Heat, Sleep, Mood + Cognition: The Brain in Perimenopause with Dr Sarah McKay
Dr Sarah McKay is a neuroscientist who translates brain research into strategies for professionals working in health, education and coaching. She received her PhD from Oxford, but after four years postdoc research, hung up her lab coat to set up a communications business bridging the gap between the lab and everyday life.
Sarah is the author of The Women's Brain Book—The neuroscience of health, hormones and happiness which explores the female lifespan through the lens of neurobiology. In 2019, Sarah hosted an episode of ABC Catalyst exploring brain health, bio-hacking and longevity. Sarah is the director of The Neuroscience Academy, which offers professional development training in applied neuroscience and brain health.
The scientist in me was totally geeking out before this interview and ironically after a horrible peri impacted sleep the night before, I finally got to interview Sarah. Strap yourself, there is SO MUCH you need to know about how your brain is impacting your journey through perimenopause, including:
- the biopsychosocial approach - bottom up, outside in, top down model - which explains how our brains receive data from our biology, our environment and our thoughts/emotions
- A broad brushstroke chat about the hypothalamic-pituitary-ovarian (HPO) axis, the conversation between our brain and our ovaries and how it begins to change in perimenopause, causing fluctuating levels of estrogen month to month
- How the estrogen rollercoaster impacts your body's thermostat and the resulting "it's hot in here! It's hot in here!!!" messages to your brain - hello HOT flush/flashes and night sweats waking with a feeling of panic
- Sleep disturbances as a result the physical changes in perimenopause, and how over time the behavioural issues which can arise from sleep disturbance and together form a pattern of insomnia
- Sleep architecture in a healthy sleep cycle, the influence of body temperature, and how even if you are sleeping through the night that thermoregulation can result in waking feeling fatigued
- Sleep disturbances impact memory consolidation, emotional processing, physical regeneration processes and how important it is to protect the early stages of sleep to consolidate deep sleep
- Mood changes in perimenopause and how our bottom up biology makes us more vulnerable to other influences (stressful events, sleep disturbances, behaviour, challenges with kids and ageing parents)
- How perimenopause is a time of significant structural reorganisation in our brains, and the brain fog, word finding, and cognitive changes which can show up in perimenopause
- New research on the positive impact of HRT
You can find Sarah here
And preorder now for April 2023 Sarah's new book Baby Brain: The surprising neuroscience of how pregnancy and motherhood sculpt our brains and change our minds (for the better).
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