Many people struggle with getting a good night’s sleep, and if you have high cortisol you could be thrown into a cycle of sleeplessness… and that’s bad!
Join Dr. Martin as he shares some side effects of poor sleep. From developing heart disease, to getting cancer, and weakening your immune system… you’re a lot more at risk when you don’t sleep!
TRANSCRIPT OF TODAY'S EPISODE
Announcer: You're listening to The Doctor Is In Podcast, brought to you by MartinClinic.com. During the episode, the doctors share a lot of information. As awesome as the info may be, it is not intended to diagnose, cure, treat, or prevent any disease. It's strictly for informational purposes.
Dr. Martin: Well, good morning everyone, and once again, welcome to another live this morning and hope you're having a great day, and we sure appreciate you guys coming on. Yesterday, we talked about, let me just give you that headline. We talked about sleep, but one of the keys was having a cool room at night decreases insulin resistance. Okay, guys, do everything you can to have a good sleep, but I was just reviewing a couple of studies. These are going back a bit because when I wrote my book, Sun, Steak, Steel and Sleep, here's how I started, okay, with sleep. Sleep is a performance enhancing drug. That's how key a good night's sleep is.
But I was just reviewing some of the research that I did for that book on sleep, and they were recent studies about a year ago, but let me just read some of these things here. A healthy brain requires normal cortisol levels, and if you don't sleep, okay, because remember what I was saying, sleep is a low hanging fruit to help your cortisol levels. When your cortisol levels are high and they should be higher in the morning and down to almost zero at night, but a lot of people have high cortisol all the time, and that isn't good at all. It's going to disrupt your sleep. You're never going to get into the five stages of sleep. Your self-cleaning oven, we talked about that. The self-cleaning oven of your body doesn't go on unless you're sleeping. Your regeneration and detoxification doesn't work unless you're sleeping.
Here's some side effects of poor sleep because I have several of them, but let me just read to you a few of the studies, okay? If you don't sleep, your heart will pay the price. Heart disease. Heart disease is more prevalent in people that have high cortisol and decreased sleep, okay? Remember, sleep is a performance enhancing. I hate to use the word drug, but that's what I did when I wrote the book Sun, Steak, Steel and Sleep, okay? Heart really takes a hit with high cortisol. It really takes a hit. Listen to this. Recent studies have shown that people in midlife that have a combination of poor sleep patterns nearly triple a person's risk of heart disease. Okay? Then I quoted Proverbs 14 and 30, A peaceful heart will lead to a healthy body and a peaceful heart is when you're sleeping, when you're calm, when you cortisol is down to where it should be.
Remember, I used to measure cortisol, and it was amazing to me that in my practice, and this is why I wrote a book back in 2011, two hormones that want you dead, insulin and cortisol, and isn't it funny that cortisol has a major effect on insulin. Think about it. Here's cortisol when it's high, okay? Cortisol on the inside of your body gets you ready for the fight and flight. Well, obviously you don't want to have high cortisol at night because high cortisol at night is like a vibration. It's your body is still tense. It's not getting in. You got two modes. You got fight or flight or rest and digest. You want your body to be in the rest and digest mode. When you get into a good night's sleep, your cortisol is down low, low, low, and that's when your body repairs itself, especially the brain. So this study showing that people in midlife that have a combination of poor sleep patterns and high cortisol, nearly triple a person's risk of heart disease, so the heart is affected.
Number two, cancer rates, okay, listen to this. The link between a lack of sleep and cancer is now so strong that the World Health Organization has classified any form of a nighttime shift work as a possible carcinogen. People that work the night shift, they study that. People that work the night shift, what choice do they have, but they're at triple the risk. Okay, well, that's for heart, but even the World Health Organization is saying they're at a much higher risk of cancer. Let me give you a short little form to connect this, okay? I remembered reading about this study and bringing it on my radio show 25 years ago at least, and it was a study on if you miss a night's sleep, okay, just one night's sleep. Whatever, you don't sleep well, you're traveling and they show this big time when you travel, how many people. T hey're all excited about their winter vacation and they're heading down to the Caribbean or whatever, to Florida or whatever, and they get a bad cold. Well they were up early to get a flight or whatever. All I'm saying is this has been shown.
