Speaker 1: Scott back on seven hundred wlw oh, yes, the time change.
Speaker 1: You wake up, it's dark outside, you get home from work,
Speaker 1: it's dark outside, just darkness and developing like we need
Speaker 1: this right now. Well, all the bad news in the world,
Speaker 1: it just makes things worse. Doctor Catherine Athens is a
Speaker 1: expert in this area and author of numerous books. And there's
Speaker 1: a connection between the darkness and our mental health. We
Speaker 1: all know about this, but what new information is there
Speaker 1: out there? And how do you cope with it? As
Speaker 1: we lose time another hour this weekend, Doctor Catherine, good morning,
Speaker 1: how are you.
Speaker 2: I'm fine, Thank you, good morning, Thanks for having me,
Speaker 2: and good morning to all your listeners as well.
Speaker 1: I'm already just thinking about the time change, getting depressed.
Speaker 1: I know. It's funny. When I was younger, I mean,
Speaker 1: I love cold weather, love the snow and all that stuff.
Speaker 1: But the fifteen hours of darkness a day, it really
Speaker 1: hasn't effect the owner I get the worst it is?
Speaker 1: Is there some is there connection with an age and
Speaker 1: lack of sunlight?
Speaker 2: Well, we don't get as much sunlight when we get older,
Speaker 2: do We were not outside playing all the time? You know,
Speaker 2: kids are outside, We tell them go outside and play.
Speaker 2: And although you know with a digital age it may
Speaker 2: have changed a lot. But adults are behind a desk,
Speaker 2: usually sitting under a fluorescent light, which is not good
Speaker 2: for the brain at all. And usually we're sooped over,
Speaker 2: we're dehydrated, we're drinking coffee to stay away, or maybe
Speaker 2: eating that nice jelly donut, and we're just trying to
Speaker 2: brace ourselves to get through the day. So the thing
Speaker 2: to do in the morning is to drink some warm water.
Speaker 2: You can drink it with lemon. You can put a
Speaker 2: little bit of apple cider vinegar in there, which is
Speaker 2: good for cleaning the kidneys and the liver, which are
Speaker 2: two organs that help get rid of poisons. So why
Speaker 2: do we get depressed? We become over poxified in our
Speaker 2: bodies because we're stationary and the things we eat aren't
Speaker 2: necessarily nurishing. They taste good, though, So I tell people
Speaker 2: think about the basics. Think about doing some deep breathing,
Speaker 2: starting your day with an affirmation of something positive. Think
Speaker 2: about that during the day, and sip water. Bring a
Speaker 2: water bottle or water container, sip it all day. The
Speaker 2: brain needs water to function, and most of us are dehydrated.
Speaker 1: Especially when you're inside and the air is dryer, it's
Speaker 1: not as humid, you're not, so you spend more time
Speaker 1: in dit. That's why you get sick because you're dried out.
Speaker 1: So hydration is a critical thing to remaining well in
Speaker 1: the winter months. For sure. What does the lemon do
Speaker 1: for me? Though? How does that? Does that beat depression
Speaker 1: and the lack of sunlight? Is it? It's vitamin C.
Speaker 2: It's vitamin C. But it also helps to cleanse the liver.
Speaker 2: And you know, God bless our livers because they're always
Speaker 2: pulling toison out of our bloodstreams for us and trying
Speaker 2: to get rid of it so it doesn't circulate so
Speaker 2: much around the body, and the limit helps the liver
Speaker 2: do that. It also helps the kidneys to function, and
Speaker 2: it helps the water to taste better so you'll drink it. Sure,
Speaker 2: So there's lots of good reasons. You know. The thought
Speaker 2: of this darkness is horrific for people, So I tell people, look,
Speaker 2: start by getting out in the sun more often. When
Speaker 2: there is done, try to take your lunch break and
Speaker 2: maybe take some thing like this sandwich that you can
Speaker 2: eat while you're slowly walking, or go to the park
Speaker 2: and sit in the sun and they have a little
Speaker 2: bite to eat, So that way you're getting more sun.
Speaker 2: Even though we're not getting more sun. That will help
Speaker 2: the brain.
Speaker 1: A lot, right, But I mean, here's the problem here,
Speaker 1: doctor Catherine Athens. Here's the problem with Cincinnati, Ohio. Problem
Speaker 1: with Cincinnati, Ohio is we literally will not see the
Speaker 1: sun until opening day this year when the red started,
Speaker 1: and even then that may be again, but there may
Speaker 1: be a couple hours. I think in the next six
Speaker 1: months we'll see the sun. But it's just a mere rumor.
