Today I want to talk to you about why it is really important to “Out Run” your stress.
If you are suffering with memory problems, especially short term memory, you walk into rooms and you don’t really remember what you were going to do, or perhaps you forget where you left the car keys or you have to write down things to remember what they were, then you may actually be having issues with what I’m about to talk about today.
Before we start getting into it, before I can actually explain to wine it out under stress is a few key things you need to understand about the brain and stress, most importantly, a little fella called the hippocampus.
The reason it’s called the hippocampus is because it looks a little like a seahorse, where it gets its Latin name from. Despite its small size, it’s actually one of the most important areas of the brain when it comes to dealing with stress. Let me explain to you why…
Let’s say we are in the jungle, we’ve gone for a walk, we stumbled across a lion and this lion comes out and roars at us, we need to be able to get away from there really, really quickly. What happens is all our senses send information into our hypothalamus. The hypothalamus determines, hey, this is a potential threat to our life, we need to protect ourselves. It sends messages through to our fight or flight system to our adrenal glands.
These glands release cortisol which enhances the flight or fight response. The cortisol hits an area on the outside of your brain called your hippocampus. And that’s the structure we’re talking.
The hippocampal increases your navigation skills, your spatial awareness, your memory, short term to long term memory conversion and your visual memory. This allows you to flee as quickly as possible and remember the threat.
What’s the side effect of this?
The hippocampus actually starts to shrink! As this occurs, it’s other functions actually starts to decrease. In short, you start developing issues with your short-term memory, your navigation skills, your spatial awareness, the ability to read maps, the ability to orientate where you are AND your ability to turn off future stress reactions!
How can we restore our memory?
Counteracting this is a really important substance known as BDNF, brain derived neurotrophic factor, an amazing neural growth factor found in high concentration in the hippocampus. BDNF stimulates dendritic growth rapidly when it meets your neurons.
There are many ways to improve BDNF production and help restore your memory. At the top of the list is aerobic exercise. In fact light cardiovascular exercise has been shown to significantly elevate BDNF levels.
The connection between exercise and brain health was significantly shown in the early 80’s by Napperville high school. The introduction of a compulsory pre-school exercise that later became known as the Napperville hour program, completely changed the academic level at Napperville high taking it to be ranked in the top 5 categories of schools in the world!
Whilst exercise is renowned for its enhancement of brain function and health, there are a growing list of foods, nutritional supplements and herbals that research is showing to have a beneficial affect on the brain and memory which our team uses everyday to help people regain the brain health and restore their quality of life.
If you need help, would like to discuss any of these products or how our team might be able to help you get your life back, just reach out and contact me with the message button, through the contact us page or via phone on 9318 7758 or if you want help right now book online and let’s get started.
