Dhru Purohit Show - PhD Shares One of the Most Critical Antioxidants in the World for Longevity, Gut Health, Sleep, and Disease Prevention with Dr. Deanna Minich

Episode Date: August 19, 2024

This episode is brought to you by Bon Charge, Lifeforce, and Lumebox.  What if we told you there’s a holy grail of molecules that can prevent early aging, promote longevity, and help prevent dementia and Alzheimer’s? This super powerful hormone, neurotransmitter, and antioxidant is melatonin. Today’s episode is a masterclass on melatonin and its crucial role in our bodies. Today on The Dhru Purohit Show, Dhru sits down with Dr. Deanna Minich to discuss the crucial role of melatonin in our body as an antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, and circadian regulator. Dr. Minich reveals early warning signs of low melatonin levels and lifestyle habits that can disrupt its production. She also covers the latest research on melatonin and critical considerations for supplementation. If you are looking for a deep dive into melatonin, this episode is for you.  Dr. Deanna Minich is a nutrition researcher, educator, and functional medicine-trained clinician with a unique approach to nutrition that combines physiology and psychology. She has served on the Institute of Functional Medicine’s Nutrition Advisory Board and curriculum committee and is a faculty member teaching nutrition for the Advanced Practice Module for Environmental Health. She currently serves on the Board of Directors for the American Nutrition Association and is President of the American College of Nutrition.  In this episode, Dhru and Dr. Minich dive into (audio version / Apple Subscriber version): The Crucial Role Melatonin Plays In the Body (00:00:33 / 00:00:33) Early Warning Signs That Your Melatonin Is Low (2:22 / 2:22) Melatonin Production and The Circadian System (9:35 / 6:15) Brain Health and Preventing Alzheimer’s (13:06 / 9:46) Lifestyle Habits That Disrupt Melatonin and Corrective Measures (17:34 / 14:14) Melatonin Supplements and Synthetic Production and Testing (29:16 / 24:15) The Research: What We Know (38:00 / 33:00) How Melatonin Is Made (43:00 / 38:00) Who Should and Should Not Take Melatonin (50:41 / 45:40) The Rebound Effect (1:02:00 / 57:00)  Melatonin As a Routine Supplement (1:06:30 / 1:01:30) Personalization For Your Phenotype (1:10:50 / 1:05:50) *Dr. Minich’s note about the animal study mentioned: Seasonal breeders, like mice, use changing light and melatonin to regulate reproduction. In animals living in cold climates like Canada, breeding is timed with daylight changes to avoid winter births when conditions are harsh. Humans, however, are not seasonal breeders and can reproduce year-round. If melatonin caused infertility in humans, it would be widespread, which it is not. Melatonin helps counteract infertility caused by environmental toxins due to its anti-inflammatory and antioxidant effects. Also mentioned in this episode: Herbatonin To learn more about Dr. Minich, follow her on Instagram, Twitter, or her website. This episode is brought to you by Bon Charge, Lifeforce, and Lumebox.  Right now, BON CHARGE is offering my community 15% off; just go to boncharge.com/DHRU and use coupon code DHRU to save 15%. Right now, you can save $250 on your first diagnostic and get personalized suggestions. Optimize your longevity and track your progress; go to mylifeforce.com/dhru!  Lumebox is offering my community $260 off their FDA-registered portable Red Light device! That's over 50% off! Go to thelumebox.com/dhru and get your Red Light device. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Dr. Deanna Minick, today you're here to talk about one of the most important hormones, neurotransmitters, and antioxidants in the body. In fact, some may call it the holy grail multitasker inside the body that plays a crucial and incredibly important role in helping to prevent early aging to increase longevity and even reduce our risk of dementia and Alzheimer's. What is this holy grail of multitasking in the body, and why does it matter? We're talking about melatonin, one of my favorite molecules ever, and I feel that melatonin has been misunderstood.

There are so many myths and misperceptions circulating, whether on social media, on blogs. So I want to set the record straight in this podcast on all things, melatonin. I want us to think critically about its functions. It's got six different functions. You've already named some of them. Yes, it's anti-inflammatory. Yes, it's an antioxidant, but it's very unique in its antioxidant properties. It's not like vitamin C. It's not even like vitamin E. And it can even stimulate things like glutathione levels in the body. So it's very unique. The other thing is that it's a, I call it a circadian nutrient, which means that we need it for our circadian system.

Many people think about darkness and releasing pineal melatonin, but we actually need melatonin to set our rhythm straight. And melatonin does that with vitamin D and even polyphenols that we take in through our diet. And of course, one of the other aspects of melatonin is that it connects to the mitochondria. In fact, I was having a convales that. I was having a conversation with Dr. Terry Walls about the mitochondria and melatonin because I love melatonin. She loves the mitochondria and the two go hand in hand. So lots of different functions of melatonin. And I think that one of the first myths is that it's just a hormone. It is not just a hormone. It doesn't work like other hormones. And it's been pigeonholed into that role. Well, before we go further into myths and

tackle all that. Our audience often is asking, what are some of the earliest warning signs that you're not producing or absorbing enough melatonin in your body? Well, the first one, if we think of the mitochondria would be fatigue, mitochondrial dysfunction. Just think of how many conditions are related to mitochondrial health. So we think of autoimmune diseases like multiple sclerosis or any number of different aspects, even toxicity. So if somebody has a high toxic load, chances are they could be imbalanced in melatonin, believe it or not. The other signs would be accelerated aging, like early graying of hair or even skin changes because we know that melatonin primes the mitochondria to deal with free radicals, and we know that aging is about the rancidity in our body, right? We're kind of rusting with time,

so to speak. So if we have accelerated aging and even diseases of accelerated aging like type 2 diabetes, we might be low in melatonin. The other thing that relates to melatonin is quite simply our stress level. Because melatonin does connect to other hormones like cortisol and sex steroids like testosterone, high stress levels in the body impair our body's ability to make melatonin. And then quite simply, age. So as children, children produce the most amount of melatonin endogenously. But then when they hit puberty, it starts to go down sequentially decade by decade. So by the time you hit the 50s like me, you're starting to bottom out. And coincidentally, what you see is the rise of many different chronic diseases that align with increased age.

So I think as a matter of course, people need to be attentive to their melatonin levels. And if you're spending a lot of time in artificial light at night and women will be more sensitive to this than men and people with light colored eyes will be more sensitive, your melatonin is also probably low. Now, the biggest thing that most people think about is immune health. And in fact, I didn't even start hearing a lot about melatonin until we started to hear about COVID and then we started to hear more about the immune system. Different aspects of the immune system make and interrelate with melatonin. So if you're somebody who continues to get recurring immune issues,

you might actually have low melatonin. So that's a short list. If you, I mean, there's so much more. Gut issues. If you have a gene deletion of glutathione, you probably need more melaton. If you have difficulty with things like the time changes or seasonal rhythms, you probably have an issue with melatonin. Now, the obvious one that I didn't say, because it's one that most people think of, is that if you have an issue with sleep, then most likely you have an issue with melatonin. And that's true too. If you are doing shift work where you have flip-flopped your day and night rhythm, chances are you have an imbalance of melatonin, blood sugar imbalances. I mean, you name it.

Because melatonin serves so many functions, it is across the board implicated in so many different symptoms. Well, we're learning firsthand how important this master multitasker is. And we're going to talk about how to check your levels if it's possible. We're going to talk about how to correct it and all the different things you can do and whether diet makes a difference in it. But let's start off first with the basics. Because I find that when you understand the basics, you're a lot of. more educated on understanding how to prioritize this in your life if it's something that you need. So I called melatonin, a neurotransmitter, I called it a hormone, I called it an antioxidant.

