Dr Jenna Macciochi

Because if I get to the end of the day and I realize how much time I've spent mindlessly scrolling, when I could be living more deeply in the moment, more present with myself, with the world around me, then...

That means by the end of the day, I've had very different inputs into my body in terms of our kind of information diet.

You know, we talk a lot about what we eat, but, you know, what we're exposing ourselves to and in the content that we're exposed to is also having a physical effect on our health.

Yes, completely.

And it sounds like what you've experienced with your patients is starting to be reported now in the literature.

And it's an anecdote that we hear time and time again for people who have autoimmune conditions.

They'll also often say that stress will flare up their...

symptoms as well as perhaps being some antecedent to the diagnosis.

And again, that's because we have this really integrated response between the stress response and the immune system.

And also, if you think about it, you know, when your stress response is activated, everything's going to be amplified in the immune system.

So if you already have

some immune responses that are happening.

So for example, in rheumatoid arthritis, there is an attack on the cartilage in the knee.

Then you're just amplifying the conditions for this.

Immune cells are metabolically active.

So the stress is affecting our metabolism.

It's affecting things like blood sugar levels.

And that doesn't cause inflammation, but it will amplify what's already there because of the metabolic profile of those immune cells.

And also things like cortisol, when we have a heightened cortisol, which is one of the main stress chemicals, it down regulates the cortisol receptor.

So we can't resolve the stress response as well.