Stress – Functional Medicine Back to Basics

In this episode of Functional Medicine – Back to Basics Dr. Rutherford discusses stress and how it can be a major contributor to chronic conditions.

Note: The following is the output of a transcription from the video above. Although the transcription is largely accurate, in some cases it is incomplete or inaccurate due to inaudible passages or transcription errors.

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We’ve gone over just a number of things. Now I can’t put them all in order and review them that we’ve gone through the history. We’ve gone through the exam we’ve gone through, so many of the basics of what needs to be done.

The foundational one easily done, and now we’re, going to start moving into a little bit more into treatment and and and this this topic today, which is stress and how chronic stress, creates and/or, perpetuates chronic conditions.

It’s, kind of a it’s kind of a borderline foundational issue and it’s kind of a it’s kind of also a huge functional issue. As far as relative to the future, talks are going to be, for example, about the large intestines of small intestines, the stomach, how they all play into each other, the order in which to attack them, and so, when purse comes into our office, we once we decided That they’re, probably a good candidate.

We haven’t, fill out an 18-page history and it has questions on all of those areas and we have one section of about maybe twelve questions on the intestines and then we have another test area on maybe five questions on intestinal permeability.

We have five pages of questions on the brain and and and brain chemistry and brain chemistry when it goes abnormal results in anxiety, it results in panic, attacks or results of the pression. It results in inflammation.

It results in breaking down what’s called the blood-brain barrier. The bottom line is all of these different physiological neurological abnormalities create a lot of problems. I would make the argument that it’s, at least a ginormous contributor to this expand.

The group of patients who are the chronic pain patients, the autoimmune patients and and I’m gonna we’re gonna understand why I think that by the time we’re done with this. So so basically yeah. You have you know, the brain can pretty much controls everything and I’m, not gonna get into you, know the neurons and all that type of stuff, but the brain pretty much controls everything it controls your arms and controls moving and controls.

It controls whether you move your finger, controls your thinking and controls all that we’re. Pretty we’re, pretty much aware of all that, and and and we know that if our arm starts not working and we start getting tremors, we start thinking.

Oh there’s, some nerves, that’s going on and sometimes those nerves are are coming from the brain. Sometimes they’re, not news, but we kind of a relative grasp of that. But what we see in this office, this, I can say with full accuracy, virtually every day in in probably 95 % of the new patients that come in here, people who come in here for consultations, people who start care is that the vast majority of them have A chronic stress response going on that’s, separate from the motor nerves.

That I just got done talking about. Motor nerve is something that allows you to move your hands and move your feet, and then it’s separate from and that’s separate when that’s separate from the thinking part of your brain.

Okay, the thinking part of your brain is all of these ripples. All these Ruge i in in in the in that what’s called a cerebrum okay. So this is thinking, but we’re, not talking about those parts of the brain.

We’re talking about the part of the brain. That is, and is the automatic part of the brain, the autonomic part of the brain, which controls your entire physiology. Without you, even thinking about it, the stress response is is is so important that I don ‘

T think that you can get somebody well long term, unless you’re. Addressing this response, I don’t, think you can get a person’s, irritable, bowel syndrome on long term. Unless you address the response, I’m about to talk about.

I don’t believe you can get like persons. Leaky got better. If you don’t address this response and I could go on and on you’re, not gonna happen. This goes kind of back to for those of you who might be familiar with the alternative care.

This goes back to the days I mean. If you can’t fix the adrenals, you can’t fix anything, but you can ‘ T fix the adrenals. If he can’t fix the stress response. You I’ve done talks online that were titled.

I believe the adrenals are the wrong target, so so that so so in our world we talked about doing a complete neurological exam on every chronic pain, patient that comes in here, and certainly that’s warranted.

If you have fibromyalgia, preferably those are nerves, but we do it on somebody comes in here and if they have chronic fatigue or if they have irritable bowel syndrome and they don’t have fibromyalgia or some neurological problem like MS or something like that, We still do it for this reason, so so let’s say I’m.