Speaker 1: It's actually a lot of people right around April start
Speaker 1: to question whether or not the sun actually exists, if
Speaker 1: it's not just one of those Internet rumors or a
Speaker 1: myth or fake news or something like that, because we're
Speaker 1: pretty sure after by the time we get through February
Speaker 1: that the sun just doesn't exist anymore.
Speaker 2: Okay, all right, Well, there are things you can do.
Speaker 2: There is some thing called full spectrum light bulbs that
Speaker 2: you can buy and replace your light bulbs at home
Speaker 2: with the full spectrum because part of the seasonal effective disorder,
Speaker 2: that depression, is we're not getting some of the spectrum
Speaker 2: of the sun. If you're really bad off, there are
Speaker 2: machines that you can buy. They're not too expensive, and
Speaker 2: they will you can sit have them sit in front
Speaker 2: of you. You can watch TV or listen to the
Speaker 2: radio and they will project full spectrum light at you.
Speaker 1: Okay, how many? How many hours?
Speaker 2: You know?
Speaker 1: My wife got me one last year at Christmas. I
Speaker 1: said I'm gonna try. I never used it because I'm
Speaker 1: just naturally positive. As you can tell here. I'm a
Speaker 1: national treasure, is what I am. Doctor, and I have
Speaker 1: a user. Yeah, I plan on maybe cracking that thing out.
Speaker 1: How long? How many hours a day? If you've got
Speaker 1: the happy light as they call them, they're pretty cheap.
Speaker 1: You can get on Amazon too. I didn't know about
Speaker 1: the light bulbs. You can put full spectrum light bulbs
Speaker 1: on the same thing. So if you got your I
Speaker 1: don't know, your easy chair next to your couture, you know,
Speaker 1: light next to your touch plays, use that when you're
Speaker 1: sitting there watching TV. How many hours a day do
Speaker 1: you need that?
Speaker 2: Though not very many. Actually you could start off with
Speaker 2: maybe two, one in the morning and one in the evening,
Speaker 2: you know, maybe two. If you don't have two, start
Speaker 2: off with twenty minutes a few times a day if
Speaker 2: you're home, but at least twenty minutes at a time,
Speaker 2: and it's really very useful. It helps a lot. It
Speaker 2: helps to retard that sad kind of syndrome in the
Speaker 2: winter with no light. Another thing is, if it's too
Speaker 2: cold to go outside, do some aerobic exercise inside. Get
Speaker 2: the blood going through your body, the get circulation going
Speaker 2: along with the light, and that will help the feeling
Speaker 2: of sadness and depression. It will actually make you feel better,
Speaker 2: more positive.
Speaker 1: Well, exercise is good for you. I mean I noticed
Speaker 1: in the days that if I go a few days
Speaker 1: between workouts, I notice I start to get a little
Speaker 1: more tired and irritable than I normally am. And it's
Speaker 1: because I'm missing my workout. So I get that. Doctor
Speaker 1: Kathin Athens on the show this morning on seven hundred
Speaker 1: w welw got the time change. We lose an hour
Speaker 1: and now darkness will encompass us and develop us here
Speaker 1: for the next five months, roughly in Cincinnati, we won't
Speaker 1: see the sun maybe for a couple of minutes, I
Speaker 1: think in the next five months here too. Some may
Speaker 1: say the sun was cut out in an extreme some
Speaker 1: sort of extreme budget cut or something like that or
Speaker 1: maybe the sun was captured and stolen by aliens, or
Speaker 1: we just don't get so you will not see the
Speaker 1: sun for quite some time in Cincinnati that south is
Speaker 1: Does that affect your sleep then too? I know that
Speaker 1: sun and sleep generally are at odds with one another,
Speaker 1: but does it mess with their sleep cycle too?
