How to support your cognitive health in midlife
Personal experience has shown me that you can completely change your life in your 50s. But if your brain isn’t working so well - if you can't concentrate, if you struggle to make decisions, or you struggle to find the right words or your memory isn't quite what it used to be - it makes it more challenging to turn things around.
Our cognitive health is all-important.
‘Like it or not, at some point during midlife, you’re going down, and after that there are only two choices: staying down or enduring rebirth.’
Brené Brown
I started studying nutrition a few months after quitting drinking – I was 47, peak peri-menopause and still nutrient-deficient from the years of alcohol abuse.
My brain at that point, to use a handy South African term, was vrot.
In that first year, writing those papers felt like wading through treacle. I barely passed each module. It was very upsetting and I worried that I would never get my brain function back.
But I did – the next year was easier and so was the next, and in my 4th and final year of studies I graduated with distinction. Go me!
In time, I healed. Our bodies and brains are always trying to heal.
But we need to help ourselves – firstly, by removing, or reducing, what’s damaging us (stress, alcohol, sugar, processed foods, environmental toxins etc); and secondly by nourishing ourselves properly (food, water, sleep, movement, connection).
These are the very foundations of cognitive health.
Alcohol and cognitive function
Studies show that in the first month of abstinence, brain volume begins to increase, and evidence of improved executive function and verbal episodic memory begins.
I particularly like this sentence: “[…] the adult human brain and particularly its white matter seems to possess genuine capabilities for regrowth.”
Aren’t our brains amazing?
Gut health and cognitive function
And of course, an optimal gut microbiome potentially improves the function of an aging brain.
Several studies show associations between gut microbial measures and neurological outcomes, including cognitive function and dementia. Mechanisms have not been fully established, but there is growing support for a role in microbiota-generated short-chain fatty acids.
Mind-body interventions and cognitive function
Mind-body interventions have been shown to improve cognitive function in older adults, as well as reduce depression and stress, and lower risk of dementia.
Clinical research has shown that practicing Kirtan Kriya, a Kundalini yoga meditation, for just 12 minutes a day can improve cognition and activate parts of the brain that are central to memory.
Here’s a YouTube link to the meditation and one on Insight Timer.
Genetics, supplements and cognitive function
Supplements can help support cognitive function, but it’s not a ‘one-size fits-all’. To understand more about your genetics and how they may impact on cognitive function, the APOE report and Methylation report from Lifecode GX are particularly helpful.
In your DNA report intepretation session I give guidance on how to support or bypass bottlenecks or weaknesses. Supplementation is targeted and individualised.