Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:09):
Hey, everyone, welcome to another edition of Wisdom Wednesdays. And
before we get into it, just a little plug for
my book and The Hardiness Effect, How to Grow from
Stress to optimize your health.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
And live Longer.
Speaker 1 (00:22):
It is no unsealed for pre order on Amazon, and
right now there is a twenty five discount that's not
going to last very long, so jump in and get
yourself a copy of The Hardiness Effect.
Speaker 2 (00:36):
By doctor Paul Taylor. Now onto the podcast.
Speaker 1 (00:41):
And this is a podcast that I actually debated whether
or not I would record it because it might just
piss people off. And the reason is that there is
a reasonable amount of evidence out there that suggests that
your morning coffee could be increasing your diabetes risk. And
(01:04):
before you stop listening to this podcast ever again, I
just want to explore the mechanisms and a way that
we can.
Speaker 2 (01:13):
Get around it.
Speaker 1 (01:14):
So first of all, and let's talk about morning cortisol.
So cortisol it often gets a bad rap, right because
it's the major stress hormone. But if you can't produce cortisol,
you die pretty damn quickly. And so there is this
diurnal rhythm. So there's this natural rhythm throughout the day
(01:36):
of cortisol, and it tends to pig It starts to
rise at if you're waking up at a sort of
normal six seven o'clock.
Speaker 2 (01:46):
It starts to rise a few hours before.
Speaker 1 (01:49):
And then it typically reaches its maximum about thirty to
forty five minutes after waking, and many people it can
remain remain at a high level about a third above
baseline even an r after waking. Right and after that
wakening spike, and that's known as the cortisol awakening response
(02:13):
or car corsol gradually declines throughout the rest of the day,
eventually reaching its lowest point during the night or early
sleep hours. And that's if you are if you're not
stressed out of your head, because obviously stressful events will
spike that throughout the day.
Speaker 2 (02:32):
But let's talk about caffein.
Speaker 1 (02:34):
So it so how caffeine keeps you awake or gives
you a bit of a burst or a wakefulness, is
that it is similarly structurally similar to a denizine and
it acts as a competitive antagonist to a denizine receptor
receptors in the brain. So basically, caffein binds to a
(02:57):
denizine receptors and block sidenizine's effects and thedenizin's effects are
sleepiness and youuronal inhibition. So basically your brain sleeping are
not working very well. And that's why caffeine can work
as a bit of a pick me up. Now, people
have talked about caffeine impacts on cortisol, because cortisol one
(03:22):
of the reasons that it wakes you up is that
it can bind to the adenosine receptor. But caffeine actually
doesn't interfere with that at all. So let's explore what
it actually does. High caffeine can have an effect on
your blood sugar. Is caffeine actually increases cortisole release, especially
(03:49):
when you take it acutely, and even more in people
who aren't habitual users of it. Right, So, caffeine is
a stimulant to the adrenalinelands and it prompts him to
release both cortisol and adrenaline with the Americans called epinephrine.
And basically it's a bit of a stress response. And
this is why people who have anxiety should not drink
(04:12):
bloody coffee because it is a shot of stress hormone
and that's kind of how it wakes shop. But by
blocking a denazine, Caffeine increases neuronal firing and the release
of neurotransmitters like no epinephyrin.
Speaker 2 (04:29):
So that is or nord.
Speaker 1 (04:31):
Adrenaline as we as we call it in Australia in
the UK, and so that's the kind of sister chemical
of adrenaline in the brain, and that further activates arousal
stress response pathways that can indirectly elevate cortisol. Now, why
is this an issue If caffeine is increasing cortisol well
as well as if if you're stressed or anxious, you
(04:53):
don't want that extra burst of adrenaline no adrenaline cortisol.
The main issue here is that cortisol actually spikes your
insulin and interferes with your glucose tolerance. Now, most of
the studies that have been done commonly use a single
(05:15):
dose of around five to six milligrams per kilogram of
body weight of caffeine. So for me at eighty kilos,
that's that's four hundred to four hundred and eighty milligrams
of coffee. Now, I'm not a coffee drinker. I'm a
tea drinker. College's a coffee drinker, But there's not many
coffee drinkers I know that would have a five shot coffee.
