Protecting against dementia

[Bankai]

Creatine's been used very widely for several decades, including by top level athleats. It's reasonable to assume side effects are either non-existant or very rare.

Looking at Chinese pagoda, I wonder what do they know that the West doesn't when recommending >5g of salt per day while here the recommendation is at little as possible.

[Jean]

regarding salt, i think the recomandation is as little as possible because there is already too much of it in most food people buy.
But i think the consensus about mammals needing salt to survive is quite undisputed.

[Bankai]

Well the body only needs about 0.5g a day and multiple heath institutions/organisations are recommending to keep intake below 1-1.5g per day while Chinese are recommending 10x what human body needs as a minimum.

On the other hand they are also recomending meat, fish, dairy and eggs so the whole thing is dubious.

[IlliniDave]

Looking at Chinese pagoda, I wonder what do they know that the West doesn't when recommending >5g of salt per day while here the recommendation is at little as possible.

I think what underpins the "Western" nutritional recommendations is that if a person's kidneys' efficiency is degraded, then they are unable to precisely regulate salt levels in the body. For those people, an increase in salt level in the body means more fluid is retained, blood volume increases, and with it blood pressure which puts a strain on the system, and decreasing salt intake seems wise. For a person with healthy kidneys that function properly, the kidneys are amazingly efficient at regulating salt levels such that if a person starts a day with the perfect level of salt and eats 5g of salt they will excrete 5g of salt. If they eat 10g they will excrete 10g.

Ironically, high blood pressure is one of the things that seems to cause reduction in kidney function, and for increasing populations around the world it's primarily caused by insulin resistance/pre-diabetes/type II diabetes/metabolic syndrome/whatever you want to call it. Along with it comes reduction in kidney efficiency. So for those people cutting salt seems to reduce adding insult to injury, but it isn't going to fix the problem. The real fix for the widest swath of people seems increasingly to be getting insulin under control. Often hand-in-hand with that is getting stress under control as, like insulin resistance, it can cause elevated blood pressure in in the presence of perfect salt levels.

[7Wannabe5]

Obviously, there are different forms of dementia with differing causes. I think that living by yourself in a non-challenging environment can lead to something like unto a form of dementia. So, you either need the challenge (or drama-lol) of dealing with the complexities of other humans OR you need to put yourself in a highly challenging environment (like Dick Proenneke) or some combination of both.

[IlliniDave]

Obviously, there are different forms of dementia with differing causes. I think that living by yourself in a non-challenging environment can lead to something like unto a form of dementia. So, you either need the challenge (or drama-lol) of dealing with the complexities of other humans OR you need to put yourself in a highly challenging environment (like Dick Proenneke) or some combination of both.

As an incorrigible loner, I'm going to have to bet on the nutrition and physical activity side of the coin. I also wonder if there isn't a bit of chicken/egg going on with the observations--do people cognitive decline begin to become socially isolated (the outward order of progress in my dad) or does social isolation cause the dementia. Along with all the metabolic causes linked to dementia now, it's also becoming apparent that a person's emotional well being affects the measurable physical changes: positive outlook mitigates, negative outlook exasperates. So I think it's a safe bet that for many people whose temperament leans more towards the social, then maintaining social connectivity at worst significantly influences/mitigates the progression through age (stress hormones leap on the bandwagon of insulin-driven maladies,which go well beyond dementia, and worsen them all).

[7Wannabe5]

@IlliniDave:

You very well may be right. My take is in good part based on the fact that for the last 18 months I have been living completely by myself for the first time in my life. I feel like it is making me a little bit (more?) demented along the lines of sometimes talking aloud to myself, wearing the same clothes for 3 days in a row, and eating whatever/whenever. Therefore, although it is kind of an addictive, easily hedonically adapted/adopted, luxury, I have determined that it is probably not in my long-term best interest to plan on continuing to "afford" it. My ideal would be my own room/office/garden in otherwise shared accommodations, but it's not all that easy to find such a set-up when in 50s. So, I might have to figure out how to make it myself.

[IlliniDave]

7wb5, I get around that by distinguishing between eccentric and dementia. Maybe a false dichotomy. To maintain the positive mental outlook I mentioned I bucket my own eccentricities as my "adorable quirks."

[7Wannabe5]

@IlliniDave:

I like it! Maybe you should use it as your UserName for your next internet dating profile. Adorable Quirk seeks...

(JK. That's something I would do and then live to regret. Too much coffee today. Etc.)

[Sclass]

After reading this exchange I went off to see what is known about prisoners in solitary confinement getting dementia. That’s a pretty brutal experiment that should yield some real data.

I had this eighth grade science project thought “can I give a person dementia by locking them in a box for a few years?”

It doesn’t look good. I imagine prison can be hard on the brain in a great number of ways. according to the articles I skimmed prisons are full of dementia patients. Aging is accelerated and and 55 and up is a senior inmate. There are a lot of bad things happening in there for brain health. So it’s hard to separate out the locked in a solitary confinement effect.

Dementia seems to have a lot of causes. So many things we must do and not do to stave it off. But what do we really understand about age related brain disease? The science seems all over the place. Twenty years of trying to dissipate amyloid tangles has gotten us nowhere.

Sunlight? Socialization? Sudoku? What do we really know for sure?

I’m at a loss thinking of all the old people I knew. Some lived alone. Some were intellectuals. Some gardened a lot. Organic food nuts. Vegetarians. Fitness nuts. Lazy bastards. Smokers. Herpes? Others had giant extended families living on site. I cannot really correlate a good outcome on any particular activity. It all seems random.

