Brain Stamina Strategies For Restoring Mental Focus & Motivation

Daniela Giangiorgi

Hi everyone. Hi Laura.

Laura Frontiero, FNP-BC

Thank you so much for being here again, as we do these talks each day. Daniela, you are a mindset empowerment health coach who is also a Pilates instructor, with a muscle activation technique certification. And your story is something. At age 41, you are diagnosed with breast cancer and that interrupted the breastfeeding of your one year old baby boy. And this is why I love having you here because you understand the power of cellular healing and why I stand for restoring mitochondria function and gut health, because this is the process that you went through to heal your body at such a young age to have cancer. So welcome, and thank you for being here today to help facilitate this discussion.

Daniela Giangiorgi

Oh, thank you so much, Laura. And yes, you know, it was a sobering thing to go through, but it it’s just awoken to me how important this all really is. We all get to live and thrive and sometimes we have to, we have to really take the horse by the reins and drive to it ourselves. And so this is near and dear to my heart and sharing the work that you do. And I’m so thankful I’ve found it. It’s huge, so yeah.

Laura Frontiero, FNP-BC

I’m glad you did too.

Daniela Giangiorgi

And so, Laura, I mean, I’ve had the opportunity of getting to know you and I know that for over 20 years you’ve been a nurse practitioner and you’ve specialized in preventative medicine and functional medicine. And you’ve had the opportunity to work closely with and study with so many, a huge list of today’s most respected, functional natural health oriented doctors and experts. And now you’ve gotten to a point where you’ve built your bio radiance health brand and it’s helping everyday high performers, just people who really want to excel in their life. And you’re helping them reclaim their energy and helping them with their brains stamina and their productivity. And so you’ve become a trusted resource, for many, many people and people who you’ve supported are people who really want to build back their health so that their bodies can keep up and match their level of ambition. And you’ve done this for me and I just see you do this over and over with our clients. And it’s an incredible thing. And so you’ve become this go-to source for gut health, for energy and for brain health. And we have parents that are aging and as we see the struggles that they go through, or even just sometimes feel that, waking up one morning and not feeling as sharp as maybe I did sometimes in my thirties, it really speaks to the importance of gaining control and supporting our brain health. So I came to you with some brain fog and some energy fog and whatnot and you really helped shift that as well as some anxiety and depression. But I see our clients come to you for some of these things as well. So as they come to you and they don’t feel as sharp as they used to, can you just tap into that and share with us for a little bit, and share the different signs of brain dysfunction and how that brain dysfunction is linked with cellular energy?

Laura Frontiero, FNP-BC

Yes, brain fog is a big thing. I’ve suffered from it as well after I had COVID last August, that was probably one of the biggest things. Getting my brain back was really a long road. And there’s nothing like when you’re a high performer to feel like you can’t trust your brain anymore or you don’t have that stamina. So brain fog really feels like a cloud over your cognition. It makes it hard to think clearly. And it blocks success in your professional life. It blocks, you being connected in your relationships, it blocks you from doing the things you love and your hobbies. It’s a really big deal. And some of the things you might, yeah. Some of the things you might experience with brain, brain dysfunction or, just not feeling great with your memory, you might have slow word and name recall. For example, you walk into a party, you know everyone, but you can’t remember their names, which leads to embarrassment when it’s time to introduce your friends to each other.

Daniela Giangiorgi

I don’t know what you’re talking about, Laura. That’s never happened to me.

Laura Frontiero, FNP-BC

Well, that was happening to me a lot after I had COVID where I just was like, oh, please, please, please. Don’t ask me like, and don’t, like, oh my gosh, I can’t remember people’s names. And I hate that when I wanna introduce people and this is somebody I should know their name and I can’t think of it. It’s terrible. So another thing is forgetting tasks or missing appointments. So you unintentionally end up letting people down and you have to play catch up because things are stacking up and you might not trust yourself to go for that promotion at work or go for the next big project or do the next big build in your business. Or, I mean, that happens. There’s nothing worse than something completely slipping off your plate like that. It can happen to the best of us, but if it starts happening repeatedly like that becomes a regular thing, that’s an issue. Not remembering why you’re doing something. So you walk into a room and you can’t remember why you went in there. And of course, that can happen to us, especially when we’re on high levels of stress, it’s more likely to happen. 