How is it all of those things and how is it produced in the body? There are two methods of production. One is through the pineal gland and that comes through the signal of darkness. So our eyes, when they register dark and the absence of blue light, it signals the superkhyasmatic nucleus in the brain to then signal the pineal gland to produce melatonin. That melatonin travels throughout the body systemically to key into clock genes within the cells in order to best synchronize our body rhythms. Like this is basically like a symphony. It gets the orchestra within all the different cells in alignment with circadian rhythm. And this has now become

known, at least in my mind, as the circadian system, and there's even a circadian syndrome for people who do not have proper alignment. So that's the first kind of melatonin. And that's the one everybody thinks about, right? And it's really the smallest percentage of melatonin that we create in the body. The other type of melatonin that we create is in every cell of the body that would have a mitochondrian. So one of the largest organs that produces the most amount of melatonin is actually the gut. The gut produces something on the order of 100 to 400 times the level that the pineal gland produces. And that is not happening in response to darkness. That can be happening in response to the things that we eat or don't eat or even to the normal daily rhythm. So I think when people are

reacting to melatonin, they're just thinking of it as something from what we would produce from the pineal gland, something as it relates to sleep. But that's like the tippy top of melatonin. Underneath that, there's so much about all of the different cells and where we see it produced. And perhaps I'd just give a quick list of some of those organs, Drew, because there are so many parts of the body that produce melatonin, right? So we have the brain, and we're going to talk about the brain, and it's kind of its neurotrophic factor and how it helps the brain to release toxins at night. So the brain, the eye, obviously, the skin. And in fact, one of the myths of melatonin is, oh, I can just make enough melatonin from my skin.

Well, you can, but remember that we have the kind of melatonin that is produced locally and works locally. And then we have the kind from the pineal gland that is produced there and work system. systemically, very different kinds. The liver, the kidney, the thymus, all of the different many, like even natural killer cells respond and connect into melatonin. One of the things that I just posted in my Facebook group is that breast milk contains melatonin. So if a woman is feeding her infant at night, when her melatonin will be higher, then her infant will be getting more melatonin from the breast milk, but you do not find melatonin in infant formulas. And then otherwise, I mean, all the other body fluids. I mean, it's, it would be, I would be hard pressed to give you an

organ or a cell type where you do not find melatonin. You know, you mentioned it briefly. So I just want to touch on it as we will continue on in a second. Brain health and Alzheimer's disease and cognitive decline. Connect the dots for us. If melatonin is super crucial, how does it help us prevent or at least avoid, if we can, knock on wood, the diagnosis of some of these chronic conditions. Yeah. Well, I think one of the most intriguing aspects about melatonin, well, you named a couple of them that would be important for the brain. So first of all, the brain detoxifies during sleep. There is more and more information about that. And in fact, there's a great scientific article by Dr. Russell Ryder, and it's called brain washing. And he talks about melatonin. He talks about the glymphatic fluid exchange. So here's what happened when we sleep. When we sleep, we give our brain the opportunity to create convection. So around the glial cells, we have lymphatic fluid. And that is called glymphatic fluid. So when we're sleeping or under anesthesia, we actually produce more exchange from the brain, a lot of those toxic amympathic fluid. And that is called glymphatic fluid. So when we're sleeping or under anesthesia, we actually we actually produce

more exchange from the brain, a lot of those toxic amyloid peptides or different proteins that we want to just clear, that is done at night during different phases of sleep. And it seems as though what we could see based on some research is that melatonin is helping in that process. So just think of it. If we can keep our brain more primed and more clean at night, because coincidentally, the greatest peak of pineal melatonin is between 2 and 4 a.m. Between 2 and 4 a.m. That's also when we see increases in other antioxidant systems. I mean, if you think of it, sleep is when we repair, and the brain is truly doing a lot of that repair work. So in addition to helping with the glymphatic fluid flux, another thing that melatonin can do is that it's neural protective. It is

seen as having nerve growth factor properties. And that's a big deal when we are talking about cognitive health, brain health, keeping our brain plastic in a good sense. Right. So what that means is helping with neuronal differentiation, proliferation, survival, helping with mood states as a result of this, helping with the immune brain complex. So I would say, and also the obvious of it being anti-inflammatory. I think we need to see that as a very important feature because as Dr. Jeff Blan talked about many years ago, brain health issues, whether we look at neurodegeneration or Alzheimer's disease, what we're talking about there is brain on fire. Many people don't think about the brain getting sick as an organ, but it can get inflamed. It can be rancid with reactive oxygen

species. And because it's lipid rich, you know, it's fatty. Our brains are fat. So you need an antioxidant that can deal with a lot of that oxidative stress that can be in a lipid-soluble matrix. And melatonin, this is one of the features I want everybody to remember. It's fat-soluble and water-soluble. And it's unique. There's a name for that. It's called amphiphilic when you can do both. Vitamin C, water-soluble.

Vitamin E, fat-soluble. Melatonin, water and fat-soluble. So it can go to a lot of different portions of our bodies. So it can definitely cross the blood-brain barrier. And in fact, there was some preclinical work showing that melatonin can help to decrease the permeability of the blood brain barrier and preserve that integrity, right? So so many things. I mean, it also helps with blood sugar balance. And we know that type 3 diabetes is connected to things like cognitive impairment.

So if we know that melatonin helps to improve blood sugar, we're also changing it from that perspective. So I think, Drew, there are actually a number of different mechanisms. It's not just one thing. But because melatonin can hit on a number of cylinders, it's amplified in terms of helping with brain and nerve health. You know, you've mentioned so many important things. And it's very clear that our bodies have evolved to really prioritize melatonin for a lot of different reasons. What the heck is going on in our modern lifestyle? If you had to say one, two, and three, at least that we know of, that is leading to many people being greatly diminished

in their ability to make and use melatonin inside the body. So are there any lifestyle factors that are harming our ability? And if there are, can you rank them in order? Well, I would say artificial light at night is number one in my minds, my mind. I mean, just, it's called A-Land, right? Artificial light at night. This is the biggest, most societally accepted endocrine disruptor, I think, on our planet, and it only continues to increase. And in fact, it's not even looked at as a bad thing. You know, we know plastics are bad. We know toxic metals are bad. But we don't actually see being on our phone scrolling at night as bad. And we don't really see being on our computer at night as bad. What if we go to a sporting event with artificial lighting at night or we go to the gym with artificial light or we're in a grocery store with artificial light?

I don't think that most people understand the importance of that because if we look ancestrally, we would have had higher melatonin because we were living in sync with nature. Right. So before electric lighting, we were exposed to bright light during the day. And especially that bright morning light is important for the next night. of melatonin. So we need to remember that it's not just darkness, but also light that is important. And many people when they wake up, they're in their homes. You know, maybe they're not even leaving their homes. So they're kind of in this shrouded, darkish kind of environment, right? So I think that's number one, Drew, artificial light at night. I think it's huge. The other thing

that I think has tremendously impacted melatonin is our stress level. So when we're we are stressed, it changes our hormone cascade. And in fact, one of the things that happens is that we need more energy when we're stressed. So the way that our body gets melatonin is we get it from an amino acid called triptophan. So triptophan, 95% of it is going down a pathway that gives more energy and energy cofactors like NAD. Some of your listeners may have heard of NAD. Only 5% is going to serotonin and then onto melatonin. So we have to be eating tryptophan in order to get the precursor to allow us to even make the melatonin, which is why protein is so important, right? So when we're stressed, we kind of hijacked this pathway and we start to have less

tryptophan left over for melatonin, and we're shunting more of that over to getting energy. So I think that's part of our everyday culture and how we're living. And then I would say in terms of, gosh, you know, like a third factor you're asking, I just think we live lives of lots of like oxidative stress. And what I mean by that is that that is a bucket for so many things. That means that, you know, we're eating lots of, I would say, processed foods that aren't nutrient-dense. we're not sleeping enough, we're not exercising enough. All of this goes in the bucket of not having a healthy redox balance within the cell.

