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Brain Fact: Morning light and it’s positive effects on mood disorders and ADHD · Do You F*cking Mind?

• 0:16
  Speaker 1: Brain Fact of today, and the brain fact is all
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  Speaker 1: about sunlight as a protective factor against depression, other mood disorders,
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  Speaker 1: and also ADHD.
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  Speaker 2: And why it's so important.
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  Speaker 1: So I want to start with saying that light affects
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  Speaker 1: everything in the brain. And I'm not just talking about sunlight,
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  Speaker 1: although that's what the focus of the talk is today,
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  Speaker 1: but all kinds of light, you know, artificial light, blue light,
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  Speaker 1: red light, all different wavelengths. Light affects everything, and that
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  Speaker 1: is because it is linked to sleep and brain function
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  Speaker 1: in general. It helps set off the release of neurochemicals
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  Speaker 1: at different times depending on what time of the day
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  Speaker 1: it is, and the time of the day is really
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  Speaker 1: important for your system to work properly, for you to
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  Speaker 1: feel alert when you're supposed to be feeling alert, and
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  Speaker 1: for you to feel like you can wind down when
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  Speaker 1: you're supposed to be, you know, getting ready to go
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  Speaker 1: to sleep and falling asleep, and all these feelings are
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  Speaker 1: due to chemicals and light impacts the release of chemicals. Sleepiness, motivation, alertness,
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  Speaker 1: your overall drive. All of that is due to chemicals,
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  Speaker 1: and the time of day heavily influences the release of
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  Speaker 1: chemicals and what determines the time of day, the light
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  Speaker 1: that enters your brain. Okay, so first thing in the morning,
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  Speaker 1: you should be getting sunlight. You want to be getting
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  Speaker 1: up and getting outside for a couple of minutes. You
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  Speaker 1: don't have to be there for ages, it's literally just
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  Speaker 1: a couple of minutes. So as soon as you get
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  Speaker 1: up and if the sun's not up yet, then the
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  Speaker 1: moment the sun does come up, you want to be
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  Speaker 1: getting some light into your eyes, and this is what's
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  Speaker 1: going to set off this whole series of events in
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  Speaker 1: your brain to make you feel alert. This is when
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  Speaker 1: the production of cortisol, where healthy production of cortisol is
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  Speaker 1: at its highest. And when we talk about cortisol production,
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  Speaker 1: i'm talking about when your body is naturally releasing amounts
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  Speaker 1: of cortisol throughout the day.
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  Speaker 2: The morning is when it's going to be at its highest.
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  Speaker 1: Now, of course, i'm not talking about times where you're
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  Speaker 1: in a very very very highly stressed situation like fight
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  Speaker 1: or flight, where of course you're going to get a
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  Speaker 1: massive spike of cortisol as well. But in general, the
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  Speaker 1: morning is when you want cortisol to be at its highest,
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  Speaker 1: and morning light also affects the release of dopamine. So
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  Speaker 1: this is the chemical that's involved in motivation. It's the
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  Speaker 1: chemical that's involved in your willingness to do something, that
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  Speaker 1: feeling of anticipation and then following through with the action.
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  Speaker 2: And it's also linked to addiction.
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  Speaker 1: But it's very necessary for your motivation and your drive
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  Speaker 1: in general. When it comes to neurochemicals, it's not this
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  Speaker 1: idea of these are bad neurochemicals and these are good neurochemicals.
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  Speaker 2: You need all the neurochemicals.
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  Speaker 1: In your brain, just at different times and at different amounts.
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  Speaker 1: But all neurochemicals play a very important role. If you
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  Speaker 1: didn't have cortisol, you'd be dead right. If you didn't
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  Speaker 1: have open at the right amounts when you needed it,
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  Speaker 1: you would have you know, among other things that that
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  Speaker 1: are not linked to mood, like movement and stuff, but
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  Speaker 1: you would have no drive or no motivation or no
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  Speaker 1: willingness to do something. So you need neurochemicals at the
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  Speaker 1: right levels at different.
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  Speaker 2: Times in the day.
