All Episodes

July 8, 2025 25 mins

Feeling drained despite a full night's sleep? That persistent exhaustion might be more than just "being tired" – it could signal deeper imbalances in your body's energy production systems. 

Dr. Enrico Dolcecore dives deep into the fascinating world of human energy, exploring what truly powers our bodies beyond just caffeine and willpower. By understanding energy as a three-dimensional concept – physical, chemical, and emotional – we gain powerful insights into why so many people feel perpetually exhausted in modern life.

The episode unveils the five critical drivers of fatigue that might be sabotaging your vitality: poor sleep quality, nutrient deficiencies, chronic stress, sedentary lifestyle, and hidden inflammation. Each driver connects to your mitochondria – the cellular powerhouses producing ATP, your body's primary energy currency. When these microscopic energy factories malfunction, every aspect of your life suffers.

What makes this exploration particularly valuable is the science-backed, practical approach to rebuilding your energy reserves. From optimizing sleep cycles to strategic nutrient supplementation, from counterintuitive exercise benefits to detoxifying your environment, Dr. Dolcecori offers a comprehensive roadmap to sustainable energy restoration. You'll discover why movement paradoxically creates more energy, how EMF exposure might be draining your batteries, and why conventional hydration advice might be making you more tired.

The distinction between temporary energy fixes and true vitality becomes crystal clear: energy isn't about constant hustle – it's about creating harmony within your body systems. By implementing these evidence-based strategies, you can transform your relationship with energy and reclaim the natural vitality that stress, poor nutrition, and environmental factors have slowly eroded.

Ready to stop feeling tired all the time? This episode provides the blueprint to recharge your life from the cellular level up. Your journey toward boundless, sustainable energy starts now.

Send us a text

Mark as Played
Transcript

Episode Transcript

Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
Have you ever had one of those days where your body
works but your energy is justgone?
Last week, we dove into fatigue.
So if you listened to thatepisode, we went deeper into
what causes fatigue in the humanbody.
This week, we're diving intowhat energy is.
Why are we so fatigued and howdo we restore our vitality.

(00:24):
Welcome to another episode.
Why are we so fatigued and howdo we restore our vitality?
Welcome to another episode.
I'm Dr Enrico Dolcecori andwe're going to dive into what is
energy this week, both thephysical and chemical and
emotional parts of energy.
So energy in the body is thecapacity to be able to do work.
Biologically, this comes fromATP, adenosine, triphosphate.

(00:48):
This is produced in everysingle cell in your body in an
area called the mitochondria.
It's also an emotional andmental part of our vitality,
felt as motivation, clarity,zest, however way you want to
put it.
It has all three components toit.
So fatigue in itself is asymptom.
It's not a diagnosis ofanything in particular.

(01:10):
This is why it's so frustrating, because we may go to our
primary care physician and tellthem I feel fatigued, and they
may or may not run tests on this, because there's really nothing
to test in that portion ofphysiology, so nothing may
actually show up with fatigue.
Once we get into a diagnosis of, maybe, chronic fatigue
syndrome, it's because hormonaltesting has been showing low

(01:34):
production of some hormones,adrenaline decay, some kidney
fatigue or adrenal fatigue.
So that becomes more of adiagnosis of chronic fatigue.
What we're talking about todayis just fatigue, just feeling
tired, and how do we just feelenergized?
That's what we want to get into.
So physical fatigue is muscletiredness or lack of endurance.

(01:58):
Mental and emotional fatigue isbrain fog, low motivation,
irritability.
And nutritional fatigue is poorcellular function due to
micronutrient deficiencies,dehydration or imbalanced blood
sugar.
I feel as a primary providermyself, as a chiropractor,

(02:18):
talking to people every singleday.
Those are the three questions Ialways ask them Are you
hydrated?
Not?
Do you drink water?
Are you hydrated?
Are you getting electrolytes?
Do you have salt in your diet?
A lot of people have pulledaway from just salting their
foods because salt has beengiven a bad rap and when our
blood pressure goes up or adoctor says, hey, you have got
high blood pressure, you got towatch your diet, people

