Fix Chronic Fatigue & Regain Your Energy, By Science
10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.
Chronic fatigue is on the rise. A lot of it appears to be Long COVID-related, but whether that’s the case for you or not, one thing that will make a big difference to your energy levels is something that French biochemist Jessie Inchauspé is here to explain:
Mitochondrial management
Inchauspé explains it in terms of a steam train; to keep running, it must have coal burning in its furnace. However, if more coal is delivered to the engine room faster than it can be put in the furnace and burned, and the coal just keeps on coming, the worker there will soon be overwhelmed trying to find places to put it all; the engine room will be full of coal, and the furnace will sputter and go out because the worker can’t even reach it on account of being buried in coal.
So it is with our glucose metabolism also. If we get spikes of glucose faster than our body can deal with them, it will overload the body’s ability to process that energy at all. Just like the steam train worker, our body will try! It’ll stuff that extra glucose wherever it can (storing as glycogen in the liver is a readily available option that’s easy to do and/but also gives you non-alcoholic fatty liver disease and isn’t quickly broken down into useable energy), and meanwhile, your actual mitochondria aren’t getting what they need (which is: a reliable, but gentle, influx of glucose).
You can imagine that the situation we described in the steam train isn’t good for the engine’s longevity, and the corresponding situation in the human body isn’t good for our mitochondria either (or our pancreas, or our liver, or… the list goes on). Indeed, damaged mitochondria affect exercise capacity and stress resilience—as well as being a long-term driver of cancer.
The remedy, of course, is blood sugar management. Specifically, avoiding glucose spikes. She has a list of 10 ways to do this (small changes to how we eat; what things to eat with what, in which order, etc) that make a huge measurable difference. For your convenience, we’ve linked those ten ways below; first though, if you’d like to hear it from Inchauspé directly (her style is very pleasant), enjoy:
Click Here If The Embedded Video Doesn’t Load Automatically!
Want to learn more?
You might also like to read:
- 10 Ways To Balance Your Blood Sugars ← this is the longer list she’s referring to in the video!
- How To Unfatty A Fatty Liver ← also relevant
Take care!
Don’t Forget…
Did you arrive here from our newsletter? Don’t forget to return to the email to continue learning!
Learn to Age Gracefully
Join the 98k+ American women taking control of their health & aging with our 100% free (and fun!) daily emails:
-
A Planet of Viruses – by Carl Zimmer
10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.
We’ve reviewed numerous books on the immune system before, and this one’s mostly not about that.
Instead, this one focuses on the viruses themselves, and the part they play in our world, for good and for ill. Popular awareness tends to focus on the ill, of course.
But, there’s a lot that viruses do for us too, including:
- Weak/harmless viruses that keep our immune systems on their toes and ready
- Bacteriophage viruses that kill and consume pathogens that, left unchecked, would do the same to us
- Endogenous retroviruses that have become symbiotic with the human organism, without which our species would quickly go extinct
He also talks about biological warfare, and how we cannot bury our heads in the sand by avoiding research on those grounds, because someone will always do it anyway, so (as the motto of the immune system itself might say), best to be prepared.
The author is a science journalist, by the way, and has no PhD, but does have a flock of Fellowships and assorted scientific awards and honors, so he appears to be doing good work so far as the scientific community is concerned.
Bottom line: if you’d like to know more about viruses than “they’re very small and can cause harm”, then this book will open a whole new world.
Click here to check out A Planet of Viruses, and upgrade your knowledge!
Share This Post
-
CBD Against Diabetes!
10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.
It’s Q&A Day at 10almonds!
Have a question or a request? We love to hear from you!
In cases where we’ve already covered something, we might link to what we wrote before, but will always be happy to revisit any of our topics again in the future too—there’s always more to say!
As ever: if the question/request can be answered briefly, we’ll do it here in our Q&A Thursday edition. If not, we’ll make a main feature of it shortly afterwards!