And our ability to age and age well is determined by that redox ability. So in other words, it's kind of like cleaning up in the cell when you can get rid of a lot of those radical species. And some of us have very fit mitochondria, and we can get rid of those quickly. We have sufficient melatonin. but others of us, we can't get ahead of the curve. So we keep eating poorly. We're sleeping poorly.

We're not active so we don't increase mitochondria in our muscle. So essentially, it just becomes like a tsunami where we cannot get ahead of this free radical curve. And so that's from a lot of different things, Drew. But I do think, number one, the artificial light at night. Number two, the high mentally emotional stress of modern living. And number three, all the things that create oxidative stress. And for everybody that might be a little bit different, some people smoke, some people don't, you know, you kind of have to weigh what it is that's causing the stress in your life.

So if those are the top things that are taxing our ability to create our body's own natural melatonin and use it appropriately over the years especially, are there foods, drinks, or supplements, obviously we're all aware of there are melatonin supplements that are out there that can help us correct that. And we'll be diving deeper into this, but I like to give at least some gems at the beginning of the conversation because I know that's what people are asking themselves right now. Yeah, and you see it on social media. You see, oh, you know, have a handful of pistaches before you go to bed so you can get enough melatonin or drink tart cherry juice so that you get enough melatonin.

I love the question because my training is in nutrition science. So I always think, like, let's go to food first and try to figure it out. So first and foremost, as I just mentioned, we need try to phyptophan. Triptophan is the precursor, even for the pineal gland, to create melatonin. So you definitely want to have enough protein in your daily diet. And there's so much talk about that just on social media, right? I mean, most people know that. and dietary protein intake requirements are being reevaluated, whether, you know, higher amounts at certain

times of life. So I just want to start there because I think protein is important. It's a precursor to us getting and making melatonin. So there's that. The other thing about food, can certain foods be important for giving us melatonin? And I get that question a lot. So, and I was really interested in it because there are some, you know, we hear some rumblings about, oh, yeah, you know, the cherries, the walnuts, the dairy, the seeds, nuts of various types, even coffee containing melatonin. So what foods? You know, the thing about melatonin is that none of those foods are just isolated sources of melatonin.

So we can't really say that tart cherries is because it contains a little bit of melatonin. that it is going to fuel your body's melatonin. Well, but I would say tart cherries are great because they're high in polyphenols. They're high in vitamin C. They're high in fiber. So they've got a lot of other things that are going to increase your antioxidant status, which can then translate into helping your body's melatonin level. But I don't think that the minute amounts that we see in food is enough.

And also, it's just not standardized. Just to go back to cherries again, I actually did this calculation. I went into the literature. I looked up the articles where they measured melatonin and cherries, and there were many different kinds of cherries, and there was a range for how much melatonin. And then I calculated how many cherries would you need to eat in order to get just your basic physiological dose of melatonin that most adults need, like 0.3 milligrams. So let me just 0.3 milligrams. Again, we're not talking double digits. We're talking a physiological

dose. And when I did the calculation, I got something on the order of 2,700 cherries, fresh cherries, not dried or juice, fresh cherries in order to give you melatonin at that level. So I would never say to discourage anybody from having cherries, pistachios, nuts, seeds of various types, different fruits. But I don't think that it can give us the melatonin that we're lacking in our modern society and what we need for successful aging. Just so that we could touch on this for a second, you know, one of the funniest means on this topic of melatonin over the years, which will set us up a little bit in terms of what supplements and what's the best quality, et cetera. I don't know if you ever seen this before, but this is something that a lot

of Jen Zier's have shared. There's a funny view, and it basically shows my dreams after taking Walmart melatonin. And there's a bunch of these that are out there, but it's like, they're all memes showing that like, oh my gosh, like when you get melatonin from Walmart or one of these big box stores, you have like the craziest dreams and you like trip out and other stuff. How have you seen that before? And is there any truth to that? Well, I can't speak to that store brand.

But I have heard that melatonin supplements can help people to have more vivid dreams. In fact, we should talk about some of the effects that people do have. That is one. And you could say, is that because people are spending a more significant time in the dream state and in certain sleep phases? You know, I can't tell you the number of people. Just to make one comment on that. Yeah. I think the implication from that meme, because I've seen it before,

was like there's like low quality melatonin and there's like higher quality melatonin. So I think they were saying like when you get it from a low quality source, you feel like you're kind of acid in your dreams. So that's where I was coming from. Okay. Well, you know, when it comes to like wonky dreams and just kind of feeling off from taking a melatonin supplement, I mean, there's so much in the way of looking at the quality. And, you know, 99% of the melatonin supplements on the market are synthetically produced. And that's not necessarily a bad thing, but there is a lot about how it's produced. And if you start to look at the process, you can see that there are many different steps

that involve different chemicals of different types. And there are at least one or two papers that talk about 13 potential contaminants in synthetically produced melatonin. So different kinds of types of. triptophan residues, different kinds of thalomide residues. So I don't know. I mean, is the effect that somebody is getting from a melatonin supplement because of some adulterant that could be in that melatonin? It's a possibility. You know, I think it's really important to be looking at the source of melatonin. One of the things after I started getting into melatonin, I was approached by

some other people that were telling me about their interest in creating bioengineered melatonin from microorganisms, right? So if we look back at the history of like, how is melatonin isolated? And I think this is really interesting because the person who actually identified melatonin and called it melatonin was a dermatologist. This was back in 1958. Aaron Lerner was a dermatologist at Yale. And he thought that melatonin was a skin lightning agent. agent. And so he started to do research, but then soon found that it was not doing that. So fast forward, if we start to look at kind of the evolution of melatonin research, then there was some interest for its antioxidant and other properties. The pineal gland became much more, I would say, in the 1960s,

1970s, much more in the way of pineal gland research. So what they started to do was to isolate the pineal gland of animals, and then that became a source of supplemental melatonin. Now, you can imagine that that's not very feasible or practical, and it would take a lot of pineal glands from animals in order to produce that, and then you have the threat of prions or viruses or whatever else. So then came in this commercial process of creating synthetically produced cheap melatonin. So if people are buying melatonin and they're not looking under the hood at the quality, you do run the risk of other things being in there. And you know, Drew, one of the other things that I often say to people is that look at what else is in that

melatonin supplement because many times there are other things in it, like herbs or different things for sleep, that will actually change the metabolism of melatonin. And so that could change dream state as well. So if we understand that diet does not make that much of a difference, to our melatonin levels. It makes some, but it doesn't make that much of a difference that's out there. And yet there are still many reasons why we should have a whole food diet and a ton of vegetables and fruits and different things like that and healthy protein, as you mentioned. The two-part question that I have is, is it worthwhile?

And is there a way to check your levels of melatonin? And number two, if there's not an objective way to do it, and it's more, you know, just checking out on your symptoms or what you feel like you're maybe lacking, is it worthwhile to introduce a high-quality supplement to fill the gap? Let's first talk about testing. Like, how do you actually know that you have enough melatonin? So there are the subjective symptoms, kind of what we've already clipped through of like, are you stressed?