(05:40):
Now let me get to this study. So this study
actually took twenty four healthy volunteers, twelve for meals and
twelve for females.
Speaker 2 (05:49):
Which is really good.
Speaker 1 (05:51):
I like the design of this study already because often
these studies are just on on meals, are just on females,
and they don't cross. And they did four trials, and
they did it in a crossover randomsigned, randomized, sorry, and
double blind fashion.
Speaker 2 (06:08):
So this is a really well designed study.
Speaker 1 (06:10):
And so they ingested caffeine at three different rates on
three different times, right, and one was one milligram of
caffeine per kilogram a body bit, so for me that's
eighty milligrams. That's a standard cup of coffee. Or they
did three milligrams, which for me would be three cups
of coffee or five milligrams, or they took a placebo, right,
(06:33):
which was probably decaf coffee, I would imagine. And then
they did a two R oral glucose tolerance test and
that was an R leater after that, so that given
a bit of time to see how the glucose responded.
So they measured in glucose, insulin, and something called sea
(06:54):
peptide area under the curve and then inchulin sensitivity index
data were basically they did this fancy stuff to work
out the impact on insulin, and what they find was
that there was a significant difference for glucose, insulin, and
sea peptide areas under the curve, with all of them
(07:18):
being different from the placebo and just having the one
milligram per kilogram of body weight increased insulin and the
sea peptide errors under the curve by five point eight
and eight point seven percent. And now despite the exaggerated
insulin response, the glucose area under the curve was similar
(07:39):
for that when they did that one milligram per kilogram
of body weight and the other doses actually had a
bigger impact on that. So what's the take home of
all of this mumbo jumbo. I think we need to
look at this in the context of daily living. So
if you're waking up and you're having one shot of
(08:01):
coffee whenever you get up a standard cup of coffee
and not having any food, it's probably not going to
have a significant effect. Yes, it's going to spike your
cords all a little bit, which will actually wake you
up a little bit. But the problem here is that
(08:22):
if you're having coffee with a high carbohydrate meal such
as cereal toast, or having coffee and cake or coffee
and I don't know whether it's a doughnut or a
muffin or whatever, which is often powerred with it, that
is bad juju for your insulin response, because you're going
(08:46):
to get a significant spike or significant increase of the
insulin response from drinking the coffee, and that insulin response
by itself will be pretty damn significant if you're having
a high carbohydrate breakfast.
Speaker 2 (09:02):
And this is a particular problem.
Speaker 1 (09:06):
If you have issues with your blood sugar or issues
with your weight, because insulin is the thing that stores
fat and it is the thing that drives diabetes. And
if anybody tells you otherwise, they're completely and utterly bunkers.
So the take home here is I'm not one of
(09:26):
these people who said you shouldn't have coffee first thing
in the morning. And I think the thing here is
be worry what you match your coffee with. You are
much better if you're going to eat something and have
a coffee around that time, especially in the morning when
cord is allus I and therefore insulin is more sensitive.
(09:47):
You're much better off to have a low carbohydrate breakfast
that is high in protein and moderate in fat and
low in carbohydrates, so that and particularly low in sugars,
which is not our typical breakfast. The typical breakfast is
often breakfast cereal or a piece of toast, which is
(10:08):
going to drive up that insulin, especially an inchulin sensitive people.
And then if they're having one or two coffees with that,
that's going to be haywire for their insulin sensitivity. And
I am a big believer that one of the most
important things that you can do for your health, especially
(10:29):
as you get older, is to control your insulin because
when your insulin starts to become disregulated, not only does
it drive diabetes, but it basically destroys all of your organs.
Speaker 2 (10:44):
Including your brain.
Speaker 1 (10:46):
And high insulin in the brain is bad, bad, bad.
So the take home here is not too much coffee
as soon as you wake up, and if you are
going to be drinking coffee, make sure that you're not
having a high carbohydrate breakfast if you want to have
good insulin sensitivity, which translates to good health. So that's
(11:09):
it for this week. Folks, don't shoot the messenger and
I'll catch you next time.