So, no question/request too big or small
❝CBD for diabetes! I’ve taken CBD for body pain. Did no good. Didn’t pay attention as to diabetes. I’m type 1 for 62 years. Any ideas?❞
Thanks for asking! First up, for reference, here’s our previous main feature on the topic of CBD:
CBD Oil: What Does The Science Say?
There, we touched on CBD’s effects re diabetes:
in mice / in vitro / in humans
In summary, according to the above studies, it…
- lowered incidence of diabetes in non-obese diabetic mice. By this they mean that pancreatic function improved (reduced insulitis and reduced inflammatory Th1-associated cytokine production). Obviously this has strong implications for Type 1 Diabetes in humans—but so far, just that, implications (because you are not a mouse).
- attenuated high glucose-induced endothelial cell inflammatory response and barrier disruption. Again, this is promising, but it was an in vitro study in very controlled lab conditions, and sometimes “what happens in the Petri dish, stays in the Petri dish”—in order words, these results may or may not translate to actual living humans.
- Improved insulin response ← is the main take-away that we got from reading through their numerical results, since there was no convenient conclusion given. Superficially, this may be of more interest to those with type 2 diabetes, but then again, if you have T1D and then acquire insulin resistance on top of that, you stand a good chance of dying on account of your exogenous insulin no longer working. In the case of T2D, “the pancreas will provide” (more or less), T1D, not so much.
So, what else is there out there?
The American Diabetes Association does not give a glowing review:
❝There’s a lot of hype surrounding CBD oil and diabetes. There is no noticeable effect on blood glucose (blood sugar) or insulin levels in people with type 2 diabetes. Researchers continue to study the effects of CBD on diabetes in animal studies. ❞
~ American Diabetes Association
Source: ADA | CBD & Diabetes
Of course, that’s type 2, but most research out there is for type 2, or else have been in vitro or rodent studies (and not many of those, at that).
Here’s a relatively more recent study that echoes the results of the previous mouse study we mentioned; it found:
❝CBD-treated non-obese diabetic mice developed T1D later and showed significantly reduced leukocyte activation and increased FCD in the pancreatic microcirculation.
Conclusions: Experimental CBD treatment reduced markers of inflammation in the microcirculation of the pancreas studied by intravital microscopy. ❞
~ Dr. Christian Lehmann et al.
Read more: Experimental cannabidiol treatment reduces early pancreatic inflammation in type 1 diabetes
…and here’s a 2020 study (so, more recent again) that was this time rats, and/but still more promising, insofar as it was with rats that had full-blown T1D already:
Read in full: Two-weeks treatment with cannabidiol improves biophysical and behavioral deficits associated with experimental type-1 diabetes
Finally, a paper in July 2023 (so, since our previous article about CBD), looked at the benefits of CBD against diabetes-related complications (so, applicable to most people with any kind of diabetes), and concluded:
❝CBDis of great value in the treatment of diabetes and its complications. CBD can improve pancreatic islet function, reduce pancreatic inflammation and improve insulin resistance. For diabetic complications, CBD not only has a preventive effect but also has a therapeutic value for existing diabetic complications and improves the function of target organs❞
…before continuing:
❝However, the safety and effectiveness of CBD are still needed to prove. It should be acknowledged that the clinical application of CBD in the treatment of diabetes and its complications has a long way to go.
The dissecting of the pharmacology and therapeutic role of CBD in diabetes would guide the future development of CBD-based therapeutics for treating diabetes and diabetic complications❞
~ Ibid.
Now, the first part of that is standard ass-covering, and the second part of that is standard “please fund more studies please”. Nevertheless, we must also not fail to take heed—little is guaranteed, especially when it comes to an area of research where the science is still very young.
In summary…
It seems well worth a try, and with ostensibly nothing to lose except the financial cost of the CBD.
If you do, you might want to keep careful track of a) your usual diabetes metrics (blood sugar levels before and after meals, insulin taken), and b) when you took CBD, what dose, etc, so you can do some citizen science here.
Lastly: please remember our standard disclaimer; we are not doctors, let alone your doctors, so please do check with your endocrinologist before undertaking any such changes!