Are you fatigued? Are you having signs of aging? Are you of a certain age? do you have certain chronic diseases? All of those things, I think, are really important. then I think if we look at laboratory testing, there are three different kinds. There is saliva, there's urine, there's blood. The most common one is urine. And when you're looking at the urine measurement, it's basically giving you an assessment

of how you metabolized your nightly melatonin. That would be nice. We all like numbers, but there are pros and cons to that test. And if you ask practitioners who understand a bit about melatonin, they kind of see both sides as well. And sometimes it's not always worth running that test because there can be a lot of change in that melatonin level. That melatonin level could change just based on one night. Let's say that somebody had a lot of light exposure when they were, before they were going to bed. So they changed their rhythm of melatonin. Maybe they have different liver pathways related to melatonin

metabolism. So then you see a difference in that. So, you know, there are urine tests out there. I think that they're pretty common. And where I have seen them before is within a context of looking at cortisol, things like estradiol, testosterone. I think it's kind of nice to look at melatonin vis-a-vis the other hormones. But I wouldn't go on laboratory testing, specifically looking at urine or some of these measures, because quite honestly, it's very transient. in the blood, and what you're seeing in the urine anyway is only a metabolite. You're not really seeing the peak that you would get at night between two and four. And Drew, as I mentioned, you actually have two different categories of melatonin. You have pineal melatonin, and then you have

cellular melatonin. It's very difficult to measure intracellular melatonin. And after talking with many experts who do melatonin research, who are not clinicians, they say that the best way to actually get a read on pineal melatonin is to take a sample of the cerebral spinal fluid, which no one is going to do. So all of which to say, I think that we have to just think about the other factors relating to melatonin status. You know, I think that one of the biggest misconceptions out there as it relates to melatonin supplements is that people get concerned that if they take melatonin, that it will stop their body from making melatonin. Have you heard that? I have. I've heard that in a list of a few other ones that are out there too that I'd love to ask you about. But yes, I have heard that.

So this is where I think, you know, it's so important to think about dose. So just to first kind of address that question, because I think it's really important. Otherwise, people would just tune me out talking about supplemental melatonin without answering that question. First and foremost, does taking supplemental melatonin result in decreased melatonin in the body, production by the pineal gland? And the answer is based on different research studies. And this has actually been researched in like three to five different published papers over the years. And basically, there is no indication that that happens. I've also talked with, again, researchers in this field like Dr. Russell Ryder, who has written thousands of articles on melatonin.

I mean, he's like, if Jeff Bland is the father of functional medicine, Dr. Russell Ryder is the father of melatonin. And what he says is that there's no indication of that whatsoever. If you look at a lot of the studies, even when they give it to people with cancer, there's no indication that you're changing endogenous melatonin levels. In fact, you might actually help your body's production of melatonin by taking melatonin. That is something that I have learned from one of the researchers that I've talked with, Dr. Tan. So there's that. I do think that when we think about the dose, I think some people have gone through both levels of the

spectrum. So there are people who take more of the conservative physiological dose, like 0.3 milligrams. That's kind of what we see in the literature. There are a number of studies on 0.3 milligrams. That kind of like fills the gap of what we miss as an adult. But then in many cases, that can go up to as high as 10 milligrams. But then I see like this whole number of people kind of talking separately about taking double-digit milligrams of melatonin over a long period of time. And I don't think that for the average population, that there's good data to suggest that that's a good thing to do. You know, you brought up top myths that are there. And one of the ones he talked about is that if you take melatonin, are you going to stifle your body's ability to make melatonin? I'd love to go through a few other top myths. One that I've heard that was floating.

around there just because the podcast is so big and influential, there was a reference on the Joe Rogan podcast. I believe it was by Andrew Huberman saying that he is unsure about some of the components. Hats off to Andrew Humein. I'm a big fan of his. He was saying he's unsure. So he wasn't making a definitive statement, but that there was some mice studies about melatonin being fed to mice or given to mice supplementally. and the shrinking of testicles. I don't know if you ever heard about this before,

but this was one that a lot of my friends started texting me afterwards. They were like, you know, are our testicles going to shrink because we're taking supplemental melatonin? Well, first I would ask Dr. Huberman and even the thinking on that, you know, what is the mechanism of action?

Like, how would that even happen? What we know is that actually melatonin is helpful for reproductive health. It's helpful for ovarian health and fertility, it's helpful for sperm. And so if you look at testosterone, if we just look at that, because there was an earlier study that wasn't very clear about what happened with testosterone levels. But then to the best of my recollection, there was a follow-up in a human clinical trial.

There was no issue with testosterone. I mean, goodness, if we, I would say just the opposite. If we don't have enough melatonin, we may have some issues with testicles. And that's just because we do see an issue of low melatonin status with aging and what happens with aging. We start to get atrophy. We get atrophy of the brain and shrinkage of a number of organs. So I would say, you know, best to really think through that more mechanistically. And again, what was the dose that they were giving the mice?

Was it intraperitoneally? Was it, you know, we have to look at all those things, right? And because in mouse studies, the construct is usually very different than we would be giving in a human clinical trial. So we need to take everything within context. I'd love to actually send you the paper, just like we've been chatting back and forth on a few other papers and to get your take on it. Because I know there was a lot of other things they were looking at in the study. And I don't have the background, the PhD like you do to be able to interpret a study. So I'll send it over to you and we'll get your thoughts and we'll include it in the show notes.

and maybe even report a little something that we can splice in. Well, on that note, I want to ask you, what are some of the other top myths that you've heard about taking melatonin that you want to take an opportunity to address on this podcast? The biggest one is really, you know, can you get enough from food, which I do think that we addressed. You know, the biggest ones would be, can I get it from food? If I take it, will my body stop making it? And the third one is that children should be taking melatonin to go to sleep. Now, that is one I'm on the other side of the fence on.

I think that if we look at gummies, right, one of the biggest things about melatonin and what happened during the pandemic was people had sleep disturbance. They were at home. They were on Zoom more. They had a lot more artificial light at night exposure. And I think that melatonin, if you look at the melatonin sales, there was an uptick in those. So then, you know, with people giving melatonin to kids, trying to get them to bed at night. So I think that one of the other myths is that children need melatonin for sleep.

I actually think, based on what we know about the physiology of children in their melatonin production, they tend to produce the highest amount of melatonin. They will produce the most amount of melatonin. They will their whole lives, right? So unless they have a condition like ADHD or autistic spectrum disorder where there could be some imbalance in that in melatonin levels. But for the most part, kids are going to be producing high amounts of melatonin. And so maybe that's why some of them sleep so well. Like some of them sleep for like, you know, 10 to 11 hours, right?

I don't know. But I think a myth is that kids need melatonin to sleep. I don't necessarily think that the average child needs melatonin. In fact, I think we need to look at sleep hygiene. We need to get kids off their phones earlier. We need to look at their physical activity. We need to be looking at their sleeping room and making sure that, you know, it's non-toxic, that it's dark enough. And so I think that that is one of the other misperceptions.

Since we're on this topic of supplemental melatonin, Do you want to talk a little bit more about how there are different sources that a company or a lab could use to actually create melatonin? I didn't know about this until your work and another friend in this space where actually plants make melatonin too. And so you can get it synthetically, which is created in the lab from different raw materials. or you can extract melatonin from plant compounds. Well, you know that I love plants. I mean, even before melatonin, I mean, all of my work has been on plants, which is why you interviewed me about spices and dietary diversity.

I mean, it's not that I'm into being vegan or vegetarian, but I do recognize that plants comprise 80% of the biomass on this planet. And they're smart. They have a lot of things that would be of benefit. So if you look at some of the literature on plants, And it's really fascinating because if you were to ask a plant scientist, what is melatonin? They would see it in a very different way. Plants do produce melatonin.

In fact, they don't have a pineal gland, but they still produce melatonin. And it's interwoven with the photosynthetic process. So it helps the plan to actually make more phytochemicals, which we would want, especially things like glucosinolates, which are important for detoxification. So I got really jazzed looking at some of the literature on the use of melatonin in agriculture. So if we look at certain plants and their production of melatonin, yes, there are starting to be more plant-based melatonins on the market. A small amount, but they're kind of trickling on in there.