Looking for a looking for a tool here here’s, my tool, okay. So so there’s. A part of the brain called the brain stem for those of you who are students, you might have heard it called the old brain and the lizard brain.

It has a number of different names, but but technically it has nothing. To do with. Thinking has nothing to do with any of that type of stuff; it does a million things, but that, but we’re, particularly interested in in this presentation.

Is that fact that it houses something called the autonomic nervous system? You can almost think of it. As the automatic nervous system and what it does is it keeps us balanced. It speeds us up, it slows us down, it controls your saliva, it controls your eyes tearing it controls your eyes, dilating and contracting.

It controls everything dilating, attracting it controls your arteries, dilating and contracting. It controls your breathing. It controls your bowel movements. In fact, it controls your sleep. There’s, a part of it that actually works with a place in your brain, called the hippocampus to control your circadian rhythm.

I go you’re, going to sleep and waking up are my patients, but my I can’t go to sleep and I wake up and I can’t go back to sleep and they’re. Now calling this the rest and digest system, because if this system is working properly, you’re sleeping well, your bowels are moving well, and so this is this and, and this system is, is, I believe, the key to long-term success in the functional world.

In it in any world I mean, if you’re, trying to get yourself better and you’re. Having this type of a stress response, there’s, a you, you may be someone who goes to a chiropractor and and and you can’t get better because and the adjustments hurt you because your muscles are stiff and they never get.

Soft or you may go to the physical therapist and they can or the massage therapist and they say: oh, your muscles are like knots and and and it hurts when you get taken care of or just a number of things where this stress response is going to Prevent you from even getting well with with with treatment.

So what is this stress response? This is the this. Is the brainstem and, and there’s, three parts to it. The bottom two-thirds for those of you who are more academic out there is the pons and the medulla, but the bottom two-thirds, basically houses the parasympathetic nervous system.

We’ll, call it the rest and digest relaxation mechanism. Okay – and the important thing to understand about this mechanism is that this is kind of where we’re supposed to be the way your brain is set up is, is it works by stimulation and we get a lot of sensory input from a lot Of things from walking from feeling things from smell like this, and they all feed back to the brain and they stimulate certain parts of the brain and the brain needs to be stimulated to work right.

Ninety-Five percent of stimulation that comes into your brain goes up through your thalamus, and it goes into your brain and all this type of stuff feeds back to stimulate this part of your brain. Why do I tell you that? Because when I’m, trying to to show there is that nature knows that we need to be calm all the time, because if this area of the brain is dominating, if it’s strong, if it’s working, we’re, going to become we’re, going to be sleeping well, our bowels are going to be working well in absence of some sort of a pathology.

This is going to keep this working. Well, this so calm, believe it or not. Is your natural state of being all right? Now there are neurons there’s a there’s, a small pool of neurons here in the upper third of your brain.

Okay and those neurons are the neurons that run your sympathetic nervous system and I don’t know why they call it sympathetic. I do know why they call it some of that, but it sounds like it would be sympathetic to you, but it’s, not very sympathetic, because it makes you go crazy because when this goes on, it makes it jittery now.

This is actually a a core survival mechanism for us, so what happens is when, when this is the for those of you who are familiar with the fight flight mechanism? Ok, this is the fight flight mechanism.

This is our innate primitive survival mechanism, the ok, the Bears chasing me, the Lions. Over there I got a like. I like I like anything, got to throw the spear at it or I get to get out of here, one or the other.

Ok, so here’s, how this works a little bit more of an updated example. Let’s, say you let’s, say you you, you think, like you’re gonna be walking down a street. You’re gonna get attacked or let’s say you simply have to give a speech for the first time and you ‘

Ve, never talked in front of five people in your whole life. Both of those create a response in what’s called your frontal lobe right here. Ok and this don’t follow them part on me, and this is your frontal lobe, ok, and so this is your front.

