Carbohydrates and insulin comprise the tools we need to survive scarcity only if we know when the time is coming. There must be a clocking mechanism in place to prompt us when scarcity is around the corner. The hormones melatonin and prolactin are the drivers of our body's time perception, our clocking mechanism. The public has no real idea what effect that over the counter melatonin they are buying for jet lag really has. It just compounds the problem. It actually decreases natural production by shrinking the gland in your head that makes melatonin, the pineal gland.
In order to view the clocking process as it was meant to be, let's jump on the merry go round feedback loop. The handhold to grab for this ride is the time of day. if you were to jump on at 6pm, depending on the time of the year and your latitude location, the light of the sun would be starting to fall, or diminish. Just prior to sundown is dinner time in all cultures, it doesn't matter which country you are located. The quality, or spectrum of the light is shifting too, as the sun makes the break for it. In this daydream, we have had an okay day hunting and are now joining the group for a bite.
Now, let's assume you got a bite. Insulin would rise to deal with the incoming carbohydrates you had dried last summer to eat later and cortisol would start to fall because you have been fed. That's why we all go for sugar when we're stressed out. Remember, we are imaging the mythical natural world here, not ours. In our world, cortisol would never falls until we're completely, unconciously asleep. And even then, because of light leaks, not completely.
As the sun sneaks off, you and your significant other might try to prolong the day and warmth by huddling around a small fire entertaining each other. Sex would be an option, depending again on the season, the climate and how charming you are.
As the pink light of sunset comes over the landscape, you start to get really sleepy, because while the reflected 'green' bright light of the day shuts off melatonin production, the 'rose' light of the setting sun blocks the green spectrum, causing a release of melatonin to ease you into the night's altered state.
Back at the paleolithic campsite, you would look for a warm spot to settle down because rising melatonin is already cooling you off. Huddling together for warmth also reinforces pheromone communication. Early sleep, is usually REM sleep, so premonitions or hallucinatory 'visions' continue the evening's earlier entertainment as your brain sorts and tags the mind's perceptions. Drifting into deeper NREM sleep as your melatonin surges shifts your brain activity to immune maintenance.
All reproductive activity is slowed at night. That means a better chance for pregnancy would be offered by daytime mating. At night, sex steroid hormones take a backseat to increased prolactin production from the pituitary. Both prolactin and melatonin are powerful players in reproduction too, due to the fact that melatonin controls the production of estrogen and testosterone and prolactin makes milk. Melatonin and progesterone are both master switch hormonal controllers. If either one of them is out of sync, it reads to nature as "pushing the red button". A chronic lack of melatonin an progesterone, such as that which occurs with aging, tells nature you are not viable anymore.
When you are not a player, nature takes you out. Because of melatonin, any increase or decrease in dark time triggers physiologic and behavioral changes via sex hormones in many species, like changes in breeding and migration. Readiness of reproduction, in turn, determines the amount and timing of progesterone release in women and DHT secretion in men.
In order to view the clocking process as it was meant to be, let's jump on the merry go round feedback loop. The handhold to grab for this ride is the time of day. if you were to jump on at 6pm, depending on the time of the year and your latitude location, the light of the sun would be starting to fall, or diminish. Just prior to sundown is dinner time in all cultures, it doesn't matter which country you are located. The quality, or spectrum of the light is shifting too, as the sun makes the break for it. In this daydream, we have had an okay day hunting and are now joining the group for a bite.
Now, let's assume you got a bite. Insulin would rise to deal with the incoming carbohydrates you had dried last summer to eat later and cortisol would start to fall because you have been fed. That's why we all go for sugar when we're stressed out. Remember, we are imaging the mythical natural world here, not ours. In our world, cortisol would never falls until we're completely, unconciously asleep. And even then, because of light leaks, not completely.
As the sun sneaks off, you and your significant other might try to prolong the day and warmth by huddling around a small fire entertaining each other. Sex would be an option, depending again on the season, the climate and how charming you are.
As the pink light of sunset comes over the landscape, you start to get really sleepy, because while the reflected 'green' bright light of the day shuts off melatonin production, the 'rose' light of the setting sun blocks the green spectrum, causing a release of melatonin to ease you into the night's altered state.
Back at the paleolithic campsite, you would look for a warm spot to settle down because rising melatonin is already cooling you off. Huddling together for warmth also reinforces pheromone communication. Early sleep, is usually REM sleep, so premonitions or hallucinatory 'visions' continue the evening's earlier entertainment as your brain sorts and tags the mind's perceptions. Drifting into deeper NREM sleep as your melatonin surges shifts your brain activity to immune maintenance.
