The Stress-Proof Brain – by Dr. Melanie Greenberg

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The premise of the book is as stated in the subtitle: using mindfulness and neuroplasticity to manage our stress response.

As such, it’s divided into three parts:

  1. Understanding your stress (and different types of stressors)
  2. Calming your amygdalae (thus, dealing with your stress response while the stressor is stressing you)
  3. Moving forward with your prefrontal cortex (and thus, gradually improving automatic stress responses over time, as we learn new, better responses to do automatically)

The content ranges from the neurophysiological to “therapist’s couch” stuff; Dr. Greenberg having her PhD in psychology has prepared her to write both of those different-but-touching fields with equal competence. In-line citations are given throughout, for those who want to look up studies.

The style is direct and informative, with little to no attention given to making it an entertaining read. As a result, it’s information dense (which is good), and/but not necessarily a “couldn’t put it down” page-turner.

Bottom line: if you’d like to improve your ability to deal with stress, this book is as good as any.

Click here to check out The Stress-Proof Brain, and stress-proof yours!

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    Elder abuse is on the rise in high-income countries, with one in six Australians over 65 reporting abuse. Can a multimillion-dollar ad campaign truly protect our seniors?

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  • Walden Farms Caesar Dressing vs. Primal Kitchen Caesar Dressing – Which is Healthier?

    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.

    Our Verdict

    When comparing Walden Farms Caesar Dressing to Primal Kitchen Caesar Dressing, we picked the Primal Kitchen.

    Why?

    As you can see from the front label, the Walden Farms product has 0 net carbs, 0 calories, and 0 fat. In fact, its ingredients list begins:

    Water, white distilled vinegar, erythritol, corn fiber, salt, microcrystalline cellulose, xanthan gum, titanium dioxide (color)

    …before it gets to something interesting (garlic purée), by which point the amount must be miniscule.

    The Primal Kitchen product, meanwhile, has 140 calories per serving and 15g fat (of which, 1.5g is saturated). However! The ingredients list this time begins:

    Avocado oil, water, organic coconut aminos (organic coconut sap, sea salt), organic apple cider vinegar, organic distilled vinegar, mushroom extract, organic gum acacia, organic guar gum

    …before it too gets to garlic, which this time, by the way, is organic roasted garlic.

    In case you’re wondering about the salt content in both, they add up to 190mg for the Walden Farms product, and 240mg for the Primal Kitchen product. We don’t think that the extra 50mg (out of a daily allowance of 2300–5000mg, depending on whom you ask) is worthy of note.

    In short, the Walden Farms product is made of mostly additives of various kinds, whereas the Primal Kitchen product is made of mostly healthful ingredients.

    So, the calories and fat are nothing to fear.

    For this reason, we chose the product with more healthful ingredients—but we acknowledge that if you are specifically trying to keep your calories down, then the Walden Farms product may be a valid choice.

    Read more:
    •⁠ ⁠Can Saturated Fats Be Healthy?
    •⁠ ⁠Caloric Restriction with Optimal Nutrition

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  • The 7 Approaches To Pain Management

    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.

    More Than One Way To Kill Pain

    This is Dr. Deepak Ravindran (MD, FRCA. FFPMRCA, EDRA. FIPP, DMSMed). He has decades of experience and is a specialist in acute and chronic pain management, anesthesia, musculoskeletal medicine, and lifestyle medicine.

    A quick catch-up, first:

    We’ve written about chronic pain management before:

    Managing Chronic Pain (Realistically!)

    As well as:

    Science-Based Alternative Pain Relief

    Dr. Ravindran’s approach

    Dr. Ravindran takes a “trauma-informed care” approach to his professional practice, and recommends the same for others.

    In a nutshell, this means starting from a position of not “what’s wrong with you?”, but rather “what happened to you?”.

    This seemingly subtle shift is important, because it means actually dealing with a person’s issues, instead of “take one of these and call my secretary next month”. Read more:

    What is Trauma-Informed Care?

    Pain itself can be something of a many-headed hydra. Dr. Ravindran’s approach is equally many-headed; specifically, he has a 7-point plan:

    Medications

    Dr. Ravindran sees painkillers (and a collection of other drugs, like antidepressants and muscle relaxants) as a potential means to an end worth exploring, but he doesn’t expect them to be the best choice for everyone, and nor does he expect them to be a cure-all. Neither should we. He also advises being mindful of the drawbacks and potential complications of these drugs, too.