So one of them that I can talk about extensively is called herbotin. And herbotin comes from, it's melatonin. It's the same melatonin that we find in our bodies, but it's derived from the plant cell matrix, three different plants, alfalfa, chlorella, and rice. And what I love about it is that it's not just taking the isolated melatonin from the plant and then just isolating it into a white powder like you're going to find with many of the other kinds. it is in the complex of the plant. So when you look a little bit closer at the specification, what you see is that you get small amounts of nutrients.

You get things like carotenoids like lutein and ziazanthin, which could be really good for protecting the back of the eye from blue light, actually. It doesn't contain a lot of that, but it contains a number of other things. Like if you actually look at a capsule of erytonin, it's green. and so it contains that plant matter, and there was a study on it. So that study was published in the molecule's journal. And what they did, what these researchers did was they had a series of different assays where they took the erbotonin compared to the synthetically produced melatonin, just side by side, is one better than the other or not.

And what they found, this is really fascinating, that the erbotonin had 646% percent greater anti-inflammatory activity. So again, that's like six times greater in its anti-inflammatory potential. And then when you look at free radical scavenging, you know, back to that oxidative stress, what they showed using a specific model of looking at the percent scavenging is that there was up to a 470 percent greater free radical scavenging with the erbotonin versus synthetic melatonin. And then there was a skin cell line. You know, the skin is very vulnerable. to oxidative damage. And the erbotonin outperformed the synthetic melatonin by 100%. So all in all, if you look at erbotonin, and erytonin comes in two doses, 0.3, which is again, that physiological

dose, again, filling the gap as we get older. But then there's also a three milligram dose, which I use if I'm going to be traveling or if I'm not feeling well or, you know, just feeling sick or having an immune dysregulation kind of an issue. So those two doses, if you think about it, they're actually a bit amplified from those dose amounts, right? Because their activity has been shown to be between four to six times greater in these cell models. So when you're thinking about erbotonin, it's great because it's like a value add. You're getting the melatonin, how the plant had had it within its cell matrix. So that really resonates with me because I'm a Whole Foods kind of person. I'm a whole plant kind of person whenever possible.

And it's a very novel position to have a melatonin that you could consider more of a Whole Foods approach to melatonin, right? So, and it's, again, you'll see the doses are standardized. So they're not wavering based on the different plant amounts like we would find with food. So I love urbitonin for that reason. That is definitely what I use. I knew about urbitonin before I met you, but I got even more excited after chatting with you just over the years, just our friendship. I have no affiliation with the company. I'm always happy to recommend products that are out there that I use that other people use that they're fans of. If people listening feel excited about it, they want to check it out, where would they go to check out herbotone?

they could go to symphony natural health.com. So symphony natural health is the company that makes erbitonin. I am their chief science officer and I oversee their science. I make sure that, you know, we're putting out more and more interesting science about melatonin and a number of their other products. But yeah, this is something I am so passionate about melatonin. And I would say, you know, symphony aside, they have given me the reason to go into the literature. we published a paper. I've had the opportunity to interview experts and look deeper. And I really feel

like there is so much to be gained. My family just considers me like this melatonin advocate because it's like something I'd want to talk with everybody about. You know, even, you know, maybe we can talk about some of the other aspects for melatonin levels. Like, you know, just looking at monthly cycles, looking at eye color. I mean, I just learned so much more about melatonin. the deeper I go. And then it becomes even more intriguing to me. And, you know, just even recently, you know, you're part of one of my Facebook groups. I just stumbled across a paper and it was on hair growth and regeneration with melatonin. So like this is just me. I'm in the world of like monitoring the science of melatonin, really getting to know it, talking with people who have researched it,

their whole lives. And it's one of those things like where I am bullish about adhering to to my own supplemental taking of melatonin for all these various reasons. And maybe before we go into some of those things, we'd love to ask some clarifying questions. You know, is melatonin one of those supplements that you regard as, you know, generally safe for most people and that at the maintenance dosages that we'll talk about here in a second, that it's not typically something that people have to review with their practitioner, although everybody should always talk about their own individual health needs with their practitioner and all the legalities around that. But, you know, people are thinking, like, is this something that I can safely take on my own? Do I have to be checking with my doctor?

Especially, you know, you don't need a prescription for melatonin. You can get it over the counter. If you're using it at these 0.3 milligrams, right? Point 3 milligrams? Yeah, you got it. Yeah, 0.3 milligrams dosage for like the daily use that's there. And then if you use it at three grams, let's say, you know, jet lag or you're not feeling really well. You need a little bit more of a boost that night because you feel like you're coming down with something. These are generally things that people can take on their own without checking in with their practitioner. Well, the only thing I'm going to say is that melatonin is known to interact with medications. So, Drew, if we go back to thinking about how melatonin works, it can help with inflammation,

antioxidant status. It can lower blood sugar. It can lower blood pressure. So if you're people are taking a something that they have diabetes. They're taking a hypoglycemic agent. They're taking metformin or they're taking something to monitor their blood sugar. Yes, there could be a further lowering with melatonin. So they need to be aware of that. What about certain immune agents? Well, we know that melatonin interacts with the immune system. So it would be worthwhile to check that out with your practitioner, if you are taking certain immune kind of drugs to compromise your immune system to bring it down and suppress it because melatonin is going to be working with these different body systems and can, in fact, interact with some of these different drugs. So yes, for the most part,

you're going to hear that melatonin is safe, especially at physiological doses. But if people are on medications, I do want them to check out their daily taking of melatonin. And it's not because the melatonin's not safe, but because it can actually make their drugs, you know, just different in terms of activity. It may help to reduce the levels of certain medications that they're already taking. So I think people need to be aware of that, that if they're taking an anti-inflammatory, because it's an anti-inflammatory, they may need less, or they may need to adjust. the dose. So I hope that that makes sense that this does need to be personalized. Melatonin on the whole is safe unless it's a supplement that has contaminants and is not a well formulated supplement.

But for the most part, melatonin as a molecule is safe. But if we're taking certain amounts, we should really, we should apprise our practitioner that we are taking it and just check in with them about different medications if we're on them. Yeah, that's great advice. And obviously you already shared your disclaimer when it comes to kids and so many kids are out there on gummy especially gummy forms of melatonin that have you know that are just addictive in nature like you know who doesn't want sugar especially a kid right before bed right like you know are they taking it because of sleep maybe the parents are giving it to them for sleep but kids are just they'll take any shot that they can for sugar so that's a whole other thing that people really should be pulling back from

It's true. And trying to find other solutions and go more upstream, devices, hygiene, light exposure, other things. You know, your kids should be falling asleep and staying asleep well, especially after a certain age group. If they're not, it's worthwhile to figure out what is actually going on, not just throw something like melatonin on top of it, especially for kids. Agree. The other question that I had was, in your instance, again, this isn't medical advice. You're just talking about yourself.

If you do feel like my life was feeling a little rundown today. You know her well, Yasmin. And she was thinking, you know, what should I take? I feel like I'm a little bit. I feel like I'm coming down with something. She didn't sleep the best the last couple nights. In that instance, if you were feeling that way, would melatonin be something that you take? And the question that I would have, you know, we have an herbotone at home, is that something that she should take during the day?

or is there any fear that that would make her further, you know, drowsy or sleepy? That's there. Any thoughts on that? First of all, let's answer the question of if you feel like you're coming down with something, should you be taking melatonin? I would say yes. In fact, I just had the opportunity to interview a medical doctor who treated 10,000 people with COVID using melatonin.

