Never Stop Learning

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The most difficult part of adult learning is choosing to learn. 

That’s the closing line from a recent Seth Godin blog. If you want to read it in its entirety, click the link below. Reading it double-tapped the nail on the head for me. There are definitely some courses and areas of study I would love to learn more about; I just haven’t chosen to spend the time doing it. One course would be on where and how to use herbs in cooking. The other is learning how to make sauces of all types. As Seth suggests, I just haven’t decided to do it for a myriad of reasons.

The other nail on the head was for you as readers to take the time to learn about aging, regardless of your current age: what you can do now, if you’re not older, and what you can do when you’re there. The earlier you start in life, the more you can accomplish and the better you’ll be able to meet the challenges of aging.

Meanwhile, I’m preparing the next component of Aging with a Vengeance. That will be another opportunity to learn more about changes in your body as you grow older, and even better, what you can do about it based on the latest science. Before I announce the date for the next webinar, I’m going to give you the opportunity to get the first three Aging with a Vengeance videos so you can learn about Reclaiming Your Power, Taking Back Your Muscle, and Managing Pain at a reduced rate. I’m lowering the price of these webinar replays to just $9.95. That’s an opportunity to learn a lot at your own pace. Then you can take another opportunity with the next Aging with a Vengeance later this month.

Insiders: Remember you can download free copies of the MP3 or PDF for all topics of The Bottom Line. Subjects include Alzheimer’s disease, migraines, sucralose, and more.

“You don’t know what you don’t know” is a common expression. Isn’t it time you take this opportunity to learn?

What are you prepared to do today?

        Dr. Chet

Reference: https://seths.blog/2025/01/honesty-about-better/

Sleep: Your Body Decides

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Before we get back to sleep (today’s topic), a reminder: don’t forget to sign up for the Kids’ Top Health Issues webinar tomorrow afternoon! And if tomorrow isn’t convenient, the replay will be available after the webinar ends. You can watch it as many times as you want to take more notes or absorb more info.

Now, about sleep—the question remains: how do you know how much sleep your body needs? After all, we’ve all been told that we need at least eight hours per night. Or do we?

My mother-in-law Ruth had a particular aide in the nursing home who just loved her, and the feeling was mutual. Molly said she never got more than four hours of sleep per night; due to the nature of her job, she could come in at 4 a.m. and be on her way home by noon to spend time with her young children. In fact, her dad was the same way—never more than four hours, and they had all the juice they needed to do all they wanted to do.

That’s why I used to give the answer I gave as indicated in the last Memo: “Don’t worry about it, because that’s apparently all your body needs.” But was there any science to support that? Turns out, there was.

The Science of Sleep

Thanks to an excellent article in Knowable magazine, I had a direction to look for the science behind sleep. (If you have the time, read the article in the reference below.) Two researchers in San Francisco have been researching sleep for about 15 years. The initial part of the research was to find people with different sleep patterns. They found a group that were early risers, but the group that caught their attention was the one they termed “short sleepers”; their research focused on that group for the most part.

The research didn’t stop there. Researching that term yields over 380 papers in PubMed alone. I reviewed the first 50 abstracts. To be blunt, there is a lack of clarity in the research; the primary reason seems to be because there’s no clear definition of what a short sleeper actually is. It can be someone who doesn’t get more than seven hours of sleep. They also mix in people with diagnosed insomnia and sleep apnea and associated conditions such as obesity, heart disease, diabetes, and Alzheimer’s disease.

What is clear is that when researching families with at least two generations of short sleepers, defined as four to six hours per night, there are at least seven gene mutations involved. Further, this group of short sleepers doesn’t seem to be at risk for any debilitating condition and spend the extra time doing more work or tasks.

The Bottom Line

Should you be concerned about how much sleep you get? Yes, if it interferes with your life and you walk around fatigued all the time. The occasional loss of sleep is expected, but habitual loss is the problem. The actual number of hours of sleep you need is the amount that allows you to recover, renew, and get on with the next day. Forget about how much sleep you’re supposed to get.

One of the researchers was quoted stating it this way: “Saying everyone should get eight hours of sleep every night is like saying everyone should be 5 feet 10 inches tall.” Can’t say it any better than that.

What are you prepared to do today?

        Dr. Chet

Reference: Marla Broadfoot. 2024. The Ones Who Need Little Sleep.  www.knowablemagazine.org

Do You Worry About Sleep?

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We’ve all been there—an occasional night when you just can’t get to sleep. Judging from the questions I get, a whole lot of you are worried about getting enough sleep. I’m not talking about chronic sleep issues, which may require working with physicians and sleep specialists (as Paula has done). I’m talking about people who can’t seem to get more than four or six hours of sleep per night.

