Why Women's Brain Health Is at Risk in Midlife (and What You Can Do Now) with Emma Heming-Willis & Helen Christoni

If you are somewhere in your 40s, 50s, 60s, or beyond, and you felt like your body is changing, your brain is foggy, your moods are all over the place, here's what I want you to know. You are not alone. So many of us experience this as we move into our post-menopausal years. So for starters, you're not broken. Just keep in mind that because you're going through a transformation. And like any phenomenal transformation, it's really important to have a guide, not guesswork. So this is why I created what I call my Reset Academy. It's a really cool group of online women from all over the world, where we come together to learn how to fast for hormones, how to eat for our brain, how to understand the behavioral changes that are going on with us and to really give women an opportunity to feel at home in both their bodies and their brains again. In the Reset Academy, we do many live calls. We do lots of challenges together. We have monthly programs and you have an incredible community that is built not only from me and my team of coaches, but from women who have been in the Academy for years that have read my books, done my videos, listened to my podcast, and are working on making themselves the best version they can possibly be. So if you're looking for that community support, if you're wanting to lean into more knowledge, get off of the socials and into a really cool live community, come join me inside my Reset Academy. You can go to resetacademy.drmindypels.com and find all the ways you can sign up there. I will tell you my absolute favorite thing we do in this community are the Saturday morning coffee chats, where two Saturdays a month, you will find me not only working out with you all, but leading you through whatever's burning on my heart and opening up community discussion around how as women we can use our menopausal experience to come together and how we can use it to not only better ourselves but better everyone around us. So excited to see you inside my Reset Academy. on this episode of the resetter podcast i am bringing you emma willis and helen cristoni now i hope you are aware of what emma has been up to because she has written a book called the unexpected journey and it's about her journey with her husband bruce willis uh through the experience of dementia. And she and Helen are on a mission to get the word out that your brain matters. And specifically, they have dialed in now to helping women. They have a beautiful organization called Make Time Wellness, which is giving women the tools to take back their brains and to put their brains as a health priority. So what I love about this conversation that I think you all will be moved by is that they have come up with a very simple way of looking at our lifestyle to support our brain, not only in disease prevention, but in functioning the way we want it to function right now. Because let's be honest, as we go through menopause, there's the brain fog and the irritability and the trouble focusing. And we can blame that on the loss of estrogen, if that's where you're at, or we cannot be a victim to that experience and realize that there are some simple things we can do to keep our brain working at its best. And what Emma and Helen bring forward that I really like is they kept it simple. You'll hear Emma say this a lot. And they give us five tools, five things that we can do on a regular basis. They are all free and they are all easy to do. They line up with many of the things I've been teaching women over the years. And I think there are really important to prioritize. So I'm excited that the front half of this conversation is really built around what dementia is, how it differs or doesn't differ. You'll hear this in a moment from Alzheimer's. What are the five things we can do to support better brain health? And then the back half of the conversation, we went into caregiving. And what's really what I wanted to bring forward is when I look at the demographics of my audience, a lot of you are dealing with aging parents like me. And caregiving can be one of the more draining experiences that we go through. And if you know Emma's story, her level of caregiving has been extreme. And so at the back half of the conversation, She really talks about what she does to take care of herself so that she can turn around and take care of not only Bruce, but her children. She still has young children. And it's just a beautiful, heartfelt conversation about women prioritizing themselves, women supporting each other, and us all stepping into a new conversation around women's health where we are empowered. We are not victims. we can choose to live a life that supports a better brain. And it's a really beautiful conversation. I'm really excited to bring it to you all. So here you go, Emma and Helen. And please go get her book, The Unexpected Journey. It is so moving and easy to read. And you're going to love it. And we're leaving codes in the notes, just so you know. If you're interested in their company called Make Time Wellness, they have some really cool resources there. So we'll leave codes and notes for you on that. But most of all, as I always say, don't give up on yourself. And conversations like this will help you see just how powerful you are. well Emma and Helen I just want to say I am so looking forward to this conversation because I have watched the fear around dementia just start to permeate my audience and as I mentioned in the pre-interview about a year ago I started doing videos on my YouTube channel about what women could do to prevent dementia. And I had no idea that they would become the most popular videos on my on my channel, and that there was such a need for information. So I just want to say welcome. Thank you for your book. And I'm so excited to have this conversation. Thank you for having us. We're we're excited to talk to women about their brains, because no one is talking to us about it. Yeah, that's why we're here. Thank you so much. Excellent. Yeah, yeah. So I think the best place to start when I opened up your book and I started reading it, I was shocked at how complicated it was to even diagnose dementia. So can we start off and just explain what dementia is? I know there's a bazillion different types, but what exactly is it and what are some of the early signs of it, I think would be the most helpful to start with? Yeah, so dementia is kind of like this one big term, right? And underneath dementia sits all different types of diagnoses of dementia, which could be Alzheimer's, FTD, Lewy body. You know, what I've learned in the process of, you know, going through my husband's FTD and learning more about dementia is that there are 120 different forms, which is crazy. So, you know, it can be the loss of ability, you know, to function in everyday life, to be able to organize our thoughts, you know, how we are just moving in the world. There is all these different, there is just, you know, dementia isn't just about being forgetful. it comes in all different shapes and sizes, which is so important to be talking about dementia, raising awareness about it, not talking about it in hushed tones anymore, because that's not helpful. We want people to get diagnosed earlier so that they can get the support that they need for their loved one and for themselves as they become a caregiver. So dementia and Alzheimer's gets thrown around like they're the same term. And especially for women. Yeah. Can you explain the difference? Because it's almost like the fear I see in women is, well, I don't know if I don't want to get dementia or Alzheimer's. Do I have it? Like there's, it's so such a mystery, the label of the term. Yeah. I mean, I think, you know, when we were really learning about brain health, we learned that one in five women are at risk for getting Alzheimer's and Alzheimer's is really associated with like losing your memory and that type of