This is your thinking. This is who you are. This is your personality. This is where your brain goes. There’s a problem here. I need energy that’s. What the frontal lobe does. The frontal lobe then sends a signal to these guys.

They’re called the amygdala Magdala are the fear center of your brain. Remember that it’s. The fear center of your brain is this Center also happens around your whole emotional system. That’s, important that’s.

Gon na be important to us in a few minutes. So this frontal lobe goes there’s, danger front Allah says we, we need energy, it tells the amygdala the fear center. Brain hey be fearful because we need energy and then that tells the little neuron pool here in the upper brain to start making energy right now.

This sympathetic nervous system and here’s, an important point. This then shuts down the relaxation response. Now again, a more salient even a point than that is you’re either here or you’re here, but you’re.

Never in both, you might be in the fight flight response and be like a1 on a scale at 1 to 10, or you might be a 10 on a scale at 1 to 10. But while you’re in that flight mechanism, this is pretty much shut down.

The relaxation response where we’re supposed to be in our normal state of being, is shut down. When relaxation responses is is dominating, we are feeling pretty darn good okay, but we need to get out of here right now, because the bear is about to eat us, so this shuts down, and then it sends a signal down here down here.

This is your spinal cord and it sends it out to something called your adrenal glands, which are too little kind of kind of cone, shaped a little glands that are sitting on top of your kidneys and then those adrenal glands start vomiting out hormones.

You would, you would know them as stress hormones, although they do a lot of other things they would. They would vomit out adrenaline. So adrenaline starts making your heart pounds right, and so then then they then they start putting out something called epinephrine.

So now you start being able to breathe more. You’re, you’re, you or bronchial tubes. Nell start to dilate, you’ll, you’ll, actually be able to take more oxygen and they put out something called aldosterone.

Aldosterone works with your kidneys to raise your blood pressure. Why would you want to raise your blood pressure? Because you got to get blood to your big muscles in your chest, your back, your arms, your butt, your thighs, you know all the big muscles that are gonna, allow you to fight or flee.

It starts moving blood sugar. There’s, another hormone that the adrenals put alcohol doubt dust our corticosteroids, so the corticosteroids then start moving blood sugar out of your liver and into your and into your bloodstream, and a lot more things happen than that.

But basically, all of that’s happening to put sugar into your muscles sugar into your frontal lobe electrolytes. It’s, moving everything into the big muscles so that they can fight or flee. In the meantime, it’s, draining blood from your intestines.

It’s, telling your bladder shut down and whether you realize it or not. It actually even shuts down your throat, because you don’t need to be eating and you don’t need to be peeing and you no need to be pooping right.

While you’re, fighting or fleeing so nature puts you in the optimum position neurologically and chemically to be able to fight or flee, and this is where that superhuman strength comes from. Where you’ve heard the word.

I haven’t heard this one lately, but during my lifetime it’s, always been the little old gal who, like weighs about 90 pounds, who picks the car up off of the kid that the car just rolled on top of. And these things have happened and they’ve been documented, and then, when it’s over the person drops the car and everything goes back to where it should be, and that’s.

What should happen this is, should be a very short-term response. What should happen is once the danger is gone or once that speech is over or once the kids out from under the car. What should happen is, is this frontal lobe should now say you know what okay I don’t need all that energy anymore, because you’re gonna I’m gonna you know you’re gon Na be in good shape, if I, if I, if you keep putting all that energy out and then it tells the fear center to tell something down here – called your cerebellum to shut down this midbrain sympathetic, fight/flight response.

And then you go back to rest and realize section: okay, that’s, not the patient that shows up in here. Okay, the patient that shows up in here is continually in some gradient or level of fight flight and and – and so here’s, how that happens? Okay, so it’s, the same mechanism, but what happens in the person that has most chronic conditions? Again, I’ll, say 95 % of the people that come in here.

What happens with them is this fear center? It gets programmed so it gets programmed like a computer. It’s, actually still a survival mechanism, but I just got done saying that it’s, not a survival mechanism.