Want to read more?
You might like our previous main feature:
How To Prevent And Reverse Type 2 Diabetes ← obviously this will not prevent or reverse Type 1 Diabetes, but avoiding insulin resistance is good in any case!
If you’re not diabetic and you’ve perhaps been confused throughout this article, then firstly thank you for your patience, and secondly you might like this quick primer:
The Sweet Truth About Diabetes: Debunking Diabetes Myths! ← this gives a simplified but fair overview of types 1 & 2
(for space, we didn’t cover the much less common types 3 & 4; perhaps another time we will)
Meanwhile, take care!
Share This Post
-
How to Change – by Katy Milkman
10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.
Sometimes it seems that we know everything we should be doing… We have systems and goals and principles, we know about the importance of habits, and we do our best to live them. Yet, somehow, life has other plans for us and things don’t quite come together they way they did in our genius masterplan.
So, what happened? And more importantly, what are we supposed to do about this? Katy Milkman has answers, right from the start.
Sometimes, it can be as simple as when we try to implement a change. It’s not that there’s a “wrong time” for a good change, so much that there are times that are much more likely to succeed than others… and those times can be identified and used.
Sometimes we’re falling prey to vices—which she explains how to overcome—such as:
- Impulsivity
- Procrastination
- Forgetfulness
- Laziness
We also learn some counterintuitive truths about what can boost or sabotage our confidence along the way!
Milkman writes in a compelling, almost narrative style, that makes for very easy reading. The key ideas, built up to by little (ostensibly true) stories and then revealed, become both clear and memorable. Most importantly, applicable.
Bottom line: this is a great troubleshooting guide for when you know how everything should be working, but somehow, it just doesn’t—and you’d like to fix that.
Click here to check out “How To Change” on Amazon, and get those changes rolling!
Share This Post
Related Posts
-
How To Keep Warm (Without Sweat Patches!)
10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.
It’s Q&A Day at 10almonds!
Have a question or a request? You can always hit “reply” to any of our emails, or use the feedback widget at the bottom!
In cases where we’ve already covered something, we might link to what we wrote before, but will always be happy to revisit any of our topics again in the future too—there’s always more to say!
As ever: if the question/request can be answered briefly, we’ll do it here in our Q&A Thursday edition. If not, we’ll make a main feature of it shortly afterwards!
So, no question/request too big or small
❝I saw an advert on the subway for a pillow spray that guarantees a perfect night’s sleep. What does the science say about smells/sleep?❞
That is certainly a bold claim! Unless it’s contingent, e.g. “…or your money back”. Because otherwise, it absolutely cannot guarantee that.
There is some merit:
❝Odors can modulate the latency to sleep onset, as well as the quality and duration of sleep. Olfactory modulation of sleep may be mediated by direct synaptic interaction between the olfactory system and sleep control nuclei, and/or indirectly through odor modulation of arousal and respiration.
Such modulation appears most heavily influenced by past associations and expectations about the odor, beyond any potential direct physicochemical effect❞
Source: Reciprocal relationships between sleep and smell
Translating that from sciencese:
Sometimes we find pleasant smells relaxing, and placebo effect also helps.
That “any potential direct physiochemical effect”, though, when it does occur, is things like this…
Read: Odor blocking of stress hormone responses
…but that’s a mouse study, and those odors may only work to block three specific mouse stress responses to three specific stressors: physical restraint, predator odor, and male–male confrontation.
In other words: if, perchance, those three things are not what’s stressing you in bed at night (we won’t make assumptions), and/or you are not a mouse, it may not help.
(and this, dear readers, is why we must read articles, and not just headlines!)
But! If you are going to go for a pillow fragrance, something well-associated with being relaxing and soporific, such as lavender, is the way to go:
- Effects of aromatherapy on sleep quality and anxiety of patients
- Effects of Aromatherapy on the Anxiety, Vital Signs, and Sleep Quality of Percutaneous Coronary Intervention Patients in Intensive Care Units
- Effect of lavender aromatherapy on vital signs and perceived quality of sleep in the intermediate care unit: a pilot study
tl;dr = patients found lavender fragrances relaxing, experienced less anxiety, got better sleep (significantly or insignificantly, depending on the study) and enjoyed lower blood pressure (significantly or insignificantly, depending on the study).