My first question is always, “How do you feel? How’s your energy level? Are you tired all the time, or can you do all you need to do every day?” The answer to that question is critical. If the answer is something along the lines of “I feel fine—I just can’t sleep any longer than that.” My typical response is “Don’t worry about it, because that’s apparently all your body needs.”

The problem is that I didn’t have a good explanation beyond that. Turns out it may all be genetically determined, and I’ll explain that on Saturday.

Coming Up

Tomorrow night is the Insider Conference Call. For those of you not familiar with Insider membership, the monthly calls are designed to answer health, nutrition, and product questions; I also dig into the health headlines to give detailed answers based on the research behind those headlines. You can join the call if you become an Insider by 8 p.m. ET tomorrow.

Also, the Kids’ Top Health Issues webinar is Sunday afternoon. I’m going to cover the relationship between gut health and constipation, ADHD, and autism. If you have kids or grandkids or work with kids, you don’t want to miss it; if that time doesn’t work for you, you can watch the replay at your convenience.

What are you prepared to do today?

        Dr. Chet

From Polypharmacy to the Natural Way

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When last we left our subject, he had a stent inserted while having a heart attack and was sent to cardiac rehab. He was on six medications (the very definition of polypharmacy) for congestive heart failure, A-fib, and hypertension. He decided that he wanted to get off all the medications he could because they contributed to him feeling weak, with no energy and a foggy brain.

The wellness center he went to had a strong nutrition-education program so while he was exercising, he was learning how to eat. The diet? As much as her wanted of raw, baked, and steamed vegetables; limited amounts of grains, beans, seeds, nuts; no meat. No SOS—that stands for sugar, oil, or salt.

The results? In five months, he lost ten pounds, but that wasn’t a goal. He reduced medications from six to two and will stop another when he’s a year out from his stent. He has normal sinus rhythm, normal blood pressure, and no signs of congestive heart failure. He states that his diet compliance isn’t perfect, but since following the nutrition approach, he has no brain fog, lifts weights, and runs on a treadmill. He wakes up every day with energy.

If you want to really get off medication for cholesterol, BP, and other associated conditions, that’s the natural way. It must be done under supervision and with your physician’s guidance. This man was fortunate that he could afford to participate in the in-patient program where he continued to learn, but many people have done it without an in-patient experience. This case report says it can be done and outlines the way. The effort is up to you.

The Kids’ Top Health Issues webinar on January 26 still has openings. I’ll cover the question I get asked most often in detail: constipation. Reserve your spot today.

What are you prepared to do today?

        Dr. Chet

Reference: BMJ Case Rep 2018;11:e227059.2. Arch

Here’s a New Term: Polypharmacy

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Polypharmacy is defined as the use of multiple or unnecessary medications.  One of the questions I often get goes something like “How do I get off all these medications my doctor has me on?” Another related question is “I don’t want to take medications—I want to do things the natural way.” These are valid goals, but it may not be easy.

Because of the nature of some conditions, there may be no other way. But when it comes to heart disease, type 2 diabetes, and hypertension, there may be a lot you can do, and thereby hangs a tale.

Several years ago, an 82-year-old man had been living with several heart issues: coronary artery disease, elevated cholesterol levels, high blood pressure, and persistent atrial fibrillation. With multiple medications to control symptoms and treat the conditions, he was a poster child for polypharmacy. He was admitted to a hospital while having a heart attack. The surgeon opened the artery, more medications were added, and he was released. On his follow-up, he was not feeling well, weak, and had periods of brain fog. He was referred for cardiac rehabilitation.

At some point, he decided that he wanted to reduce his medications. Together with a wellness center and under the supervision of his physicians, he changed his diet; on Saturday, I’ll tell you what happened over the next six months.

The Kids Top Health Issues webinar on January 26 still has openings. Every day, more scary headlines cast doubt on science and health practices. For example, will fluoride really impact a child’s IQ? Those questions and more will be covered in this webinar. Reserve your spot today.

What are you prepared to do today?

        Dr. Chet

Reference: BMJ Case Rep 2018;11:e227059.2. Arch

Let’s Improve Kids’ Health

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I’m kicking off the New Year with a webinar about children, Kids’ Top Health Issues. Specifically, I’ll cover the top three questions that I get all the time about kids: digestive issues, especially constipation; attention deficit hyperactivity disorder; and autism. If you have children who face these issues or even if, like a teacher or grandparent, you just want to better understand these conditions, sign up for this webinar today; space will be limited for the live event.

