Brain Health Longevity with Dr. Claudia | Longevity Optimization Podcast

In this engaging conversation, Dr. Claudia Aguirre, a neuroscientist and mind-body expert, discusses the intricate connections between the brain and skin, the differences between male and female brains, and the impact of stress on health. She emphasizes the importance of neuroplasticity, the role of AI in cognitive function, and offers practical techniques for stress reduction, highlighting the significance of touch and emotional processing in our lives.

In this conversation, the speakers delve into various aspects of health, focusing on longevity, the importance of touch, sleep differences between genders, the role of hormones in brain health, and strategies for healthy aging. They discuss the impact of estrogen on cognitive functions, the prevalence of Alzheimer's in women, and the complexities surrounding depression and SSRIs. The conversation concludes with practical recommendations for maintaining brain health through active engagement, social connections, and nutrition.

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Timestamps

00:00 Introduction to Dr. Claudia Aguirre

01:50 Exploring Neuroscience and Its Impact

05:20 Understanding Brain Myths and Neuroplasticity 09:23 The Role of AI in Cognitive Function

12:07 Differences Between Male and Female Brains

16:56 Stress Responses in Women vs. Men

19:50 Techniques for Stress Reduction

23:15 The Science of Touch and Emotional Processing 28:21 Exploring Longevity and Community Benefits

29:46 The Importance of Touch and Love Languages 30:59 Sleep Needs: Gender Differences and Hormonal Influences 32:21 Understanding Sleep Stages and Brain Function 34:41 The Role of Estrogen in Brain Health

38:20 Hormonal Changes and Their Impact on Women's Health 42:41 Alzheimer's Disease: Gender Disparities and Hormonal Factors 44:29 The Complexity of Depression and SSRIs

46:53 Strategies for Healthy Brain Aging

49:17 Meditation and Mindfulness for Well-being

50:20 Supplements and Nutrition for Brain Health

Transcript

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (00:00)

All right, so today I am so excited to have Dr. Claudia Aguirre on the podcast. So Dr. Claudia is

a neuroscientist and mind-body expert specializing in the connection between the brain and the

skin. She earned her Bachelor of Science degree from UCLA and completed her doctorate at

the University of Southern California, where she investigated hormonal interactions in the aging

brain.

During her academic journey, she also researched molecular mechanisms of schizophrenia at

the National Institute of Mental Health. She's passionate about making science accessible, and

Dr. Aguirre has created several TED education lessons that have reached millions worldwide.

She has also presented on the brain-skin connection. Her work has been featured in

publications, and she's collaborated with platforms like Netflix. Dr. Aguirre consults

internationally as a professional speaker, writer, and spokesperson in the health and wellness

industries.

Her expertise encompasses a broad range of topics including neuroscience, skincare, and

wellness, with a particular focus on longevity in the aging process. Beyond her professional

endeavors, she's dedicated to bringing science to everyone in a fun and digestible way,

traveling the world, lecturing on various topics under the wellness umbrella, and you strive to

lead a healthy life yourself. Welcome to the podcast. Of course, there's so many things that I'm

interested in there, longevity, skin.

DR. CLAUDIA (01:16)

Thank you, thank you for having me.

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (01:23)

the brain. I am so excited to dive into all the things today. Same. Yeah, today I really want to

focus on a few key like tenets and then we'll kind of explore some other areas as well. So

definitely want to talk about the differences between the male and female brain and know that

you know, that's like really what I'm trying to investigate, right? Like we have so little data on

male or sorry, we have so little research on women overall, right? So it's really

DR. CLAUDIA (01:26)

Yeah.

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (01:50)

exciting to me to look at the differences, because we know that there's a lot of differences. And

then also talking about brain health, anti-aging for the brain or how the brain ages. And I'm so

excited to explore the brain and skin relationship. let's just start with what got you interested in

neuroscience.

DR. CLAUDIA (02:08)

You know, it's sort of been long coming, guess. My mom studied psychology and when I was

little, and she didn't really influence me in that sense. She was, you know, an educator and I

was, well, I had a long journey. You know, I was born in Peru, came through Venezuela and it

was like a very affluent society there back then because of the oil and now it's completely

different. And then, and I went to an American school, so when I came here I already

spoke English and so my education was you know LA mostly LA and so I was influenced by

everything that has to do with LA and so on sick days I would you know stay home and I'd watch

TV but there was there was some stuff that was really interesting to me back then TLC was

called the learning channel yes so that's what it was actually about and you would learn things

and so I would watch you know there was like a show

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (02:57)

Okay.

DR. CLAUDIA (03:04)

from an anthropologist called Desmond Morris called the human animal. And I found it so

fascinating because he would follow like people around like they were human animals. And it

was very much like about sociology and that lens. And I just found it fascinating as a child. So I

guess I was always interested in understanding why people do things, behavior and society,

culture, all of that. But I wanted obviously a deeper understanding than just psychology.

That kind of just gives you a very, for me, a very surface kind of level. I wanted to know how it

works. What is that mechanism? So at UCLA, was doing like pre-med and I did a lot of literature

and English. And so I was like trying to combine two different worlds there, even back then. I

started doing research my sophomore year and published papers with my advisors. And it was

just a new and fascinating world that wasn't clinical.

that was very much like a bubble of knowledge and I loved it. And so that's why I went to the

NIH to do a program there. And I was probably in the top lab for schizophrenia research in the

world. And it was just so fascinating to see clinicians and scientists working together and really

trying to solve big problems, which I think scientists at their core are very creative in sense

because

they endeavor to solve a problem that has no solution yet. And so you have to think really

outside of all the boxes, right, to understand how to do something that's long lasting and then

just, and you know, science for science sake. So just understand it so that we get a better

understanding, not because it's tied to medicine or pharma or anything like that. And yeah, then

I decided that one year of snow was enough.