And when I listen to him talk about the immune benefits and all of the people and their quick turnaround from having an infection or a virus. We know that melatonin can help with a number of different viral infections. Yes, prophylactically, preventatively, be thinking about melatonin. And of course, other things too. Like I would be thinking about vitamin C, which works really well with melatonin for Yasmin and potentially even lycine, which is helpful for viruses and viral replication. It's also good for just even our collagen. So I, I would be thinking absolutely melatonin. And in fact, that's how I also use it when I'm traveling, is I will take additional melatonin

with me, not just for the jet lag, but also to help me stay healthy from an immune perspective. So I've been talking, as I mentioned, with a number of these researchers. Dr. Reiter and some of the others, they have talked about taking melatonin during the day. And, you know, because if you think about it, we are very metabolically active during the day. We think of our chronobiology. And so some people do like to take melatonin during the day. Now, the only thing I would caution there is that if people are taking it during the day as an antioxidant and to help with the mitochondrial levels, now we're not talking sleep here.

But if we're taking it during the day, some people might be prone to having a sleepy effect from it. So I know my husband, Mark, I mean, Mark will take it and he gets groggy. He gets groggy in the morning. So what I have had to do in order to coach him is I say, you know, you need to take melatonin earlier than just an hour before bedtime. Your personalized kinetics are showing that you are a slower metabolizer of melatonin. So for him, instead of one hour, I say three hours before bedtime. So we have a whole schedule of how he does that.

And he has played around with dose a little bit. And he actually takes two of the 0.3 months. milligrams of erbotonin, like the 0.6 works really well that hit the spot for him. So everybody kind of has to find their dose. You don't want to be sleepy during the day if you're one of those people that gets groggy. Now, me, on the other hand, I'm a fast metabolizer of melatonin. No problem with sleepiness. I can take three milligrams at 12 noon and continue to work and have no problem. So that really speaks to personalized kinetics. And so most people don't realize this, but the way we metabolize caffeine is how we metabolize melatonin.

So there is an enzyme, primarily a liver enzyme, but we find it throughout the body. It's called cytocrine 1A2. And some people have a gene variant in that, and it makes them slowly metabolize caffeine. Those are the people that get jittery if they have a cup of coffee at like 12 noon, and then they can't get to sleep that night. For other people, they're gene variant. makes them quickly metabolize melatonin and caffeine. So that's why if you take caffeine together with melatonin,

you're going to change the metabolism of melatonin because they're going to compete for that enzyme. This is probably more than people want to know, but it just shows the power of how we can change metabolism and how we truly need to personalize to our kinetics. So with Yasmin, you know, I would be asking her, are you going to be at home today? You know, maybe just start with a low dose of melatonin, a 0.3.

She doesn't feel sleepy. And if she's not feeling well, she probably needs some rest. So it may not be such a bad thing if she were to have a little bit of that sleepy effect that some people get from melatonin. That's where it's important to personalize. That's great. Also, another anecdote for my house. I have my mom on herbotone.

she was dealing with a little bit of sleep challenges and was using a synthetic melatonin. I said, you know, check out this herbotin. And she's like super hooked on the product. And I have some other family members too. And I had a few family members mentioned that, you know, I take herbotone, even like three or six milligrams occasionally if I'm having a hard time sleeping or jet lag. And in the morning, I would feel a little bit groggy. I said, okay, well, are you getting out and getting out?

getting that morning sun. Yes. Because everything that I've heard, that getting that morning sunlight is what tells your body to start dissipating from that free-floating melatonin that's still in the body. And like magic, it's worked pretty much every single time. What can you tell us about that for anybody who's out there who's like, ah, I don't want to take it melatonin, although, you know, I'm hearing about all these benefits because sometimes I feel groggy.

Is there any truth to that aspect of getting that morning sun? Yes, there is. There's good science on that. In fact, I just posted something on my Facebook page about that. Yeah, getting bright morning light will help to set the circadian rhythm. And it will help with your next night's production of melatonin. So what it does is when your retina, when your eyes see that bright light, it will then tell the super chasmatic nucleus and then tell the pineal gland to stop,

stop any production of melatonin. So it's a signal, it's a stop signal. And then cortisol starts to come up, right? Cortisol and testosterone are the morning hormones. And melatonin from the pineal gland is the hormone of darkness. So yes. And, you know, it was kind of interesting because I had some people comment on that post and there was saying like, oh, but it's cloudy where I live.

I live in Ireland or I live in the Pacific Northwest. And so, you know, it's cloudy when I'm waking up. And I say still, it's okay because you're still getting full spectrum light, right? And so that is that light, even though it may be lowered intensity, it's still helping the eyes to better signal to the brain that, okay, it's time to wake up. Then the metabolism of melatonin can be underway. Typically, when you're looking at like the life of melatonin, depending on the person, it's about five and a half to six hours. So for some people, who are slower metabolizers, they are going to run a little bit longer. So what I would say for those people as well, Drew, is not only the bright morning light, but also maybe bring down the melatonin dose a little bit or take it a few hours before bedtime, just like my husband, Mark.

Instead of one hour before bedtime, take it like two hours and experiment and see if that groggyness goes away or take it three hours before bedtime. because, again, there just might be that delayed type of metabolism that happens. You know, I was listening to your interview with Dr. David Perlmutter, a mutual friend of ours, where you guys were jamming out on melatonin. And one of the things that he brought up inside of there that he learned from you, which I'd love for you to talk about today, is something that he was calling, I believe, the rebound effect.

And that he was waking up, I believe, sometimes in the middle of night. Well, I'll have you explain it. And is that something at all that our audience needs to know about or sort of navigate if they're thinking about, you know, the use of melatonin? Yeah. Some people have explained that they get what they refer to as a paradoxical effect of melatonin supplements, meaning that instead of the melatonin putting them to sleep, it wakes them up in the middle of the night.

By the way, you know, melatonin supplements, if you look for sleep, it's more about getting you to sleep. Melatonin is not about staying asleep. I'll just say that in terms of the actual science of it. But for some people, they feel like all of a sudden, at 2 to 3 a.m., they're wide awake. And they're like, what just happened? Is that the melatonin or is there something else? You know, there can be a lot of different reasons for why we have that 2 to 3 a.m. wake-up call.

And for everybody, it might be a little bit different. But here's something to explore. Number one, is it the melatonin supplement that they have? Again, that can change the kinetics of melatonin. The good thing about erbotonin is that because it's in a plant matrix, it's in a slower release format. You know, it's not isolated where it's just going to quickly go into the body, be metabolized, and then run through and then you're done.

It's in this more complex matrix. So that is part of what accounts for a nice natural curve to the melatonin. The second thing, and I just had this insight not too long ago, Drew, so I did not mention to Dr. Perlmutter. But one of the other things that melatonin can do is it can lower blood sugar. What is one of the biggest reasons why people wake up at 2 a.m.? It's low blood sugar. And the way that you can tell that is for people wearing a continuous glucose monitor,

a CGM on their arm for like two weeks or so and you start tracking your sleep, you can start to see that your wake-up times are connected to low blood sugar. And at night, because the brain is so active and it uses a lot of glucose, this is where melatonin is actually changing a bit of the glucose and insulin kinetics in order to help the brain to potentially get more energy, right? So it might be that, especially for people who do extended fasting, where they are doing extended fast, let's just say three hours before bedtime, they take a melatonin. Now, melatonin is going to lead to the reduction potentially of their blood sugar even more.

