Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: Welcome to the Midlife Happiness project, where we share inspiring stories to bring some happy into your life.
We are here with my friend Darla. She is a doctor. She's a chiropractor. She's also a wellness specialist, which she can tell you all about. And, Darla, welcome.
[00:00:28] Speaker B: Thank you so much. I'm happy to be here.
[00:00:30] Speaker A: Okay, so, Darla, what is your thing, the new thing that you've brought into your life now that we're midlife people? And what's something that you've brought into your life that's really added to your happiness?
[00:00:46] Speaker B: So I have been starting to do an infrared sauna. Infrared sauna and a cold plunge, actually, together.
I had done a longevity seminar, and we talked a whole lot about all the things you can do to increase your longevity and figure out things that could be going wrong and how to improve your health. And it was the number one thing that they recommended that they talked about, infrared sauna. And if you're in there up to an hour a week, that it increases your longevity by 40% overall on overall mortality. So I thought, well, gosh, you know, I think that's probably worth it.
So.
[00:01:25] Speaker A: Whoa. Okay, so, first of all, let's talk about this. I think we all know what a sauna is.
What is a deep plunge?
[00:01:35] Speaker B: Well, so we have the. We have a cold plunge and an infrared sauna. So we do a 30 minutes session in the infrared sauna, and then we do a three minute session in the cold plunge. So what you're trying to stimulate in the body is you're trying to stimulate, like, extreme heat and extreme cold. And it stimulates these different kind of proteins in your body that really change how your mitochondria work and how your energy works. So the infrared sauna, you could do traditional sauna or an infrared sauna. I like the infrared sauna because it's not quite as hot.
We can put it up to 135, 140 degrees. And it's these infrared heaters that are, like, around you. It's outside. So you go outside and spend 30 minutes in this sauna. You get sweaty, you're sweating a lot. You're drinking some electrolytes. You get out after 30 minutes, and you sit in a cold plunge for three minutes. So the goal is to do at least an hour a week of the infrared sauna and then eleven minutes a week of a cold plunge. So you're stressing your body and you're stressing this thing to try to stimulate these things, these called heat shock proteins and cold shock proteins. So heat shock proteins are supposed to be helping you, like, maintain your muscle mass and slow your muscle atrophy. It increases your blood flow, it lowers your blood pressure, but it stresses your body in a way that our body has to adapt to these different types of stressors. And it stimulates our mitochondria to work better so that our energy is higher during the day.
[00:03:19] Speaker A: So when you first started doing this, I mean, what is that like? Because you're juxtaposing extreme heat with extreme cold. So what does it feel like?
[00:03:29] Speaker B: So you're in the sauna and you're definitely in the beginning, it felt really uncomfortable and you're feeling really sweaty. You're trying to figure out, how do I get electrolytes in? Maybe I had a headache after the first couple ones because we weren't really, like, hydrating properly. So that was a little bit stressful in the first few weeks of getting used to it and then getting into the cold plunge. The cold plunge is 55 degrees. It's not in the thirties or the forties, but it's cold enough that you're in there going, you know, you lose your breath a little bit and you're stressing your body out and you have to stay in for three minutes. So it really helps. The cold shock proteins are really interesting. It helps with inflammation, helps with arthritis, joint pain. It really helps to repair your DNA if you have broken DNA. So those are cold shock proteins. And the cold shock proteins will help to repair early broken DNA that you might have that you don't know about that could move into, like, a cancer. So it's a very interesting, different strategy for trying to prevent cancers as well.
[00:04:32] Speaker A: So, other than. Well, first of all, let me say you were referencing we. Is this something that you and your husband do?
[00:04:40] Speaker B: Oh, yeah. Yeah.
[00:04:41] Speaker A: Okay. I should say Darla is married. She has a son and a daughter, and, you know, they're going on with their life. And so you are really taking the, the time now to make it focus on yourself. And I'm sure part of this, you know, was born from that. But is this something that you and your husband do together?
[00:05:06] Speaker B: We do. So we've been committed to doing it four times a week. So we'll start about 08:00 p.m., and, you know, we end about ten with all the process. You have to wait for that, the infrared sauna to heat up and, you know, this whole thing. So it's kind of really changing our evening routine. And we figured out nights that we can do it, that we're not getting home too late from work or whatever, but it's been a really great commitment. We're sleeping better, we're feeling better. There's a lot of really interesting health effects that we've seen so far.