The webinar will cover the following:

            Defining each condition and giving some background information

            Examining the latest research on the potential causes

            Exploring the best dietary approach for each condition

            Reviewing some natural approaches that may help

The webinar will be presented so that people with no scientific background can understand each condition and what may help from a nutritional and exercise perspective. Whether you have a child with these conditions or not, you’ll learn something that will be helpful.

The Kids’ Top Health Issues webinar will be held on Sunday, January 26 at 4 p.m. Eastern Time. Admission is $14.95; if you can’t attend the live presentation, the replay of the webinar will be available. It is certainly appropriate for kids to watch if they want, and I will leave time to answer questions at the end of the live presentation.

What are you prepared to do today?

        Dr. Chet

We’re Back for Another Year!

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I hope you had a happy holiday season and a great start to the New Year. I’ve got plenty of great things planned for 2025 designed to help you get and stay healthy, and I’m going to start by reinforcing the Memo I sent a week ago in a slightly different way.

About 60 years ago, a new wellness movement was just beginning. I read an article about it and was fascinated. It was written by the then director of the Department of Vital Statistics in 1959, and while the article is several pages long, it was summarized in a chart.

Here’s the main idea. Traditional wellness relies on people taking care of themselves through diet, exercise, stress management, etc., if the environment allows it. Traditional medicine relies on treating disease through medications and surgeries. They are not opposites; optimal health requires both approaches, not the exclusion of one over the other. The key is that they both must be based on science.

The Department of Vital Statistics is now part of the Department of Health and Human Services. Whoever becomes the head of that department must understand that the wellness of the nation depends on continuing health and medical research; there can be no pauses or time outs. That person must also understand that wellness includes both approaches; we need to know more about personal health and the necessary healthy habits, but we also need continued research in medical approaches to treat disease. They are both critical to the health of our nation.

For your part? Your wellness begins with making healthy diet, exercise, and supplementation a part of your healthy habits, in addition to seeing your medical professionals on schedule. It all begins with one question:

What are you prepared to do today?

        Dr. Chet

Reference: Am J Public Health. 1959 Jun;49(6):786–792. doi: 10.2105/ajph.49.6.786

Happy New Year!

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The beginning of a new year! Even though calendars are man-made, the new year signals a time for new goals to be accomplished in the next 365 days. I’m sure that health goals are included in those goals. Getting fitter, getting leaner, adding muscle, improving balance and flexibility, and addressing digestive issues, but that’s not all. Lowering blood pressure and cholesterol and getting a solution for chronic joint pain. Addressing dental health to improve chewing­—so important for getting adequate nutrition. Don’t forget vision when glasses aren’t enough.

Some solutions can be found in diet, nutrition, exercise, and supplements, but they can’t solve every issue. Medications and surgery may also be required, because they can be a part of health as well. They are not competitors; they can complement one another.

As I see it, we all can do better on our end to optimize our health, and healthcare professionals certainly have room for improving how they treat patients. I’ll do my part by giving you the tried-and-true methods as well as the latest science so you can reach every health goal you set.

Happy New Year! Let’s make this the year you achieve your health goals. Together we can do it.

What are you prepared to do today?

        Dr. Chet

Merry Christmas!

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Paula, Riley, and I visited Meijer Gardens to see all the beautiful Christmas trees from around the world, but this giant poinsettia tree made the biggest impression.

We all hope you have a wonderful holiday season!

        Dr. Chet

You’ve Got Another Chance

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Did you assess your time spent investing in your health as I outlined in Tuesday’s Memo, counting up the time per day, week, or month you spend in the activities that will benefit your long-term health? How did you do? Did you think of more than the short list I provided? Did you come away disappointed with your efforts? I know that I did in some areas.

Life is giving you another chance—in fact, it’s giving you more than one. As long as you draw breath, you can always start. You don’t even have to wait until the new year; pick one thing and begin working on it today. Then, when that change becomes a habit, start on another one. You don’t have to begin everything all at once; in fact, it’s better if you try one change at a time and see how that works before adding more.

If you fail, start again. As Seth Godin said in a recent post, everyone needs more chances. But whether this is the time you actually lose the weight, lower your HbA1c, add that muscle, or whatever is important to your long-term health, taking that next chance is determined by only one thing:

What are you going to do with that chance this time?

It doesn’t matter what you haven’t done—you need to succeed only once at changing a poor health habit into a good one that you will maintain. Take that chance and do something with it this time. Next year, we all could be having completely different conversations. So, really:

What are you prepared to do today?

        Dr. Chet