thing. But, you know, further than that, one in three women are at risk for some sort of like neurodegenerative issue. So I think that and that kind of like pushes into that dementia thing, which can affect your body, your ability to move, you know, your mood and just your overall demeanor. And so like Emma was saying, there's so many different types. And and when we started learning about this, we felt it's so important to really start talking to women about their brain health because it's when you go look at kind of like the brain health aisle, everything is very directed towards men. And when we started having this conversation, we felt very, very strongly that we should start really educating and just having a real easy conversation with women about dementia and Alzheimer's. Because our brain also does so much more than just hold memory, right? And I think that's where the confusion starts because Alzheimer's is the most common form of dementia. Again, like I said, there's 120 other different types and our brain does more than hold memory. It, you know, keeps us functioning in the world and showing up and, you know, being able to move and all the things. So where it's the most common, it's just still, still important to talk about women and their brain and how we can support. So is Alzheimer's then would be one of the 120 versions of dementia? That's right. Okay. You've got dementia, then under that umbrella sits all the different forms of dementia. And when you put these 120 together, are women more susceptible than men to dementia? Yeah, one out of every five women are at risk for Alzheimer's, and that's compared to one out of every 10 men. So women are at twice at risk for Alzheimer's. I don't know the stat for neurogenitor decline, but I know that the Alzheimer's stat is one in five compared to one in 10, which we found super staggering when we learned that statistic. And no one's really talking about it. No. And also, you know, when you think about one in eight women will get breast cancer. So, you know, we do so much for breast cancer awareness, which is so important. You know, I have family members that were affected, you know, by breast cancer, too. And early diagnosis is so important. But it's also important to talk to women about their brains if we are at a higher risk. You know, one in five is staggering. So what is it about the female brain that makes it more susceptible to dementia? I think it's so much having to do with hormones. You know, I mean, we have so many times in our lives when, you know, starting at puberty where, you know, our hormones are fluctuating. And then again, when we have children, then again, when we're going through perimenopause and menopause and estrogen and that estrogen decline is such a tricky time in women's life where, you know, estrogen is very tied into a woman's brain health. And I think that, you know, everyone, there's a misconception that it's an older women, you know, disease when this is really, we really need to start thinking about it as early as possible, but especially in midlife. What's the average onset age? Well, I mean, what was interesting to us was that we learned that you start losing your short-term memory by the age of 35. Is that right, Helen? Yeah, that is right. And right now, you actually start having degeneration kind of 20 years before the actual Alzheimer's or issue comes up. And so the damage is happening. Like for me right now, I'm 55. The damage is happening right now and it might show itself. Well, hopefully not because we're doing so much preventative stuff. But, you know, it'll show up 20 years later. Yeah. And and is estrogen, the decline of estrogen, the catalyst or is there a bigger picture here? I mean, I think there's many there's many things that contribute. There's environmental factors, you know, the toxic burden that we're all under our nutrition. and, you know, there's a lot of things that we need to do to be taking good care of our brains. And so I think that estrogens plays just one role in it. I mean, Dr. Mindy, with your research that you're doing with your new book that's coming out, I mean, what are you seeing that might be new or different? Yeah, I would love to share that. I had a really revolutionary interview with Lisa Moscone a couple of years ago when she put the menopause brain out. And one of the things we talked about is how the female brain, as it moves through menopause, becomes less sensitive to glucose and becomes more sensitive to ketones. So from that vantage point, I started to look at different fuel sources. And, you know, estrogen keeps us insulin sensitive. And when estrogen goes down, we don't just get menopausal belly weight. Our brain literally doesn't know how to use glucose as well. And so Lisa and I discussed, I said, well, we have this whole other fuel source. It's called a ketone. You don't have to go on a ketogenic diet. You could just put an intermittent fast every single morning. Again, curious what you think of this and get yourself a little dose of ketones. And ketones are neuroprotective. So they can protect you from those toxins. And they're a better fuel source for the mitochondria in the neurons of the brain. So in my community, I've seen women who are 48 that have tremendous brain fog, that have poor memory, and we just teach them how to get off the ultra processed foods so they're not spiking these high glucose levels and to just tack on a 13 to 15 hour fast every day. And so they're getting a dose of ketones. And I am not joking within like three days, four days, you see a woman's brain come back online. So, yeah. So so like I feel like that's that needs to be part of the conversation because it's it's an inability of the brain to use the fuel source. it's used for years and years and years. It's like you became a hybrid car. And now you got to learn how to tap into the electrical system. Well, the thing is, is like our doctors aren't speaking to us about this. Yeah, you are. Yeah, thank you. Yeah, you're you're educating us. And I mean, this was this was one of the issues that I had in when I was in my 40s going into my doctor saying I am experiencing brain fog. I don't know what is going on. Like, I am not firing in all cylinders. and I was dismissed over and over again saying, you know, you're stressed, you're not getting enough sleep. Don't worry, it's mommy brain, you know, and I left that office just thinking, okay, and then realizing that no, like this does not feel right. And I sought after a brain health doctor to, you know, walk me through and make me understand what brain health is and what that looks like. I had never heard of it before. And I'm pretty up to speed on wellness, I thought. But brain health was a new term for me. And, you know, he introduced me to the pillars of brain health and also put me on, you know, a handful of vitamins that I was taking multiple times a day. And I remember turning to Helen saying, you know, I am seeing a difference. The fog is lifting. I'm feeling great but I cannot sustain taking all of these vitamins multiple times a day so what I had said to her was like can we do something where we can just like combine all this stuff and put it into a drink or a gummy or something that is easy and that how we launched make time wellness actually and Helen was like yeah let do it Let go I mean there so many people like taking superfoods. And, you know, there's all these different things that she could do, but no one was really like thinking about women and putting this all in one kind of comprehensive solution. And, you know, it was during COVID and Emma was like taking all these supplements. And it's just not sustainable for women to continue to take that many pills. I mean, you have to be a certain, you know, a certain type of person to be able to sustain that. And so we created Make Time Wellness. We really went out and we kind of identified what Emma was taking and put it all into a drink that kind of checks all the boxes for