If it goes for more than five or ten or fifteen or twenty or thirty minutes or a couple of hours or a couple of days, okay and it’s, not so why does it get program and why is it a survival mechanism? Well, it’s, a survival Megan for the reasons that it gets program and the reasons it gets.

Programs is usually some form of emotional trauma that that person’s, brain perceived as egregious and the women it’s, usually for well. I shouldn’t say that anymore, because I ‘ Ve had men that have gone through this to verbal physical abuse, verbal abuse, sexual abuse.

I hate to tell you how frequently that comes in it could be. You know they’re. Your parents were alcoholics that they left you. It could be there’s. A lot of very specific things I mean I lady came in here was standing there with her husband got shot.

You know these are. These are like abnormal, like out of our reality type of things, and they create such massive fear that the brain will produce something called negative. I’m. Sorry negative neuroplasticity, so neuroplasticity is when your brain changes to help you more in your endeavors a simp.

The simplest way to put that may be simple. This example, I can think of is is playing the piano okay, so playing the piano. So if you’re playing chopsticks do dundun dundun dundun, you know the rest okay.

So basically, this part of the brain right here just I’ll, put my finger right there right. There is allowing you to do that. Okay! Now let’s say you get into something a little bit more complex than than those two fingers.

Okay, let’s, say you get into something very simple, like just simple old songs like Sinatra, songs or Beatles, songs, or even a simple ballad from today, something where the chords are simple, but it’s a little more complex, a larger Part of the brain will start to help that original area to be able to move the fingers more completely.

In a more complex fashion, that’s called neuroplasticity. The neurons, the brain cells will actually reach out, with these little tentacles called dendrites to other neurons, to recruit them to help by the time you’re, two playing Tchaikovsky.

It might be that this whole part of your brain has been recruited to help that you stopped playing for ten years. It goes back to that. So your brain is plastic when you, if you ever hear that term, that’s, what it means so there’s, positive neuroplasticity, that’s, positive neuroplasticity and there’s negative nor plasticity and two things.

I see in this office that are negative. Neuroplasticity is chronic pain where the brain has lost its ability to be able to filter out pain and and negative neuroplasticity of this amygdala, which, for starters, creates the situation of the brain not being able to filter out pain.

If pain is what you have so this amygdala, this fear Center now gets from one of those other thing. Oh one thing I fried to mention is: what else will prime this is? You could be a perfectionist or you could be like a type-a and because that type of brain is always looking to be right.

So everything’s got to be right. Everything’s got to be moved right here. Everything’s, you know it’s like everything’s, gonna be perfect, so you’re. Continually. Stimulating this and or or a type-a is just it’s.

Never enough! You always got to do more. You got to do more, you got to do more. You got to do more. All those keep stimulating this this, this part of the brain, and so all of those things will create negative neuroplasticity.

Even if you’re, a type-a and you own 12 businesses and you’ve just built half of like you know a big city and everything is wonderful. It’s, not because usually this is being stimulated and you’re in this fight flight response.

So what happens? Is this negative neuroplasticity causes us the MiG d’leh to continue that fight flight response, where all those hormones are being put out like 24 hours a day. Some like this, some like that, sometimes but but always being put out high low medium.

This person, who can’t, go to sleep they wake up, they can’t fall asleep there’s, a number of signs that this is going on your brain, never shuts down. So this is negative, neuroplasticity and, and and what’s worse is the latest research shows that, as that occurs, this amygdala, this fear center actually grows.

So basically it’s, trying to either help you. If you’re, the perfectionist or the or the type-a, but it’s, trying to protect you from this, egregious act of maybe being raped or beaten or shot or or alcoholic parents are abandoned.

So it’s. Keeping you aware all the time: okay, so that’s, the mechanism, but here’s. Why? I’m going through all of this, and here’s, why? I said this is kind of foundational to getting better, but it’s also something that creates problems.