You sit down at your desk to do something and you can’t recall what you’re doing. And here’s another one, how about missing exits to routine destinations? You’re driving down the road and you find yourself taking a wrong turn or missing your exit while driving. Well, occasionally if that happens, that’s not a big deal, but if that becomes a regular thing, then that is, something that you should look into. So brain fog and low energy often actually show up together because they both have similar causes. So on a cellular level, which you asked about, you’re dealing with impaired mitochondria function due to prolonged inflammation, chronic invisible infections, like mold, parasites, Lyme, environmental toxins, poor diet, stress, leaky gut or even lack of sleep. And so that’s really the connection there, between brain dysfunction and cellular energy. It does come down to mitochondria. You have more mitochondria in your brain cells than any other cell in your body, because obviously your brain is in charge of everything working properly. Your brain is constantly sending signals out to the rest of your body for everything to work, yeah.

Daniela Giangiorgi

Amazing, and as I’ve gotten the opportunity to support our clients, those two are paired hand in hand, the brain frog, the sleep, the not energy. They’re so synonymous, one almost doesn’t exist without the other.

Laura Frontiero, FNP-BC

No, they don’t. They don’t, yeah.

Daniela Giangiorgi

So let me ask you this, is it possible to reverse some of these symptoms and get our brain function back to what it was when we were younger?

Laura Frontiero, FNP-BC

Yeah, so if you’re already having all those things that I’m talking about, this is critical that you work on reversing this. So in a word, the answer is yes, you can reverse this. If you don’t work on reversing it, it will probably compound and get worse. And it may eventually lead to something more severe, something more severe like a neurodegenerative disease or Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, something like that. So the good news is that you can support this. And I did mention that your brain has the most mitochondria per cell. It’s around 10,000 and you know, your cells are tiny. So think of the tiniest little living creature you can think of like an ant, for example, compared to you. So an aunt compared to you. Now put 10,000 little living organisms inside of that ant. It’s amazing. Wrap your mind around that.

Daniela Giangiorgi

I’ can’t.

Laura Frontiero, FNP-BC

That’s crazy, right? Like how can 10,000 things fit inside of an ant? And a cell is even smaller than an ant. So how can 10,000 things, like mitochondria fit inside of a cell, but they can, and those mitochondria are so vital to your brain process. So your brain is full of neurons and neurons generate communication signals. And your brain also has neurotransmitters, that carry the message around your body. So lemme make this simple, you can think of neurons like journalists or like writers of a newspaper. They generate the copy and the paper, right? While the neurotransmitters are like the paper boys delivering the news all over the city. 

Daniela Giangiorgi

So neuro analogies, Laura, I love ’em.

Laura Frontiero, FNP-BC

So neurons are journalists writing the paper and neurotransmitters are paper boys. And sadly, I don’t think there’s that many paperboys left in the world ’cause everything’s digital, but back in the good old days. So this is a signal and a signal delivery, basically. The neuron being, the paper being the signal, and then the signal delivery being the paper boy. So when neurons get damaged or dysfunctional or if the neurotransmitters become disrupted, so the writers aren’t working or the paper boys aren’t working, they become imbalanced, then your brain can’t send or deliver the signals. The writers aren’t writing them and the paper boys are on strike. Then you’re not kind of get signals for energy production and this leads to fatigue and low energy. So that’s a huge link between energy and brain, right? So there’s this also this big link between mitochondria dysfunction and brain symptoms, including brain fatigue and exhaustion and sleepiness, and brain fogginess and memory problems and poor concentration and lacking mental clarity and clouded thoughts and slow thinking and poor focus, depression, anxiety, migraines. So all of it’s linked and most brain problems are linked with what we call neuroinflammation and a leaky blood brain barrier. So we’ve heard of leaky gut. Well, there’s also leaky brain and the barrier that protects you, the blood brain barrier protects your brain from everything that shouldn’t get in there, like toxins and pathogens and foreign particles. 