women. And so we have Cognizant, which is acetylcholine in it that's been clinically studied on women to really support focus attention brain health overall a multivitamin just by taking a multivitamin every day women can like starve off it's very great for our brains mct oil curcumin which we really can't talk about it but we all know what it's traditionally used for you know it's to reduce inflammation that's our core ingredient and So we really cherry picked this kind of all these, you know, ingredients to support women and put it in an easy drink because we're like we want it to be the easy conversation. And, you know, because so many people like me, I'm like, OK, I need to take glutathione and I need to take this. And what does it even mean? So at Make Time, we really wanted to start having a very simple conversation and reach all women. and also dig into the pillars of brain health. So a really big part of what we do and why we call it making time is so we can encourage women to really incorporate the pillars of brain health in their day to day. Yeah, I have a lot of thoughts on that one because in this book, I looked at four different people. I looked at the anthropological explanation for menopause and it's something called the grandmother hypothesis. And I interviewed Kristen Hawks, who's an anthropologist that talks about how back in the primal days, women, when their period stopped, they were actually moved to a place of leadership within the tribe. And they had a whole new job. So the brain rewires itself to be able to meet that job. Then I extensively looked at Lisa Moscone's work where she talks about there's three major times in a woman's life that the brain prunes itself again in order to make room for the next moment. And then I even looked at a feminist psychologist. I don't know if you know Carol Gilligan, but she talks a lot about how when a girl goes into puberty, this was back in the 1980s, which was my teenage years, that the culture teaches girls that you're worthy if you're selfless. And then I looked at Clarissa Pinkola Estes' work on what the mystical explanation of that transition through menopause is. And I really took a complete look and realized that there's, yes, we have the nutrient issue. And that's a big one we'll come back to here in a moment. But we also have a culture that doesn't understand the plight of a woman and definitely doesn't understand the menopausal plight of a woman. so I just want to say I love what you're up to because it's almost like women are feeling victim to the menopausal experience right now and the answer that they're getting is just put a patch on and you'll be fine and I keep scratching underneath that and saying we need to look at hemoglobin a1c what's what's your metabolic system like we need I love that you're talking about toxins we live in the most toxic time in human history. I did so much detoxing in my heavy metal detoxing in my clinic. And so I think it's very multifactorial. But the point I want to make is that women and I love what you're doing with this supplement. What I'm seeing is women are like, really? Now I got to I got to count my protein, I got to lift weights, I got to take 18 bottles of supplements. I've got to get off my phone. I can't drink like the list of what you need to do as you go through this process has, I think, buried women in the conversation. It's overwhelming. When I hear all of that, I don't want to do any of it. Right. Yeah. You're like, I just want to live my life. But you know, what we know is that the pillars are actually quite enjoyable. You know, So that's what that's what I've learned, you know, to prioritize sleep, nutrition, you know, supplementation, connection, social connection. So important, you know, and we can implement them at any point at any time. So that is sort of where I focus is what are the pillars? They're simple. They talk to me. I know I can exercise. I know how important it is to stay connected and not to isolate like many of us caregivers do and just move in that way. And that feels good to me. That is manageable to me. If I have to think about all of the other extra, the protein and the this and that, which, of course, is important, I become overwhelmed. Yep, yep, yep. So walk us through the pillars because you're offering something really new in brain health with that kind of simple approach. Yeah, I mean, sleep, right? We know how important it is to sleep and get, you know, eight to nine hours of sleep, which just seems wild to me. But what if you can't sleep? Like a lot of women can't sleep. Yeah, I mean, I think like sleep hygiene and talking about sleep hygiene, that's really important. And that's something that we do at Make Time is really give women actionable tools on, you know, if they're having trouble sleeping, you know, some things that they can do to help them. And it doesn't have to be really complicated, like go see a sleep therapist and, you know, all the things that people are out there, you know, soapboxing on, it's really like, you know, shut your phone down, make yourself a ritual and make going to bed something that's important in your day and not something that you just kind of like fall into because those sleep hours are so important. And, and it's something that we really have to think about. I'm a horrible sleeper. I have something called like sleep procrastination. Like I'm so busy all the time. Like when I get into bed, I don't want to go to sleep. I want to do all the things I didn't have time to do during the day. And I really have to work hard on it. So we share those tips with women and really make sure you're, you know, disconnecting from screens, making your room environment, something that's conducive to sleep and, and prioritizing it. Because if you're not sleeping, right, you are going to have brain fog. You are not going to be able to think clearly, you are going to forget things. And so sleep is super crucial. And most women just don't understand that. But you're, and you're also detoxing your brain in the middle of the night, you know, it is so important for us to be throwing out the trash of the day to wake up feeling refreshed and cleansed. This is very important for our brain health. Yeah, I remember I'm 56. And I remember when I was like in my late 40s, I hit a moment where I'm like, God, going to sleep is like a full event. Like the room has to be cold. I switched all the light bulbs out to red light bulbs. Without my family knowing they're all of a sudden like, why is every light I turn on here a red light? And then I had a weighted blanket, I had a mask. I'm like, oh my God, I used to just crawl in bed. Now I've got like a whole uniform. Yeah. I mean, we do what we need to do. I'm quite similar to that. I try and disconnect before I go to bed. I do read. I think reading really sort of helps me get me into a zone. I have this mattress sort of cooler, which helps me a lot. I've got my aura ring, so I'm tracking my sleep. So, you know, I've got all the things, but I know for me, it is one of the most important things that I work on when it comes to my brain health because it is the hardest for me. And it's important. Yeah. And another pillar is really managing your stress levels, you know, and because if you're not, then sleeping is going to become really difficult. So when you start learning that they're all connected, you know, and everything kind of works together, that's, I think, what's really important. And because if you're not managing your stress and making time for yourself and listening to your brain, like if you have too much going on, that's your brain telling you like you need to take your foot off the gas pedal and start listening to what's happening in your head. Because we're beautiful creatures like our bodies will tell us and make time has I mean, we call the brand make time because self-care has gotten so overused. It's become a beauty term. We really don't like that term. Women aren't making time for themselves. And