Chapter 1: What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Hello, I'm Liz Earle and welcome along to Age Better. It is a Monday and I'm really looking forward to answering your questions and sharing some of the science-backed knowledge and tools to help you thrive today and, of course, in the years to come. So on that note, if you have a question that you'd like me to answer, please do get in touch with us.
All the contact details are in the episode description and at the end of the show. Well, coming up today then, Zana has a question about broken sleep and Phil wants help with diet hacks to support our bones as we age. Yeah, not just for midlife women, you see. And I'll be sharing my thoughts on peptides for Vicky and offering tips on how caffeine can help to boost her low mood the natural way.
And lastly, we're going to be talking about something completely fascinating and that is structured water. What is it? And can it benefit you? Well, let's start with a question from Zanna and you write, Hi Liz, I can't thank you enough for all your hard work you put into these informative podcasts. I lie down with my LED mask on and learn so much. Love that. I've got that image in my head now.
My questions are, if questions... Am I allowed to? Well, go on then. Firstly, if I wake up in the night around three or four o'clock and then finally go back to sleep, maybe an hour later, does this count as getting the needed six to seven hours of recommended sleep if the sleep is interrupted? Okay, curious. And then secondly, you go on to say, I can't find this information out anywhere else.
If I eat defrosted frozen berries with my breakfast, have they been washed with no nasty chemicals lurking? Thank you. Gay. Right, Zana, are you lying comfortably under your mask? Then I shall begin. So let's look at interrupted sleep. And, you know, this is something that actually I thought about recently because I track my sleep. I've got a little sleep app on my phone. I like it.
It's called Sleep Cycle. It's just a really common one. And the reason I like it is I can switch my phone off. I don't have it on Wi-Fi. It's on airplane mode and it still works. So I'm not getting any of the EMF or any of that. And it just sits on my bedside table, you know, a little bit away from my bed.
But it manages to record stuff and let me know the different stages of sleep because sleep goes in cycles. OK, it goes from light sleep into deep sleep into REM sleep. And how much deep and restorative sleep we're getting across the night. That's the really important thing.
And do you know that most of us will wake up around three or four o'clock in the morning and that's due to circadian rhythms and hormones and shifts in our sort of cellular makeup going on internally that we're not aware of. So it's very common to be awake.
And in fact, when I was reading your question, I just went onto my sleep app just now and I checked it and I was awake for 27 minutes last night at around 3.20. I have no recollection of that.
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Chapter 2: What is structured water and what are its health benefits?
I'm going to drift back to sleep. I think sometimes we might wake up and think, oh, I'm awake. This is really bad. I need to get myself back to sleep again. Whereas if we just kind of let ourselves relax and go with the flow, literally the circadian flow, then
then as long as I say we're waking up feeling OK, I think the issue becomes more prominent if you're going to wake up and feel that you're still exhausted and you haven't had a good night's sleep. So that's something to watch. But of course, you can do simple things. Magnesium by glycinate taken last thing at night.
Some of the sleepy powders that you can buy with things like L-theanine and GABA in them. They're actually remarkably effective products. You know, there's a couple that I love. And, you know, when I take those, I'm literally zonked. And, you know, they really do have an effect. They are adaptogenic herbs and they just sort of work with the body's natural rhythm.
So, you know, it could be worth trying something if this is bothering you, the waking up. But I think overall, it is just part of our sleep cycle. So, you know, sleep doesn't have to be perfect for it to be restorative. And it does go in these cycles of waking, sleeping, deep, light, all the rest of it. OK, so coming on to your second question. There's no segue into this at all.
It's just a completely random question about frozen berries. Are they washed? Brilliant question. I'm sure a lot of us wonder about that. I love frozen berries because, A, they're a lot cheaper. And also you have them on hand all the time. You don't have to worry about seasons. And they are often picked at the moment of precise ripeness. So you're getting a really good nutrient load as well.
So, yes, the short answer is commercial berries are, are typically washed. Sometimes they're blanched and rinsed again. And again, you've got to watch that because that could potentially lower their nutritional value. But I think, you know, for the most part, they're going to be good. They're going to be full of polyphenols and vitamin C and the things that we actually want to use them for.
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Chapter 3: Does broken sleep still count towards the recommended amount?
And then they get frozen again very quickly after harvesting. So I think that rapid freezing is actually locking in the freshness. And of course, if we're buying fresh berries that have been sat on a shelf, They may have been treated in some way that we don't know. They may have a pesticide coating on them. They may have been irradiated to preserve shelf life. We just don't know.
So I think in some ways, those packets of frozen fruit could actually be better for us. And if you're throwing it into a yogurt bowl or granola or a smoothie or something, you know, frankly, I think you'd be better off with that. And it would certainly be a lot less expensive than going for the fresh kind of fruit. So, yeah, it's reducing food waste. It's cheaper. It's available all year round.
And yeah, enjoy them. Why not? It's a very good question to ask. Thank you. You can get back under your mask now and just tune into the rest of it. Well, the rest of it includes this question from Phil. Nice to have a question from a guy. Hello, Phil. You say, hey, Liz, I have osteopenia.
So for those who don't know, that is the kind of pre-osteoporosis diagnosis when we think that something is not quite going right and we want to prevent the progression into osteoporosis. And he says, my GP has advised me to get calcium from food as medication has side effects. Absolutely right. Spot on. Love your GP. Bisphosphonates, nasty drugs for many people. You want to be really careful.