And so I just only wanted to come back to LA. My whole family was here and I grew up in LA.

So I only applied to schools here and I already went to UCLA. So I decided USC. So yes, Trojan

and Bruin. But I spent about four years in each program. So a little bit less under four for my

undergrad and four for my PhD.

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (05:20)

Yeah, well, I mean, it's obviously such an interesting, you know, interesting discipline in general.

What are a few things that you think everyone should know about the brain?

DR. CLAUDIA (05:31)

yes, there are some myths out there. The whole 10 % of your brain is being used. I don't know if

it's already finally being quashed, but that's not true. We don't use 10%. We use all of our brain.

Not all the time, but we use all of our brain. There's not one little brain region that's just sitting

there like idly, you know. Another big myth is that you're born with the amount of neurons you're

always going to have and that's it. We also know that that's just not true.

Obviously there's neuroplasticity and there are new neurons being, you know, born in specific

areas of the brain. So that's another thing a long time ago people would say, well, you know, if

you kill your neurons, that's it, you won't get any more. But we know that's not true. Look at

stroke victims, epilepsy, you know, in childhood, some of them have their entire hemisphere

removed. And you wouldn't tell if that happened to a child at age four, by age 10, you're

probably a completely normal

looking child with all of the same, you know, things that they do. They can write, talk, do

everything because the brain is that malleable. So that's a big thing for people to understand.

Not to damage their brain so that they have to work hard to get it, but to know that if some

damage happens that it can be, you know, maybe not completely reversed, but it can definitely

be fixed.

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (06:50)

And what are the two questions from that? What are the, are there anything that we can do to

encourage that new growth of neurons? And then what areas do neurons still kind of rebirth new

neurons? You said it's just a few areas.

DR. CLAUDIA (07:04)

Yeah, so one primary one is the hippocampus. Now, the hippocampus is like the seat of learning

and memory. The hippocampus is also divided into different regions. It might be a little too

technical, but you know, there's like the dentate gyrus and different parts of the actual little

structure. And it's a tiny little subcortical structure, but it's connected to obviously all of the brain.

And it's very sensitive part of the brain. So stress, psychological stress, even environmental

stress,

can affect the hippocampus. Learning is partly done within that hippocampus. Memory is a big,

know, hippocampus is probably like the main section of the brain that's really involved in

memory, but we also know that memory happens everywhere, you know, in the cerebellum for

motor, you know, muscle memory kind of things. Our body can also store memory in that sense,

not in that sense where you have like long-term potentiation of the neurons, but you have, you

know,

different ways that memory is formed. So in terms of creating new neurons, it's called

neurogenesis. So for neurogenesis to happen, you need stem cells, know, like baby neurons,

and they have to differentiate into full mature neurons. So sometimes you have neurogenesis

with a little bit of like the babies that may or may not differentiate. So it's like a multiple step

process. Exercise has been shown to really

you know, create new neurons just from the neurogenesis perspective. you know, you can look

at that research and see that yes, doing movement and exercise can increase neurogenesis.

Also, obviously learning, like if you can try to be a lifelong learner, I think that's a big, big plus for

the brain. Even the elderly brain can learn, you know, that whole old dogs can't learn new tricks,

false.

They can and and us as humans we can as well. So there's a lot that the brain loves to do it

loves to be enriched and I think just because you're getting a little slower with aging doesn't

mean that you can't you know play cards with your friends Again socializing is a big part of also I

think healthy connections within the brain. So healthy connections outside healthy connections

within the brain

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (09:23)

That makes a lot of sense. What do you think AI is going to do to, I mean, because I feel as if

people are going to get so dependent. I mean, we're already a Google society, right? Like you

want to know something and then you Google it. So what about AI? It feels like we're going to

get even a little bit lazier, but I would love to hear your opinion.

DR. CLAUDIA (09:40)

There's lots of opinions on that. So as sort of a mind-body expert, my view of the brain, a lot of it

comes bottom up. traditionally we've been taught about the brain for the brain. It's kind of like

you learn about the brain and it's for the brain, but actually, and yes, the processes go down and

it's the executive function. It's in charge of your body, but your body is also in charge of your

brain.

When we rely on technology that depletes us being in our bodies, that has some serious

potential downstream effects for the brain and for your body. For example, we don't even type

anymore, right? We're just speaking. So the auditory pathways are activated, but you have lost

your hand-to-mind connection. So there's a lot of good research out there about

the hand-mind connection. Now, I'm actually working on a very tight project on this, specifically

on hands, because again, the push from AI is you don't have to think critically anymore. You

kind of have to assess what it says. You can be an editor of your thoughts, but not a creator of

your thoughts. And so when you're doing a lot of these auditory things, like, hey, Alexa, do this

and do that, you know? And of course I use it as well. But you're not using your body to do the

tasks like

find it online. And, you know, this is a little bit of an aside, but this project focuses on handwriting

because using your hands has an activation of the brain in a very specific, like neural networks

of the brain that are just not even activated by typing. So the way that the brain, you know,

converts the information, it's just completely different in verse

typing versus writing, and there's even research showing differences in cursive writing versus

script. Very important for children to write. if you've lost, you know, of track of writing and doing,

using your body for this, and you're relying a lot on AI for your thinking and, you know,

production of written materials, then yeah, you need to start at some way, even if it's writing your

grocery list. Use your hands.

bake, garden, you know, all of the things that really utilize your hands.

