Shawn Stevenson explains how magnesium reverses brain aging. A study in the Journal of Alzheimer's Disease found that raising magnesium levels in adults aged 50-70 reversed brain aging by nine years. He recommends green leafy vegetables and spirulina as sources, and says pairing magnesium with omega-3s may boost cognitive benefits.
Chapters
Electricity, right? The brain is running on this remarkable type of electricity and this energy. And so electrolytes are incredibly important, and specifically magnesium. Magnesium is critical. It is so important for brain function, and unfortunately, it's the number one mineral deficiency in our country today. With at least 56% of the US population being chronically deficient in magnesium. And here's a double-blind placebo-controlled study, and this was published in the Journal of Alzheimer's Disease, found that improving magnesium levels in adult test subjects— these are folks between the age of 50 and 70— could potentially reverse brain aging by over 9 years. Literally making your brain younger by getting your magnesium levels up. And this is one of those things where we see— and this was done in a journal specializing in Alzheimer's disease. Yeah. Because these are conditions that largely considered to be one-directional, like it's just getting worse. You can try to slow it down, but it can't get better. And now they're finding there are things we can do to improve our cognitive function when we start to see decline. And one of those things is magnesium. So I'm a big proponent of food first. because it has the cofactors and additional nutrients that come along with it that make it work better in your body. Great sources of magnesium are going to be anything that's green is going to be a great source of magnesium. The power play here, like spirulina, for example, but green leafy vegetables are going to be a great source. And so there's so many different things, so many different foods. Magnesium supplementation might be something to look towards too, but you need to be careful about that. There are many different forms of magnesium. I mean, everything from magnesium citrate that's popular in supplements to sulfates and things we have in common like Epsom salts. That's magnesium. You know, it's known to help with like muscle relaxation and things like that. So there's a wide spectrum. And what, for myself personally, one of the things I do almost every night is I put it on a topical magnesium. That's absorbed through the skin, you know, supercritical extract, and your skin absorbs nutrients too. You absorb water from when you take a shower, you know, so your skin is hungry and absorbing nutrients. But food first, dense sources of magnesium-rich foods, and if you can power play that with things— sources of like DHA and EPA— it's even better.