It certainly perpetuates problems, and here’s, why these adrenal glands that are putting out you can’t, see me down here, but my DS, adrenal glands, I’m, pointing to on top of my kidney, these adrenal glands keep Putting out stress hormones, because the brain keeps telling them to keep this relaxation response shut down and keep putting out adrenals hormones, and so they are so intermittently.

You keep putting out things that are altering your blood, sugar or things that are causing stress hormones, things that are making you breathe heavy those types of things, but more than that, there’s.

One particular hormone that’s, that’s, that is extremely destructive and it’s. Cortisol most people to come here know cortisol as being bad. They’ve, looked on the internet and cortisol is bad bad, bad.

That but it’s not until there’s too much of it. Cortisol helps us to maintain our blood sugar cortisol works with certain chemicals and balance with our sex hormones cortisol. It helps to modulate our immune system in a good way until it’s too much.

And when is it too much when you’re in chronic fight flight and you’re, putting out too much cortisol. And what does the cortisol do? I’m just gonna give you kind of like the Cliff’s. Notes part here, because this is this could be like you know, a twenty hour lecture, but but but but the core of it.

What you need to understand is the stress hormone. Cortisol has a wonderful affinity to damage your frontal lobe here’s, the symptoms, depression, anxiety, panic attacks; okay, so so it’s. It’s, rare that you’re gonna have those without being in a chronic fight flight response.

Cortisol has been shown to create inflammation in the brain and be part of virtually every migraine that’s ever been. There was a couple of parts of migraine, but cortisol. The stress hormone is a huge part of creating the chemistry that you’re now, starting to see online.

They’re, ultimately making drugs for to to take care of your migraines. It’s. It’s, the the the the tightness in your neck that headache that you’re taking medicine for you’re, going to the chiropractor for the massage therapist or the Agron physical therapist, and won’t ever Go away that tightness in the neck and going all the way down into your shoulders and all the way down your back.

The cerebellum causes that well, I thought we were talking about cortisol yeah, we are the cerebellum, so it’s, be shutting down the stress responsible when it’s, going like this all the time cerebellum wears down stiffness and then that dizziness Balance blurred vision, all of those things come secondary from that mechanism, so it’s, a it’s.

It’s, a big they actually are now thinking that it is one of the causes of the immune inflammation. It attacks. The thyroid better known as Hashimoto’s, the things that we see an awful lot: chronic sinus infections.

You have a chronic sinus effects. You’ve, got to the doctor. You’ve gone to the allergy guy. You’ve, had your deviated, septum removed, you has holes plugged up in there and you ‘ Re still are getting chronic problems.

It’s because it’s, because we talk now about 70 % of your immune system being on the inside of your intestines okay. But it’s actually in the inside of intestines, on the inside of your lung cavity. On the inside of your throat and on the inside of your your nasal passage and we step back a minute to where we talked about cortisol being part of what helps to modulate your immune system.

So it goes to those areas to help alert the immune system. To invaders coming in and and and calling to white blood cells, and things like this to get a lot of the immune system, neutrophils narsings, to come and attack until it becomes the problem.

Cortisol and high doses is called catabolic its destructive, so those very tissues that it’s. Norley helps it starts destroying now you start getting chronic sinus infections. Now you start getting food sensitivities because cortisol remember we go back now to the fight flight response.

The stress response does what shuts down your throat so a lot of times. If you’re chronically stressed you’re. One of the patients that can’t swallow pills that feels like you got. A lump in your throat that can’t swallow those types of things frequently that’s.

The stress response overwhelming the cranial nerves here, but remember when you’re in fight flight, it’s, shutting down the throat it’s, shutting down the intestines in the bladder, so it shuts down the stomach and the intestines.

Also, okay, it shuts down the stomach in the intestines. It shuts down the lungs. This is the number one cause of chronic non-pathological asthma. Athletic asthma is chronic stress, hormones or immune inflammation, but chronic stress hormones play a big part in these chronic asthma cases.