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (12:07)

Yeah, I mean, that makes a lot of sense. Okay, so let's get into the female versus male brains.

Let's just start like broad strokes. What are some of the primary differences?

DR. CLAUDIA (12:18)

So in terms of the architecture of brain, so in terms of the structure, a lot of the early research

was done on animals and animal research is mammalian, but it is different. you know,

sometimes it is hard to translate. So that's why we need translational science, but sometimes it's

hard to translate some of the mouse studies that have been done because they are nocturnal.

They have a much larger olfactory bulb, and so their senses are different than ours. So, you

know, sometimes it's tricky to see, but mouse studies, animal studies have shown that there are

some key differences in the brain structures of males versus females. And you can see this in

humans in terms of like mood, memory, and stress. Those are probably like the main behavioral

effects of these changes in the brain.

Sometimes there's, you know, articles talking about how there's changes, there's differences in

cortical thickness or size, but I would take this with a little bit also grain of salt because cortical

thickness can be affected by a lot of different things. Same thing with white matter. So white

matter versus brain matter, white matter, we're not talking about myelin. And that obviously has

to do with the speed of the destruction of like the electricity going on in your brain.

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (13:17)

Thanks

DR. CLAUDIA (13:39)

But it's, you know, it has, there's some differences there that have been shown in past literature.

But I would say if you want to focus on the differences, focus on like the outcomes, the outputs

of these potential structural differences. So the hippocampus, great. I talked about it. So we

already kind of know a little bit about it, right? It's this very important structure for learning and

memory. But it is also highly, you know, sensitive to stress.

And I think that there's pretty good research showing that women experience stress differently

than men. There's that hypothesis of you get into like the nurture and the overprotection when

you're under stress as a woman, as a female versus a man that might want to do the fight or

flight and fight, right? Or maybe fly away or maybe run away. But a woman kind of gets the

females get that sort of nurture instinct going to be like protect.

Because evolutionarily, all of this makes sense, right? We have children and babies that we

must protect at all costs. And I think also women are very much in tune with their immediate

society and their bodies differently because of just a way that we're constantly being bombarded

by our hormonal changes and fluctuations. So this plays into...

to brain as well because I mean a lot of people out there in general, maybe not your audience,

but a lot of people don't know that hormones are produced everywhere. Yes, you can make

estrogen from your ovaries, but your brain also produces its own estrogen and it has a different

function in the brain. Your skin produces its own estrogen, has a different function in the skin.

Testosterone, all the hormone, cortisol is made in the skin by the skin and for the skin.

I think in terms of like male versus female, there is a difference enough to want to address

changes differently. Whether it's for stress, that's probably the biggest one. There's good

research on that, but also for learning and memory.

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (15:52)

So, I'm so fascinated by the differences in stress because so I wear an aura ring and I know, like

the science states, that women process stress and experience stress and perceive stress at

higher levels, but I also see it directly in the data. So, I'll look at my husband's aura ring and he's

a very high functioning guy. He's CEO of multiple, CEO of company running multiple different

ventures, but he's in a restored state like all the time on aura.

Mine, my stress is just higher, it's simply higher. So why exactly is it? So the hippocampus is

bigger? Is that what you're kind of saying? Or what area of the brain is controlling that? And we

can probably go back to, we have more perceived stress, I would guess, because we're meant

to be mothers and we have to be more aware, right? So it makes a lot of sense, but it's just so

fascinating to me that I'm wondering what, anything, can we do to optimize that, to reduce our

stress as women?

Because we also know that 80 % of doctors visits are related to stress. So it's a huge

component of longevity.

DR. CLAUDIA (16:56)

Yes, yes. So in terms of brain structure, that would be more the hypothalamus. So the

hypothalamus will release hormones that then tell the pituitary to release more hormones that

go to your adrenals. So when you're talking about stress, are you talking about like the, you

know, the HPA axis or the SEM axis, and either way you are releasing epinephrine or

epinephrine cortisol. Those are your stress hormones that are probably being tracked if you're

doing a blood test or saliva test.

with Aura, you know, they, they do different ways to measure. they'll do like an HRV. I don't

know they still do that. I was in contact with the Finnish, CSO a long time ago. and then they

moved into sleep and that became like their big thing. And now they're moving into women's

health, which is great to see. Yeah, it's great to see. with cortisol, it's important to know that it's

not just triggered by stress. It's also, triggered by, you know,

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (17:43)

They are in

DR. CLAUDIA (17:54)

melatonin would be like the opposite effect of it, right? So if you're not getting good sleep, you're

gonna have higher cortisol levels, not necessarily your stress, but you didn't sleep well. And

women tend to have changes in their sleep a lot more than men in terms of aging in particular.

So menopause, some of the biggest issues with that are sleep, you know, they can't get to

sleep, the sleep is truncated, or it's just inefficient sleep.

So sleep inefficiency, sleep deprivation, a lot of this is due to hormones. And we, think as

women, experience hormonal aging a lot faster and more robustly than men. So I think stress is

coming, you have to think about it from like all the different ways, right? There's environmental

stress that puts stress on your tissues and organs. And so if your husband has something that

he does that maybe is very, immediately brings him back to a

good baseline. think men are easier in that way. Their mechanisms are not as sort of not

confusing, but they're just not so, you know, all over the place as women are because of

hormones.

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (19:05)

So thinking through what we can do as women. I've kind of like, obviously just intentional stress

reduction, right? I have like different points in the day where I'm intentionally trying to get into

parasympathetic. Something else has been so interesting that puts me in parasympathetic like

immediately and keeps me there is hyperbaric oxygen. That's been a newer finding in my, I've

been doing hyperbaric for I mean like five years, but I have a hard shell chamber upstairs in my

bedroom. But I found that really beneficial because

literally within minutes of getting in and it being fully pressurized, it drops me into

parasympathetic. what I wanna like identify kind of like a backed by neuroscience protocol for

women to de-stress. What are some of your favorite ways to do that? What would be your

recommendations?

DR. CLAUDIA (19:50)

Again, coming from the body, think is really easy and important. So even using the trauma sort

of techniques, Like tapping and reminding yourself, grounding yourself really. So if you're in a

point of like high stress or anxiety, really grounding yourself, don't grind, that's too hard, that's

stress.

you know, gets you back into your body. And I think that is the number one thing to do before

you get into any other sort of, you know, protocols or whatever, right? Getting your body first.

Because when we stress, we're dissociating. And that means we're outside of our bodies. And

so we do things that our bodies don't want necessarily, are not asking for, like eating or pushing

ourselves or not feeling pain.

And that's because the stress is causing blunting of some of those sensations. So getting into

your body with all of the senses, auditory, taste, touch. So there's a few things that I think in

terms of more trauma healing that people recommend and it would be like, listen to the sounds,

right? Like go outside, listen for birds. Hopefully there's birds around you.

Listen to that immediately. Those are called naturalistic sounds in the brain have been shown to

really reduce stress levels. Looking at specific colors is also, I mean, this is beautiful. You know,

we see green. Looking at specific colors that are again, nature colors, like real colors, also

stimulate the brain in a very specific way. This is a whole different area that I've lectured on

called neuroesthetics. So what does our...

what does looking at green and blue do for the brain? That's very different than looking at art or

different than looking at something else that we consider maybe beautiful. And it's changing our

brain and putting us back into that sort of relaxed state. So if you can, get outside, look outside,

listen, also for the sounds, put something in your mouth so you can taste it and acknowledge

the taste, right? This is almost like a mindful eating, mindfulness exercise.

And after you've used your senses, touched something, it could be the tree, it could be a plant, it

could be your hands or your body to kind of like get back in your body. I think those are sort of

some key, very simple things to do to regain that parasympathetic you say.

Benson from Harvard many years ago was talking about the relaxation response, which is the

opposite of the stress response. And it's something that's very easy to do as well. You just need

to be more mindful and conscious about it.

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (22:39)

Yeah, I love that. I mean, essentially like going outside on a nice walk, that's like you're feeling

the pavement, you're seeing the colors, you're smelling probably like up here in the hills, my

mom pointed out when she was in town, it's so fragrant of flowers. smelling something. So just

by going on a walk, you get a lot of seemingly you get the sun, you get like, know, a long vision.

that's, maybe you hug a tree on the way out. Yeah. So that's okay.

DR. CLAUDIA (23:05)

Get

into nature, yeah, get in your body, get into nature and that will set you up for, you know, really

getting back that parasympathetic that you were.

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (23:15)

Can you talk more about the tapping? what is kind of the process? How long do you do it where

you tap?

DR. CLAUDIA (23:21)

So I'm not like a clinical therapist, so I don't do this, but I know about it in terms of like how

you're using, and you can look it up so your audience like it, I'm not the person to explain exactly

how works, but you're using it to tap and you you got your vagus nerve, right? And your vagus

nerve is wrapped around all of your organs and it's the biggest nerve, it sends the signals back

to the brain and so you're kind of getting your vagal tone back by accessing it through the body.

You could tap your chest, and I'm not sure how many times, but you know, do it as it feels good.

You do it and you kind of like are reminding yourself like, look, I'm here and also have like really

open, gentle thoughts with yourself because if you're really stressed and anxious, like

acknowledge that, that it's okay and that you're going to calm yourself down, you know? We do

this when we're moms, right? Like I'm a mom, so with babies, you already instinctively know

like,

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (23:56)

Yeah.

DR. CLAUDIA (24:19)

the rhythm of it. There's very specific, we can talk about this now or later or whatever, but there's

so much specific neuroscience around touch and specific touch, right? Like I'm talking about a

tapping, has like that rhythm. Gentle caress is very different and it activates a completely

different part of the brain than what normal touch does, which is the somatosensory cortex.

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (24:42)

What is that activating like more like slow?

DR. CLAUDIA (24:46)

So there are very specific fibers in the skin called C-tactile fibers and they are only activated at a

velocity of like three centimeters squared. You know, a very gentle motion on the skin, on hairy

skin versus what's called non-globorous skin, meaning like the palms of your hands don't have

hair. You have an extra layer on the skin called the stratum lucidum there. And so in in hairy

skin,

we're petting, you know, it's like the velocity of caressing a baby or petting a pet, a cat, dog,

whatever. And again, I can go for days on this specific topic, so I'll try to get some little points

out here. Our language really beautifully reflects a lot of this that we inherently know. So we

know of the term going against the grain. It's going against the grain of like your hair. You want

to go where the hair grows. If you...

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (25:38)

Yeah.

DR. CLAUDIA (25:42)

pet a cat the wrong way, where their hair is, you know, their fur is not growing in a specific

direction and it doesn't activate that nerve fiber the same way. That's probably... Yeah, they're

like, what are you doing? Same thing with velocity. You got to get the velocity of these nerve

fibers correctly to activate them. you can't go... rubbing is not going to work too Too slow, now

you're in an awkward phase of like, what is that awkward touch? You know? And then it's just

your executive function lights up.

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (25:52)

stressful.

DR. CLAUDIA (26:12)

But the brain region is the emotional processing parts of the brain. So all of the things that deal

with emotions, striatum, even your reward system, all of those emotional processes that happen

in the brain happen only with this specific C-tactile fiber. And it was only discovered maybe 20

years ago in humans. I think the first literature talked about it longer, 80 years ago, but in cats.

accidental discovery of these very highly sensitive nerve fibers in skin that travel to not the

somatosensory cortex. It tells you what you've touched, but they tell you how you feel when

you've been touched.

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (26:59)

Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. Also, we release, so a little bit maybe like oxytocin, right? So

we release some of these chemicals in our brain. that correct? Yes.

DR. CLAUDIA (27:08)

Yes, absolutely. So touch helps release of oxytocin. But did you know that if you view someone

getting touched, you know, in a nice way, you will also release oxytocin. So we're super wired

for touch. it's not, you know, and even like watching somebody get touched in a nice way will

release oxytocin in your own brain. one thing that we're losing is losing touch, right, with

ourselves, with AI and

sort of this hyper technological world that we live in, where I even know like massages being

done by robots or you know all the things that are on the horizon if not here already, that will

also have an effect on how our brain ultimately functions.

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (27:53)

guys, I'm going to interrupt this episode for a brief announcement. As you may or may not know,

I started a community for females, by females, and it's a female longevity optimization

community. This is a place that you can connect with like-minded women. We are all here to

support each other, and there's a variety of different benefits to being a member. You get a

monthly Ask Me Anything, so submit your questions and I'll answer them directly. We also have

an entire library of courses on

all of the important components of longevity such as labs, nutrition, exercise, sleep optimization,

longevity optimization protocols that I'm doing along with real time updates to my personal

protocols. There are so many benefits of being a member of the community. We'll also be doing

in-person live events here in California and virtual events for anyone that can't attend. But if

you're interested in joining the community, I would absolutely love to see you there and I will

include a link in the show notes.

Do you think women are a little bit more wired for touch than men? I I know, like, I prefer

cuddling more with my husband. enjoys it, but, you I would say physical touch is more of my,

one of my love languages.

DR. CLAUDIA (29:04)

Yeah, you know, I don't know if there's good research that has decidedly said that. I think

intuitively it makes sense. But I also think that, like you mentioned, love language, right?

Everybody has kind of their own love language. So touch might be for some males and females

their love language. think we, I know we all need it. If you don't get touched as a newborn, like a

premature infant, if they don't receive touch consistently,

The lungs don't develop as well. The heart does not develop as well. And so it's almost like a

prescription to touch a premature infant so that they'd start developing as well as a normal

infant.

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (29:46)

Well, you would think too, a regular infant can definitely massive benefit from that. Let's talk

about the differences. Well, first, you have any more just thoughts? We talk about like stress for

men versus women. We talked a little bit about sleep. You said a lot of that has to do with

hormones because I've kind of found, you know, the literature says that women need about 11

to 20 minutes more sleep than men, but I found that I need even more than that, you 45 up to

an hour, depending on where I'm in my cycle, more sleep than my husband.

that I find interesting too. I think it might have to do something to do. mean, there's probably a

lot of factors, but we do know that we detox slightly slower than men. I wonder if we also detox a

little bit slower in our brain, like our lymphatic system.

DR. CLAUDIA (30:30)

I haven't seen research comparing the two again. know, some of them could be anecdotal, but I

do think that, well, everybody needs their good seven to eight hours. That's a non-negotiable,

for me, for my family, well, at least my husband, no, but child, yes. Whether he's tired or not,

he's in there. I'm like, just close your eyes. And it's been that way. I'm very strict about sleep.

That is a non-negotiable. I used to travel all over the world.

and I didn't get jet lagged. It could be my biology, also I was like, land, you know, if I land in

London, it's daytime, I'm outside. I don't just do the, I'm tired, I'm gonna take a nap. No, I also

don't do naps, but I'm very strict on like, the sun is down, that's my time to be inside.

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (31:18)

Is no napping just a personal preference or is this something related to brain optimization?

DR. CLAUDIA (31:23)

No, if I am completely sleep deprived, then a nap will be regenerative and beneficial. But

otherwise, I find that I don't need it because I've gotten my good nighttime sleep. And nighttime

sleep is shown to be different than daytime sleep for brain function and for, you know, just the

way that you get into the different phases. So you do get like regenerative sleep. If you're taking

a nap, don't do don't overdo it, you know, keep capped at like 40 minutes.

20 to 40 minutes is fine, but also deep rest is good. So, you know, if you're feeling tired, which I

often do, I won't now, but I'll rest and I'll just kind of be really quiet and rest for 20, 30 minutes.