When you don't sleep or you miss even one night's sleep, it makes you much more susceptible to getting a virus. When you don't sleep, your cortisol goes up. When your cortisol goes up, you don't sleep. So what happens? It affects your T cells. They've shown this. Your T cells are your navy seals of your immune system. They're not near as charged, even though you're heading down to the Caribbean to get sun to supercharge your T cells, that cortisol is a negative effect and your T cells temporarily are not working as well, and you've got a virus that comes. And what I'm saying is imagine cortisol over a period of time, high cortisol, you're not sleeping and what it does for cancer. See, cortisol pours gasoline on the fire. Cortisol is an accelerant and it decreases the immune system's ability to fight even cancer. And that's why the World Health Organization came out with, you know what, if you work the night shift, it's a carcinogen. Well, if you're up at night and you don't sleep well, your body's not going into that repair and cortisol negates your T cells.
Now you can make up for that and your body is fearfully and wonderfully made, my friend. You just got to put everything on your side to get a good sleep. And I talked to you yesterday. Sometimes you got to sleep during the day. You don't sleep at night. If you fall asleep during the day and give yourself a 20, 30 minute power nap if you can, your body goes into that self-cleaning oven. It does. And people used to argue with me about that because they said, ah, doc, I don't sleep at night. I don't want to go to sleep during the day because I said, you're already not sleeping at night. True or false? And they'd say, true. I said, well, if you can get some shuteye during the day, get some shuteye during the day, it's proven that it will help. Okay?
Now, if you don't sleep, heart. If you don't sleep, cancer rates go up. If you don't sleep, weight. This is a study that I quote in my book. Teenagers who sleep less than eight hours are more likely to be overweight and obese. Up to 72% more likely. That was in the Scientific Daily. New study links insufficient sleep to teenage obesity. I'll tell you something, okay? And this is especially women, not just teenagers. This is a study that I quote, but I'm telling you ladies, where cortisol affects you in a lot of ways, it slows your thyroid to a crawl. Cortisol robs progesterone. Okay? So I take out my little diagram and I would show people, you see the adrenals here. You see those adrenal glands, add renal on top of kidneys. They release your cortisol. Well, when cortisol's high for a prolonged period, it robs your progesterone. Then you get estrogen dominance. Then your thyroid don't work properly. They're all connected. Your thyroid slows to a crawl and then you gain weight gain, especially around the midsection. You gain weight. Okay?
Listen to this, okay? Listen to this research. Central fat cells, belly fat. Belly fat cells, listen to this, found mainly deep in the abdominal wall, have four times more cortisol receptors than other fat cells. Prolonged lack of sleep activates cortisol, fat storing, and you'll become a fat storing machine. Who said that? Dr. Martin, in his book, Sun, Steak, Steel and Sleep. You'll become a fat storing machine. Cortisol, you got receptors, fat cell receptors, four times more for cortisol in the midsection. And one of the things when you go on the reset, reset is so good for you. Metabolic Reset. It's food. You're changing fuels. Helps a lot, but a lot of women, they complain about their lack of weight loss, okay? Especially if they're happened to do it with their loved ones, their better half or whatever. They frustrated women because I didn't lose a lot of weight compared to that bum I live with. He lost weight and I didn't lose near as much. Remember, cortisol affects you much differently than a man. Secondly, cortisol in a woman robs progesterone and it slows the thyroid to a crawl. These things will balance themselves out.
But listen to this one, results from a new study from Uppsala University. Never been there, suggests that curtailing sleep alters the abundance of a bacterial gut species, microbiome and individual species to compromise metabolic health. Layman's language, no sleep, change in the microbiome. And then you become a fat storing machine. So you got cortisol receptors in the gut, in the fat cells, in the midsection, and they're much more receptive to cortisol. And then you've got changes in the microbiome that have a big effect. Okay? Insulin resistance.
Number four, they just said if you cool your room down and you get a good night's sleep, we talked about it. It decreases your insulin resistance. And this is a study increase in cortisol changes insulin sensitivity. Now, your cells are not near as sensitive to insulin. You want to be sensitive, okay? You want your cells to be sensitive to insulin. The opposite of that is insulin non sensitivity. We call that insulin resistance. Your cells are so tired of seeing insulin. They say, will you get the heck out of here, I'm so tired of you, but you want to be sensitive to insulin, oh, please come insulin. We love you. Okay?
So listen, increase in cortisol changes insulin sensitivity. Diabetes is twice as likely in people who don't sleep. Okay, so what do you got? Heart, cancer, weight gain, especially around the middle because cortisol makes a beeline for your abdominal fat cells. And cortisol, again, high over a period of time will slow your thyroid to a crawl. It changes your microbiome to the extent that it makes you much more susceptible to weight gain and fat storing, and it changes your insulin resistance independent of what you eat. Now, you know me guys, I'm a food guy, and you can't out sleep a bad diet. You can't out supplement a bad diet. You can't out exercise a bad diet. You can't do anything if you don't start with your diet. I mean that, but cortisol is just something you want to get under control. And sleep is the best thing to regulate that cortisol.