So sometimes people just have that blood sugar awakening even without taking melatonin. So that is something to look at. And if people do have that, what I would say is look at taking your melatonin supplement with a little bit of fat or protein. And in fact, that should even help with the bioavailability of this supplement. because, again, melatonin flexes to being fat soluble and water soluble. So having a little bit of almond butter or whatever you can have that has a little bit of fat and protein might help to stabilize blood sugar a little bit more. You know, when listeners of this podcast hear different interviews,

they'll see that there are some supplements in the category of supplements. Could even be lifestyle things, but I'll stick to supplements, that have a lot of research and they tend to be universally recommended and re-recommended. And some of those that I'll put on there is our audience hears a lot about creatine and it being one of the most studied supplements that's out there. They hear about fish oil that's out there. They'll hear about high-quality multivitamin and some of the studies that are out there. And for a lot of people, even though everybody's familiar with melatonin, they're probably

getting a lot of new information here by listening to this podcast, which is why we're excited to have you on. Would you put in your sort of arsenal, because we know that people can only do so much that's there, and for everything you do, you usually stop something else or something else that's kind of crowded out, would you put melatonin in your top 10 of supplements that you would recommend? And obviously, supplements is a whole personalized conversation. People should be getting blood work, work with a practitioner, use a service like life force, or work with a functional medicine doctor. But would melatonin make your top 10 in terms of your recommendations? 100%. And the reason why is because me as a scientist, I think about mechanisms.

What molecules or compounds are hitting on multiple mechanisms? Like, I want a multitasking molecule. I want something that is going to give me many activities for one agent. And many plant compounds, many phytochemicals actually do that pretty well. So melatonin fits that bill, right? Because it is an amphiphilic antioxidant. It's an anti-inflammatory. It's a mitochondrial regulator. It's an immune modulator.

It is a neurotrophic or a neuroprotective agent. It's a chronobiotic. I mean, it's hitting on a number of cylinders for me. And because I think about chronic disease and the rising rates of neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, any number of different cognitive issues I'd be thinking about melatonin. I just think melatonin is good for aging. We produce less with age. And so I think, you know, it was very clever because I was on a different podcast. And Dr. Dickon Weatherby, he said, Deanna, it sounds like it's melaton.

Like, you know, we have menopause, andropause, we have perimenopause, we've got all these pauses, we do have melatonopause. And I think that it's very significant to be looking at melatonin and repleting our levels. You know, there's so much talk right now, Drew, about menopause, hormone replacement, therapy, MHT, BHRT, HRT, all of this. I mean, those are classic hormones in the sense of you know, they have a particular function in the body, right? We have declining ovaries and reduce production. So we want to bring in a bit of those hormones, right? And they're classic in terms of their function. Melatonin is a hormone in so much more. In fact, to me, I would say vitamin D and melatonin go hand in hand. And the reason I say that is because when you compare

vitamin D and it's many different effects. In fact, vitamin D is not really even just a vitamin, just like melatonin is not really even just a hormone. And both of them give so much in return. And we start to lose those levels with age. And in fact, just to toss this in real quick, the levels are related. There was one study in which they looked at vitamin D levels. And when vitamin D levels were corrected for that helped to correct melatonin levels and status. And they kind of track even seasonally. Like there was one really beautiful paper, and I'm sorry I don't remember the name of the author, but Yehuda Schoonfeld at Tel Aviv University does a lot of this work on autoimmunity and seasons.

And in one of the papers, they were talking about how vitamin D and melatonin actually tend to be very low at early spring. So, you know, it's just something we're always up against. Like, we need to be looking at the functions. You know, this is how a scientist thinks in terms of like mechanism of action. Like, what can I get mechanistically? Right. So I do think if we thought about our supplements as mechanisms, I would definitely be putting my chips on melatonin.

Deanna, what else? What other considerations around melatonin? uses, questions that you see, you know, as the chief science officer, I'm sure you see so many things where you find that either people are not using it correctly or it's a different question that maybe people aren't considering. Is there anything that we missed on that side when it comes to melatonin? Well, let me just give you a couple of tidbits that I think are of interest for your audience and they're about melatonin, but also just larger about our interface with the environment. Like one of them is eye color. Like, first of all, let me just to back up.

I think it's really important to personalize everything we do, supplements, activity, dietary protein, you name it. So one of the things that leads to personalization is our phenotype, not just our genotype, but our phenotype. So for people with light eyes, so light green, light blue, even light brown, but probably not like, I mean, your eyes are pretty dark. But people who have light colored irises will be more prone to the effects of melatonin suppression from artificial light at night.

In fact, there was even a study on this showing, like, I believe it was a 17% greater suppression of melatonin endogenous production, just with light eyes. So, you know, we didn't talk about it until now, but blue light blocking glasses, I think are important in a way for people to help to preserve their endogenous melatonin.

So, and they can also help with other things as well. So bringing in those blue light blocking glasses, This is good, especially if you have light-colored eyes. The other thing, oh, this is a good hack. I just thought of it now. There is an app that you can use to measure the amount of light in your environment. You know, most people don't really understand light and darkness. Like, until we measure it, we don't really understand its role and what we're exposed to.

So I use an app on my phone called light meter. You don't have to pay for it. I'm not, you know, a part of the company or anything, but I use it. And the small camera on your phone, you just would place it. You'd open up the app and then you can just run your phone where your eye would be to see exactly what you would be getting in terms of lux. And lux is a measure of light. So what you want to aim for in your bedroom or wherever you sleep is you want under one

lux at night in your sleeping room. Like, you need to have darkness. Most people have a darkness deficiency, and darkness is what creates the pineal melatonin. So that's one of my tips is make sure that you measure the light in your surroundings. And actually, back to your point, Drew, about light during the day. Like right now, as I'm talking to you, I sit in front of a window that faces outdoors. And as a result, I've actually measured my lux, and I'm getting like 4,400 lux, which is a high number. That's not as much as if I was outside where I'd probably be getting 10,000, but at least it's

something appreciable. Because if I was facing a wall, I've actually measured it and I would just be getting like 200 lux, which is not good because we want to enrich the eye with light during the day. So I think that the future of medicine and health is light photons, biophotons. And having that light exposure through the skin, through the eyes. I mean, we need to really be attentive to that. So light meter is an app, I think, is a good one. So when it's like three hours before bed, what you want to aim for is no more than 10 lux. And in the bedroom, like as you're going to bed, one lux. Now, I was having a conversation with Dr. Terry Walls about this. And for people with, let's just say, gait issues, stability issues, like if you have multiple sclerosis or, you know,

you've got to get up at night and use the restroom and you're kind of unstable. You know, you could just be kind of tired and sleepy and trip and fall. You know, if you have a night light, many times that'll just be enough for that one lock. So you'll just have to try out in your sleeping room, what will give you one locks? So that's not just my recommendation. That's like through literature and light exposure recommendations that have been given overall. And if you sink yourself with the light in the dark, then you're helping to preserve your melatonin a bit more. And then the final thing I'll mention that I think is of interest and I think it's kind of cool because I'm really getting into cycles, cycles and rhythms.

Like if I think of the menstrual cycle, the lunar cycle, the seasonal cycle, even your month of birth can play a role in the diseases that you get later in life. you know, it doesn't, it's not like a determinant 100%, but it can kind of predispose you. And in some ways it's thought that that could be because of the in utero vitamin D levels. I think for your birthday, August, you're okay. But for some of the other months, I think that there are some other susceptibilities. So just to kind of look at that for a second, full moons. Like if we just look at the lunar cycle and a full moon, really some interesting work on how, full moons can change melatonin levels.

And some people would say, well, is that because it's brighter outside so that, you know, the eyes are receiving more light and then you're producing less melatonin? But there was actually a study that was done in a sleep lab without the interference of the light and showed that for four days before and four days after a full moon, that you can see differences in melatonin levels, like a reduction. So some people may not sleep well around a full moon. that might be the time to take a three milligram dose of urbitonin, and to do that for a couple of days before the full moon and a couple of days after the full moon, and then to resume the lower dose.

And for women who are menstruating, there might be some issues with sleep as well where I know for me as a perimenopausal woman when I was having hot flashes and night sweats, that the supplemental melatonin was very helpful. Because one of the functions, I did not mention this, but melatonin, helps with the regulation of core body temperature. So you know that little dip of like around 9 or 10 p.m. You start to get a little chilled. It's kind of like, oh, it's bedtime.