    Interventions

    Sometimes, surgery is the right choice. Sometimes it isn’t. Often, it will change a life—one way or the other. Similar to with medications, Dr. Ravindran is very averse to a “one size fits all” approach here. See also:

    The Insider’s Guide To Making Hospital As Comfortable As Possible

    Neuroscience and stress management

    Often a lot of the distress of pain is not just the pain itself, but the fear associated with it. Will it get worse if I move wrong or eat the wrong thing? How long will it last? Will it ever get better? Will it get worse if I do nothing?. Dr. Ravindran advises tackling this, with the same level of importance as the pain itself. Here’s a good start:

    Stress, And Building Psychological Resilience

    Diet and the microbiome

    Many chronic illnesses are heavily influenced by this, and Dr. Ravindran’s respect for lifestyle medicine comes into play here. While diet might not fix all our ills, it certainly can stop things from being a lot worse. Beyond the obvious “eat healthily” (Mediterranean diet being a good starting point for most people), he also advises doing elimination tests where appropriate, to screen out potential flare-up triggers. You also might consider:

    Four Ways To Upgrade The Mediterranean Diet

    Sleep

    “Get good sleep” is easy advice for those who are not in agonizing pain that sometimes gets worse from staying in the same position for too long. Nevertheless, it is important, and foundational to good health. So it’s important to explore—whatever limitations one might realistically have—what can be done to improve it.

    If you can only sleep for a short while at a time, you may get benefit from this previous main feature of ours:

    How To Nap Like A Pro (No More “Sleep Hangovers”!)

    Exercise and movement

    The trick here is to move little and often; without overdoing it, but without permitting loss of mobility either. See also:

    The Doctor Who Wants Us To Exercise Less, And Move More

    Therapies of the mind and body

    This is about taking a holistic approach to one’s wellness. In Dr. Ravindran’s words:

    ❝Mind-body therapies are often an extremely sensitive topic about which people hold very strong opinions and sometimes irrational beliefs.

    Some, like reiki and spiritual therapy and homeopathy, have hardly any scientific evidence to back them up, while others like yoga, hypnosis, and meditation/mindfulness are mainstream techniques with many studies showing the benefits, but they all work for certain patients.❞

    In other words: evidence-based is surely the best starting point, but if you feel inclined to try something else and it works for you, then it works for you. And that’s a win.

    Want to know more?

    You might like his book…

    The Pain-Free Mindset: 7 Steps to Taking Control and Overcoming Chronic Pain

    He also has a blog and a podcast.

    Take care!

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  • Tasty Hot-Or-Cold Soup

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    Full of fiber as well as vitamins and minerals, this versatile “serve it hot or cold” soup is great whatever the weather—give it a try!

    You will need

    • 1 quart low-sodium vegetable stock—ideally you made this yourself from vegetable offcuts you kept in the freezer until you had enough to boil in a big pan, but failing that, a large supermarket will generally be able to sell you low-sodium stock cubes.
    • 2 medium potatoes, peeled and diced
    • 2 leeks, chopped
    • 2 stalks celery, chopped
    • 1 large onion, diced
    • 1 large carrot, diced, or equivalent small carrots, sliced
    • 1 zucchini, diced
    • 1 red bell pepper, diced
    • 1 tsp rosemary
    • 1 tsp thyme
    • ¼ bulb garlic, minced
    • 1 small piece (equivalent of a teaspoon) ginger, minced
    • 1 tsp red chili flakes
    • 1 tsp black pepper, coarse ground
    • ½ tsp turmeric
    • Extra virgin olive oil, for frying
    • Optional: ½ tsp MSG or 1 tsp low-sodium salt

    About the MSG/salt: there should be enough sodium already from the stock and potatoes, but in case there’s not (since not all stock and potatoes are made equal), you might want to keep this on standby.

    Method

    (we suggest you read everything at least once before doing anything)

    1) Heat some oil in a sauté pan, and add the diced onion, frying until it begins to soften.

    2) Add the ginger, potato, carrot, and leek, and stir for about 5 minutes. The hard vegetables won’t be fully cooked yet; that’s fine.

    3) Add the zucchini, red pepper, celery, and garlic, and stir for another 2–3 minutes.

    4) Add the remaining ingredients; seasonings first, then vegetable stock, and let it simmer for about 15 minutes.

    5) Check the potatoes are fully softened, and if they are, it’s ready to serve if you want it hot. Alternatively, let it cool, chill it in the fridge, and enjoy it cold:

    Enjoy!

    Want to learn more?

    For those interested in some of the science of what we have going on today:

    Take care!

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Related Posts

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  • Are Waist Trainers Just A Waste, And Are Posture Fixers A Quick Fix?

    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.

    Are Waist Trainers Just A Waste, And Are Posture Fixers A Quick Fix?

    Yesterday, we asked you for your opinions on waist trainers and posture-fixing harnesses, and got the above-depicted, below-described set of results:

    • The most popular response was “Waist trainers are purely cosmetic, so useless. Posture-fixers have merit”, with a little over a quarter of the votes.
    • The least popular response was “Both are great tools to help us to optimal waist size and posture, respectively!
    • The other three answers each got a little under a quarter of the vote. In terms of discrete data, these were all 7±1, so basically, there was nothing in it.