But the gut is like the huge thing. Most people understand that stress causes ulcers and they people have known that my whole lifetime. Okay, so, but now we know why we now know it kills hydrochloric acid in the stomach, and then you can’t digest your proteins and now the protein sits there and it becomes acidic.

And now what do you do you go to doctor? They say I got acid ingestion and they give you an antacid, a MEP rizal, and they tell you to take this, which now kills what little hydrochloric acid. You have left and kind of duplicates the physiological effect on your stomach and your intestines.

That’s already being caused by the stress response. This is bad because now you’re, not making hydrochloric acid, you’re, not digesting your proteins that becomes acidic. This is the number one cause of gall bladders, not working, because the because there’s, a signal sent from the stomach to the gall bladder to say, hey, don’t work is a signal sent to the that was called cholecystokinin.

That’s, it that’s, a hormone there’s. Another signal incentive pegasus that don’t work because the pancreas and the gallbladder all empty into the same area that the food empties into, which is the duodenum right below your stomach.

And so you’re. Your body’s wired to make sure that those try to not get in fact that are inflamed. But once you have this stress response that’s. Shutting down the the the ability to make hydrochloric acid in your stomach, then it starts doing that now.

Long-Term. That stress response kills those parietal cells that are making the gastrin and the hydrochloric acid, which are the chemical things for the chemical nerdy, guys out there, and once once once that happens, and it keeps happening that’s.

When you get an ulcer okay and when then you get an ulcer and then what happens you can’t, kill bacteria, you get h, pylori, you can’t, kill bacteria. You get small intestinal back to your overgrowth, because these bacteria either sit in your stomach or make their way into your intestines.

These stress hormones have an affinity for the inside of your intestines, because cortisol is part of the immune system. Seventy percent of your immune system is on the inside of your intestines. It’s called secretory IgA that starts getting damaged, it starts flaring up and the next thing you know you get, you start getting.

You start getting leaky gut from that. You start getting food sensitivities while you’re in fight flight, your your intestines are shut down, so it’s, not only so so so in the long term. Is it’s? It’s.

You know creating inflammation in there, which creates all this other type of symptoms, but it also decreases blood supply to your intestines and also overwhelms the stress response. Okay, I can’t see how high do I need to hold this, but this stress response.

Okay, that’s going from here it’s. Shutting down your your your parasympathetic nervous system. Well, your vagus nerve, which it comes from right here, is what controls your bowel movements. This is the number one cause of constipation.

By far, there are other causes. Don’t get me wrong, but this is number one cost. Oh, what else is here? The mechanisms to filter out pain is here. So if you have a central pain syndrome like like fibromyalgia or some of these other central pain syndromes, like reflex, sympathetic, dystrophy, it’s partially or largely because your stress response is overwhelming this area.

This is a big part of those things and when you – and so so this this is like they’re now calling irritable, bowel syndrome, constipation or diarrhea. Three days a month for more than three months, they’re now calling that irritable brain syndrome, and the last thing I see a lot here, and particularly in women, two last things I just did it.

I just did a talk just a few minutes ago before we started this on infertility. Okay, this is a huge part of causing infertility, polycystic ovarian syndrome, those types of things and it’s. Also, the number one cause of chronic cystitis pain in your bladder because, again, when you’re in short-term fight/flight, your bladder is like is like your bladder is shut down.

Okay, but when you’re a long term fight/flight I mean when you’re, you, you have constipation at some point. You know your your. Your small intestines are having to empty into your large intestines and at some point, even though your brains telling it to shut down.

You know your your your bowel, you have a separate nervous system and there was going. I got ta go. I’m. Full it’s, the same thing with the bladder. The bladder fills up it’s, confused the brains telling it.

I’m in chronic fight/flight don’t pee that, but there are reflexes in the inside of bladder, go. I got ta pee and because I’m getting full up, then you start getting pain next thing. You know you you, you you, you’re Nate, okay, for those of you like urination, better than pee your your Nate and then the next thing.