[00:05:35] Speaker A: That's what I wanted to ask you about, because it's one thing to say from a medical or scientific point of view, it has these benefits, and that's great. But I think what people would want to be interested in also is, do you feel better because of it?
[00:05:56] Speaker B: So the number one reason why I started doing it was that I have one of the Alzheimer's genes. Not both, but I have one. So I have been in pursuit of trying to figure out how do I make my brain better? How do I make sure that I can maximize my brain and not develop Alzheimer's. There's obvious things like don't get diabetes. But, you know, there are some really interesting hacks in some of these seminars that I'm taking, and one of them was sitting in a sauna. Helps you to clear out your brain from all of these pre Alzheimer's tangles, because the brain of people that get Alzheimer's don't clear out their brain very well. It's kind of like you sleep and it doesn't clean out tangles very well. So this sauna is what stimulates that. So that was my first impetus to say, this is something important. I'm going to do this. I don't know what my next 50 years holds, but I really would like to preserve my brain function. So I do notice that my thinking is clearer. I feel I used to have a little bit of a difficulty pulling out words from time to time. It was just more subjective. I'm not feeling like that anymore. That's difficult to quantify. But I.
[00:07:06] Speaker A: But there's clarity.
[00:07:08] Speaker B: There's clarity. I feel better. I feel like I sleep deeper. I feel like I.
There's all sorts of detox type things that go along with this. I'm not really pushing into that. I'm pushing more into. I want to preserve my muscle. I want to stay strong. I want to make sure that I don't get high blood pressure, all those types of things. So the things I've been noticing is a little bit more clarity.
A very interesting thing that we've noticed with the cold plunge is that I adjust people for a living. And my wrists were getting a little bit sore. So in the cold plunge, my wrists are feeling a lot better. I just. My joints feel better. I don't feel like I'm hopping up and feeling like my feet are sore, you know, I don't feel sore joints. And that's really different. So that's really helpful.
[00:07:55] Speaker A: I love to hear this because Darla and I were speaking earlier, and I think a lot of people listening to this can appreciate it. It seems like we get to our age and, hey, I mean, we're no spring chicken, but we're definitely not old. Certainly not in my mind. And it's already started where you go to a cocktail party on the weekend and you end up chit chatting with people. And then inevitably, people are, like, telling you about their medical ailments. You know, my knee hurts, I'm getting migraine headaches. I'm like, oh, God, we're too young to be, you know, this is not a topic for conversation. And people sort of lean into it. And I think it's, it's a strange thing where it's, this is what they talk about. And I think you and I share this in common, that, hey, we all have stuff. And of course, occasionally you do need to unload, but ultimately, rather than talk about it, pursue something to get better, make a difference.
[00:08:59] Speaker B: Right. Well, and I have a lot of patients in my office that have chronic pain, and I have really struggled to try to figure out how to get some of them out of chronic pain, especially if they've been in a bad car accident or they've just had, like, their joints are just a hot mess. And the number one thing I'm doing right now is having them do cold plunge. Just get it. If they have a pool, don't heat the pool, just get in the pool. It's ambient temperature, so it's probably 50 degrees. Get in there, do three minutes. Do it four times a week, at least eleven minutes a week. And they're noticing that their joints aren't as inflamed and their joints feel better. They feel better after exercise, they feel like they recover better after exercise. And really, when people have joint pain, they stop exercising, they stop moving, they gain weight, and then all of a sudden, they create this inflammation in their body that's just perpetuated because they can't move their body. So it's just a really interesting hack to get in and say, listen, shift this, turn it around, right? And people are really stressed about getting cold. And I'm like, you know what? We're very precious, you know, oh, I'm too cold. I put my sweater on. I put my heater on. I don't want to be too hot, you know, I mean, let's turn on my ac. And I think that our bodies aren't really built like that. Our bodies are built to be stressed, and we're stronger when we're stressed, and we're stronger when we push ourselves. And I think it just helps your body to function better overall.