by doing just simple things like prioritizing sleep, acknowledging that you're stressed and you need to kind of take a step back and do some things for yourself, whether it's take a break, go for a walk, you know, call a friend, whatever that means to you is so super important. What do you think about the burden that women are under right now to, you know, overperform in life? Like, you know, I used to have a picture of Rosie the Riveter in my kitchen and I was a working mom. And I remember one day coming home from work and looking at Rosie and going, I think you had it wrong. I don't think we can do it all. And you mix that with the culture of plotting women for working, being super moms. And then you got to stay a certain size and you got to keep up with, you know, your kids schedule at school. And is it possible that we're overburdened with have tos, which is causing us our brains to keep spiraling when we get into bed? A hundred percent. I mean, I think, you know, I grew up in a single parent household. My mother was working three jobs to keep us afloat. I saw what it looked like to you get on with it. You do what you have to do. You don't ask for help. You don't ask for support, you suck it up, you get out there. That was what I saw. So, you know, coming into this world now as a woman, that is the, you know, what I have subscribed to. And now moving into this caregiving role, you know, realizing that, you know, I didn't know that I could ask for help. I didn't know I was allowed to. And if I asked for help, I was I thought I was failing myself, my husband, my family. So I think as women in society, we really need to sort of unburden ourselves from all that we have. All we set ourselves up so high, but we will fail, you know, and I realized that that was sort of my rude awakening was becoming a caregiver and burning the candle at both ends. And I needed my husband's neurologist to give me permission to ask for help. You know, I didn't know that I was allowed to. So I was very grateful for her who said, like, you it's time you can't you cannot set yourself up like this. And so, yeah, I think it's important for us to be talking to women and knowing that it's OK to slow down. It's OK to make time. And that is truly important for us to be able to sustain anything. Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's so well said. And I will tell you my experience working with women is there's so much of our worth is wrapped up in everything we do. So when we slow down, where's the worth juice coming from? Yeah, I mean, the world is moving so quickly, right? And you see it when you're on social and this person doing that and that. Oh, I got to get in there and I got to keep, you know, moving at this speed. That is it's too much. It's really too much. Yeah. Agreed. I mean, hence the make time movement. You know, I mean, that's a real big part of what we're doing is, you know, getting women to start talking about how we're making time, how we're kind of pushing back on that grind culture status quo. and also you know like it's okay there's seasonality you know like sometimes there's busy seasons sometimes there's not let's like let's make sure that we're working through all of them and making time to take care of ourselves if we're in a busy season and enjoying the slower seasons and so really talking about it and just having a dialogue I think it's okay and what what when somebody says to me you should stop stressing it actually stresses me out I'm like, I don't know how to do that. Yeah. So when you talk about stress management, can you give us a few examples of what we might do? I think it's really about, you know, when we talk about making time, it's really talking about the things that feed our soul. And that looks different for everyone. For me, it's about gardening. Like I love getting out in my garden. I'm not great at it. I kill these plants all the time, but then I go to the garden center and then I get the thing and I replant. But that for me, that is my meditation, being out in nature, my hands in the soil, you know, pruning, weeding, that for me helps de-stress me out in the sun. That, that, that is personally what, what helps me de-stress. And it's different for everyone. It could be meditation. It could be, you know, whatever it might be. So doing the things you love, not just sitting on the couch doing nothing, like prioritizing the things you absolutely love to do. Listen, if you want to sit on the couch and do nothing, you should do that. You know, I really think that we need to do some soul searching to really find out what what our hobbies are. Like, what are our hobbies? What are the things that we used to love when we didn't have the weight of the world on our shoulders? And really just tapping into the simplicity, just going back to something simple. And it does look different for for everyone. But that's why it's important we we talk about it. Yeah. One of the other pillars is movement and making sure that we keep moving. And I think for me, making time to move is so important. And it really is for everybody because it's really supporting our brain health. And I think, you know, you were talking about these societal pressures. There's a lot of pressures as it relates to movement, too. Like if you're not, you know, doing F45 and like, you know, stacking your like, you know, weight and getting gains, you're not out there doing what you're supposed to do. But it doesn't have to be that hard. Like just by walking, like everyone's like, oh, I need to get 10,000 steps. Just by walking 3,500 steps a day, you can reduce your chance of Alzheimer's by 25%. That's measurable. It's meaningful. And 3,500 steps is really doable. And so I think that just making sure that we're moving and what does that look like for you? It doesn't have to be what everybody else is doing on social media. It can be just taking around the walk, walk around the block, joining a mall walking club. You know, there are people all over the country that can be doing different things to really make sure they're taking care of their brain health. And I love that stat so much because I, you know, when you get that in your head of this, these 10,000 steps that we must do every single day, and you're like, I'm not doing the 10,000 steps. And then you feel like you're failing to hear that, you know what, it's not all or nothing. You know, there are some middle ground here, we need to give ourselves some grace. So I loved when, you know, Helen had told me about, you know, it's 3,500 steps you could do. I'm like, oh my god, that's doable. I can actually do that as opposed to just throwing my steps out the window completely. Yeah. One of my, um, one of the lenses I see everything through is the neurochemical lens. And when you go to walk, if you, if you go out into nature, nature brings cortisol levels down that right foot, left foot walking also calms the brain. If you go with a friend, you're now getting oxytocin. If you're out in the middle of the day without your sunglasses is on, your eyes will actually take the light and turn and it hits the serotonin receptor sites in our eyes and your eyes will make serotonin. If you go to new places, you bring in dopamine. Like all of a sudden I started looking at walking recently as this is the most amazing tool and everybody can do it. Yeah. I mean, what we talk about at Make Time is like, get out there with a friend, go take a walk, talk about your problems. And I mean, you are doing something that is so beneficial for your brain health And I know for me like when I take a walk even if it just a 10 minute walk the creativeness that sort of comes into my brain even though I trying to like not have those moments, I just want to just sort of be at peace. But it's really interesting to me, you know, like people sometimes get their best ideas in the shower for me. When I want to walk, you know, I just like it sort of opens up the creative flood, which is nice. Yeah. So you so you're