You know because there’s, an abnormality in a way this functions, you get urine in your urinary tract, and this is the number one cause of chronic urinary tract infections. So what happens to those you go to the doctor? They give you they give you antibiotics right and what does it do it screws up the stomach that’s already being screwed up by the same mechanism that’s, causing you chronic urinary tract infections, and I go on with this for, Like ages, oh my god, there’s like so many.

It literally affects our Ken effect, literally every single cell in your body. So when somebody comes in with a chronic condition and and and they’ve been through, they’ve, been through everything, yeah they and and they’re taking and and they’re, taking medications for their sort Of depression or for their panic attacks or for the anxiety and and they’re, taking medications for their gut and they ‘

Ve changed your diet and they’re and they’re. Doing all of these things. They really haven’t addressed the chronic fight flight response. That person is never going to get better, they might get better for short periods of time.

They might have certain things get better. Maybe you go on a maybe you find out. You have small intestinal bacterial overgrowth, which is probably to talk about the next in the next presentation, and then you get on the fodmap diet and then you take the let’s, say berberine is one of probably dozen things you can use to get Rid of those bacteria and they go away for a week or two, so you’re.

Still, you’re, you’re starving it. You’re killing it they go away for a week or two or maybe even six weeks, and that comes back. Why? Because the perfect perpetuating factor is the stress response that’s, killing the hydrochloric acid in the stomach.

That’s, not allowing you to have the hydrochloric acid that should be killing any new bacteria, that’s, creating that and that has to be taken care of, and it’s and it’s. It’s, you know it’s, the biggest challenge.

Honestly, the biggest challenge is to get that brain under control. We use a number. We use a variety of of complementary approaches, but it’s, a little different for each person. It’s, sometimes when that person is in chronic fight/flight imaging if they get it’s like a seven, maybe a definitely a nine or a ten.

You may have to go to the to the to the length of counseling. We’ve, sent people to traumatic trauma counselors. We have a clinical hypnotherapist that we work with. There are functional psychiatrist.

I’m here in Reno Nevada, so these people are here in Reno, Nevada, don’t. We work because sometimes even brain rehab exercises and self guided meditations and tapping exercises and herbs and botanicals and nutraceuticals and neurotransmitters aren’t enough for when that brain gets.

So what we call it, we call it sympathetic wind up when it when you get sympathetic line of them. You just came back from you, know the the war in Afghanistan or or or something like that, and you’ve.

Had one of those experiences been in the middle of combat, then that has to be, if I have a patient that comes in and they’re in that situation or if I have a patient that comes in and I just have. I’ve had one or two in the past couple of weeks, who are in the middle of a massive trauma, and I’m like you’re in the middle of a divorce and it’s.

Just divisive and you’re going the court, and who knows, I even had one word that they couldn’t afford to live apart, so they were still living in the same house. You’re, not getting a person better when that type of trauma is there day in and day out those people.

I will advise no matter how sick they are that they need to get through that first, then they can come in and then we can start working on them and then we ‘ Ll get a response because trying to overcome that you know it’s like having this massive fire.

I’m trying to put it out with like a garden hose, so these are like the perspectives. I’m. Trying to give you relative to the stress response, because and and I even have people come in here and say they’re, not stressed.

How do you know your stress, how you know if you’re this responsible? One of the things I talked about was that this I can’t go to sleep. I wake up. I can’t, go back to sleep, that’s, largely a stress response and a blood sugar response and and that cortisol also screws up your blood sugar as well as causes all those stress responses.

Another thing is: if you find yourself, if you, if you close your eyes just gently and you find your eyes fluttering like that – that’s called blepharospasm clamminess on your feet and oh that’s. Just me, you know that no it’s, not just you, you’re in a fight flight syndrome.

If you’re, one of those people are sitting there rattling your leg, all the time or doing something like that. That is an instinctive response of your nervous system to move some body part that will send stimulation back to your cerebellum.