That’s like the force field, right? Like the force field is up. Nothing goes in. The force field is down and we got problems. Things are going in. And at the same time, the barrier needs to be able to let good things in. So that barrier is selective. It lets in glucose and carbohydrates and proteins and amino acids and ketones and vitamins and minerals, immune cells, hormones. There’s a lot of stuff going through that blood brain barrier that should be there. And the barrier becomes leaky over time due to a few things, chronic stress, poor diet, infections, environmental toxins and the leakiness allows neurotoxic molecules to enter the brain. And this causes neuroinflammation and neuronal injury and clearance of metabolic toxic waste products is no longer efficient. You can’t do it. So your brain actually drains. There’s a glymphatic system. So we hear of the lymphatic system. Well there’s glymphatic system that drains the brain at night while you sleep and cleans it. Think about a toilet being flushed, your brain flushes at night, it all needs to get out of there. So it’s kinda like having a bathroom with leaky pipes under a sink and a clogged drain and a toilet that won’t flush. I mean, that’s what’s happening. Waste backs up. Yeah, it’s awful. Waste backs up, which causes neurons to fire slowly and brain cell communication and cognitive performance gets slowed down, and brain cells become sluggish and exhausted. And this cascade just causes mitochondrial dysfunction. And then you can’t make brain energy or body energy. And the result is not being able to focus on your tasks, scatter brain, forgetful, anxious, all those things. So now I’ll talk about, I had to lay that out before we talk about strategies to fix your brain, okay? So that’s kind of what’s going on and then you need to have strategies to fix the brain. And so the good news is the strategies are being shared all over this summit. 

And it’s really simple things, eat brain healthy foods. And I’ll talk a bit about brain healthy foods in just a minute, but let me give you a quick list of the things. So eat brain healthy foods. Fix your circadian rhythm and get deep restorative sleep. I did a talk with Christine Shoffner on circadian rhythm. So look for that talk. People, everybody on this summit is talking about how to eat healthy. I don’t think there’s a, maybe the EMF Summit, maybe the EMF talks about 5G and EMF. I don’t think they talked about food. Those guys didn’t have any interest in food, but everybody else talked about food and the mold remediation guy. He didn’t talk about food either. So maintain a healthy weight and reduce fat. That’s another really important thing that actually, when you are, when you are not at your ideal weight, your brain is also not functioning ideally. Restore and repair your gut microbiome. I mean, day one, I gave a talk on the link between mitochondria and gut microbiome. So make sure you catch my talk from day one and then stabilize your blood sugar levels. This is critical. We have several speakers talking about the importance of blood sugar stabilization. I’m trying to remember who was the big talk about blood sugar. I’m looking over at. Oh, it was David Jockers. 

I think he did. I think David Jockers hit. I’m looking, I have a list of my speakers over here. I think David Jockers was the one that had a good talk about blood sugar. So take a look at that. Peter Osborne may have mentioned it as well. And then brain healthy foods. Let’s talk about those. So green leafy vegetables so green leafy vegetables have lutein in them, which is a carotenoid. And it’s an antioxidant that protects against DHA oxidation inside your brain. And the higher levels of lutein that you have are connected with higher cognitive function and aging better. And then egg yolks also contain lutein and they’re a better source of lutein than vegetables. And of course, if you’re eating egg whites you’re not getting your lutein. So eat your whole eggs. I think one of the biggest mistakes we ever made in nutrition was the whole egg white craze. Oh my God, egg yolks are so healthy. They’re so good for you. I will never eat egg whites again, as long as I live. Okay, so the next thing is high quality protein. So it supplies the dopamine precursor tyrosine and the serotonin precursor tryptophan So serotonin is really important in your brain, and so is dopamine and Daniela, these are two of the things that were a little bit outta whack when we started working together. And this is something that we supported you with. Now, without protein, we won’t have the building blocks to make neurotransmitters. And without these, we feel depressed, fatigued and apathetic kind of like I don’t care about stuff anymore. Seafood is another one of these big foods because it contains DHA and EPA fatty acids. DHA, DHEA, DHA, and EPA fatty acids. 