saying, women, let's just move. You're not saying start lifting heavy weights. I mean, of course you can do that. But I just want to point out that a lot of women don't want to lift heavy weights, but they are willing to go walk with a with a friend. I think you have to do what works for you and not what works for other people. And so it's like if you love Pilates, or if you're a runner, if you just want to go for a walk, or if it's, you know, hiking, dancing, it could be any number of things that feed your soul. There's nothing worse than like setting an alarm to get up to do something you don't like to do. So I think like making sure you're enjoying what you're doing is key. And of course, women need to, you know, take their muscles into consideration as we get older. It's very important for our bone health and whatnot. But, but I think that as it relates to this discussion, it has to be you making time for things that really feed your soul. Like Emma I was saying is really key. Yeah. Great. Yeah. And not setting and not setting yourself up to fail. You know, we don't we don't want that. It's just really about getting out there and moving. And yes, of course, lifting weights is so important. You know, I do it as well. But we just want women to know that anything is better than nothing. Right. Right. It's so well said. Okay, what's the next pillar. Well, connection, you know, uh, connect connections, super important, especially today, because as we all know, we're losing connection because of social media, all of our screen times, and that's, this is not what connection looks like, you know? And so, um, making sure that you're connecting with people one-on-one talking about your problems, sharing, getting to know new people, staying in touch with people we love is very, very key. And there's such a big lack of that. And it's so important that we bring connection back. And so making sure that you're making time to connect is super important. And they say that isolation is a silent killer. And what they say, it's like it's like smoking 15 cigarettes a day. I mean, this is how important connection is. And And like Helen says, you know, we have lost it. We are so disconnected in our world today. And we feel like we're connected because we're looking at social media, but that is not meaningful connection. It is really about being amongst our friends, our family, our community, you know, getting on the phone, talking, walking and talking is really is very important. Connection is really important for our brain health. Did you find any research on if you connect in person compared to if you connect, you know, FaceTime on a phone or, you know, text connecting? Like, is there different levels of connection? Because sometimes I think that in person is there's just another level of neurochemical juice there. Yeah, I mean, I've definitely noticed that sort of in this world of caregiving advocacy, you know, being in person is really important. important. But it is very difficult for caregivers to be in person when they are at home solo with their person. So we need to find other other ways, other outlets. And yes, I think being together is is important, but also for a caregiver to be able to connect on a Zoom, you know, with a support group on a phone call. I mean, that is still really meaningful and very important. Yeah. What do you say? Like, I'm an extrovert. And I have some friends that are introverts. And we always compare notes because and I actually heard the other day that extroverts, they we get more energy, the more we connect throughout a day and introverts just get drained as the day goes on. So I don't want to leave the introverts out of this conversation, who are like, Oh, God, now I got to go see people. What do we do with them? You're speaking to one right here. So I'm a full introvert. Like after this conversation, I'm going to go crawl up in a ball. You can do that. Yeah. Yes, it is. It is hard to get out there sometimes to be able to connect and be amongst and really you have to I have to bring in the energy to be able to do that. But I know there is importance to it. I know how important it is for me, for my health to not isolate because I would love to actually, it's my default, but it's not healthy. It's really not healthy. And we need to learn as introverts to be able to come out of our cocoons a little bit. And it doesn't have to be big and huge. It can literally just be with one person. Yeah. I also think for extroverts, because I'm an extrovert also, it's really important we also mind our social batteries because so many people are drawing off our our social battery you know when you're an extrovert so people are coming to you for energy and you're that person you know and minding your own social battery is really important because you know even extroverts hit that point where they're like i am out of gas i mean that was me yesterday i had to like turn everything off i had to like power down i had to take a minute and now i'm ready to get back at it But, you know, listening to your own social battery and making time, that's your brain telling you if your social battery is low, you need to recharge it. And that's really like such the basis for this whole conversation we're having with women. It's just like cluing into these messages that your body's giving you. In my research, I discovered Shelley Taylor's work, and she found that women have more oxytocin receptor sites in their amygdala, the stress part of their brain. And so we actually can move to a different stress response called tend and be friend. And one of the things I noticed when studying estrogen is S when estrogen goes down, so does oxytocin. So it's almost like we have to go seek it and get it in deeper ways than ever before to be able to have it calm the stress response. It's and I don't know if you all have experienced this, but it's like superficial conversations. Just don't do it. Don't do it anymore. Yeah. I mean, I know I keep going back to this caregiving conversation because that is my people and who I am amongst. But I mean, I do find it so meaningful in a world that feels disconnected and discombobulated. There is something so beautiful connecting caregiver to caregiver. And for me, that is really deep and it is meaningful. um so yeah i couldn't i i i agree to that i want to talk about the caregiving in a moment too because a lot of my audience is caregiving for their elderly parents so um so we'll definitely come back to that um okay what's so that was four what did we have four things yeah and then we go sleep nutrition you know the mind diet mediterranean diet is really you know healthy fats um is i i find really what I've learned, you know, very, very good for for the brain. There's also, you know, a lot of really great, wonderful cookbooks out there, I think that have really helped me sort of be able to implement the mind diet into our, you know, on our menu at night with the kids, you know, we have two young, young daughters, so I'm teaching them about healthy eating, you know, mindful eating. But yeah, so you know, nutrition. and also you know watching your blood sugar i think it's really important because if you have swings in blood sugar you're going to have swings in your cognition and and we always we really need to be watching that and also pure water like making sure that we're not dehydrated that we're having enough electrolytes like our brains are made up of water and when you're dehydrated that alone can create brain fog and kind of like a drain on the brain, as I like to say it. So really making sure that you're eating some sort of blue zone diet and, you know, just keeping on top of your hydration and also watching sugar, like sugar is absolutely not good for us. Right. What's, have you found one food that, or a group of foods that you're like, you definitely like blueberries became the mental health, like, superhero of foods. Are there other foods that you're like, you definitely need to get this in on a