(02:40):
immediately default on cuttingout all the salt, which can lead
to deficiencies.
So that's what we're going todive in today.
Today's episode is all about thefive drivers of fatigue, and if
, by understanding the driversof fatigue, we can then have
more power to recapture ourvitality.
So let's start with them.
This is in no particular order,but instead of you know one,

(03:02):
two, three, four, five, we'regoing to go A, b, c, d, e.
How's that sound?
So today, a is poor sleepquality, and you knew this was
coming.
So when we have a bad night'ssleep and we have that groggy
feeling the next day, weobviously know we're fatigued
because we had a poor night'ssleep.
Maybe we only got two hours ofsleep last night.
New parents know exactly whatwe're talking about right here.

(03:27):
So deep sleep is when your braindetoxes and your body repairs.
If we miss that portion of oursleep cycle, well, now we have
no detox and our body wasn'table to repair, so we may feel
it the next day.
Even six or seven hours of lowquality sleep can feel worse
than four hours of deep rest.
Sleep deprivation reducesglucose metabolism in the brain,

(03:48):
especially in the prefrontalcortex.
This is from the Journal ofNeuro Report from 2000,.
But it shows that sleepdeprivation can actually be
picked up on PET scans in thebrain, where the brain only uses
glucose as energy and itreduces that metabolism in our
frontal cortex, where we prettymuch do all of our thought

(04:10):
during the day.
That's where we get the termbrain fog from where we just
can't think straight.
We're forgetting what we needto do.
Next, that's from lack of sleep, of good sleep.
So sleep is really important.
We've done probably two or threepodcasts on sleep and circadian
rhythm.
Go back and look at those upand listen to them.
They have some great tips onhow to improve your sleep.

(04:30):
So that's number one when itcomes to fatigue.
You knew this was coming.
You knew we were going to talkabout sleep Nutrient
deficiencies.
Now this is where things get alittle bit interesting.
B vitamins, magnesium, iron andcoenzyme Q10 are essential for
mitochondrial energy production.
When we're looking to getenergy back, these are hard

(04:51):
things to test for.
B12 is tested a little bitthrough blood tests and then if
you're low, you're given a B12shot, but other than that, other
things are really not checkedfor, unless we have signs of
anemia, where iron can bechecked for.
So we're missing a lot ofthings here and most people will
or know to get a B-complexmultivitamin and start there if
their energy feels low, and manyreport back saying it did help

(05:13):
a little bit, it was great.
Then we want to add ourmagnesium Iron.
You want to make sure you talkto your doctor first, make sure
you review that with someone whoknows your blood work before
you add iron into your diet.
But coenzyme Q10, for many ofyou listening right now can be
added and that combination of Bvitamins, magnesium and coenzyme
Q10 can help repairmitochondrial damage and improve

(05:37):
mitochondrial energy production, which is absolutely essential
for energy, which is amazing.
So an iron deficiency, anemia,is one of the most common causes
of chronic fatigue, especiallyin women.
We've known this for a while.
Happens because they have acycle every month, they give
birth and also their hormonesplay havoc on the red blood cell

(06:00):
production through thedifferent phases in their life,
in their adult life.
And anemia can be misdiagnosed.
It can be missed completelybecause numbers and blood
volumes may come back normal,like an RBC study or a CBC panel
can come back, showingeverything within normal range.
So things can sometimes bemissed and they usually are.

(06:21):
So if you're feeling tired,it's the beginning of a symptom
or a clue that things are not inbalance.
So looking into that is reallyimportant, but starting off with
those things to help stimulatemitochondrial production may be
the best first step forward torestoring your energy.

(06:42):
C chronic stress and emotionalexhaustion.
Constant cortisol productionburns you out.
There's no question about it.
That's what we talk about withstress.
The constant cortisolproduction burns you out.
Mental stress manifestsphysically it turns into
digestive issues, tight muscles,and it lowers your immunity.