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  Speaker 1: Now there's this whole trend also that I'm hearing about,
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  Speaker 1: this low dopamine morning trend. I'm actually going to do
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  Speaker 1: a whole episode coming very soon about the whole low
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  Speaker 1: dopamin morning trend and what I agree about it and
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  Speaker 1: what I don't agree about I agree with about it.
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  Speaker 2: But basically what you want to look at is.
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  Speaker 1: That there's no good or bad neurotransmitters. It's all about
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  Speaker 1: when is a good time for it to be released?
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  Speaker 1: When is it not a good time for it to
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  Speaker 1: be released. But it's much more beneficial for your state
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  Speaker 1: and your mood to have the high releases of cortisol
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  Speaker 1: and dopamine in the morning when your body needs it,
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  Speaker 1: when you can utilize it, then at bedtime when it's
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  Speaker 1: likely going to interfere with your melotone and release when
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  Speaker 1: you're trying to wind down and fall asleep and therefore
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  Speaker 1: affecting your sleep quality, which then affects the overall function
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  Speaker 1: of your brain and your alertness the following day. So
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  Speaker 1: it's this vicious cycle that you get into. Interestingly, studies
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  Speaker 1: have found links between lower prevalence of ADHD in areas
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  Speaker 1: where there's greater solar intensity versus other areas, and this
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  Speaker 1: is found in a whole bunch of countries like the US, Spain, France, Lebanon, Mexico, Belgium,
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  Speaker 1: And a study was done on eleven thousand people, which
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  Speaker 1: controlled for confounding variable. So what is a confounding variable.
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  Speaker 1: It's a third variable which can or does influence both
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  Speaker 1: the independent variable and the dependent variable. So in this case,
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  Speaker 1: the confounding variables that were controlled for was low socioeconomic.
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  Speaker 2: Status, healthcare access, race.
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  Speaker 1: And ethnicity, and a whole bunch of other things. And
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  Speaker 1: it basically found that the greater the amount of the
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  Speaker 1: sun intensity, the lower the prevalence of ADHD. Now it's
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  Speaker 1: not to say that it's causal, so it's not saying
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  Speaker 1: that low light causes ADHD. It doesn't say that at all,
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  Speaker 1: but it's saying that light exposure from the sun in
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  Speaker 1: general is likely to be a protective factor or a
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  Speaker 1: managing factor for adults with ADHD. And this has a
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  Speaker 1: lot to do with a cicadian rhythm. In eighty percent
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  Speaker 1: of adults with ADHD, the cicadian rhythm is disrupted. So
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  Speaker 1: one of the best ways of helping maintain a healthy
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  Speaker 1: circadian rhythm and sleepwork cycle is exposure to sunlight, especially
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  Speaker 1: first things in the morning when you wake up, and
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  Speaker 1: being in a dark room or being in a dark home,
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  Speaker 1: not going outside in the morning, or they're not being
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  Speaker 1: enough sunlight, it's not going to be helpful to kick
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  Speaker 1: start that circadian rhythm for the day, and therefore it's
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  Speaker 1: going to be even less helpful if you suffer from
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  Speaker 1: disrupted or disturbed circadian rhythms, such as in many adult
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  Speaker 1: cases of ADHD.
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  Speaker 2: So for people that have low moods.
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  Speaker 1: Struggle to fall asleep and who have ADHD, having this
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  Speaker 1: proper light dark cycle and a really good morning routine,
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  Speaker 1: people with these mood disorders at ADHD might find that
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  Speaker 1: that is soon super helpful in managing these things. Light
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  Speaker 1: in the morning and low light or no light.
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  Speaker 2: Ideally at nighttime.
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  Speaker 1: Now, when it comes to sleep time, it's super important
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  Speaker 1: to avoid bright lights in general. Okay, so yes, blue lights,
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  Speaker 1: but it's actually all lights in general, and.
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  Speaker 2: It's and that's more so in the evening.
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  Speaker 1: So when we talk about different wavelengths of light, blue
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  Speaker 1: light exposure, red light exposure, yes, okay, blue light is
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  Speaker 1: going to be keeping you more alert, and red light
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  Speaker 1: not as much.
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  Speaker 2: Or the wavelength of red light.