Hey, everyone, welcome to another edition of Wisdom Wednesdays. And
before we get into it, just a little plug for
my book and The Hardiness Effect, How to Grow from
Stress to optimize your health.
Speaker 2 (00:21):
And live Longer.
Speaker 1 (00:22):
It is no unsealed for pre order on Amazon, and
right now there is a twenty five discount that's not
going to last very long, so jump in and get
yourself a copy of The Hardiness Effect.
Speaker 2 (00:36):
By doctor Paul Taylor. Now onto the podcast.
Speaker 1 (00:41):
And this is a podcast that I actually debated whether
or not I would record it because it might just
piss people off. And the reason is that there is
a reasonable amount of evidence out there that suggests that
your morning coffee could be increasing your diabetes risk. And
(01:04):
before you stop listening to this podcast ever again, I
just want to explore the mechanisms and a way that
we can.
Speaker 2 (01:13):
Get around it.
Speaker 1 (01:14):
So first of all, and let's talk about morning cortisol.
So cortisol it often gets a bad rap, right because
it's the major stress hormone. But if you can't produce cortisol,
you die pretty damn quickly. And so there is this
diurnal rhythm. So there's this natural rhythm throughout the day
(01:36):
of cortisol, and it tends to pig It starts to
rise at if you're waking up at a sort of
normal six seven o'clock.
Speaker 2 (01:46):
It starts to rise a few hours before.
Speaker 1 (01:49):
And then it typically reaches its maximum about thirty to
forty five minutes after waking, and many people it can
remain remain at a high level about a third above
baseline even an r after waking. Right and after that
wakening spike, and that's known as the cortisol awakening response
(02:13):
or car corsol gradually declines throughout the rest of the day,
eventually reaching its lowest point during the night or early
sleep hours. And that's if you are if you're not
stressed out of your head, because obviously stressful events will
spike that throughout the day.
Speaker 2 (02:32):
But let's talk about caffein.
Speaker 1 (02:34):
So it so how caffeine keeps you awake or gives
you a bit of a burst or a wakefulness, is
that it is similarly structurally similar to a denizine and
it acts as a competitive antagonist to a denizine receptor
receptors in the brain. So basically, caffein binds to a
(02:57):
denizine receptors and block sidenizine's effects and thedenizin's effects are
sleepiness and youuronal inhibition. So basically your brain sleeping are
not working very well. And that's why caffeine can work
as a bit of a pick me up. Now, people
have talked about caffeine impacts on cortisol, because cortisol one
(03:22):
of the reasons that it wakes you up is that
it can bind to the adenosine receptor. But caffeine actually
doesn't interfere with that at all. So let's explore what
it actually does. High caffeine can have an effect on
your blood sugar. Is caffeine actually increases cortisole release, especially
(03:49):
when you take it acutely, and even more in people
who aren't habitual users of it. Right, So, caffeine is
a stimulant to the adrenalinelands and it prompts him to
release both cortisol and adrenaline with the Americans called epinephrine.
And basically it's a bit of a stress response. And
this is why people who have anxiety should not drink
(04:12):
bloody coffee because it is a shot of stress hormone
and that's kind of how it wakes shop. But by
blocking a denazine, Caffeine increases neuronal firing and the release
of neurotransmitters like no epinephyrin.
Speaker 2 (04:29):
So that is or nord.
Speaker 1 (04:31):
Adrenaline as we as we call it in Australia in
the UK, and so that's the kind of sister chemical
of adrenaline in the brain, and that further activates arousal
stress response pathways that can indirectly elevate cortisol. Now, why
is this an issue If caffeine is increasing cortisol well
as well as if if you're stressed or anxious, you
(04:53):
don't want that extra burst of adrenaline no adrenaline cortisol.
The main issue here is that cortisol actually spikes your
insulin and interferes with your glucose tolerance. Now, most of
the studies that have been done commonly use a single
(05:15):
dose of around five to six milligrams per kilogram of
body weight of caffeine. So for me at eighty kilos,
that's that's four hundred to four hundred and eighty milligrams
of coffee. Now, I'm not a coffee drinker. I'm a
tea drinker. College's a coffee drinker, But there's not many
coffee drinkers I know that would have a five shot coffee.