PS: this writer uses a pillow spray like this one
Enjoy!
Don’t Forget…
Did you arrive here from our newsletter? Don’t forget to return to the email to continue learning!
Learn to Age Gracefully
Join the 98k+ American women taking control of their health & aging with our 100% free (and fun!) daily emails:
-
Protein Immune Support Salad
10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.
How to get enough protein from a salad, without adding meat? Cashews and chickpeas have you more than covered! Along with the leafy greens and an impressive array of minor ingredients full of healthy phytochemicals, this one’s good for your muscles, bones, skin, immune health, and more.
You will need
- 1½ cups raw cashews (if allergic, omit; the chickpeas and coconut will still carry the dish for protein and healthy fats)
- 2 cans (2x 14oz) chickpeas, drained
- 1½ lbs baby spinach leaves
- 2 large onions, finely chopped
- 3 oz goji berries
- ½ bulb garlic, finely chopped
- 2 tbsp dessicated coconut
- 1 tbsp dried cumin
- 1 tbsp nutritional yeast
- 2 tsp chili flakes
- 1 tsp black pepper, coarse ground
- ½ tsp MSG, or 1 tsp low-sodium salt
- Extra virgin olive oil, for cooking
Method
(we suggest you read everything at least once before doing anything)
1) Heat a little oil in a pan; add the onions and cook for about 3 minutes.
2) Add the garlic and cook for a further 2 minutes.
3) Add the spinach, and cook until it wilts.
4) Add the remaining ingredients except the coconut, and cook for another three minutes.
5) Heat another pan (dry); add the coconut and toast for 1–2 minutes, until lightly golden. Add it to the main pan.
6) Serve hot as a main, or an attention-grabbing side:
Enjoy!
Want to learn more?
For those interested in some of the science of what we have going on today:
- Cashew Nuts vs Coconut – Which is Healthier?
- What Matters Most For Your Heart?
- Beyond Supplements: The Real Immune-Boosters!
- Goji Berries: Which Benefits Do They Really Have?
- Our Top 5 Spices: How Much Is Enough For Benefits?
Take care!
Don’t Forget…
Did you arrive here from our newsletter? Don’t forget to return to the email to continue learning!
Learn to Age Gracefully
Join the 98k+ American women taking control of their health & aging with our 100% free (and fun!) daily emails:
-
Are Fruit & Vegetable Extract Supplements Worth It?
10almonds is reader-supported. We may, at no cost to you, receive a portion of sales if you purchase a product through a link in this article.
At 10almonds we are always extolling the virtues of fruits and vegetables, but how much do those benefits still exist when we’re looking at a fruit and vegetable extract supplement?
We examined one aspect of this previously, here;
Mediterranean Diet… In A Pill?
This looked at getting the anti-inflammatory benefits of the Mediterranean diet, in supplement form, by providing extracts of 16 key plant extracts—which also provides an excellent shopping list, by the way, if you just want to skip the supplements and buy those plants; if nine top scientists (anti-aging specialists, neurobiologists, pharmacologists, and at least one professor of applied statistics) came to the conclusion that to get the absolute most bang-for-buck possible, those are the plants to get the phytochemicals from, then we’re not going to ignore that!
And yes, the short answer was “it does very significantly improve anti-inflammatory markers”, by the way.
But when it comes to benefits from polyphenols, anti-inflammatory powers are very much “low-hanging fruit”, so to speak. It’s the “fork found in kitchen” level of shocking revelation. It’s what polyphenols are best at (tied with antioxidant powers, which directly mediate their anti-inflammatory powers).
So, what about something more challenging, like brain benefits?
Underrated Brain Boosters
A European research team (Dr. Begoña Cerdá et al.) looked at the effects of polyphenol-rich nutraceuticals (plant extracts) on cognitive function and neuroprotection biomarkers.