    The sample size was smaller than usual—perhaps the cluster of American holiday dates yesterday and today kept people busy! But, pressing on…

    What does the science say?

    Waist trainers are purely cosmetic, so, useless. True or False?

    True, simply. Honestly, they’re not even that great for cosmetic purposes. They will indeed cinch in your middle, and this shape will be retained for a (very) short while after uncinching, because your organs have been squished inwards and may take a short while to get back to where they are supposed to be.

    The American Board of Cosmetic Surgery may not be an unbiased source, but we’re struggling to find scientists who will even touch one of these, so, let’s see what these doctors have to say:

    • Waist training can damage vital organs
    • You will be slowly suffocating yourself
    • Waist training simply doesn’t work
    • You cannot drastically change your body shape with a piece of fabric*

    Read: ABCS | 4 Reasons to Throw Your Waist Trainer in the Trash

    *”But what about foot-binding?”—feet have many bones, whose growth can be physically restricted. Your waist has:

    • organs: necessary! (long-term damage possible, but they’re not going away)
    • muscles: slightly restrictable! (temporary restriction; no permanent change)
    • fat: very squeezable! (temporary muffin; no permanent change)

    Posture correctors have merit: True or False?

    True—probably, and as a stepping-stone measure only.

    The Ergonomics Health Association (a workplace health & safety organization) says:

    ❝Looking at the clinical evidence of posture correctors, we can say without a doubt that they do work, just not for everyone and not in the same way for all patients.❞

    Source: Do Posture Correctors Work? Here’s What Our Experts Think

    That’s not very compelling, so we looked for studies, and found… Not much, actually. However, what we did find supported the idea that “they probably do help, but we seriously need better studies with less bias”:

    The use of posture-correcting shirts for managing musculoskeletal pain is not supported by current evidence

    That is also not a compelling title, but here is where it pays to look at the studies and not just the titles. Basically, they found that the results were favorable to the posture-correctors—the science itself was just trash:

    ❝ The overall findings were that posture-correcting shirts change posture and subjectively have a positive effect on discomfort, energy levels and productivity.

    The quality of the included literature was poor to fair with only one study being of good quality. The risk of bias was serious or critical for the included studies. Overall, this resulted in very low confidence in available evidence.❞

    ~ Palsson et al.

    Since the benefit of posture correctors like this one is due to reminding the wearer to keep good posture, there is a lot more (good quality!) science for wearable biofeedback tech devices, such as this one:

    Spine Cop: Posture Correction Monitor and Assistant

    Take care!

    Don’t Forget…

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  • All In Your Head (Which Is Where It’s Supposed To Be)

    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.

    Today’s news is all about things above the neck, and mostly in the brain. From beating depression to beating cognitive decline, from mindfulness against pain to dentistry nightmares to avoid:

    Transcranial ultrasound stimulation

    Transcranial magnetic stimulation is one of those treatments that sounds like it’s out of a 1950s sci-fi novel, and yet, it actually works (it’s very well-evidenced against treatment-resistant depression, amongst other things). However, a weakness of it is that it’s difficult to target precisely, making modulation of most neurological disorders impossible. Using ultrasound instead of a magnetic field allows for much more finesse, with very promising initial results across a range of neurological disorders

    Read in full: Transcranial ultrasound stimulation: a new frontier in non-invasive brain therapy

    Related: Antidepressants: Personalization Is Key!

    This may cause more pain and damage, but at least it’s more expensive too…

    While socialized healthcare systems sometimes run into the problem of not wanting to spend money where it actually is needed, private healthcare systems have the opposite problem: there’s a profit incentive to upsell to more expensive treatments. Here’s how that’s played out in dentistry:

    Read in full: Dentists are pulling healthy and treatable teeth to profit from implants, experts warn

    Related: Tooth Remineralization: How To Heal Your Teeth Naturally

    Mindfulness vs placebo, for pain

    It can be difficult with some “alternative therapies” to test against placebo, for example “and control group B will merely believe that they are being pierced with needles”, etc. However, in this case, mindfulness meditation was tested as an analgesic vs sham meditation (just deep breathing) and also vs placebo analgesic cream, vs distraction (listening to an audiobook). Mindfulness meditation beat all of the other things:

    Read in full: Mindfulness meditation outperforms placebo in reducing pain

    Related: No-Frills, Evidence-Based Mindfulness

    Getting personal with AI doctors

    One of the common reasons that people reject AI doctors is the “lack of a human touch”. However, human and AI doctors may be meeting in the middle nowadays, as humans are pressed to see more patients in less time, and AI is trained to be more personal—not just a friendlier affect, but also, such things as remembering the patient’s previous encounters (again, something with which overworked human doctors sometimes struggle). This makes a big difference to patient satisfaction:

    Read in full: Personalization key to patient satisfaction with AI doctors

    Related: AI: The Doctor That Never Tires?