regular basis? I think nuts and seeds have, you know, are important olive oil. I really like to go for salmons, you know, that sort of has those omegas in it. I also, you know, take a little bit of extra omegas just to make sure that I'm that I'm getting more in, you know, we have to be careful with our fish intake because of mercury and right you know it is such a hot mess out there but you know i think that um you just do what feels right and good and that you know feels you know supportive to your body yeah let's switch to caregiving um unless there's anything else you feel like is really important for women to know and i love the simplicity of your list by the way i keep it simple over here i think it's important so we don't lose people you know we don't want to lose people we want people to know that we can start looking after our brain at any age. And it is not it is not difficult. Yeah. And it can be fun. Right. Right. We're not trying to scare women. You know, we're not trying to do that. We want people to hear about the pillars and and what we do. And it's it's fun how we incorporate it into our lives and into our brand. Yeah. Health should be fun. Like, I don't know where we ever decided health was like arduous and required a whole lot of discipline. We need to rebrand that for sure. Too overwhelming. Yeah. So, okay, talk about caregiving. And I'll tell you my personal experience in the last three years. My dad is 89 and my mom is 86. And, yeah, I mean, their brains, their bodies. My mom falls. My mom has had four joint, two hips and a shoulder replacement. My dad has had two knee replacements. Like it's been a full time job. But I think the hardest thing has been watching their brain health decline. And I just want to share one thing. When I read your book, Emma, I, you know, my dad is got some strange behaviors. And so we got him to a neurologist, took six months to get there. Once we got there, he came out and he said, no, I don't have dementia. they just said that I have zero function of my frontal lobe. Wow. I was like, I think that's dementia. And I and I my sister and I sat and talked about why did they not want to give him a diagnosis. And then when I read your book, I was like, wait a second, there's something fishy that went down in this in this office with it with the neurologist. And what we see is same conversations. This, what we're seeing, we're just the same conversations. He'll ask the same thing over and over and over again. And it's easy to get frustrated and be like, dad, we just told you we're going to a restaurant in an hour. And he's like, oh, oh, okay. Like I'll give you an example. He had spinal surgery and literally in right before they're about to wheel him in, he turns to me and he says, what am I doing today? And I said, dad, do you remember they're doing spinal surgery on and he's like, Oh, and he goes, did I choose this? And I said, Yeah, you did. That's so hard. It is so hard to watch the people that we love lose parts of, you know, of what made them them, it is very hard and heartbreaking for us to see. But, you know, I think this idea of, you know, like, for me, learning about when my husband was diagnosed, diagnosed with frontotemporal dementia and realizing like, you know, that's why I think landing on a diagnosis is so important because then you can learn how to separate your person from their disease. You realize that by them, you know, asking, uh, you know, the same question over and over again, it's not because they're doing it on purpose. It's just because their brain is being dismantled. Their brain is changing. And then that, then that turns into how can we support them and support ourselves, you know, to be able to protect ourselves when we are when we are seeing those really hard changes happening in our loved ones. Yeah, it's so subtle, too, right? It just sort of like I really like some when it first started happening, I would say to him, really, like, you really don't remember. And then now I'm starting to realize I just got to play along. Yeah. I think that when you can sort of decide to accept what is happening, it is easier just to go along, you know, by doing that. But don't you remember or you just said that, you know, and it's not they don't they're not again, not doing it on purpose. It's just just to go along with it. It will save you that energy, that sort of cortisol spike that sort of comes with it. You have to learn how to protect yourself in those moments and not try and test them. Yeah, you know, just move away from the testing. How long did it did it take you from diagnosis to where you are now to find a good care routine for yourself? Like, how did you find yourself in that caregiving role? Because I from your book, it sounds like there was a lot of dots to connect. And then once they were connected, you were trying to figure out how to help Bruce, but you didn't really think about how to help yourself in that initial phase. No, I mean, I didn't realize that caregiving could be so bad for your health. I didn't know that, you know, a lot of us are thrusted into this role without any previous knowledge or education about the disease that we are starting to care give for and what caregiving looks like and means. It was, you know, learning these statistics that caregivers die at a rate that is higher than people their own age who aren't caregiving. And that was a wake-up call for me, that I wouldn't allow this disease to take our whole family out, especially not me. So I really sort of realized it was a wake-up call for me to learn that I needed to put my, my, my care first in order to care for the people I love. And I think that goes to just women today in general, you know, we, we put everyone at the top of our list, our, you know, our kids, our parents, our business, our whatever it is. But we just need to learn how to sustain this journey that we're on. I want to I want to say something about that one thing, because this is what I really want to change for women is this badge of honor we wear when we put everybody's needs ahead of our own. Like we think it's really something that's to be proud of. And I love the way you said that, because that's partly what's damaging the brain is that we've outsourced our worthiness to all the people around us. Yeah. And get yourself that friend, you know, that I think is so important as women, we need to like reach out to our friends and just be like, Hey, you know, like you're going a little hard. Are you okay? Can I, can I help you like stranger danger, you know, take a minute and let's make sure you're taking care of yourself. And, um, Emma and I do that for ourselves, like each other frequently, like, Hey, you're going a little hard right now. Um, are you okay? And what can we do? And so I think talking about it's so important. And also, you know, I think that we really need to, I mean, again, make time and it's okay if we want to be like the superhero and do all these things. And if that's your ambition, great, but also making sure that we're recharging our batteries and, um, and being good friends and that there's a sisterhood, I think is super important. Yeah, calling each other out is important. Sometimes we have to be put in check. Yes. I when my kids were little, I was so overwhelmed one day that I put myself into a timeout. And I, I closed my bedroom door. They're like, what are you doing? I'm like, I'm going into timeout. And I thought, Oh, that's a good parenting strategy. Great one. Actually, I love this. I love that. I still do that. I'm like, I just need to go spend some time in my closet, not to really do anything, but just to go somewhere and just take a minute. You can press. Recently my dad had this really extreme spinal surgery which took over about a month of my life Like literally everything just got put on hold And I had several moments where I had to say to myself am I going to tend to my dad right now? Or am I going to go work out? And that provided a lot of guilt. It was