All reproductive activity is slowed at night. That means a better chance for pregnancy would be offered by daytime mating. At night, sex steroid hormones take a backseat to increased prolactin production from the pituitary. Both prolactin and melatonin are powerful players in reproduction too, due to the fact that melatonin controls the production of estrogen and testosterone and prolactin makes milk. Melatonin and progesterone are both master switch hormonal controllers. If either one of them is out of sync, it reads to nature as "pushing the red button". A chronic lack of melatonin an progesterone, such as that which occurs with aging, tells nature you are not viable anymore.
When you are not a player, nature takes you out. Because of melatonin, any increase or decrease in dark time triggers physiologic and behavioral changes via sex hormones in many species, like changes in breeding and migration. Readiness of reproduction, in turn, determines the amount and timing of progesterone release in women and DHT secretion in men.
Readiness of reproduction, in turn, determines the amount and timing of progesterone release in women and DHT secretion in men. So, going to sleep with the sunset means as a whole body melatonin bath, and a sharp increase in prolactin. Prolactin is not only active in humans milk production, it is essential in all mammals for lactation. The most major effect of prolactin in all species is to enhance production of T cells and NK cells. These are the first lines of cancer defense.
First of all, caves are dark, our bedrooms aren't. We try to sleep with the lights on all the time, that is if we even go to bed at all. I've known tons of friends and colleagues who pretty much have screwed up their sleep wake cycles. Most of my clients' circadian rhythm are off, you can even notice why their weights are not dropping off the scale. Not only do we live in endless summer, we live at endless lunch. Bear in mind, unlike during our caveman period, we now have abundance of food available everywhere, anywhere, 24/7. There's always foods, usually carbohydrates, and lightwise, it's always straight up noon. Not only have we lost half a year every year to lights and indoor heating and cooling, we've lost the night to blinking digital timers, police sirens, street lights,, headlights, illuminated billboards, restaurants, motels, TV, Internet, movies and tons of others which used to be our stories around the dying campfire, or perhaps stories told by our great grandparents. The real problem is that, the campfire never dies because the TV and Internet is always on.
First of all, caves are dark, our bedrooms aren't. We try to sleep with the lights on all the time, that is if we even go to bed at all. I've known tons of friends and colleagues who pretty much have screwed up their sleep wake cycles. Most of my clients' circadian rhythm are off, you can even notice why their weights are not dropping off the scale. Not only do we live in endless summer, we live at endless lunch. Bear in mind, unlike during our caveman period, we now have abundance of food available everywhere, anywhere, 24/7. There's always foods, usually carbohydrates, and lightwise, it's always straight up noon. Not only have we lost half a year every year to lights and indoor heating and cooling, we've lost the night to blinking digital timers, police sirens, street lights,, headlights, illuminated billboards, restaurants, motels, TV, Internet, movies and tons of others which used to be our stories around the dying campfire, or perhaps stories told by our great grandparents. The real problem is that, the campfire never dies because the TV and Internet is always on.
Check this out. There is long night sleep(14 hrs) and short night sleep(8 hrs), where study at the NIH, back in 1993, showed that obvious difference hormonally between short and long nights was the amount and length of prolactin secretion. This change in melatonin and prolactin secretion reflected the long night's fragmented sleep pattern. The long night subjects spent as many as five of fourteen hours lying almost awake. This group slept in two nightly bouts, each preceeded by up to two and a half hours of wakefulness, with a high secretion of prolactin throughout. That means that they got a total of nine hours of actual sleep as we know. And, in our time, nine hours of sleep is all we know. The sleepless five hours were very much like the awake alert quiet state infants display repeatedly in a twenty four hour period. Interrupting the subjects, by talking to them, caused prolactin to drop.
It is statistically proven that ninety or so percent of all babies are born between midnight and 4.00am, the exact time their mothers would, in nature, be in meditative state with high endorphin (painkiller) levels, just like yogis who are able to walk over beds of nails and hot coals without any effects. In this state, an unmeditated birth would be far more tolerable. It was in this period of time, which we no longer have access to, that we solved problems, reproduced, and transcended the stress, and most likely, talked to the gods.
When you are tired, you really are experiencing massive metabolic derangement between you and the bacteria controlling your immune system and reproduction, which is translating to mental health in a way. Short nights that mimic summer mean, reduced melatonin secretion, which reduces white cell immune function. Also, a severe reduction in the most potent antioxidant you have, which is melatonin. Meanwhile, less prolactin at night and way too much in the daytime, as prolactin secretion at night means more and stronger T and NK cells. Prolactin during the day means autoimmunity and carbohydrate craving.
But, the biggest problem with short nights year round, beyond appetite derangement, is that insulin will stay higher during the dark, when it should be flat, and cortisol falls so late it won't come up normally in the morning. This is a reversal of normal hormonal rhythms. You should wake up with elevated cortisol to deal with stress during the day. You should wake up hungry with low insulin and cortisol rising. Instead, your cortisol is low and your insulin is up. Wonder why you just can't drag your little butt off the bed in the morning? Your eyes just can't open and your body is as heavy as a gigantic log.