    Combination brain therapy against cognitive decline

    This study found that out of various combinations trialled, the best intervention against cognitive decline was a combination of 1) cognitive remediation (therapeutic interventions designed to improve cognitive functioning, like puzzles and logic problems), and 2) transcranial direct current stimulation (tDCS), a form of non-invasive direct brain stimulation, similar to the magnetic or ultrasound methods we mentioned earlier today. Here’s how it worked:

    Read in full: Study reveals effective combination therapy to slow cognitive decline in older adults

    Related: How To Reduce Your Alzheimer’s Risk

    Take care!

    Don’t Forget…

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  • How to keep your teeth young

    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 keep your teeth young

    The association between aging and teeth is so well-established that it’s entered popular idiom, “too long in the tooth”, and when it comes to visual representations, false teeth are well-associated with old age.

    And yet, avoiding such outcomes does not get anywhere near so much attention as, say, avoiding wrinkles or hair loss.

    At 10almonds, we’ve covered general dental health before, in a three-part series:

    1. Toothpastes & Mouthwashes: Which Help And Which Harm?
    2. Flossing, Better (And Easier!)
    3. Less Common Oral Hygiene Options

    Today, we’re going to be looking specifically at keeping our teeth young. What if you have lost your teeth already? Well, gum health remains important, and it’s foundational for everyone, so…

    Look after your gums first and last

    Hollywood’s most “perfect” whites would be nothing without the gums holding them in place. So, set aside the cosmetic whitening products that often harm gums (anything containing bleach / hydrogen peroxide, is generally a bad idea), andinstead focus on your gums.

    As for avoiding gum disease (periodontitis)?

    ❝In conclusion, periodontitis might enhance the association of biological aging with all-cause mortality in middle-aged and older adults.

    Hence, maintaining and enhancing periodontal health is expected to become an intervention to slow aging and extend life span.❞

    Source: Does Periodontitis Affect the Association of Biological Aging with Mortality?

    Ways to look after gum health include the obvious “floss” and “brush often” and “use fluoride toothpaste”, along with other options we covered in our “Less Common Oral Hygiene Options” article above.

    Also important: don’t smoke. It is bad for everything, and this is no exception.

    We expect we probably don’t have many subscribers who smoke, but if you do, please consider making quitting a priority.

    See also: Smoking, Gum Disease, and Tooth Loss

    Consider supplementing with collagen

    Everyone’s all about the calcium and vitamin D for bones (and teeth), but a large part of the mass of both is actually collagen. And unlike calcium, which most people not living in a food desert get plenty of, or vitamin D, which is one of the most popular supplements around, collagen is something that gets depleted as we get older. We’ve written about its importance for bones:

    We Are Such Stuff As Fish Are Made Of—Collagen’s benefits are more than skin deep

    And as for its role in combatting gum disease and tooth loss:

    Nanoscale Dynamics of Streptococcal Adhesion to AGE-Modified Collagen

    By the way, that “AGE” there isn’t about chronological age; it’s about advanced glycation end-products. Those are also something you can and should avoid:

    Are You Eating AGEs?

    A different kind of “spit and polish”

    We imagine you have the “polishing” part in hand; that’s tooth-brushing, of course. But spit?

    Saliva is hugely important for our oral health, but it’s not something most of us think about a lot. For example, you might not have known (or might have known but not thought much about) that many common medications affect our saliva, including many blood pressure medications and antidepressants:

    Impact of ageing and drug consumption on oral health

    Because there are so many possibilities, this is the kind of thing to check with your pharmacist or doctor about. But as a rule, if you take a medication whose side-effects include “dry mouth”, this might be you.

    Here’s a really useful (academic) article that covers what drugs cause this, how to diagnose it, and what can be done about it:

    Hyposalivation in Elderly Patients

    If something’s difficult, find a way to make it easier

    Sometimes, as we get older, some things that used to be easy, aren’t. We can lose strength, coordination, manual dexterity, memory, attention, and more. Obviously, we try not to, and do what we can to keep ourselves in good health.

    But, if you do have some disability that makes for example brushing and/or flossing difficult to do consistently and/or well, consider talking to your doctor to see if there are assistive devices that can help, or some other kind of support that could allow you to do what you need to.

    See also: Improving oral hygiene for better cognitive health: Interrelationships of oral hygiene habits, oral health status, and cognitive function in older adults

    There’s never any shame in getting help if we need it.

    Take care!

    Don’t Forget…

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