[00:10:19] Speaker A: So if somebody listening to this was interested in what you're talking about, but they're like, look, I live in an apartment or a house. I don't have a sauna. I don't have some of these things. You're saying that perhaps just doing a cold plunge at their house, just without the infrared sauna or traditional sauna, that would render some benefits as well, just on a more practical, sure level.
[00:10:46] Speaker B: I mean, they have pain in their ankles, put their feet in a bucket with some cold water, you know, get a little thermometer. It doesn't have to be freezing, freezing, freezing. And it really has to be about 55 degrees. That's the studies they did in Denmark. And then in Denmark, they had 55 degree ponds, so they all did saunas, and then they all jumped in the. In the lake. So that's why they developed this sort of 55 degrees. It's not that cold. It's not that uncomfortable. A lot of health clubs have saunas, and you can have the traditional saunas that have the rocks that they throw the water on and the eucalyptus, whatever, you know, that are up to 100, 7180 degrees. That's fine, too. A lot of sauna. A lot of. I mean, these 24 hours fitness places, they have saunas. So, you know, maybe for $20 a month, you can just get some access to a sauna. And then maybe you go to your house and you do just run yourself a tub. Or, like, my son started this a long time ago and just got a horse trough and just put water in it and just put a board over the top of it. Really interesting ice in there. And he would just dunk himself. And he did that until the water got disgusting and he dumped it and put new water in there. So I don't know. I mean, you could do it in your bathtub. So there's a lot of different ways of doing it, but I think it's beneficial thing to push into.
[00:12:01] Speaker A: So if you had to say, it sounds like obviously there's some real medical benefits.
If you were to say how this has benefited you beyond that, would you say that it's impacted you beyond just like, physically, has this been something that's been good for your relationship with your husband emotionally? You mentioned sleep on. Just more specifically, how has this benefited your life.
[00:12:32] Speaker B: You know, we tend to have our schedule of when we do this. And so I also have. We'll sit out there and I'll put Netflix on the outside of the sauna, and we'll watch something and put it through the speakers and watch a show. It's just this whole event. If we're going to watch a show, it's going to be in the sauna, right? So getting kind of just like, I don't want to sit on the. Just sit there. So we're doing that. It's, you know, we're talking about our health, about how things are changing. We're freaking out about jumping in the cold plunge. You know, it's like, like this.
[00:13:06] Speaker A: Thing.
[00:13:06] Speaker B: That we do together that's consistent. And I also run a ton of blood work, so I'm watching our blood work and seeing how it changes as we're doing sauna and cold plunge. And we have had a remarkable change in my husband's blood work with his cholesterol panel with the cold plunge. There's a couple of studies out right now that are talking about cold plunge and lowering people's cholesterol, and he has kind of 25% more cholesterol than I'd like him to have pretty consistently. So I said, let's try this for 90 days. Let's do it four days a week. Let's see what happens. We ran a pre, at a post, and his cholesterol came down 25%.
So we have. I've talked to his cardiologist, and his cardiologist is like, this is compelling. Do this again. Do another 90 days, and then let's do another blood work and just see if this is consistent or if this is a fluke or what this is. But every single inflammatory number came down.
Every single number that came down was like, oh, these are the big ones that you don't want to have. They all came down. Everything improved. So I'm pushing this with a lot of my patients. Like, you know, what if you have really resistant cholesterol and you're doing everything right and you don't know what to do, and you're maybe leaning against wanting to be on statins, do the cold punch for 90 days and redo your blood work and see how it goes? It's been.
[00:14:21] Speaker A: I think what I like about this whole concept of yours is that, and this is something I definitely embrace in my own life, is if it can't hurt you, just try it, you know, being on, you know, pills or putting yourself at risk with certain things like, hey, it might work out. However, there's a lot of potential side effects. This is something that, it's not going to hurt you, so why not try it?
[00:14:49] Speaker B: Correct. And people get all a little bit wimpy about it. But, but I have a couple of patients that have had really bad reactions to statins. And I said, well, then do a cold plunge. Let's do it for 90 days. So they're doing it right now. They have a pool. I'm like, just don't heat your pool. Get in your pool. Just do your cold. You know, just get in there with your husband. Do three minutes, do eleven minutes a week. And let's see. And so we're waiting. There's a lot of people, I'm going to do some post checks in about 30 days, so I'll keep you posted.