(07:04):
We've all been witness to this.
We can all attest to havingthis happen to us at some point,
where the chronic stress andchronic issues can add up on our
bodies and leave us sore, tired, tight and in pain.
Emotional exhaustion correlateswith low heart rate variability

(07:25):
and poor sleep.
This is from the Journal ofPsychosomatic Research from 2013
.
So they showed a directcorrelation between stress and
lowering HRV.
So we got to play andunderstand what stress is.
50 years ago, the word stresswasn't used as loosely as it is

(07:45):
today.
We have teenagers walkingaround saying I'm stressed, and
they are.
They're not lying, but it'sused more so now than ever,
either because we are attuned tohow we feel or we've
drastically changed the way theworld works, and I think it's
both.
50 years ago, we weren'tbombarded with the information

(08:05):
we are now.
It's both.
50 years ago we weren'tbombarded with the information
we are now.
We get more data per hour nowthan we did 30 years ago, 40
years ago, 50 years ago.
We have more points of interest, more points of data because of
the screens.
We're constantly downloadinginformation and most of it's not
good.
Most of it is either news,which is never positive, it's
usually negative.

(08:26):
Two, it's updates and three,it's social status, where we're
comparing ourselves to what wesee on social media, and all of
those things cause an increasein cortisol because it does
start to stress us out.
We feel like we're never goodenough, no matter what we do
financially, spiritually,friendships good enough, no

(08:46):
matter what we do financially,spiritually, friendships,
humanitarianly, diet, fitnessthe list just goes on and on.
So this chronic fatigue andthis chronic stress and
emotional exhaustion thateveryone's facing is really
because of the constant downloadof information and we need to
give ourselves a breakinformation and we need to give
ourselves a break.
D on this list.

(09:06):
Number four sedentary lifestyle.
This has been shown over ahundred year study that,
counterintuitively, movementgives you more energy.
We just talked about muscleexhaustion, muscle fatigue, and
you think rest and not movingwould actually improve your
energy.
But it's actually contrary towhat you may think.

(09:27):
Movement actually gives youenergy and research has shown
that regular low-intensityexercise improves feelings of
fatigue more than rest.
That's from the University ofGeorgia in 2008.
So just constant daily moving,even going for a 15-minute brisk
walk every day there's beenstudies showing it reduces the
chances of breast cancer by 80%and all the health benefits that

(09:49):
come from movement.
But also for energy.
It keeps the circulatory systemmoving, pumping and needing
energy from mitochondria and itcauses a positive feedback loop
for production of ATP, which iswonderful.
So movement is key.
And the last one is the hiddeninflammation or toxin exposures

(10:11):
that we're chronically subjectedto on a daily basis, like mold
or mildew EMF exposure.
This comes from our electronicdevices and Wi-Fi devices,
processed foods, chronicinfections.
These can all zap your energywithout obvious symptoms, and
they're the most common thingsthat I see on a daily basis with

(10:34):
my patients is they're eitherchronically exposed to mold this
is definitely a thing in morehumid areas and hotter temperate
areas.
Mold is chronically around.
If there's humidity and we haveto have this, I would check
your home every year or two tomake sure that the mold is
minimal in the home.
You definitely don't want it tobe in places where you sleep

(10:58):
the living room, you know.
If it's in and around thegarage because of moisture and
rain, that's fine, but you wantto try and mitigate this stuff
as much as possible and if it'sgotten into your body you have
to detox this out because moldcan run rampant on your immune
system.
Emf exposure is not talked aboutenough, unless you wear a
tinfoil hat, it seems, or youlisten to weird podcasts.