Speaker 2: It absolutely does. Our sleep cycle or circadian rhythms all
Speaker 2: get off. So I ask people to go to bed
Speaker 2: that hour earlier. Even though it says, you know, it
Speaker 2: says four o'clock, it's actually five. So go to bed
Speaker 2: when you normally go to bed for a while, and
Speaker 2: then you can increase your bedtime maybe ten minutes each week,
Speaker 2: but go to bed. Try to maintain those same habits
Speaker 2: you have and get a lot of sleep. And yes,
Speaker 2: the sun, the sun activates trying to think of the
Speaker 2: name of the organs in the back of your head,
Speaker 2: and when you're in the sun, they're activated. When you're
Speaker 2: in the dark, they secrete melatonin. So you want to
Speaker 2: be in a dark room to sleep, but you want
Speaker 2: to have had some full spectrum light, whether it be
Speaker 2: the happy machine or you're light bulb, or for some
Speaker 2: reason there is some sunshine. Because that balances the brain. Now,
Speaker 2: you notice in the winter time people become less friendly,
Speaker 2: more irritable, just because we're not moving as much. Again,
Speaker 2: we're not drinking enough water. I mean, just think about
Speaker 2: the holidays here. You don't drink all year, and you
Speaker 2: don't eat much, and suddenly you're drinking like crazy on Thanksgiving.
Speaker 2: You're eating all kinds of stuff you never eat the
Speaker 2: rest of the year, and then you feel miserable and
Speaker 2: you go, why am I feeling so bad?
Speaker 1: Yeah? Yeah, I mean I'm living my life like a
Speaker 1: medieval king or something. I'm eating literally just eating giant
Speaker 1: geese neck and the drumsticks, and I'm drinking wine and
Speaker 1: meat and I'm just having a blast. But then you
Speaker 1: feel like crap after. It's kind of like when you
Speaker 1: eat all the Halloween candy, the.
Speaker 2: Same thing, right, right, So so don't I tell people
Speaker 2: don't use moderation.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but that's not fun. That's no fun though, it's
Speaker 1: it's uh. I. I I'm the other extreme though. I
Speaker 1: believe in everything in its excess. I think if you
Speaker 1: I think it'll balance, it balances. I'll work out for
Speaker 1: three straight days and I'm gonna eat for nine straight days.
Speaker 1: What about that all what most people do.
Speaker 2: You're right in the groove. Oh I worked out? Why
Speaker 2: am I gaining weight? When did you work out last week?
Speaker 1: Oh?
Speaker 2: Okay, Well, I don't.
Speaker 1: Want to rush into anything. I could strain something.
Speaker 2: That's true. That's true.
Speaker 1: I don't want to I don't want to jump in
Speaker 1: this exercise thing. You know, Well, at the time change
Speaker 1: here and losing an hour's sleep. It's also to trying
Speaker 1: to get your body set because uh, you know the
Speaker 1: week when they tell you the clock changes, and then
Speaker 1: it's takes you a week to get your body right again.
Speaker 1: Is it better? Is it kind of like jet legs?
Speaker 1: Should you just go to bed at the same time?
Speaker 2: Or yes, go to bed at the same time. We
Speaker 2: actually gain an hour, but the hour we gain is darkness.
Speaker 2: So go to bed at the same time, get up
Speaker 2: at the same time, and then slowly work into the
Speaker 2: new time zone. You know, if you can go to
Speaker 2: bed at the same time, get up at the same time.
Speaker 2: Drink your water. Now, if you want to know how
Speaker 2: much water you should asp take your body weight, Say
Speaker 2: you weigh one fifty, divide it in half. That's seventy
Speaker 2: five and those are ounces you need seventy five ounces
Speaker 2: of water a day, which is huge. It's more than
Speaker 2: half a gallon.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think that's something you sip on a little
Speaker 1: bit of water all day. Go I had like two
Speaker 1: bottles of water. That's not it's not for me. And
Speaker 1: then if you're active, you need even more water.
Speaker 2: For that matter, if you're active, you need more water.
Speaker 2: And so the brain doesn't function without water. It doesn't function.
Speaker 2: Functions on glucose, water and amino acids. And most of
Speaker 2: us don't get enough amino acids because we're dieting or
Speaker 2: we're eating some kind of green and we're not looking
Speaker 2: at the fact. We need a variety of amino acids
Speaker 2: for the brain to function properly. But we also need
Speaker 2: each other. We need human interaction face to face for
Speaker 2: the brain and the neural pathways to function properly. I recommend,
Speaker 2: if you do nothing else, go to the market or
Speaker 2: the hardware store or the Walmart, whatever, and start saying
Speaker 2: hello to people, Hello, how are you good morning?
Speaker 1: If you just hate people, is there no hope for you?
Speaker 1: Is it terminal? What's going on there? Doctor?
Speaker 2: Oh? It could be no, say the reals.
Speaker 1: I don't go. It's because people piss me off.
Speaker 2: Okay, well, well that's another story.