[00:15:15] Speaker A: I love this. And so it sounds to me, and I already know this, that you are consciously looking to embrace new things. And so it doesn't necessarily end here. You're always looking for the next thing. And as opposed to just being completely focused on longevity there comes with it the sense of quality of life, too, which I think is important.
[00:15:40] Speaker B: Well, and I think we have to really be mindful about all the things that tend to creep up on us, high blood pressure, blood sugar issues, what's happening with our blood flow? You know, just everything that's happening. How is our muscle tone as we get older, there's a lot of things that we lose after 50. Right. We start to lose our muscle tone. We start to gain all these issues. So what can we do to disrupt that activity and how do we turn it toward the way we really want it to go? Right. Because we're looking at, we want good, quality life at 80 and 90. Right. We don't want to be like, well, I just can't do that anymore. So I think we have windows of opportunity in our lives and I think that our fifties and our sixties are a big turning point. Right. You can really see who's going to make it and who isn't going to make it. Right?
[00:16:26] Speaker A: Exactly. Exactly. I mean, you and I have chatted about this and that. Basically that is, you know, the cornerstone of this program. It's having the mentality that life doesn't happen to you. You make things happen. I think people get that, but then they don't really employ it into their life.
And with that, you have been a sensational guest. We so appreciate it. We have people on our program who speak to feeling better and things that definitely have improved their life and contributed to their happiness. But what I appreciate is you brought real medical, scientific perspective to this, which is new to this program. And I think people will learn a lot. I really do. Darla, thank you so much.
[00:17:18] Speaker B: You're welcome.
[00:17:19] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:17:19] Speaker B: Awesome.
[00:17:20] Speaker A: And on that note, we'll see you next time.
[00:17:22] Speaker B: Thank you. All right.
[00:17:26] Speaker A: Well, it is true what they say. You do learn something new every day. I think I speak for a lot of you guys out there that I knew what a traditional sauna was, had no idea about this infrared sauna. And to be clear, for those of you guys who still are wondering what that's all about, it's using light as opposed to traditional heat when you put water on rocks in, like a steam sauna. So it's a little bit different, but at the end of the day, it renders the exact same benefits. It makes you sweat and it raises your heart rate. And so what's interesting, of course, I did a little bit of homework on this after I spoke to Darla. And this combination of a sauna followed by a cold plunge is not a new practice. It turns out, a matter of fact, that the Vikings use this as a spiritual and physical cleanse. The native american tribes have been using sweat lodge ceremonies followed by these ice bath plunges for years. So it's very clear that there is a history to this. And as well as Vikings, native american tribes, we also have elite athletes that are swearing by this to the likes of LeBron James and Steph Curry, who use this especially for helping with injuries. Another thing that's interesting here is clearly Darla is not a Viking or necessarily an elite athlete, but she recognizes the benefits from this. And what's worth mentioning here is, with regards to this program, it's clear our focus is on happiness. And some of you might be saying, well, you know, getting into a hot sauna followed by a cold plunge does not sound like a lot of fun. And here's the thing. It's not the doing of it that makes her happy. It's the results from it. She feels better, she sleeps better. Her mind is clear.
And as an additional benefit, it's bringing her closer to her husband, because this is something they've decided that they want to do together. So in the evenings, they make this as part of their nightly evening routine. So, yet another benefit for this. Although Darla started this whole process because she was trying to address a very specific genetic predilection for Alzheimer's disease that runs in her family, it ended up being far more beneficial and rendering far greater results than just helping her from a medical or physical perspective. And I hope you guys were really inspired by this, because I have to tell you, I really think what she's talking about, it's very compelling and interesting. So much so that I sought out an infrared sauna and a ice, a cold plunge combination that they offer, actually, at our local fitness center.
And so I'm going for it. I'm going to try it this week. I'm a little bit scared, a little bit anxious myself. I'm not really sure what to expect, but I figure at my age and stage, it's worth giving it a shot. So I'm going to go for it, and I encourage you guys to give it a try. And so on that note, if any of you guys are interested in following what that experience is like for me, before you kind of take the jump yourself, feel free to follow me on Instagram, where I am going to just go for it. Anyway, on that note, thanks for joining us, and we'll see you next time.