Bear in mind, the reversal you have created by staying up late, making your insulin and cortisol stay high at night, when they should be low, continue into the daylight hours. The first symptom of melatonin overflow, is needing an alarm clock to wake you up. When you have a melatonin 'hangover' you are still too sleepy to wake up even though morning light should suppress melatonin spontaneously. The real problem is that without a rise in cortisol, you have no dopamine.
Your cortisol is not high enough to deal with stress during the day and even whacks time perception. Without cortisol to enhance dopamine, the day seem to go too fast. With your prolactin abnormally high in the morning and no dopamine, you are kind of stupid too, with no memory or ability to plan. I'm sure some of you experienced 'brain fog' or poor cognitive memory ability during some point during the day. Rings a bell? Now, the same scenario reruns in the afternoon. Prolactin abnormally suppresses leptin again, so around mid day 3pm, you really crave carbohydrates and get impatient and even dumber.
What's the difference when you have hormones surge, as long as they surge? Unfortunately, timing is everything. You can't make melatonin in the daytime or with the lights on. So, how are you still sleeping with the light of the sun shining? Well, hunger should be your alarm clock. One of the evolutionary functions of melatonin is that it enhances the appetite suppressing effect of leptin, so you stay asleep instead of roam around hungry all night. It's a feedback loop. Melatonin enhances leptin and leptin keeps your brain in the 'fed' stage, so you stay asleep and make more melatonin.
Unfortunately for us, less sleep at night, and therefore less melatonin and less leptin, makes you eat more, day and night. Just losing sleep at the beginning of your night is enough to make your hungrier for sugar and you get fat. That's why sleep loss makes you fat. Once you start eating carbohydrates day in and day out, your start to retain water. This is a bad thing folks. Stay tuned.
It is statistically proven that ninety or so percent of all babies are born between midnight and 4.00am, the exact time their mothers would, in nature, be in meditative state with high endorphin (painkiller) levels, just like yogis who are able to walk over beds of nails and hot coals without any effects. In this state, an unmeditated birth would be far more tolerable. It was in this period of time, which we no longer have access to, that we solved problems, reproduced, and transcended the stress, and most likely, talked to the gods.
When you are tired, you really are experiencing massive metabolic derangement between you and the bacteria controlling your immune system and reproduction, which is translating to mental health in a way. Short nights that mimic summer mean, reduced melatonin secretion, which reduces white cell immune function. Also, a severe reduction in the most potent antioxidant you have, which is melatonin. Meanwhile, less prolactin at night and way too much in the daytime, as prolactin secretion at night means more and stronger T and NK cells. Prolactin during the day means autoimmunity and carbohydrate craving.
But, the biggest problem with short nights year round, beyond appetite derangement, is that insulin will stay higher during the dark, when it should be flat, and cortisol falls so late it won't come up normally in the morning. This is a reversal of normal hormonal rhythms. You should wake up with elevated cortisol to deal with stress during the day. You should wake up hungry with low insulin and cortisol rising. Instead, your cortisol is low and your insulin is up. Wonder why you just can't drag your little butt off the bed in the morning? Your eyes just can't open and your body is as heavy as a gigantic log.
Bear in mind, the reversal you have created by staying up late, making your insulin and cortisol stay high at night, when they should be low, continue into the daylight hours. The first symptom of melatonin overflow, is needing an alarm clock to wake you up. When you have a melatonin 'hangover' you are still too sleepy to wake up even though morning light should suppress melatonin spontaneously. The real problem is that without a rise in cortisol, you have no dopamine.
Your cortisol is not high enough to deal with stress during the day and even whacks time perception. Without cortisol to enhance dopamine, the day seem to go too fast. With your prolactin abnormally high in the morning and no dopamine, you are kind of stupid too, with no memory or ability to plan. I'm sure some of you experienced 'brain fog' or poor cognitive memory ability during some point during the day. Rings a bell? Now, the same scenario reruns in the afternoon. Prolactin abnormally suppresses leptin again, so around mid day 3pm, you really crave carbohydrates and get impatient and even dumber.
What's the difference when you have hormones surge, as long as they surge? Unfortunately, timing is everything. You can't make melatonin in the daytime or with the lights on. So, how are you still sleeping with the light of the sun shining? Well, hunger should be your alarm clock. One of the evolutionary functions of melatonin is that it enhances the appetite suppressing effect of leptin, so you stay asleep instead of roam around hungry all night. It's a feedback loop. Melatonin enhances leptin and leptin keeps your brain in the 'fed' stage, so you stay asleep and make more melatonin.
Unfortunately for us, less sleep at night, and therefore less melatonin and less leptin, makes you eat more, day and night. Just losing sleep at the beginning of your night is enough to make your hungrier for sugar and you get fat. That's why sleep loss makes you fat. Once you start eating carbohydrates day in and day out, your start to retain water. This is a bad thing folks. Stay tuned.
No comments:
Post a Comment