So if you sleep less than eight hours a night, that's the sweet spot between seven and nine, eight being the sweet, sweet spot. If you can get eight hours of sleep a night, if you don't, your heart's in trouble, your cancer rates are up, your microbiome, diabetes, weight gain, memory. Well, it makes sense, right? Memory. One of the factors I know insulin's a big factor. What do we call Alzheimer's? Type three diabetes. But one of the factors is when your brain doesn't detox, you need your brain to go into the self-cleaning glial cells, your glymphatic system in your brain, that detoxes itself. Depression, the rates are up. Compromised immune system. When I talked about heart, the blood pressure goes up if you don't sleep properly.
Anyway, I just thought we'd bring that out because we started yesterday with just sleep and a new study on just getting your room cooler really helps with insulin sensitivity. Isn't that something? Little things that we can do to help. And we talked about this yesterday. What do you do? Cool room. Wear a mask, try and get to sleep. Not always possible. I know that. Try and get to sleep at the same time. Wind down, get off that blue light. Give your body a chance to produce melatonin. Get in the sun. Sun and sleep. Okay? Get in the sun. Even in the winter, sunny day. Enjoy the sunlight. You're not getting vitamin D, but you're getting melatonin. And then a dark room. You're getting melatonin. Melatonin. You got a supplement. You don't have to take it as a supplement. You can get it. Your body produces it, okay? Your body produces it.
Cool your room. Epsom salt bath. A lot of people do that one to two hours before bed. Hot bath with Epsom salts. Those are magnesium salts, okay? This is all in my book, by the way. Stop drinking coffee. No, guys, I always defend coffee. You ever notice that? Okay, but I'm talking about caffeinated. I found out when I was 50 I could drink coffee just before going to bed before that. I mean it. I could have a cup of coffee at any time, anywhere, any who, and I slept like a baby. But I don't know if it was on the day I turned 50 or right around there. It was like what? I remember one night I was up all night wired. I said, I got to start drinking decaf and I ain't giving up coffee. It's the real vitamin C. If I have a decaf, I'm fine. Okay? And I find like me, even in the afternoon now, if I'm going to have a coffee, I'll have a decaf. I just got to, that's me.
I remember my neighbor, he used to boast. I couldn't drink coffee. I'm having a decaf. What are you having? No, I don't decaf. Give me the full thing. And then he turned 50. He was screaming for a decaf. Avoid high intensity exercise. Well, that makes sense, right? Don't go out and exercise before sleeping. Now you're going to elevate your cortisol. You don't want that. You want it to lower. Wear a mask. Magnesium. Guys, I love our supplement. Cortisol Control. I mean, I got tens of thousands of people. I all started in my office years ago, and I tried melatonin, I tried kava, I tried theanine on its own. You name it. I mean, I did it. It's when I combined. I said, nah, no, it's not working. Got to get something. That's by the way, I could prove it. Not only subjectively by my patients sleeping better, I could prove it by cortisol testing. I would just prove it to even, not only my patients, but to myself. Anyway, that's me.
Okay, I thought we would finish up on sleep here today. And you know what tomorrow is? It's question and answer Friday and I'm telling you that it's not too late to send your questions in. Maybe you have some questions about sleep that I haven't answered. Well, don't be shy, okay? And to make sure you get it to us, like you can post it here, but I ain't guaranteeing nothing. But if you would send us an email at info@martinclinic.com, all one word, martin clinic.com, info@martinclinic.com. I promise you, I'll answer your questions. Okay? We love your questions guys. Don't be shy. Ask questions. Okay, guys, have I told you lately that I love you? I haven't? If I haven't told you that, I know your cortisol is going up, you're getting stressed because I haven't told you lately that I love you, but I do. I want you to know it. What a group we have on our private Facebook group. If you're not a member, hey, join. Okay? Just join. Go to martin clinic.com and join our private Facebook group or go to Facebook and put in Martin Clinic and join us. Okay? We love you dearly, talk to you soon.
Announcer: You've reached the end of another Doctor Is In Podcast, with your hosts, Doctor Martin Junior and Senior. Be sure to catch our next episode and thanks for listening!