It was a randomized, crossover, double-blind, sex-stratified, placebo-controlled clinical trial that had people take the supplement or a placebo for 16 weeks, have a 4-week washout phase (to minimize leftover effects contaminating the data) and then switching groups (still blinded to the placebo control) for 16 weeks.
They tested cognitive function and neuroprotection biomarkers in various ways before and after each of the testing phases (so, four testing sessions in total per person: before and after the supplement + before and after the placebo).
The results:
❝The results suggested that participants who consumed the polyphenol-rich nutraceutical demonstrated significant improvements in cognitive performance compared to the placebo group.
The Stroop Test scores indicated enhanced attention and inhibitory control, while RIST results suggested improvements in logical reasoning and memory. The Trail Making Test also revealed increased cognitive flexibility, highlighting the supplement’s potential to boost overall mental agility.
Furthermore, the ELISA results showed a notable increase in BDNF and CREB levels among participants who took the active supplement. BDNF is a protein that is essential for neuronal growth and survival, and its levels were significantly elevated, reinforcing its role in synaptic plasticity and long-term memory formation.
Additionally, CREB, a transcription factor involved in learning processes, also showed increased levels, supporting its function in cognitive enhancement.
Importantly, the correlation between improved test scores and higher biomarker levels suggested that polyphenols may directly influence brain function rather than merely offering general health benefits.
While the study focused on healthy adults, the findings also raised questions about whether similar interventions could benefit populations at risk for cognitive decline, including older adults and individuals with neurodegenerative conditions.❞
Key to abbreviations:
- RIST = Reynolds Intellectual Screening Test
- ELISA = Enzyme-Linked ImmunoSorbent Assays
- BDNF = Brain-Derived Neurotrophic Factor
- CREB = cAMP-Response Element Binding Protein
- cAMP = Cyclic Adenosine MonoPhosphate
Source: Daily fruit and vegetable extracts may boost brain power ← we quoted a pop-sci article for the above summary, for easier readability while still having the critical conclusions in one place
For those who do want to dive into the actual data and a lot more detail about the study methodology (which is well worth reading if you have the time, as it’s very good), here is the actual study:
If nothing else, be aware that the usual benchmark for statistical significance is p < 0.05, whereas the results in this study ranged from p < 0.01 to p < 0.001, in other words, ranging from 5x more significant than is required to be called “significant”, to 50x more significant than is required to be called “significant”.
In fewer words: impressively significant
In lay terms: the scientists are about as sure as scientists ever get about anything, that this supplement produces significant results
What was the supplement they tested?
Good news! It was…
- a commercially available supplement (JuicePlus), which is convenient, because it means we (and you, dear reader) can get it if we so choose
- not paid for by JuicePlus or anyone associated with them (indeed, the funding declaration on the study is “This research received no external funding”), so not subject to any conflict of interest that might introduce bias into the study
As for why they chose that one:
❝A unique aspect of the polyphenol-rich nutraceutical evaluated in this study lies in its composition, which integrates a blend of fruit, vegetable, and berry juice powders.
This product, Juice Plus+ Premium®, contains over 119 distinct polyphenolic compounds, including flavanols, anthocyanins, and flavones, as demonstrated in prior compositional analyses.
Compared to other polyphenol-based interventions, this nutraceutical stands out due to its comprehensive formulation, combining a wide range of bioactive compounds with complementary antioxidant and neuroprotective effects.
These characteristics ensure a more diverse interaction with neurobiological pathways, including those related to oxidative stress mitigation, synaptic plasticity, and cognitive function❞
Source: Ibid. (it’s in the introduction)
Want to try some?
We don’t sell it, but for your convenience, here’s where to get JuicePlus supplements Amazon 😎
Enjoy!
Don’t Forget…
Did you arrive here from our newsletter? Don’t forget to return to the email to continue learning!
Learn to Age Gracefully
Join the 98k+ American women taking control of their health & aging with our 100% free (and fun!) daily emails:
