Does Mindset Matter?

🧠 Does mindset matter?

Your mindset is a set of deeply rooted beliefs.

It shapes how you make sense of the world.

It determines how you think, feel, and behave.

Which means it inevitably influences whether you succeed or fail 🤔

Some of the earliest research on mindset was done by Stanford psychologist, Carol Dweck. She found that a person’s mindset determined their performance.

Here’s a challenge for you:

➡️ While most people are making New Year’s Resolutions to start good habits or break bad ones, what if we all make a resolution to embrace a new mindset that serves us better than before?

I’ll be sharing some examples of mindsets (especially those that I believe influence health) in upcoming posts.

Maybe some will resonate with you.

New Study: Intermittent Fasting vs. Caloric Restriction

Intermittent Fasting vs. Calorie Restriction:

🤷‍♀️ Which works better?

A new study compared them in a group of 75 people with type 2 diabetes and obesity.

Here are the highlights:

▪️ Participants were randomly assigned to intermittent fasting (freely eating between noon and 8pm daily) or caloric restriction (25% calorie reduction).

▪️ After 6 months, those doing intermittent fasting had lost twice as much weight on average (-3.56% vs. -1.78%).

▪️ Both groups experienced similar improvements in average blood sugar levels (measured by HbA1C).

Caloric restriction is the norm in diet culture, but it’s hard to follow (this study also showed better adherence to intermittent fasting than calorie restriction), and a LOT more goes into healthy eating and weight loss than just calorie counting.

Intermittent fasting is not for everyone.

This is something I discuss on an individual basis with clients to come up with the best plan for each person.

Give us a like if you learned something new or share to a friend that may find this interesting! ❤️

Reference

Pavlou V, Cienfuegos S, Lin S, et al. Effect of Time-Restricted Eating on Weight Loss in Adults With Type 2 Diabetes: A Randomized Clinical Trial. JAMA Netw Open. 2023;6(10):e2339337. [link]

News Flash: 4 Food Additives Banned

🍭 4 Food Additives Banned in California

A new law in California that bans 4 common food additives will go into effect at the beginning of 2027.

That may seem far off, but here’s what we can all take away from this right now:

1️⃣ The banned additives are Red Dye No. 3 (in candy canes and other candies), Brominated Vegetable Oil (a flavor stabilizer in sodas), Potassium Bromate (a leavening agent), and Propylparaben (a preservative).

2️⃣ The additives are banned because of research raising concerns about cancer, reproductive issues, and neurobehavioral problems—particularly in children.

3️⃣ These additives are already banned in the European Union and many other countries.

There was one other additive initially on the list: titanium dioxide. That one is banned in the E.U. because of concerns that it can damage DNA.

Where do you stand?

Are you concerned about food additives or no?

Reference

California Food Safety Act [link]

Prescription Medication Trends in the US

Prescription drug use in the US is at an all-time high ➡️

A new study out of Penn State shows that Americans can expect to take prescription drugs for about half their lives—a little more for women and a little less for men.

Does that bother you?

Some of the medications that are being prescribed more than ever include blood pressure medications, cholesterol-lowering medications, and antidepressants.

For example:

A girl born in the US in 1996 could expect to take antidepressants for 5.55 years of her life, but by 2019, that number jumped to 12.52 years.

This👆is just one of the many sobering statistics from the study.

I am not against medications, but there are often less invasive and more effective ways to support health, and many of the most commonly prescribed meds treat conditions that respond dramatically to lifestyle.

Prevention is truly the best medicine—starting with food, water, movement, and rest.

↗️ Share to your stories to spread the word!

Reference

Ho JY. Life Course Patterns of Prescription Drug Use in the United States. Demography. 2023;60(5):1549-1579. [link]

Mental Health through the Menstrual Cycle

450.

If you menstruate, that’s about how many periods you’ll have in a lifetime.

Yet even though half the world’s population is menstruating for half their lives…we have very little research on what the hormonal effects actually are…especially in relation to the brain and mental health.

That’s why this new study 👆 is so remarkable.

Neuroscientists tracked 30 women over the course of their menstrual cycles with MRI brain scans and hormone tests—and found brainwide structural changes that correlated with hormone fluctuations 🤯🤯🤯

For example:

🔹 Just before ovulation (when estrogen is high), brains showed changes that indicated faster information transfer.

🔹 The rise of FSH before ovulation was associated with thicker gray matter.

🔹 Progesterone after ovulation correlated with decreased cerebrospinal fluid volume.

What does all this mean?

It means the hormone changes throughout the menstrual cycle influence MORE than just the ovaries and uterus. The more we learn about these hormone-brain connections, the better we can make sense of the domino effect of female hormone balance.

Is your mind blown?

P.S. this study is not yet peer-reviewed but available preprint.

Reference

Rizor EJ, Babenko V, Dundon NM, et al. Menstrual cycle-driven hormone concentrations co-fluctuate with white and grey matter architecture changes across the whole brain bioRxiv 2023. [link & news article]