And you need a lot or you don’t need a lot, excuse me. You can get away with about 500 to a thousand milligrams per day. And if you don’t like seafood, then take a supplement. I mean, you can do that. Other good brain foods, berries, nuts, beans, whole grains, poultry, olive oil and another important strategy is hydration. We’ve all had a, a dehydration headache, right? Your brain needs constant pure water every day. Being hydrated means you also maintain blood pressure and arterial vessel health, which promotes increased blood flow to the brain. And that means you have oxygen and glucose delivery to the brain cells, which in turn improves mood, energy levels, cognitive performance. So basically in a nutshell, clean up your gut health, move your body, get good sleep, reduce your toxic load and support your mitochondria. There’s a lot of talks on this summit about how to support mitochondria through autophagy. I gave a talk on autophagy. I think that is airing on day four, if I remember correctly. The autophagy talk, but basically, all the things that you’re learning here on this summit are a hundred percent gonna support brain health and finally work with a practitioner who can make a brain supporting supplement protocol to enhance all the healthy lifestyle things you’re doing and also speed up your brain recovery. There are specific supplements we can give you that support brain health and there’s several brain specialists on this summit. Peter Kahn, Titus Chu, Chang Rong, all have talks on brain health. So this has been great Daniela. I’m gonna keep this one kind of short ’cause brain is a heavy topic, but thank you for being here to help me facilitate this talk.

Daniela Giangiorgi

Absolutely, absolutely Laura and just, I know that along with the summit you have a live 21 day journey coming up to help our viewers become energetic and focused and the people that they essentially wanna be. Can you just real quickly share a little tidbit about that and how our viewers can get access to this 21 day program?

Laura Frontiero, FNP-BC

Yes, this is a guided program by me. And so that means you’re gonna have six touch points with me. So two live calls per week, and that’s as you implement the strategies I teach during the course, I’ll be there with you. And during our three weeks together, I’m gonna coach you on what steps you can take so you can fix your brain health. And so you can wake up each day, feeling purposeful and energetic and have sustained focus when you’re working on your tasks and brain stamina and feel like you can, you’ve got this and you can go on to the next big thing in your job, in your career, with your family, whatever it is that you’re up to in the world. And you’ll be able to keep up with your family mentally and physically. And I’m gonna share with you what foods to eat and what to avoid, in order to maintain maximum energy levels. And you’ll know what products to keep in your home that will contribute to you, support you in long term. And you’ll also know which sneaky toxins in your home that are zapping your energy and how to get rid of ’em. And you’ll have a clear understanding of supplements that will support your energy and how long you should take them. And for people living in the United States, I will give curated supplement protocols that you can get from companies here in the U.S. And this program is gonna be fantastic. It’s foundational to all the work that we do to support energy, gut health, mitochondria health. It truly is foundational.

Daniela Giangiorgi

It’s gonna be great, so great.

Laura Frontiero, FNP-BC

Thank you so much Daniela for being here today with me.

Daniela Giangiorgi

Thank you, Laura. Thank you so much everyone.

Laura Frontiero, FNP-BC

Yes, oh, and one more thing I always say is make sure that you find your practitioners on this summit. This is why we do these summits, so that you can get connected with all the people who have all of the solutions for what you have going on. So find your people and be sure to connect with them after the summit and you take good care everyone. We’ll see you next time, bye.