live in a complete bubble all of the time. A lot of times your body has adjusted to the bacteria and viruses in your area. Think about like Thanksgiving and Christmas and when you're interacting with people who are flying in from other places. A lot of times you're more susceptible. Excuse me. A lot of times you're more susceptible to bacteria because those people have been living in a different microbiome than you have. Interpersonally, social supports can be one of the greatest buffers against stress and HPA axis over activation. So think about improving communication with the people that are important to you. Even if you have to socially distance for a while. How can you communicate with them especially using their love languages? How can you be improve your honesty with them? How can you increase your awareness of what they need and be more sensitive to their temperament at. And their preferences? Excuse me? How can you practice kindness in your relationships and nurture those relationships? How can you be more respectful of other people's opinions and preferences, you know, thinking of course of their temperament? And how can you demonstrate an attitude of gratitude towards people? And I encourage you to look back at the video on meditation and the loving kindness medication can really help you work on developing that attitude of gratitude towards other people. You are likely not going to agree with and maybe not even like everything that everybody in your life does all the time. That's kind of unrealistic. But having an attitude of gratitude that they are in your life can go a long way to being able to love them as human beings, to respect them their for their similarities and their differences to you and to accept when they do things, when they have behaviors that you disagree with and and address those things. It's important to educate our clients about immunity and what they can do to enhance it. Sometimes it's important to refer them back to their physician or to a registered dietitian. But it is important to educate them about the importance of it. Some people have need to eat gluten free. There are gluten free options of foods to eat that can help you get a well rounded diet. Some people want to eat. You know there are always fad diets that are going on that often involves super restriction of certain types of foods. And I encourage them, number one to evaluate how they feel when they are restricting their diets that much. Number two, I encourage them to talk with their doctor about it. Number three, I encourage them to look back at their energy levels, their immunity and, you know, all those other things and their mood and when they're on that diet and, or when they're eating in that fashion to identify how they feel. Some people, when they eat a certain way, feel much better, even if it means cutting out, you know, whole swaths of food. And that's something again, more for a registered dietitian and, or a doctor to really hone in on with them because maybe they, you know, with celiac disease, for example, where there's a gluten sensitivity, there are certain swaths of food that people who have celiac disease can't eat. And it's a matter of figuring out, okay, if you can't eat that, then what else can you eat in order to have a well rounded diet and make sure you're getting all the nutrients that you need. It's also important for clients to assess their relationship with food. Some people swear off certain types of food because they're afraid of it. Like they swear off fats completely. And fats are really important for the development of, for your body to be able to break down, to make your gonadal hormones, for your body to be able to process fat soluble vitamins. You know, we need a certain amount of fat in our diet. So those things are important in terms of vitamin D versus D3. Vitamin D, the D3 is the form that we need our body to absorb. There are vitamin D gets broken down in the body. What's important to recognize is how much your body needs is going to vary partly depending on where you live, how strong the sun is, how much time you spend outside, and your immune system. Some people will need supplemental vitamin D either through their, the foods they eat or through supplements. But again, it's important to recognize if you like mega dose on one, you may actually inhibit the absorption of other things. Some, some vitamins that you can take that people can mega dose on may actually cause their body to do things like leech calcium from their bones. So you want to be aware of the impacts of excess of a vitamin as well as deficiencies and, and take that into consideration. Stress can also contribute. We see it impairing the immune system in people when they start to develop cold sores or they start getting canker sores more easily. We even see it. My cats, unfortunately, two of my cats got a virus when they were little and they have an immune reaction when they get stressed. Now they, they get this really bad upper respiratory infection unless I'm giving them supplemental lysine. Now again, I'M not recommending you go out and start taking tons of supplemental lysine. I'm just telling you for my cat. That's one thing that we do to bolster their immune systems to help them avoid having an episode with the immune system compromised. All of the vitamins and minerals do work in synergy to do what they need to do. One of the ways that you can have clients assess their nutrition is by having them download a nutrition app. And that can be super helpful. It's for, for them to figure out what am I getting enough of, what am I getting too much of if possible and what am I not getting enough. And a lot of times I know on mine, mine shows that I'm always getting too much sodium. So that's something that I try to work on in order to reduce the stress on my body. But I also noticed that zinc is one of those minerals that I often don't seem to get quite enough of. And that's something that I also work on. Discovering foods. There's a website, self nutrition is good as as well as world's healthiest foods. I think it's dot com, but it could be dot org if you want to find out what types of foods have a certain vitamin or mineral, you can go to those websites and find out. You know, like cashews for example, are a powerhouse of copper and walnuts are a powerhouse for omega 3s. Now if you can't eat nuts, obviously those two suggestions are not going to be helpful. But you can find vegetarian options, vegan options, gluten free options. It may just take a little bit of looking. Zinc is definitely important for everybody in maintaining the immunity, maintaining your health, maintaining your energy. But as always, it's a balance, it's a balancing act. And getting your nutrition from natural foods because they found that most of the vitamins and minerals are much more bioavailable when they come from food itself. As opposed to, you know, a pill that is, you know, chemical it our body's better able to use it because it's already in the ratios that it actually needs to be to be more effectively bioavailable. When you're cooking vegetables, you know, as a side, I've kind of gotten off onto, onto nutrition here. Make sure that the more colorful your vegetables are, the higher in antioxidants and nutrients they are. If you cook them till they're gray, that's not going to do you a whole lot of good. Have them as bright and colorful as you possibly can. Like kale. I steam until it goes from kind of what I call a dingy green to a really bright, bright green. And that's enough. It tenderizes it, it takes the bitter out of it, and it's ready to go. So it. So it is important to, you know, not just assume that you're getting everything you need because you're eating food, but you need to make sure that you're not, you know, cooking all the nutrients out of it and that you're getting as much as possible chewing well. And that's one of those things that I am not good at. I eat too fast. But chewing well can also be important to help your body be able to break down the foods in your gut and make the hormones and neurotransmitters that it needs. I appreciate all the interaction. If there are no other questions, then I will end for today. But I really appreciate everybody taking time out to be here with me. I know you do have things going on and I appre but I do appreciate you attending and interacting and looking for ways to improve health and happiness. If this podcast helps you help your clients or yourself, please support us by purchasing your ceus@allce.com or getting your agency to sponsor an episode. 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