Speaker 1: Just too many idiots in the world. I think people
Speaker 1: will listen to be right, Sloan. There's too many idiots
Speaker 1: in the world, and that's why I tend to just
Speaker 1: stay home and eat and be mindless of myself. All right,
Speaker 1: we have do you think as a doctor and you
Speaker 1: studied this stuff again on the show this morning. It's
Speaker 1: doctor Catherine Athens, and she is an expert in the
Speaker 1: area of sleep. And we've got one in five Americans
Speaker 1: experiencing winter blues, according to the Cleveland Clinic. And they
Speaker 1: would know because there's no more depressing place in the
Speaker 1: world in Cleveland. So the Cleveland Clinic people, I would
Speaker 1: agree with them, and maybe even two and five at
Speaker 1: this point too. But she's a clinical and health psychologist
Speaker 1: and she's on the show talking about the time change
Speaker 1: here and what that means for you, how to combat
Speaker 1: it with happy lights and making sure you're getting hydrated
Speaker 1: well enough and all that. Should we get away with
Speaker 1: daylight savings, time in the clock four o'clock back, nonsense.
Speaker 2: You bet you we should. And in California we voted,
Speaker 2: i think six years ago to do away with that,
Speaker 2: but we still have to do it. Someone isn't listening
Speaker 2: to the people over here.
Speaker 1: Well we have that problem here too, So it's not
Speaker 1: just Ohio, it's also California.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, oh yeah, so well what issues here?
Speaker 1: But yes, time change the list of those problems you
Speaker 1: got over there, that's for dam I'm sure so uh yeah,
Speaker 1: it seems to me. I just keep one steady constant
Speaker 1: time and we're good there. This is, you know, jumping
Speaker 1: back and forth every six months. So really, you know,
Speaker 1: I could see back in the day where you needed
Speaker 1: natural daylight in order to get stuff done. But we
Speaker 1: have electricity now, we've had electricity at least I think
Speaker 1: for the last three or four years.
Speaker 2: I believe, well we do. But you know, the charcoal
Speaker 2: lobby wanted this daylight savings time because they found out
Speaker 2: that was another hour or so of sunlight. They make
Speaker 2: more money, the charcoal lobby. The charcoal lobby, no idea,
Speaker 2: blame them for this.
Speaker 1: Good lord. There's a big big charcoals behind all this
Speaker 1: big kings. Yeah, yeah, there's a lobby for any you've
Speaker 1: got politicians, you'll have a you'll have a lobby. There's
Speaker 1: no doubt about it. So doctor Catherine Athrines Athens at
Speaker 1: h A N S. And thanks again for the time,
Speaker 1: and she has written of several books. As a matter
Speaker 1: of fact, the Lates called it the Heart Brain and
Speaker 1: doctor Catherine Athens, thanks for coming on the show.
Speaker 2: It's my pleasure. And please everyone drink your water, don't
Speaker 2: don't push yourself. Everybody's going through this miserable time change together,
Speaker 2: so please just take your time and work yourself into it,
Speaker 2: and then a few weeks you'll be old. You'll be better, hopefully,
Speaker 2: but let's not get get out your happy machine.
Speaker 1: Right. Well, the good news is we have cheap flights
Speaker 1: to Florida. If all else fails, get on Allegiant or
Speaker 1: Delta or whatever and get the hell out of town
Speaker 1: for a few days. That always helps. To doctor Catherine,
Speaker 1: all the.
Speaker 2: Best, thanks to you too, Bye bye.
Speaker 1: Now today is the day because Sunday, Okay, time change.
Speaker 1: It's Sunday. You're watching football, the big deal. Monday rolls
Speaker 1: aren't yesterday. And now it's starting to, you know, affect
Speaker 1: you a little bit. Okay, sun's coming up in the
Speaker 1: morning or and when I get home, it's getting dark
Speaker 1: and your mind is preparing for sure in addition to that,
Speaker 1: today is election day, Election day. If you're in OHI,
Speaker 1: make sure you take that ID with you. You're gonna
Speaker 1: need it if you are going to vote. And of
Speaker 1: course that pulls open we'll get a full update on
Speaker 1: what's happening there. We'll also chat with the council candidate
Speaker 1: if you haven't voted yet. Anthony Weiner running for council,
Speaker 1: one of the what twenty nine people running for councils
Speaker 1: some along those lines, twenty six people. It's a lot,
Speaker 1: let's put it that way, a boatload of folks. Why
Speaker 1: should you vote for him? And what he sees from
Speaker 1: an outsider's perspective, what's going on in is Mayol race?
Speaker 1: Very interesting. We'll get into that just ahead here slowly
Speaker 1: seven hundred WLW