(05:40):
Now let me get to this study. So this study
actually took twenty four healthy volunteers, twelve for meals and
twelve for females.
Speaker 2 (05:49):
Which is really good.
Speaker 1 (05:51):
I like the design of this study already because often
these studies are just on on meals, are just on females,
and they don't cross. And they did four trials, and
they did it in a crossover randomsigned, randomized, sorry, and
double blind fashion.
Speaker 2 (06:08):
So this is a really well designed study.
Speaker 1 (06:10):
And so they ingested caffeine at three different rates on
three different times, right, and one was one milligram of
caffeine per kilogram a body bit, so for me that's
eighty milligrams. That's a standard cup of coffee. Or they
did three milligrams, which for me would be three cups
of coffee or five milligrams, or they took a placebo, right,
(06:33):
which was probably decaf coffee, I would imagine. And then
they did a two R oral glucose tolerance test and
that was an R leater after that, so that given
a bit of time to see how the glucose responded.
So they measured in glucose, insulin, and something called sea
(06:54):
peptide area under the curve and then inchulin sensitivity index
data were basically they did this fancy stuff to work
out the impact on insulin, and what they find was
that there was a significant difference for glucose, insulin, and
sea peptide areas under the curve, with all of them
(07:18):
being different from the placebo and just having the one
milligram per kilogram of body weight increased insulin and the
sea peptide errors under the curve by five point eight
and eight point seven percent. And now despite the exaggerated
insulin response, the glucose area under the curve was similar
(07:39):
for that when they did that one milligram per kilogram
of body weight and the other doses actually had a
bigger impact on that. So what's the take home of
all of this mumbo jumbo. I think we need to
look at this in the context of daily living. So
if you're waking up and you're having one shot of
(08:01):
coffee whenever you get up a standard cup of coffee
and not having any food, it's probably not going to
have a significant effect. Yes, it's going to spike your
cords all a little bit, which will actually wake you
up a little bit. But the problem here is that
(08:22):
if you're having coffee with a high carbohydrate meal such
as cereal toast, or having coffee and cake or coffee
and I don't know whether it's a doughnut or a
muffin or whatever, which is often powerred with it, that
is bad juju for your insulin response, because you're going
(08:46):
to get a significant spike or significant increase of the
insulin response from drinking the coffee, and that insulin response
by itself will be pretty damn significant if you're having
a high carbohydrate breakfast.
Speaker 2 (09:02):
And this is a particular problem.
Speaker 1 (09:06):
If you have issues with your blood sugar or issues
with your weight, because insulin is the thing that stores
fat and it is the thing that drives diabetes. And
if anybody tells you otherwise, they're completely and utterly bunkers.
So the take home here is I'm not one of
(09:26):
these people who said you shouldn't have coffee first thing
in the morning. And I think the thing here is
be worry what you match your coffee with. You are
much better if you're going to eat something and have
a coffee around that time, especially in the morning when
cord is allus I and therefore insulin is more sensitive.
(09:47):
You're much better off to have a low carbohydrate breakfast
that is high in protein and moderate in fat and
low in carbohydrates, so that and particularly low in sugars,
which is not our typical breakfast. The typical breakfast is
often breakfast cereal or a piece of toast, which is
(10:08):
going to drive up that insulin, especially an inchulin sensitive people.
And then if they're having one or two coffees with that,
that's going to be haywire for their insulin sensitivity. And
I am a big believer that one of the most
important things that you can do for your health, especially
(10:29):
as you get older, is to control your insulin because
when your insulin starts to become disregulated, not only does
it drive diabetes, but it basically destroys all of your organs.
Speaker 2 (10:44):
Including your brain.
Speaker 1 (10:46):
And high insulin in the brain is bad, bad, bad.
So the take home here is not too much coffee
as soon as you wake up, and if you are
going to be drinking coffee, make sure that you're not
having a high carbohydrate breakfast if you want to have
good insulin sensitivity, which translates to good health. So that's
(11:09):
it for this week. Folks, don't shoot the messenger and
I'll catch you next time.
Popular Podcasts
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
The Joe Rogan Experience
The official podcast of comedian Joe Rogan.