And then that actually does kind of, I don't know, it just gives you that second wave and then

you stick to your nighttime schedule. But in terms of men versus women and sleep, I think...

There's so many different factors. I don't think there's a straight biological difference in our

brains that make women need sleep more. I don't think so. But I do think that there's hormonal

changes that do press on the female biology more and cause changes to that. Again, your

cortisol is probably elevated, so you need to get a little bit more rest and more sleep to really get

back to that good baseline.

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (32:49)

Is it true or false that women's brains are a little bit more interconnected like it we communicate

a little bit more? Is that true?

DR. CLAUDIA (32:58)

you mean to each other?

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (32:59)

Like within our own brain, of like women maybe better at multitasking than men because we

have more interconnectivity between the hemispheres.

DR. CLAUDIA (33:08)

I don't know that there's a giant difference in the structure of like the corpus callosum, which is

how the hemispheres connect. There's so many individual differences. So I wouldn't say that our

brain is more interconnected than a male brain. It just depends on who the person is because if

their job is like a taxi driver, they're going to have a huge spatial memory and

and so many things in their brain that's just different than it could be another man or a woman.

So I think it just more depends on the person. But I also think just anecdotally that men have a

hard time multitasking.

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (33:50)

Yeah, yeah. Talking about sleep real fast, so talk to us about what happens during sleep. Is

there, you know, I've kind of read that it's best to be in bed before 10 because you can avoid like

an additional cortisol spike. For women, it's beneficial, but we know there's deep, there's REM,

there's light sleep. What's going on in the brain during those phases?

DR. CLAUDIA (34:12)

Okay, I mean, it depends also on your level of tiredness. So if you're super tired, you might go

straight into like a deep sleep. But usually you're like stage one, two, three, REM, you know,

four. And our cycles are about like 90 minutes. So you need a good four cycles per night, right?

And the cycles are like your washing machine and your dryer. You need a wash and rinse cycle.

necessarily just do the wash, you still need to rinse it out and do that again to really clean your

brain. Because every thought that we have, even if you don't talk all day, you're still causing

metabolic waste to happen in the brain. And it wasn't that long ago that we didn't really

understand, fully understand why we sleep. There were so many theories and a lot of it went to

like...

You know, we spend a third of our lives sleeping. That's a long time. A third of our lives just

asleep. Like, why do we do that? There's so much more we can do in life. And so it wasn't until

sort of a rediscovery in a way of the glymphatics that are going on in the brain, the glymphatic

system, having to do with these non-neuronal, you know, parts of the brain called glia.

And the glia are like the moms of the neurons because they are, they, they baby them, they

nourish them. And then they also tell them also how to communicate. So glia are in the trillions,

you know, there's much more glia than the, the neurons. So when you talk about brain function,

we're always focusing again on like neurons and neurons and neuron activity, but like, hello,

glia, there's a lot more of them. And they, they were telling the neurons what to do a lot of the

time.

So the glia are helping clean up this metabolic waste. The neuronal synapses physically open

up so that there's more gaps and cerebral spinal fluid comes and flushes it out. so you see all of

this is, that's the rinse cycle that I kind of think about it. The CSF is actually flowing through and

cleaning this out.

Yeah, you need a few cycles during sleep. And in each stage, you know, if you look at

someone's EEG, there's different brain waves happening. So you're kind of in your slower,

you're still kind of active in those first stages. But REM is when it kind of like kicks up in activity,

which is why your body is no longer sort of immobilized as it is in like a deep sleep when you're

just, you can't move. But in REM, you might...

even act out your dreams. And that's probably the part of sleep science that has its most elusive

part because it's so hard to really study RAM. You have to kind of give somebody something

that gives them lucid dreams. So you can kind of get into that.

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (37:07)

is lucid dreaming? I've heard a lot about this. People strive to have lucid dreaming, right?

DR. CLAUDIA (37:12)

Yeah, I think they do. I'm not sure why, but it's having a level of consciousness during your

dream phase. with the other stages, stage one, two, three, you're resting, you're regenerating.

So it's incredibly important. Dream state is REM, which is rapid eye movement, because your

eyes are moving, your body can also move, you might talk. And then in extreme cases, you will

walk, right? And you will act out your dream even worse.

Lucid dreaming is having the ability to be conscious within that dream. you're like, I, it's just so

clear. Like you're in the dream, but you're also semi-conscious. And there are different like

waves. I don't want to like throw it out there because I'm, don't remember exactly, but I have

written on this. And I want to say it's like either the gamma waves or one of the specific waves

are active in that lucid dream. So that's what it means. It's just kind of being conscious

throughout it. I don't know.

exactly why people want to do that. I guess it's just a cool thing to be transported into a different

world that is your subconsciousness.

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (38:20)

Yeah, that is interesting. Okay, so before we go into brain aging, anything else that you want to

talk about differences between male-female brains?

DR. CLAUDIA (38:28)

I think, and I mean, we didn't get into the nitty gritty, but I do think a lot of it lies within hormones

and hormonal aging and the fact that our brain produces, you know, our own estrogen, our own

serotonin, just as much as a male, you know, but in a different way. So, estrogen in the brain is

different than estrogen in your uterus. know, estrogen has functions that are, that have their own

little

like jobs in the uterus, does this, in the oocytes, it does this. In the brain, it does something a

little different sometimes. In the skin, it does something different, right? So like it's related to

hydration in the skin. It's very much linked to pigmentation. That's a whole separate topic, but for

example, something like melasma, it's very much linked with hormonal changes. So that's why

melasma happens when there's like

a change of fluctuation in the hormones, especially like post-pregnancy. A lot of women will get

melasma because again, that steep drop in the hormones triggers alpha-MSH to produce

pigment in the skin. What's happening in the brain, like we can't see it as we can see the skin.