And they have a short shelf life as well. You shouldn't be taking those indefinitely. I've talked before about bisphosphonates. If you don't believe me, go and look up bisphosphonate side effects. So you go on to say, I have been having organic Greek yogurt and two tablespoons of sesame seeds a day.
I don't eat cheese or eggs, but I have been drinking 700 mils of full fat organic milk to get more calcium. But I'm putting weight on. So I switched to skim milk, but I hate it. Am I better having fortified oat milk? Please help in capital letters. There's a lot I love about this question. OK, so you're probably asking the wrong person if you should have fortified oat milk.
I do not like oat milk. I'm on record. I like nothing about it, frankly, from its single lined plastic cartons to its synthetic nutrients. that aren't as well absorbed to just the whole, yeah, the glyphosate issue, the fact that it can spike blood sugar, all the rest of it. You know, I am firmly an organic milk fan.
But having said that, you know, I respect everybody's right to have their own opinion. And you do you, OK? I do me, you do you. And I'm just here to give you some information and you can make your own mind up. If you really want to go for oat milk... then I would suggest you make your own because it's a lot cheaper and it costs pennies and you can find lots of recipes online.
Of course, that's not going to give you the calcium. OK, that's one of the things, you know, they do have to artificially put it back in and sometimes it's in a form that doesn't readily get absorbed by the body. So, you know, that's that's one of the caveats.
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Chapter 4: How does hydration affect energy and longevity?
You know, you've got Greek yogurt and kefir. You've got live yogurt. You know, that would be really good. I think, you know, fermented dairy is often better tolerated and more nutrient dense than just plain milk on its own. You talk about sesame seeds. That's great. You've got almonds, tofu. Tofu, if it's calcium set, you need to check with the manufacturer for that. Tinned fish with bones.
Great. Sardines. Love a tin of sardines. Had a tin of sardines for lunch the other day. You know, really inexpensive. Eat the bones. That's where the calcium is. And yeah, delicious. Again, tinned salmon. Really good option. Dark green veggies. Things like broccoli, spring greens. Again, really good source of calcium. Not as easily absorbed, but still a very good source. Figs, interestingly.
Who knew? Whether fresh or dried. In moderation, obviously the dried ones because they've got lots of sugar. But figs, again, very good source of calcium. So you don't need to have huge amounts of one food. Don't get too hung up on your milk. As I say, if you really want to go for oat milk, if you enjoy it, then great.
But, you know, I would think of prioritising other food sources if you're thinking of having that purely for the reason of increasing your calcium. I hope that's helpful for you, Phil. Well, it is time for a short break now. When we return, I'm going to be telling you all about peptides. What are they? What can they do for us? Answer a lot of things.
And I'll be helping Cathy find natural ways to lift her low mood. Plus, Louise wants to know more about structured water.
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Chapter 5: How can I improve my bone health with diet and exercise?
It supports our serotonin. Get outside for 10 minutes as close to daybreak as you can. Trust me on this. If you try that and do it, try and watch the sun rising every day for a week and then ping me a message, send me an email, tell me how you feel. And of course, just being outside, you know, moving outside, gentle walking, stretching, yoga, all of that.
If you can do it outside, especially if you can do it barefoot, you know that I'm a big fan of grounding, you know, really good. And then don't forget your social connection. You know, low mood really often lifts when we are connecting with others.
Even just those small, regular interactions with our friends, you know, walk with a mate, taking a class in something, having a chat with somebody outside. These matter more than we realise. We really are social beings. And then just make sure that you wind down at night. Having a really good quality sleep routine, really important. Sleep is not just passive.
We don't just fall into bed and switch off. Sleep is when so much of the good stuff happens. So set yourself up for success. Set yourself up for a really good sleep routine. You can find lots about sleep on the Lizzo Wellbeing website. So it's just free. Go and
check in and have a look at that we've also recorded podcasts in the past there was an excellent one with Matthew Walker who wrote a great book it's simply called Sleep and that was several years ago but it absolutely stands the test of time and I will pop a link to it in the show notes for anybody who wants to go listen And then finally, I've kind of been waiting for this question.
I'm not going to say I'm holding the best till last, but I really have been just so delighted to receive this. It's from Louise and you write, Hi Liz, I'm loving your new book. I've never heard of structured water before. Can you share more about this? Yeah, well, thank you. Firstly, thank you for buying my book and for loving it. And you are not alone.
Structured water is something that I would say the majority of us have never come across before. I didn't know about it until I started researching for my book a few years ago. It's increasingly being discussed in both biology and longevity science. And let's just kind of break it down. What is it? OK, most of us think that water is just H2O. You know, it's the liquid that we drink.
It just doesn't do much. It just stays in a glass. It's liquid. You know, that's it. It might freeze into an ice cube if it gets really cold. You know, but there you go. That's it. Yeah. No, there is a new form of water. Yeah, there's a new kid in town. So if you think of what water does, so it flows. So it's liquid. That's the water that we get in the glass, liquid form.
As I say, you can freeze it, can't you? You can freeze it, you can make water go solid. And then there's another form which we know about, which is vapour, steam. If you boil water, then the vapour comes off and that's water that's being vapourised as little droplets in the air.
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