like, I really want to go work out. But what happens like it was a couple days like what he was still wearing off from all the anesthesia? What happens if he wakes up and we're not there? Like you start feeling like, no, no, no, I need to be there for him because he's going to be confused when he wakes up. So how do you, how do you handle those moments? I'm sure you've had a thousand of them, Emma. I think as caregivers, that is what we, we are riddled with guilt all the time. Um, but you know, it just gets in, it just gets in the way of caring for ourselves and caring for our person, You know, like you have to sort of, again, make a choice of like, yes, of course, he might be confused. He might need you there. But your sanity, your health, you know, you're going to feel a lot more energized and, you know, have that sort of pick me up by, you know, doing that exercise that you that you need to do. So, yes, we are riddled with guilt as caregivers, but I just think that we have to put that aside because it's just not helpful. It ends up just not being helpful. Yeah. And do you have, like, when you look at your day, do you have, like, parts of your day that are, like, for you and parts of your day are for the caregiving? And you're caregiving your children. Let's just not forget the demands of a mother, but also your husband. And have you segmented it like that at all? Yeah, I don't think there's a perfect day. You know, I think it just depends. And, you know, it's not just Bruce. You know, I have an aging mother as well. You know, there's so many things that, you know, we are all juggling simultaneously. And it doesn't really sort of work perfectly as I wish it would in my brain. But no, what I do make sure and I do check in with myself to make sure that I've given myself a brain break. If it's 10 minutes, if it's, you know, making sure that I do, you know, I always schedule my workouts. It's a Monday, Wednesday, Friday, for sure. It is in my calendar. There are certain things that I have in my calendar that just are non-negotiable for myself that I need to sort of help me re-sort of calibrate and energize myself. Um, so it's just understanding and going back to the idea and the importance of caring for ourselves and how important that is. What do you do on a brain break? For me, that's not like looking at social media. Like, I just want to make sure we're clear that there's probably good brain breaks and bad ones. I mean, I'll have Helen tell hers, but you know, for me, it's like, you know, walking out of the house, I can get stuck behind my desk in front of that computer screen, just, you know, email, zoom, whatever. And there just comes a point where I just like, I'm like, I got to get up, I got to move my body and a brain break is like 10 minutes outside in my garden, 10 minutes for just a walk around the block, just to sort of clear, clear the space. Yeah. And honestly, for me, I think it can be so easy as just, I mean, I have to step away from the desk. I'm that person, you know, I mean, I'm locked to my desk too much. So it's, I love to take a brain break and go around and socialize. Like if I'm in an office setting, go talk to people, see how they're doing, ask how their weekend was, you know, like take that time to actually talk to people and not have it be about, you know, whatever project. And then when I'm at home, I love to just clean my space. Like, you know, there's always something that you want to get to that you don't have time to get to, whether it's like moving a candle over here or books over there or like, you know, put it like it could be anything just to kind of like organize my environment or deal with something that's been bugging me. I think that's so important is just getting the things that you don't make time to do. So you could just not have them rent space in your head anymore. Yeah. You know, there's something called environmental psychology where they are proving that if your environment is a mess, that it raises your cortisol levels. So I have that. Do you have that? I need a clean space or it's just too, it's too overwhelming for me. When we were all work from home, I mean, it was a disaster because I basically had to like clean my whole house before I can sit down. I mean, and I'm not that person either. Like, you know, so, So I couldn't even sit down and start to think until my whole environment was better. I mean, I'm not, you know, like that was an interesting time. But here, like, I think it makes you feel good when your surroundings feel good. And if that's something that makes you happy, do it. Yeah. I have to laugh because I have a visual of you two in the office. And when you both take a brain break, Helen goes out and talks to everybody. And Emma retreats and locks the door. There you go. I'm by myself going for my lonely little walk. Exactly. It's a beautiful example. I take a walk without my phone. When I do a lap, I'll leave my phone behind, and I also feel like I'm a total rebel, right? Because no one can get me. I've forgotten about my calendar for a minute. If it's super important, someone will come find me. And I just feel like such a rebel going around without my phone, not knowing what's going on. And it's a great, very freeing feeling. Yeah, I can totally see that. What about compassion fatigue? I spent some time because of being in clinical practice and seeing patients for so many years. And then when my parents started to become needing more of my attention, I just found I literally had compassion fatigue. And it's a real thing. Yes. So I had a therapist that taught me about this and it's called empathic distress, where you take on your person's illness, their suffering, you know, whatever it is that you are seeing in front of you. If you are a very compassionate human being, you will take will take that on. And I had a tendency to do that. And what I've learned is that or what I do now, especially when I'm going into caregiving spaces where everyone wants to share their story with me. I love being there to be able to hear their stories. But it's so easy for me to then get into their head and their body and their space and then take all of that on. But I've had to learn how to protect myself. and for me it just kind of looks like this bubble that I put myself into where it's like I can be present I can be there and listen but I have to be very conscious not to take on their feelings and emotions I you know and I also do that with with my husband too where I think oh he must be thinking this or this must be going through his head or but I don't know I actually don't know that to be true. So it's important for me to sort of protect my space so that I can look at what is happening externally from, you know, a clear, a clear mind, a clear headed mind. But yes, it is, it is a, it is a real thing. And it is important that we understand how to protect ourselves in those moments. So we don't take too much on. I, one of the more challenging thoughts that I've had in caregiving my parents has been because they're vibrant. Their health is, I mean, at 89 and 86, they're like physically vibrant and they're very social. And I've had these moments where I'm like, we could be doing this for another 10 years. Like if it's very possible, this is the long game. Have you, I'm surely you've had those thoughts. And how do you, How do you stop that thought process? Because it can be a little daunting. I definitely don't get too ahead of myself, you know, and again, it's important. I try to, you know, stay here, don't go there, because I don't know what tomorrow is going to bring, you know, especially when you are in the world of, you know, caring for someone with dementia, you have these moments where things are sort of, they plant, you know, they sort of level and then the next shoe drops, and then you have to sort of figure that out. So it's important for me to stay sort of more present, to not think too far in advance, and just to know that it is important to care for