So that's what I personally love about that brain-skin connection is you're almost seeing your

brain in action if you pay attention to the skin.

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (39:48)

Interesting. And what is estrogen doing in the brain?

DR. CLAUDIA (39:51)

a variety of things. It's involved in learning, it's involved in memory, it's involved in cognition. But

it's not, it's hard to think of it sort of the way that you think of your cycle, right? You know, need

estrogen and progesterone and you've seen the chart where estrogen goes up and then

progesterone goes up. And so that happens in the brain and body. And it could have an effect

on mood, for example. So talking back again to like hypothalamus and

you know, our amygdala, the fluctuations in our hormones can also have an effect on our mood.

And women tend to experience things differently throughout their cycle, whether it's depression

or anxiety or even like epileptic seizures. A lot of this is linked to our hormonal fluctuations.

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (40:41)

And does estrogen decrease in the brain and menopause just like estrogen overall decreases in

the body?

DR. CLAUDIA (40:47)

it's a bit, yes, but it's mostly due to the ovaries. So like the ovarian, circulating estrogens don't,

there's not enough to travel to the brain. there's a lot of issues with menopause, obviously. and

back then, you know, there was a women's health initiative study years ago and they stopped,

doctors stopped giving women HRT because they were afraid of the side effects of, you know,

cancer. So.

When I started my research, we were trying to find a solution that was going to prevent

dementia, but also not give someone breast cancer.

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (41:24)

Yeah. Well, I think that those have been pretty widely debunked now. That specific study, it

seems as if they were using the wrong type of hormones and they were also starting it too late.

DR. CLAUDIA (41:35)

Right, and it's not a debunk, because it wasn't like the wrong hormone, it was just the hormone

that they were used at the time. So like, it's a synthetic, right? And most of birth control is

synthetic. So it was Madroxyprogesterone acetate versus like a natural P4, which is

progesterone. Same thing, E2 estradiol. You don't see 17 beta estradiol in most birth control

pills, patches, whatever. You see some synthetic version. And they come from like...

you know, urine. So pharmacologically, there's a variety of things. And so this study looked at

MPA and yeah, a lot of the doctors stopped giving that, but that doesn't mean that they should

stop giving progesterone. It just was specifically MPA. So now you can have like a natural

progesterone and your conjugated estradiol or just natural estradiol.

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (42:07)

Yeah.

DR. CLAUDIA (42:34)

and get really good results for prevention of dementia and Alzheimer's.

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (42:41)

Yeah, well talking about that topic, we know that women are more prone to Alzheimer's, right?

Why do we think, why do you think that is?

DR. CLAUDIA (42:49)

So, you know, it's changed a bit, but I think the initial thinking like 20 years ago was probably

due to the fact that women go through anapause. And so two thirds of people that were going to

get Alzheimer's were women. Initially, it was a little bit of the age gap. Women were living longer

and maybe they were just more prone to age-related diseases. But I think it's pretty clear that a

lot of it had to do with the...

the loss of function of ovaries and the, yeah, obviously, you know, going through menopause

and losing your estrogen and your progesterone. So a big part of the push now is to replace

those hormones. So go back to the HRT and prevent, you know, some of these age-related

diseases like Alzheimer's and dementia. Again, women also historically have been more

diagnosed, I guess, clinically diagnosed with mood disorders, depression, and anxiety.

Is it because the architecture of the brain is differently? Is it because women tend to be seen as

emotional? And so the doctors will prescribe that. That's a really tricky thing to untangle. And so

I think we need really good research to really disentangle all of that, you know, societal aspect

of things to show that whether the female brain in humans really is different enough to warrant

like, you know, different interventions.

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (44:17)

What is your take on this whole SSRI and maybe not necessarily being a serotonin deficiency?

What's your thought on this whole topic?

DR. CLAUDIA (44:30)

So I think depression, just like Alzheimer's has, it's been throwing some curve balls over the

years that has produced not very functional therapeutics. So with depression, SSRIs were

derived from World War II bombs.

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (44:53)

okay, it is not that, yeah.

DR. CLAUDIA (44:54)

Yeah,

really crazy stuff. History of asoceritis is really different, interesting. I have an article on that that

I'll have to dig up and show you, but it came because of this idea that it was a chemical

imbalance in the brain, and so you needed to kind of produce more serotonin or stop the

reuptake of the serotonin. Because like in the synapse, a lot of the stuff that gets, the

neurotransmitters get kind of sucked back up into the...

giving neuron. And so that's reuptake. And for a long time, you know, some of these things

worked. But again, you think about like the 1950s America, what goes to your mind, right? It's

the 50s housewife, with probably diagnosed with bipolar or you know, disorder or all these

things, hysteria. And I think in general, there's there's a lot there that played a role in how much

women were

prescribed, know, antidepressants, SSRIs. Are they the end all? Obviously not. I think now we

know that diet and our gut microbiome has just as much to do with our mood as, you know,

taking an antidepressant. So I think what I do, I'm not a clinician, but I recommend a lot of

lifestyle changes to help with whether it's mood changes that happen through our life cycle or

also cognition, know, cognitive issues. with mood,

Increasing specific things like fatty acids in your diet feed those good microbiota that ultimately

then produce the serotonin in your gut. So a lot of serotonin can be producer. Again, like they're

in charge of a lot of our mood and our behavior.

