Apr 28, 2020
Keeping Your 3 Brains Healthy with Annemarie Tolman RN MSN
In this week's episode, Melissa Batchelor talks about the health of our three brains with her special guest, Annemarie Tolman. The three brains are our actual brain, our heart, and our gut. They are linked and a disruption in one or more brain can leave you feeling tired and with “brain fog”.
Annemarie Tolman is a registered nurse and founder of 3 Brain Solutions. As a highly successful Hopkins RN, she's determined to live a healthy and balanced work-life and has found a path of alternative healing methods. That is how 3 Brain Solutions came to be.
Part One of ‘Brain Health’
In general, gut-brain health is a very new science. It's been there for a couple of years, but right now, we hear a lot more about how much the gut and specifically how certain neurotransmitters in the gut like serotonin don't work.
“Meditation helps you release the worries of the day.” — Annemarie Tolman RN MSN (05:42-05:45)
Here's a couple of recommendations from Annemarie:
- Look at your diet and make it as much as possible based on the Mediterranean diet which includes eating fish, which is high in fiber, and plant-based food.
- Look at your sleep patterns, this includes things like your sleep hours and things you do before you go to sleep.
- Set time for exercise.
In general, especially for women, alertness is so high all day long, where stress hormones used to be higher in the morning. You can do simple meditation in the evening, make time for that before you go to bed. There are so many meditations you can find anywhere on the internet. It can help you release the worries of the day.
It's all about knowing which areas of your life need to be changed for the better and the small steps that you can take to make a significant change.
Part Two of ‘Brain Health’
Both REM and non-REM sleep are essential. When you don't get enough REM sleep, you lose the ability to process specific memories. If you're waking up three to five times a night, that's unhealthy for your brain health in general and also for your emotional health.
So, it's vital to look at patterns in your diet, sleep, and exercise. There are natural supplements and foods to help optimize sleep patterns so you can feel more refreshed in the morning.
“Our thoughts are powerful. They drive our behavior.” — Melissa Batchelor, Ph.D., RN, FNP, FAAN (17:29-17:32)
Now, here are the symptoms someone would be experiencing that would benefit from seeking out working with Annemarie.
- Lack of energy or feeling tired.
- Lack of focus.
- Feeling emotional
- Feeling anxious
- Feeling depressed
- Feeling bloated
When we think about brain health in general, we mostly focus on our actual brain. But as for Annemarie Tolman, she likes to focus on a larger scale. That's why several programs are geared towards optimizing brain health so we can feel better overall, concentrate better, and sleep better.
Be sure to watch the full episode: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCs8oeiZlJGQJzTE6Yan4hXw/videos
About Melissa
I earned my Bachelor of Science in Nursing (‘96) and Master of Science in Nursing (‘00) as a Family Nurse Practitioner (FNP) from the University of North Carolina Wilmington (UNCW) School of Nursing (SON). I truly enjoy working with the complex medical needs of older adults. I worked full-time for five years as FNP in geriatric primary care across many long-term care settings (skilled nursing homes, assisted living, home, and office visits) then transitioned into academic nursing in 2005, joining the faculty at UNCW SON as a lecturer. I obtained my Ph.D. in Nursing and a post-master’s Certificate in Nursing Education from the Medical University of South Carolina College of Nursing (’11) and then joined the faculty at Duke University School of Nursing as an Assistant Professor. My family moved to northern Virginia in 2015 and led to me joining the faculty at George Washington University (GW) School of Nursing in 2018 as a (tenured) Associate Professor where I am also the Director of the GW Center for Aging, Health and Humanities. Find out more about her work at https://melissabphd.com/.