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Stress, Aging and the Brain
Dharma Singh Khalsa, M.D.
Did you know that the latest brain research reveals that stress may cause short term memory loss? Well, it's true.
Stress, anxiety, and worry may also disrupt brain cell function leading to Alzheimer's disease as well as depression, studies show.
This vitally important information considering our multitasking, hyperwired, 24/7 lifestyle we live today.
Julie was distraught. She was a mother of two teenage girls and was happily married to Bill who was a physician. She worked full-time as a health care administrator, a job she enjoyed immensely. Her life seemed to be perfect yet the anguish in her face was easy to see.
She was only 49, yet she had began to notice those small lapses in memory that have been called "senior moments." She had forgotten she had promised to take her daughters to a party recently, she had missed a parents meeting at school, and was finding it hard to remember the names of the new physicians at her hospital.
What really scared her, though, was that she had completely missed an important administrators meeting. She had never missed one before in the 20 years she had worked at the hospital. In fact, she had always prided herself on having a perfect memory.
Julie was worried that she was developing Alzheimer’s disease. Her father had been diagnosed with early stage Alzheimer’s a couple of years previously and she knew that if you have a family member with Alzheimer's disease, you have a three-to fourfold greater chance of developing it.
As I talked with Julie, it became clear that her life had changed considerably over the past few years. Her teenage daughters demanded a lot more of her time, her husband was working longer hours, and she felt she had more stress in the workplace. This added up to much more stress causes than ever before.
Conventional medicine had little to offer Julie to overcome her memory loss or to help prevent Alzheimer's disease. I explained to her that the Brain Longevity Program, which combines conventional and alternative medicine, has a proven track record and that she would have her normal brain function back in approximately 40 days.
First I needed to explain to her why she was beginning to experience short term memory loss. Many of us forget things if we either don’t pay attention or if we don’t think they are important enough for us to remember. This is a normal part of life or we would fill our heads with trivia.
Julie though, was forgetting things that were important to her. All the extra demands that had been put on her over the past few years had increased her stress levels enormously. I explained to her that chronic stress causes a long-lasting increase in the production of cortisol from the adrenal glands. This rise in cortisol is a normal response to stress to help us cope, but when the stress is over, cortisol levels should return to normal. With chronic stress, however, this does not happen and cortisol levels stay high with disastrous consequences for the brain.
Cortisol affects the hippocampus, which is the part of our brain that helps sort and store memories. It prevents it from taking up glucose; it also slows nerve impulse transmission and eventually can lead to death of brain cells. The size of the hippocampus in Alzheimer’s patients is considerably reduced as the disease progresses. Cortisol also inhibits a process called “long-term potentiation” that is critical to laying down new memories. Altogether high levels of cortisol are lethal to brain cells and seriously impair our brain function.
I took a blood sample from Julie to measure her cortisol and DHEA levels. DHEA is the most predominant of the steroid hormones and declines with age. In fact, DHEA levels are a good measure of the aging process.
As I suspected, Julie’s cortisol levels was high and her DHEA was low. This is a common finding with older people who are under stress, as they use up their DHEA to produce the excess cortisol.
Julie was now fired up to start the Brain Longevity Program. She could see that her blood tests showed a real reason for her short term memory loss. She wanted to know what she could do to make sure she recovered her brain power and to avoid becoming a victim of Alzheimer’s disease.
Although I had identified stress as the key part in Julie’s memory loss, I explained to her that the reason the program is so successful is that addresses many of the other reasons why people suffer from it. Nutrition, exercise and sometimes conventional medications are all part of the program.
The brain, even though it’s the most complicated and mysterious organ in our body, is in fact just flesh and blood. It needs the right food and dietary supplements, exercise and protection from harm that come from my Brain Longevity Program.
Read more about the Brain Longevity Program.
Stress Management
 Julie's main problem was chronic stress that had raised her cortisol levels, so this was the main part of the program for her. There are many ways to experience stress relief, the first of which is avoiding stressful situations, if there is a choice. I recommended that Julie start with a medita¬tion and she chose one from my book Meditation As Medicine.
Meditation is one the most powerful ways to lower cortisol levels and raise DHEA. Meditators also have lower levels of lipid peroxidases, which are a marker for free radical damage. In a study of the elderly, it was found that meditators had a greater life expectancy and longevity than did non-meditators, so there are a lot of benefits to a meditation practice.
Yoga, breathing exercises, and chanting also can lower your stress and anxiety levels. Whichever you chose, the most important point is to make it a regular practice. These techniques do not work like aspirin; their effect builds over a period of time. Recent studies show that more advanced meditations, what I call medical med¬itations, directly stimulate the hippocampus and improve memory loss.
Julie was a model patient and followed the program religiously. She did regain most of her perfect memory in the 40 days. She also feels more alive and vital than she has for years.
Julie is not an isolated case. The Brain Longevity Program has helped thousands of people to gain maximum brain power - and I know that dealing with stress has been a major part of their success.
Remember, prevention is better than cure so there is no time better than now to begin your Brain Longevity Program.
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