CHANGE OF SEASONS GOT YOU BLUE? FIND YOUR RHYTHM

Why am I SAD?

Find your rhythm for great health and happiness!

Autumn is here and winter is near. Today is cold and gloomy in the mountains. Some people would say how wonderful it is to live in this extraordinary old growth forest, but I woke up with SAD. Seasonal affective disorder or SAD is caused by a disturbance in  my circadian rhythms.

When I first heard about biorhythms or circadian rhythms, I thought they were just more superstition like believing in astrology.

Well, it turns out both circadian rhythms and astrology can affect our health because the pulls of the planets can change our rhythms!

Disturbed circadian rhythms can affect our:

• Moods
• Appetite
• Sleep patterns
• Energy level
• Depression and mania
•  Immunity

So what is a circadian rhythm?

Circadian rhythms are self generated body clocks on an approximately 24  hour cycle.

Circadian rhythms are found in single cells and act as cell clocks. They are found in every living thing and can be disturbed by many things such as:

• sunlight
• temperature
• noise levels
• electrical wires
• lack of sleep
• eating at the wrong time
• quickly changing geographic location
• lunisolar tidal pulls
• stress
• and others

How do lunisolar tidal pulls change our clocks?

The moon, sun and heavenly bodies can alter your health!

You have probably heard or seen how crowded emergency rooms are on a full moon. Studies have shown that planetary pulls affect our Ultra-Weak Photon Emissions (WPE) (1.) WPE are the lights that our body puts out. That’s right! We make light. (More on WPE on a future blog!)

WPE can change the utilization of our DNA and our cell and body clocks. Simply moving  to different geographical locations across the world cause alterations in the light generated and our body clocks. Many of us know how this feels…we call it jet lag. Different lunisolar tidal pulls (or planetary pulls) in different locations disturb circadian rhythms to cause jet lag. It is not just the moon and the sun that pull on us, the other  planets pull on us too, changing our WPE and our circadian rhythms! Some people are more sensitive to these changes than others, so next time you hear, “Mercury is retrograde” or “it’s a full moon“, understand it may not affect you but it could affect your wife, husband, friend or child.

“Let there be lights in the expanse of the heavens to separate the day from the night. And let them be for signs and for seasons, and for days and years,” Genesis 1:14

Okay, why am I so SAD?

Each person is different genetically and some are easily affected by temperature, lack of sunshine, noise or electrical wires, while others never notice. These things can even affect your energy level. Watch out because chronic stress can alter your rhythms and cause problems too.

Circadian rhythms can change how your DNA, RNA, and proteins are processed. Do you remember the so-called junk DNA and RNA scientists thought were useless? Well, some of those bits of spliced out RNA react to light and form a feedback clock, affecting your epigenetic mechanisms and the elements that process your proteins.3

Did you ever imagine that sunshine, sleeping at the right times and eating breakfast could affect even how your genes are used?

The problem is, if you stay out of sync, you can end up with many diseases like metabolic, sleep, autoimmune and mental disorders and even cancer! At the very least, it can cause problems with mental performance. Think about how you react if you aren’t sleeping.

“We just aren’t on our toes”, or “I got up on the wrong side of the bed”.

We are not at the top of our games if our circadian rhythms are off.

Rhythms can affect your blood pressure and body temperature too.4

Why do we have circadian rhythms?

It seems that the tight connections and cross-talk of our cells led to the formation of interconnected, organ specific clocks (That’s right our cells talk to each other!). The clocks synchronize to each other through light. They align and react with our environment. All of our clocks are under the control of one master clock located in the brain. The brain, or more specifically the suprachiasmatic nucleus of the hypothalamus, receives direct light input from the eyes to synchronize the clocks. The clock then sets the timing of our bodies’ cells to release hormones and other important things at the correct times.

Why is this important?

Disruptions in our body clocks can lead to:

• Cardiovascular diseases
• Inflammation
• diabetes
• Mental health disorders
• Obesity

That is right…

Besides getting sick, having a messed up body clock can cause weight gain and keep you from losing weight to o!!!

Dang! So what can we do to prevent a breakdown of our body clocks?

Get into your rhythm!

Here are some things that can help you get back in time.

• First of all, understand that you can be affected by your environment so if you wake up SAD try to improve your surroundings.
• Getting up early. Ever hear “the early bird gets the worm“? In this case, the early bird gets health, wealth and happiness.
• Sspending 20 minutes in that early morning sun without sunglasses and sunscreen is enough to reset your melatonin/serotonin cycle.
• Getting some exercise.
• Eating an early, healthy breakfast to get your stomach and other hormones going.
• Eating an early dinner, so your body can digest its food early and use the nighttime to clean, detoxify and correct any issues.
• Keeping the light off at night keeps your melatonin going.
• Going to sleep early! What if you can’t sleep? Drink a relaxing tea with lemon balm, hops, chamomile and passion fruit or valerian root, 30 minutes before bed. Of course, check with your doctor before starting any herbs. You can request a personal herbal consultation by clicking here.
• Setting a regular bedtime. Treat yourself like a young child and put yourself on a regular routine; your body will love it!
• Being quiet before bed. Turn off the TV and loud music. Try reading a book the last 1/2 hour before bedtime.
• Trying not to live next to high power lines and loud noises.
• Trying a meditation ( you can get a gift quick-start self hypnosis meditation by clicking here).
• Counting your blessings (more on that on another blog)
• If these things don’t work, ask your doctor if you can use an over-the-counter melatonin and take as directed.

Keep at it!  It may take a little while to get back into the swing of things but you’ve got rhythm and it can help you stay healthy and happy.

Hugs, health and happiness,

Cia

1 Gallep CM, Moraes TA, Červinková K, Cifra M, Katsumata M, Barlow PW. Lunisolar tidal synchronism with biophoton emission during intercontinental wheat-seedling germination tests. Plant Signaling & Behavior 2014; 9:e28671; PMID: 24714075; http://dx.doi.org/10.4161/psb.28671

2 Muehsam, David. Life Rhythm as a Symphony of Oscillatory Patterns: Electromagnetic Energy and Sound Vibration Modulates Gene Expression for Biological Signaling and Healing. GLOBAL ADVANCES IN HEALTH AND MEDICINE 2014;Vol 3, 4. PMC4010966; https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4010966/pdf/gahmj.2014.008.pdf

3 Etain, B. et al, Genetics of circadian rhythms and mood spectrum disorders. European Neuropsychopharmacology (2011) 21, S676–S682. https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Bruno_Etain/publication/51565678_Genetics_of_circadian_rhythms_and_mood_spectrum_disorders/links/55f2a74e08ae199d47c484d8.pdf

4 Preubner, M. Post-transcriptional control of the mammalian circadian clock: imlications for health and disease. Pflugers Arch – Eur J Physiol (2016) 468:983–991, DOI 10.1007/s00424-016-1820-y https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4893061/pdf/424_2016_Article_1820.pdf