(11:21):
That's the only time it's evertalked about.
But it should be talked aboutmore because there's very
conclusive evidence from theliterature showing that chronic
EMF exposure changes thefrequency of our cells and by
doing that it changes the outputof mitochondrial production,
which is ATP.
And we want to make sure weturn off devices.
Turn off Wi-Fi enabled devicesfrom our body at least when we

(11:45):
sleep away and out of our rooms.
Don't charge the phone 14inches from your head on the
nightstand.
Charge it in a different roomor on a different floor, maybe
even if you can turn off theWi-Fi at night completely, so
that signal diminishes withinyour home and gives everyone in
the home a chance to haveminimal EMF exposure a little
bit every day, otherwise we'rechronically subjected to it

(12:07):
everywhere we go.
And even devices, heavy dutyelectronic devices.
I don't know what you wouldhave in the home.
I think of medical equipment,and, yeah, I don't know
microwaves.
Conventional ovens maybe, butthose are not running all the
time.
I don't know what you wouldhave.
Oh, headphones, earbuds.

(12:33):
They constantly have aconnection to electronic current
and you're putting them soclose to the body.
Those things can add up EMFexposure as well.
And then infections.
Many people don't even know it,but they have chronic gut
infections or overgrowth of badbacteria and virus, and these
things can constantly drainenergy from the body.
Things like staph infections,strep infections, bacterial

(12:55):
overgrowth, candida the listgoes on and on and on, but these
chronic infections cancompletely drain you in general,
as the entire system.
So a study from Frontiers inImmunology in 2020 showed that
mitochondrial dysfunction andsystemic inflammation are
primary drivers of chronicfatigue syndrome, which is again

(13:17):
the diagnosis of long-termchronic fatigue issues.
We're talking about short-termor acute fatigue.
Maybe you've been feelingfatigue over the last month and
you're like man.
What do I do to zap out of this?
That's what this podcast is allabout Things that you can start
implementing right away.
So what does energy feel like?
We talk about fatigue.

(13:37):
Everyone's like, yeah, I knowwhat fatigue is, but what does
it feel like to be energized?
Go ask your eight-year-old.
They know exactly what it feelslike.
They won't be able to describeit to you.
They're like, hey, I'm justbeing me, this is just normal.
And they're like, well, give methe secret sauce, kid.
And they won't know the answerto it.
So let's talk about it.
You have energy when you'reenergized with when you wake up,

(13:59):
without dragging at all.
You wake up, you look at yourphone.
You dragging at all.
You wake up, you look at yourphone, you turn off the alarm.
You're able to sit up and walkstraight to the bathroom and
start your day with minimal drag.
You have a clear mind andability to focus.
You have a positive outlook oryou're in a good mood and your
motivation to move and interactis positive.

(14:22):
Those are all things whereyou're like I get up, you pretty
much are able to go brush yourteeth, go downstairs, know that
it's time to make some breakfastand you're relatively in a good
mood.
If you're dragging through allof those first steps in a day to
start your day, it could be asign that you are fatigued.
And then, when we are, we havethings like heavy limbs,

(14:43):
slouched posture, brain fog,trouble remembering things.
We're easily overwhelmed.
We have a reliance on caffeineor sugar for stimulation
throughout the day Multiplecoffees, multiple energy drinks,
sweeteners, things that we addthere to give us that quick 15
minute boost.
We have to repeat that becausethere's 24 hours in a day.

(15:05):
That is a sign that we'refatigued and all we're doing
there is spiking cortisol andlowering mitochondrial
production by putting thosethings into our body.
So what are some practical steps?
I listed a few steps for youthat we can take to reclaim our
energy.
What are some things?
Fix your sleep first we have toSleep.
We spend almost things.
Fix your sleep first we have toSleep.

(15:27):
We spend almost a third of ourlife sleeping.
We have to spend some timemaking sure that it's healthy
sleep and work on it, just likewe take care of our cars.
A good car is reliable to getyou from point A to point B
every single day, so that youcan do the things you need to do
Work, leisure, sports, go tothe gym, go to grocery shopping.
Take care of your life.