If we go all the way back to about 20 minutes ago – and I said, the cerebellum is what it’s supposed to shut down. The stress response, then, that that’s, an indicator that that you’re in that fight flight response, because that leg, movement or those things that they try to do some people have other other mechanisms.

They do. That feeds back your cerebellum and temporarily strengthens it. This is why exercise this is two reasons why exercise helps to calm down, stresses it dampens that it strengthens that cerebellum and dampens that stress response.

It also helps to control your blood sure, which I’m, not going to get into all the chemistry of how that brings down your stress response, but it does too so that’s. I think that’s, kind of like as much as you need to know about stress at this point in time and and III, go back to saying that I believe that it’s.

The I there’s me okay. This is me, but I believe that they’re gonna come out one day and say this is the cause of the chronic situation that’s, going on out there and at first I thought it was autumn unity, my mentor dr.

T score asean was the gentleman who first developed the understanding of something called Hashimoto’s, thyroiditis that’s; an immune attack against the thyroid that was long before anybody did even heard of that.

Everybody just thought everybody on hypothyroid, and so we found out that the vast majority of it was some unit acts. Now everybody’s got immune to tax right back at that time. Nobody had it and was just MS and was a couple of things, but but I think it’s.

The stress response that’s, breaking down the gut and the and the immune system inside of the sinuses, the lungs, but particularly the gut. I think that’s, panning out into the rest of the system, and I think that I think that is what’s, causing this autoimmune explosion.

It’s, a much much more stressful situation in society than then when I was younger and I’m in my late 60s. So it just it. Wasn’t perfect, but but it was a lot less stressful and we didn’t have the stimulation, the constant stimulation to our brain.

This thing’s. This thing seemed to be more stable back then, in just so many ways, and as I and as I see this over the years, we’re gonna we’re, not getting less people who have autoimmunity. We’re, not getting less people out, but we’re, getting more and more and more and more, and so I very least this is a core of people getting sick.

But as you can tell, this also perpetuates the things that I believe that it that it might create in the first place now it’s off to the races. Now it’s, parasites. Now it’s ease. Now it’s Candida. Now it’s, small intestinal bacterial overgrowth, an IBS and blah blah blah anyway, that’s.

The way we see it, it’s, been a pretty successful approach for us to treat that at the same time, we’re, treating other things that’s stress, so you see why I say it’s Kind of like like, like it kind of like straddles the is that a foundational thing, or is that a treatment type of a thing? Again? We have two two pages that summarize virtually the rest of the person’s entire physiology, and we have five pages on brain function and stress so I mean I kind of like that kind of represents how we see it and and – and I think It’s, just important for you to know that, so that’s.

I think that’s enough. I think that I think that kind of covers it. I think that should light you up and really give you kind of like like where it’s out relative. So you give you an opportunity to think whether that’s happening or not with you.

So I stress next so next time we’re gonna get into the actual physiology kind of an order. Again, this is back to basics. This is functional medicine back today, some people would argue, though I just went over, is not functional medicine.

My mentor just just went through a doctor crossing just in a three day course on neuro inflammation and how it affects everything and basically 90 % of what I just told you is that course, so it is function.

It is within the realm of functional medicine, and, and so we’re gonna get it now. We’re gonna get into the breakdown or and and and kind of, the order. There’s, not an exact order of breakdown and to how to attack this.

But there is a general order of how to go about this and we’re, going to start on that. The next time that we meet and that’ll, be back to basics, on functional medicine, keep it simple, as my producer said, and and and and that’ll, be the start of the treatment portion of this series.

So I hope you’re enjoying this. I like doing it. I like feedback, please feel free to comment on this. Let me know if I’m going in the right direction. Let me know if this is something you’re interested in you have any questions feel free to send them.

I’m, not I’m, not the best email guy in the world. So I’m. Not going to get back to you in 24 hours, but but I will get back to you and and so until next time, dr. Mark Rutte, fir’d, certified functional medicine, practitioner or power health signing off bye.

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