myself, you know, that to be able to sustain, you must care for yourself. And I say that all the time. But it's, you know, it's important for people to know, I want to give people permission to know it's okay to look after themselves. Yeah. Yeah. Do you think dementia and Alzheimer's or all, let's just say all forms of dementia since we don't, you know, now I'm like, I'm rethinking how I put those two words together because it's sort of what we say in the menopause space. Do you think it's preventable? I think that, listen, I don't think that there's a silver bullet, but I think that there, you know, I think what we've seen with studies is that, you know, 40% of cases can be preventable, you know, by implementing the pillars and caring for our brains. But like what Helen said, you know, dementia can, you know, start to seep in 20, you know, to 30 years before we even get a diagnosis. So sometimes, unfortunately, it just might be in our cards. But the hope is, is that we can sort of, you know, keep it off, ward it off until the hope is that, you know, science comes up with that pill, that treatment that's going to help us. I also think this is the big misconception. And we hear this all the time at make time is like, Oh, I'll get this for my mom. And I'm like, No, you need to get this for you. You know, we need to start, you know, teaching young women about their brain health and caring for their brains early. It's important. It's so important when girls are in college that they're getting the sleep so their brains are detoxing, that we're building these healthy brain habits and waiting until you're, you know, 60. I mean, it's never too late, but we need to start like really taking care of our most important asset immediately. And it's something that we need to teach our girls. And so very important that we really make a brain part of our care routine right from the get-go. And it's as important as eating right, working out, like taking care of your hygiene. It's just one of those things we need to really start talking about in society. Yeah, it's interesting. My daughter is 25 and I watch her mimic my behavior, which is very much, I don't have time. I got to do this. I said to my husband one day, I was like, I feel like I'm in that song, cats in the cradle. Like, I don't have time, mom. And then I realized, oh, she's just mimicking what I did. So I love what you're doing with with your children, Emma, like, I just think it's, we have to model it. So that the next generation doesn't do it the way we did it. No, absolutely. I mean, it's important to model that. But my kids also see me not do it perfectly either. So I'm not going to sit here and say, like, I am doing everything perfectly. I'm not, but that's okay too, because you know what, if I'm going to have some chocolate, I'm going to enjoy it. Okay. Make it really good. Make it really good quality ingredients. Yes. If I want that slice of pizza, I'm going to have it and it's okay. You know, it's, it's okay for us to also enjoy life and not be so rigid. We really do need to give ourselves some grace in this. Yeah. Talk a little bit about make time. So what I'm hoping is that, uh, people listening to this podcast or watching it on YouTube will want to tap into your resource. And I think connection to communities like what you've created is so powerful. So talk about how they can access it and what to find there. So we you can get to us at maketimewellness.com. We're also we also do a podcast, as you can see, I'm doing it from our podcast room today, make time, you know, pod where we talk to experts about what they think that we should be making time for. We're on Instagram at at make time wellness. yeah and I think our podcast is really great because you know our brand's called make time so we do these little 15 minute vignettes where we bring experts on and we get right in it like what are three actionable ways you can make time to meditate sleep eat better workout and they're very short and sweet and women really are able to walk away with these actionable things that they can do that are fairly easy. And so that's really important to us, like really making sure we're giving some really actionable ways that people can make change. Yeah, it's beautiful. And I think resources are really important as somebody who puts out information. One of the things that I'm always challenged with is I don't want to give you information that you don't know how to apply. Because now you've just created anxiety for that human. So and then community, we've been looking in our own world about how do we create more community because I think that is just where it's at. So I encourage everybody to go check out your resources and I just, I love what you all are up to. And I want to point out from one author to the other, I really loved how easy your book was to read. There are so many books I pick up and within two to three chapters, I'm like, it was either poorly edited, maybe because I've written enough books that I can sense that, or the information. This is another thing that I think is important for women over 40 that I hear is they can't read books anymore, because they can't hold on to that information. But like from the intro, I was sucked in. It was really well written. So thank you. Oh, you will. I mean, as your listeners will hear, I'm very simple. When it comes to communicating, but that but that's what works for me. And I think when it comes to talking to another caregiver, you know, we have so much already going on in our minds that I wanted to really keep things very simple, easy to digest. I also repeat things within the book multiple times because I think it's important for retention, right? I know things repeated to me multiple times to let it sort of sink in. And it's part of my story, but I've also brought in, you know, 25 experts and specialists who helped our family, you know, support our family. So I'm really bringing them in as well to be able to share their expert insight and wisdom with the next caregiver that will hopefully help them take care of themselves. Yeah, amazing. Is there anything we can do? Because I have a very enthusiastic audience. Is there anything we can do to support you two in this incredible mission? Is there any way for us to help make your passion easier? Share the one in five statistic. Women do not know that one in five women are at risk for Alzheimer's. And the more we start talking about it, the more women, if we get together, can really change the statistic. So I think it's really important that we talk about the one in five and just come on over and join the make time movement. We'll be happy to have you. Right. You know, I always say when people ask me, well, why did you write this book? I always say I write books to open a conversation up. And then I think it's our job to all step into it and take that information. And that's exactly what I see in your book is just a conversation has been had. And then you're so beautiful that thou you have make time to be able to let everybody step in over there. So So I just thank you. And I'll let Emma go rest. And Helen, you can go find somebody to talk to. But I really appreciate the conversation and just what you all are doing. I have this real deep sense in my heart that right now that women are really standing up and making change for other women in the world. And it's just so beautiful to watch. And you two are a big part of that. So thank you for everything you're doing. Yeah, thank you for having us on. And it's so important to support to support the women out there. Yeah, agreed. Yeah, thank you, Mindy. And you're doing great work, too. We're such fans. So thank you so much for having us on. Yeah, thank you. Thank you so much for joining me in today's episode. I love bringing thoughtful discussions about all things health to you. If you enjoyed it, we'd love to know about it. So please leave us a review, share it with your friends and let me know what your biggest takeaway is.