(15:47):
The same thing we need to dofor our sleep is fine tune it
all the time Make sure we'rechanging the oil, make sure
we're changing the filter,making sure we rotate the tires
the same thing we have to do.
We have to look at our sleep andmake sure things are aligned
properly.
We want to sleep if you have astandard work schedule from 10

(16:08):
pm to 6 am, if that aligns withyour circadian rhythm.
That's what we want to try andfocus on is be in bed by 10, set
the alarm for 6 to improve thechances of getting eight hours
of sleep.
Use blue light blockers duringthe day, blackout curtains at
night in your bedroom, andmagnesium before bed has been

(16:28):
shown to help calm the nervoussystem and muscles to get you to
sleep a little bit easier.
So these are all tips on maybeimproving your sleep, and we've
done the sleep and mattresspodcast and a pillow podcast and
all those things on how toimprove or know which pillow is
right for you.
So there's things we can look atthere, okay, and we need to

(16:51):
focus on what we eat.
We have to eat for our cellularenergy.
So what does that mean?
We got to focus on real foods,because processed foods decrease
our cellular energy.
Whole foods increase ourcellular energy.
So protein, leafy greens andhealthy fats that has to be the
base of pretty much every meal.
So if you eat three meals a day, you have to focus on protein,

(17:14):
greens and healthy fats as thebase of every one of your meals.
Avoid blood sugar crashes, socut out processed carbs and
sugar and we want to stayhydrated.
Dehydration equals low bloodvolume and that equals low
energy.
We want a higher blood volumeand a higher hydration level to

(17:34):
keep everything moving smoothlythrough the cardiovascular
system.
Number three take keysupplements if needed, like
vitamin D, if your vitamin D islow or below average, which is
below 50, medically it saysbelow 30, but we want to keep
our vitamin D levels.
50 to 70 range is optimal.
So we want to take vitamin D Bcomplex vitamins so we're

(17:58):
getting a little bit of all theB vitamins, not just B12.
Magnesium glycinate that's theeasiest one on your stomach.
Omega-3s, which is typicallyfound from fish oil, but you can
get it from flaxseed oil andother sources.
And adaptogens like rhodiola.
Always test before you guess.

(18:19):
Don't just add thesesupplements.
Make sure that you're low inthese and you can ask for these
tests by any provider and theycan send them for you fairly
inexpensive, and they can checkyour vitamin levels and see
where they're all at andwherever you're low at.
As long as it's an energyproducing vitamin, we may want
to increase that.

(18:41):
Get moving 20 minutes a day.
All it takes is a 20 minutewalk.
Take the dog 10 minutes in onedirection, 10 minutes back.
That's all it takes.
Include strength training, ifyou can, two to three times a
week to support your metabolismand your mitochondrial health as
well.
So exercise plays a big role,but in this case for energy.
It doesn't take a gymmembership to improve your

(19:02):
motion.
All it takes is just getting upand moving.
Manage your mind.
Practice mindfulness or breath,work for at least five minutes
a day.
Journal to get the mentalclutter out.
Write down the stressors in abook.
This book eventually will fillup and once it's filled up you
can throw it out and start a newbook.
But by writing these thingsdown helps you disperse a lot of

(19:26):
the mental stress onto paper.
There's been a lot of researchshowing that by writing it or
saying it out loud, gets it outand at least recognized.
Detox your environment, yourentire environment.
Swap out toxic locations.
Sorry lotions, toxic cosmetics,toxic lotions, toxic shampoos,

(19:48):
conditioners, fragrances,cleaning supply, plastics these
things are all toxins and whatwe mean by that is the byproduct
of them can be estrogeninhibitors in the body, which
helps spike pseudoestrogenissues inside the body, which
causes a hormonaldiscombobulation.

(20:09):
It's horrible.
We want to minimize thesethings.
So look at the ingredients.
Make sure that we're notoverusing these things in our
home.
Consider a HEPA air filter andmineral rich water.
So if we completely reverse,like use a reverse osmosis
system and water filtrationsystem in the house, we want to
make sure it's going through acalcium rinse or a calcium

(20:34):
cartridge to put electrolytesback into the water once we
drink it.
Because true, h2o with nothingelse in it is actually
dehydrating.
Because once it goes into,think of it like a small glass
of salt water.
The more pure water you add tothat glass or to that bucket,
the less salty it gets andeventually, if you add enough