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (46:40)

Absolutely. What would be your top three to five recommendations on helping to have the brain

age better or slower?

DR. CLAUDIA (46:53)

think number one is keep it active in a variety of ways. like, try to learn a new language. You

might not be good at it, but at least the trial of that is really good because now we see good

neuroscience research showing how a bilingual brain is different than a monolingual brain. And

also for prevention of cognitive decline and dementia. So...

I think that's a key thing and it's a very attainable thing, think. Try to, dual-lingual, whatever, try

to use, you know, something that helps you get to a different language, practice it, even if it's by

yourself in your garden, like no one can hear you, just try. That's one element of doing that. And,

you know, there's been brain training games that have come out in the last decade and initially

they had good data and then FTC came at them.

Because at end of the day, what you test is how good you are at the game, not necessarily that

your brain is better, you know, or functioning more, you know, more optimized in that sense. So

do them anyway, but don't like rely on like the metrics at this point. And just look for the older,

you know, again, it's look to the older generation and their eighties, right? Like what are they

doing that makes them happy? You go to France and they're playing like Patanque, right?

You go to other countries, like what are the elderly populations of other countries doing right?

That keeps them kind of happy and connected. And a lot of it is social activity. So I would say

that's another one. It's so easy to be isolated in America in general. Even the younger

generations, you you're just like on your phone and you call it social media, but it's not the

same. So yeah, I would say try to...

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (48:41)

Yeah.

DR. CLAUDIA (48:45)

connect with real world people, keep your brain busy. Obviously, take care of yourself in terms

of like your diet. That makes a huge difference in your brain. And yeah, and just like also have

something that you enjoy doing because well-being is defined by not just wellness. So like we

got wellness, that's the opposite of illness, but well-being is also that extra level of joy that you

find in life.

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (49:14)

I love that. What about meditation?

DR. CLAUDIA (49:17)

So meditation is great. I do think that it's a practice. And so if you're not going to commit to it,

then you can do things that are different. And everyone has their own way of meditating, right?

Like it's contemplation at the end of the day. So again, if you look at the hierarchy of needs, if

you've fulfilled your basics and you want to reach a very calm state of mind, then anything that

is a contemplation, could be prayer.

It could be meditation. It's really the same thing. It's a reflection and in a sort of trying to get a

connection to your spiritual side, which I think is really beneficial for just your overall wellbeing.

Again, you feel connected. Once you have a level of spirituality, you feel connected to your

natural world. And in that way, you tend to try to take care of it better.

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (50:11)

Yeah, absolutely. I agree with that. What about supplementation for the brain? Is there anything

that you like or take yourself? Anything.

DR. CLAUDIA (50:20)

I don't take any pills. I

take zero things mostly because I don't like pills. I'm really bad at taking pills. So the future of

that is great because there's new vehicles, right, to get to your supplements. I've tried things,

tinctures and powders I can do more.

because I can just add it to my sparkling water and it becomes a nice pretty drink or a powder,

yashfaganta. I do like that. I love those things. I don't add sugar to anything. I like the taste of,

maybe a lot of people don't, but I like the taste of plants and herbs and roots. Sometimes it's

strong, but I'm like, okay, this is my medicine. So I've been researching on my own and

herbalism and...

all the different things. So for me, it comes more in that sense, right? Like a whole food. For

brain, I think there's very easy things that you can do. Walnuts are so good for the brain. They

look like the brain, so just eat that. It's like a very simple signal for you to eat walnuts, high in the

omegas, the fatty acids. When it comes down to like the molecules, obviously there's a lot out

there, but I would also...

put a little bit of caution to the wind just because now you're kind of messing with your central

nervous system and it could have some downstream effects that you might not want, right? So

obviously be careful with the things that you're putting in your body and how you're putting them

and how much, because like I said, everything has a different function. If you heard of a study

that said, you know, whatever, the molecule X is great for getting your

you to sleep or I don't know, I'm just waking things up. It might have an effect on your prostate or

it might have a different effect on your ovaries, right? So just because a study is focusing on one

organ or one area doesn't mean that it doesn't exist in other parts of your body.

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (52:24)

Yeah, that is a very good point. Well, this has been an absolute pleasure. Thank you so much

for joining me today. And where can people find you?

DR. CLAUDIA (52:35)

On, yeah, I don't do too, too much, but online, know, social media, you can find me at Dr.

Claudia and a couple of different sites. So I have a wellness journal that's aimed to improve

memory and cognition. Fun. Through writing, and I did all of the neuroscience research on it. So

it's like, it changes from specific lettering for the neural networks of the hand-mind connection

through to

Now did something interesting, so I looked at affirmations and found very little scientific data on

them. Very little. But I did find that there are specific kinds that are future-focused that do help

with mood. So for the mood part of the book, you'll find some value-based affirmations. Yeah,

and that's on opusmanus.org.

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (53:19)

Bye bye.

Love that. Well, thank you so much for joining me today. you.

DR. CLAUDIA (53:25)

Yeah, was a pleasure.

KAYLA BARNES-LENTZ (53:49)

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