Let me go put on my pajamas. That already starts that signal that's connected to melatonin, the dim light melatonin onset. So body temperature, especially as it starts to change in menopausal women, can be potentially helped by melatonin. So full moons, body temperature, I think that that's something that most people aren't aware of. And then I'll just, since I'm kind of a science and spirituality kind of person, you know me for that. I've also looked into the spirituality of melatonin.

And what's interesting is that people who meditate, now we're not talking like weekend meditators or like, you know, just, I'm just going to meditate for a couple of minutes, but I don't do it consistently. but we're talking like seasoned long-term meditators have higher levels of melatonin than people who do not meditate. Now, why is that? I don't know. I mean, is it stress? Is it better brain health, better any number of things? But there was a study on that. And then that kind of got me interested in, you know, just even the spirituality.

You know, Dr. Joe Dispenza talks about the pineal gland, right? the seat of the soul and how, you know, is there something more to the pineal gland in terms of our own spiritual health? Because what we know about the pineal gland is that it can calcify with age, right? It starts to get these tiny crystals. And, you know, Terry Walls and I were talking about that as well. And then you're impacting your melatonin levels. So levels of fluoride or, you know, more inflammation. This is all going to change that. little itty-bitty gland inside, you know, right snug in the middle of the head, basically. Right? So I just wanted to bring out kind of some areas of interest that don't often get talked

about. And I don't think I even talked about these with Dr. Perlmutter because my love and research of melatonin has deepened. And I really feel like it may even be a molecule of consciousness. Like, why is it that when we meditate? Why was there so much discussion in various religions about kind of like this part of the brain where people would meditate on that part of the brain. So Dr. Joe Dispenser would be a person to go to learn more about that. I know that he mentions that a bit in his work, which is inspiring. This has been great. And I'm just going to recap a couple of my top takeaways here.

And I'm always looking for how to provide my audience, especially at the end of the episode, with actionable things that already fit into the habit stacking things that they're already working on. So first and foremost, a reminder that we all think of melatonin as something that's a supplement that helps us fall asleep. And yes, that's part of the equation. But the first component and takeaway is it's so much more. It's truly this holy grail of multitasking inside of the body. It's a neurotransmitter. It's a hormone. It's one of the top antioxidants in the body. And because of how important it is, especially to our mitochondria, it plays a crucial role in all aspects of our health, especially anti-aging, longevity, dementia, which we talked about earlier. So first and foremost is

just the prioritization of melatonin being an afterthought when we can't fall asleep to, oh, wow, so much more and can play a huge role in our life, especially if we care about aging. The next component that's there is that there can be different sources of melatonin. You can have synthetic, but there's also this new way, which you're part of a company that's innovatively taking melatonin from planet compounds. And there could be a differential in quality that you're getting from those and purity, which means that it's more of, you're more. effective and safer to be able to use longer. You talked about some of the top myths that are out there around melatonin and important

topics to think about, but also to address. You even gave us recommendations in terms of dosages of how we can incorporate it. If it's going to now jump into our top list of supplements that we're thinking about bringing in, if you believe in all this value that you've highlighted here and you guys have much more resources that we can link to, you talked about how. how 0.3 milligrams can be a great source for daily use, especially if we're looking for the long-term benefits that come with anti-aging and longevity. And also how a higher dose of three grams can be used not just when we have jet lag, but when we feel like we're coming down with something

or we just don't feel as good. It can be that boost that can play a role in our immune system and it works well with other supplements like vitamin C and vitamin D. You highlighted those. One of the most important things that I forgot to mention is that melatonin is a lot higher when we're younger. And it seems from all the literature that's out there, it bottoms out around 55. And if we're not thinking about things that we can do to preserve our natural melatonin and potentially supplemented up to better levels, we are going to lose out on a whole bunch of aspects of health when our melatonin drops. And the number one thing that destroys our natural melatonin for young people, for people my age, who are in their 40s, for people who are older, doesn't matter, is artificial light exposure, especially at night, is destroying our body's natural ability to create, absorb, utilize melatonin in a way that we were evolutionarily designed to do. So if we don't get serious about sleep hygiene, if we don't get serious about turning off overhead lights at night and kind of using lamps or switching to red light bulbs, they're not that expensive. You can pick them up on Amazon or getting blue light blockers.

We are consistently going to be attacking and destroying our body's natural ability to create melatonin. So those were some of the biggest takeaways that I feel that I got from this episode. And for my audience, is there anything else that you want to put in as the top takeaway in that list? I think the only thing would be the brain. I don't want us to forget that one of the ways that we tend to the brain is with melatonin. I think that that's up and coming and it's been done for people with Alzheimer's disease, you know, giving supplemental melatonin. I think like Jeff Bland said before, he said, you know, the 21st century, this is the age of the brain. And so I just want to emphasize that even more.

I think melatonin can help our brain to detoxify at night. Nerve growth factor helps with neuronal plasticity, helps with that glymphatic fluid flux, helps with that brainwashing in a good way. Deanna, if people want to continue this conversation on melatonin, are there other resources, interviews, things that you've done that we can send them? And if you wouldn't mind, again, mentioning the website

where if they're curious about herbotin, they can check it out and incorporate it into their routine. Yeah, the website is symphony natural health.com. And then there's another website if people just want the research, they could go to phytomelatonin.org. That's a research site. So it's phy-h-y-t-o-melatonin.org. And you'll find on there like the latest studies and kind of like a summary of the research. And then there's even like a drop-down of all the clinical conditions.

Like just in talking with you, Drew, we didn't even get through all of them. Like, we didn't talk about Parkinson's or, you know, migraines or, gosh, like mood disorders or fibromyalgia or cancer. But you could go to that website and you can start to dig in deeper and look at that. And quite honestly, one of the other places I always go is just a pub med. I don't go to social media. I mean, I want to know, like, look at the studies because sometimes things get taken out of context on social.

And then it's like, then you get this thing in your mind like, uh-oh, it's going to shrink my testicles or, uh-oh, it's going to change my retinas. But you know what? Like when you start looking at the science and you start, and not everybody's equipped to do that, but I think that if you really want to check something out, go to PubMed.com for those of you. And I think people are getting smarter about becoming more discriminating on research, which is great. Well, some of my favorite people to follow on social media are people like yourself who are also always putting out new and interesting information. People can find you through your website, if you can mention that and what social media platform are you most active on? You know, I have two. I would say I'm on

both Facebook and Instagram under my name, Deanna Minic. I'm usually talking about plants and phytochemicals. And so melatonin is under that umbrella of all things color. So my big thing is all about color. I do think that light, as I mentioned, and color and rhythm, this is truly the way of the future in terms of like coming back to our health. So yeah, thanks for having me. me, Drew. Yeah, this was great. I always appreciate you being on the podcast. The information on melatonin gets me excited every single time. It's a pleasure to have you back. And thank you for sharing all this great information with our audience. Thank you. It's been great. Hi, everyone. Drew here. Two quick things. Number one, thank you so much for listening to this podcast.

If you haven't already, subscribe, just hit the subscribe button on your favorite podcast app. And by the way, if you love this episode, it would mean the world to me. And it's The number one thing that you can do to support this podcast is share with a friend, share with a friend who would benefit from listening. Number two, before I go, I just had to tell you about something that I've been working on that I'm super excited about. It's my weekly newsletter and it's called Try This. Every Friday, yes, every Friday, 52 weeks a year, I send out an easy-to-digest protocol of simple steps that you or anyone you love can follow to optimize your own health. We cover everything from nutrition to mindset to metabolic health, sleep, community, longevity, and so much more. If you want to get on this email list, which is, by the way, free and get my weekly step-by-step protocols for whole-body health and optimization, click the link in the show notes that's called Try This or just go to Drew Perot.com.

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