(20:56):
pure water to it, you'll barelybe able to tell if there's any
salt in it.
You may think it's a good thing, but think of your body as that
bucket and if it's supposed tohave this certain electrolyte
balance, this certain saltbalance to it, and we keep
adding pure H2O to it, we startto deplete these electrolytes

(21:17):
from our body, and this stuffcan actually come from our bone
too.
We can deplete calcium fromparts of our body as well, so
that's the whole point of that.
So make sure we have a completereverse osmosis system.
Usually, if you have one in thehome, they're already built
like this.
You have to change thosecartridges.
There's a reason for it.
They're carbon filters, andthen they also add other things
in there, like calcium and someother electrolytes, to make sure

(21:39):
that we get more of a purewater rather than just H2O.
And then reset your nervoussystem.
We talked about this a coupleof podcasts ago your nervous
system and balancing it.
Chiropractic adjustments,acupuncture, vagal nerve
stimulation can help regulateyour nervous system.
Breath work, cold shower, coldplunges and grounding all

(22:01):
stimulate healthy energypathways.
So when do you actually need togo get help?
Because everything we said,there is stuff you can do on
your own to help improve yourenergy production.
But when do you know that youneed actual help?
If you're constantly tired,despite trying everything?
You could have thyroid issuesor adrenal fatigue or sleep

(22:26):
apnea or chronic infection ormitochondrial dysfunction, and I
went from probably the mostcommon to the least common in
that list, or a combination of acouple of things above.
You could have thyroid issuesand sleep apnea.
You could have adrenal fatigueand sleep apnea and thyroid
issues.
So that's where now it's timeto get some help and try and

(22:48):
find out what's going on.
And where we start is exactlylike that Check the hormone
system, the thyroid, and seewhat's going on there first.
So blood work is first, then agut test to check for any
chronic infections.
Usually, when we do those twothings, we can now see the
entire body and see what isgoing on from an energy

(23:10):
perspective.
Energy isn't just about hustle,it's about harmony.
So that is what the goal iswith all of this and your health
is to try and encourage harmonyof everything inside of it.
So, just to recap this episode,there's a lot of things that
you can do to help boost yourenergy and just you have to

(23:33):
remember energy is both physical, emotional, nutritional and
environmental.
It comes from all aspects.
Reclaiming it is a lifestyle.
It's not going to be simplytaking some more magnesium.
It's not a quick fix, but it is.
It is possible we can get ourenergy back.
So if you have any questionsabout fatigue, I encourage you

(23:53):
to share with us at info atfulllifetampacom.
We love answering all yourquestions and if you ever need
any more resources, go tofulllifetampacom and check out
some of our resources there, orour that we've put in the past
about stress, nutrition, nervoussystem regulation and all the

(24:20):
things that are on there.
There's some resources therefor you and online Go search
online as well.
So if you're tired of beingtired, this episode breaks down
what's really draining you andhow to recharge it, and all you
need to do is just take controlof your health by making
decisions.
That's all it really takes.
Add the few things in, take afew things out and, if you need

(24:44):
help, reach and ask people forsome help.
Ask the people you trust andthey will have the right
referrals for you.
Stay healthy, stay well andcatch you on next week's episode
.
Advertise With Us

Popular Podcasts

Fudd Around And Find Out

Fudd Around And Find Out

UConn basketball star Azzi Fudd brings her championship swag to iHeart Women’s Sports with Fudd Around and Find Out, a weekly podcast that takes fans along for the ride as Azzi spends her final year of college trying to reclaim the National Championship and prepare to be a first round WNBA draft pick. Ever wonder what it’s like to be a world-class athlete in the public spotlight while still managing schoolwork, friendships and family time? It’s time to Fudd Around and Find Out!

Crime Junkie

Crime Junkie

Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.

The Breakfast Club

The Breakfast Club

The World's Most Dangerous Morning Show, The Breakfast Club, With DJ Envy, Jess Hilarious, And Charlamagne Tha God!

Music, radio and podcasts, all free. Listen online or download the iHeart App.

Connect

© 2025 iHeartMedia, Inc.