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  Speaker 1: But when we talk about falling asleep and going to bed,
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  Speaker 1: the less light the better. So you could have all
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  Speaker 1: the red light in the world, but if you're constantly
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  Speaker 1: being exposed to light light light, light light, and it's
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  Speaker 1: red light, it's still going to be affecting your circadian rhythm.
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  Speaker 1: So the less light in the evening the better. And
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  Speaker 1: also with blue light, blue light's great in the morning,
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  Speaker 1: so you don't want to be blocking out and using
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  Speaker 1: blue light blockers all day long. Light in the morning, tick,
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  Speaker 1: light at nighttime cross. Okay, that's kind of how you
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  Speaker 1: want to look at it. If you want to then
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  Speaker 1: get technical on the wavelengths, you can, but that's kind
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  Speaker 1: of the general rule of you want to imagine the
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  Speaker 1: circadian rhythm is kind of like back in the day,
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  Speaker 1: how our ancestors were. You know, when it's nighttime, you're
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  Speaker 1: not exposing yourself to light because there is none, and
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  Speaker 1: when it's daytime, you are exposing yourself.
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  Speaker 2: To light because you're outside in the light.
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  Speaker 1: Okay, that's kind of really the bare bones basics of it.
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  Speaker 1: So bright lights at night will still be stuffing up
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  Speaker 1: the dopermin release. Okay, it doesn't matter what wavelength of
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  Speaker 1: that light. So you want to think about avoiding bright
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  Speaker 1: lights in general.
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  Speaker 2: And if you're someone.
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  Speaker 1: Who feels super unmotivated or flat or sad or can't
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  Speaker 1: you get anything done in the mornings. It's really important
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  Speaker 1: to pay attention to what kind of light cycle you're
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  Speaker 1: exposed to, What lights are you getting at night, and
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  Speaker 1: at what time. If you sleep regular hours, as in
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  Speaker 1: you're not a night shift worker, then you want to
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  Speaker 1: be making sure that you're not exposed to bright lights
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  Speaker 1: or screens of any kind after eleven if possible, definitely
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  Speaker 1: not from midnight onwards. So if you struggle to get
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  Speaker 1: out of bed, chances are that you might be screwing
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  Speaker 1: up with your dopamine release in the mornings because you're
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  Speaker 1: not able to fall asleep at night. So it's this
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  Speaker 1: whole cycle. It's not like, oh, once you go to bed,
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  Speaker 1: it starts over from scratch again. No, your light exposure
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  Speaker 1: at nighttime is actually affecting how you're gonna wake up
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  Speaker 1: the next morning. And then if you're not getting adequate
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  Speaker 1: light exposure in the morning, it's going to be affecting
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  Speaker 1: the neurochemical release throughout the day, which then affects how
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  Speaker 1: you fall asleep. So notice how all these things will
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  Speaker 1: play into your moods and how your brain performs in general.
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  Speaker 2: Okay, so the main thing.
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  Speaker 1: You want to think about is low light or no
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  Speaker 1: light at nighttime, no screens, none of that, especially in
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  Speaker 1: the hours leading up to falling asleep. I did even
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  Speaker 1: and if you're struggling with that in the hour before
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  Speaker 1: you fall asleep, put on an audiobook or a podcast
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  Speaker 1: or something where there's no light coming in, no light
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  Speaker 1: full stop, okay. And in the morning, you get up
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  Speaker 1: and you go outside and you expose yourself to light
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  Speaker 1: if you can. Ideally you want to couple that, if possible,
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  Speaker 1: with exercise, even if it's just ten minutes of movement, okay,
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  Speaker 1: moving your body. That's going to help increase that release
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  Speaker 1: of cortisol and dopamine when you wake up in the morning.
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  Speaker 1: So you're, you know, enhancing that release of the chemicals
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  Speaker 1: that you want released in the morning when you want
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  Speaker 1: to be at your most alerte at you're most driven,
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  Speaker 1: and then that's going to help set yourself up for
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  Speaker 1: the day. So yeah, that is the brain factor of today,
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  Speaker 1: and talking about why it is that low lights and
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  Speaker 1: bright lights, depending on the time of the day, can
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  Speaker 1: affect your mood because of the release of the chemicals.
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  Speaker 2: Hope you enjoyed that