It would be awful if we were chasing all these behaviors while dementia turned out to be pathogenic. The pandemic has shed new light on brain fog and infection.

[IlliniDave]

I don't know what we know for sure, but it seems like physical activity, mental activity (incl social interaction), anti-inflammatory nutrition (LCHF especially) and stress reduction are the best bets when undertaken before symptoms appear. Chronic neural inflammation appears to be the common denominator between the various manifestations of dementia.

[jacob]

Somewhat related: Avoid certain viral infections. (Better yet, avoid all of them.) Several viruses can trigger/cause an autoimmune reaction against the nervous system resulting in long-term brain fog or chronic fatigue syndrome. COVID is one of them. Brain fog is probably the one thing that could derail the ERE/renaissance concept since the ability to think well is rather central to the strategy.

For a popular account, see e.g. https://www.scientificamerican.com/arti ... reatments/ There's an increasing number of nature articles coming out. This is still research in progress. Losing your mental abilities at age 30 doesn't seem fun and especially not if that's your primary talent. Once the damage is done, it is almost irreversible. Estimates of those who have it seem rather high, but I don't know what it takes to count as there's a sliding scale of symptoms.

[chenda]

Brain fog is probably the one thing that could derail the ERE/renaissance concept since the ability to think well is rather central to the strategy.

Mental decline is one of my greatest fears, either through old age, head trauma, mental illness.etc Very easy to self destruct or be taken advantage of, either financially or in other ways. A fool and their money....

A combination of social capital and asset protection are probably the best insurance against it. Some kind of trust fund or other third party controlled assets is something to consider. I plan on investigating this in detail soon.

[Sclass]

Bacterial infections can also cause dementia. Syphilis if left untreated can damage the brain.

[Ego]

Shingles vaccine
https://marginalrevolution.com/marginal ... a-yes.html

[jacob]

Shingles vaccine
https://marginalrevolution.com/marginal ... a-yes.html

It's only a 1.3% percent difference but an interesting effect nonetheless.

[Walwen]

This has been on my mind lately. I'm slowly turning into a caretaker for both my mother and grandfather. Just today my mother admitted a frankly bizarre series of thoughts and events she had. I really think she's got the start of dementia and is sundowning. She has been obese my entire life and has very clear sleep apnea that she refuses to get treatment for because "they'll just tell me to lose weight and I don't want to wear a CPAP."

Maybe it's egotistical- but my chief concern is ruining my own health and furthering the cycle of bad health, in devoting myself to caretaking. My grandfather made lots of sacrifices in his life to take care of my demented grandmother. He retired early, lowering his SSI benefits, and he likes to travel, but couldn't all those years.... and now he's in too poor health. And honestly she would have had a higher standard of care in a well-chosen facility- my granddad simply couldn't lift her, didn't own industrial cleaning supplies, etc.

I agree that social capital and asset protection are your best bets. Also making your wishes known.

For instance, there was a woman who went viral for her insanely horrible DIY renovations. Like she'd think "I want a black vanity not a white one!" and so buy black craft paint and apply it directly to uncleaned marble with a dollar store brush. Then go "why is it peeling?"

It turned out she had been hit by a drunk driver and had a moderate TBI. It really impacted her thinking skills and I think this is a nightmare situation for a lot of people here. So, while she was being widely mocked, a lot of nice people actually did give her advice.... namely to hire contractors. What would be even better would be if, rather than having to rely on internet strangers, she had a person in her life who understood her desire and goal to renovate and could check through her plans. Contract out the thinking, lol. We all need advisors at some points. I come here to glean financial insight that is above my own grade.

Tldr:
Address your chronic health problems
Have a life

[EricG]

I might have some insight here worth sharing.

My childhood was somewhat idyllic growing up in a middle-upper class family in the suburban midwest, except that my father had covert naricissistic behaviors and targeted me as the family scapegoat. My mother was a codependent and gradually adopted his mindset, and my two younger siblings adopted a similar psyche to their parents of the same sex.

At school in my early teen years, I tried to remain invisible and was occasionally bullied, but for the most part was just a loner. Around this time I started to find ways to avoid my family, like living in a walk-in closet or the basement to not have to share a room and have some space of my own in the house. High school was a little better in the sense I had extracurriculars such as band, work, cross-country, etc., found some good friends, and college was an extension of that. In my college years I largely avoided my family and made friends with my friends' parents who served as surrogate parents. This pattern has continued in my life as I often seem to form bonds with older people.

After graduating from college, it was my aim to find a job as far away from my family as possible. I ended up working as an environmental engineer in the southeastern U.S. The first few years were okay, but gradually I became aware that the part of the country I lived in and my workplace shared some of the same authoritarian ways of thinking as my family. I employed the same behaviors in childhood, and tried to find ways to distance myself from my situation while still remaining in it. I also started a relationship with someone who in hindsight probably has borderline personality traits from a really traumatic childhood that were exacerbated by head injuries.

In 2015 I experienced a back injury that would last several years, that I think was the beginning of a downhill descent. My sleep was never the best, but the injury led to insomnia. Compensating for the back injury led to a neck injury. Then I started to develop psoriasis. Meanwhile I was dating a single parent who decided to move to a big city on the east coast for work.

Instead of quitting the relationship, I tried to tend to it from afar. Every 4-6 weeks I would travel and stay with her for 2-3 weeks. My time there was spent between working, cooking, cleaning, taking care of the kid, etc. I poured my wallet into the effort, not only for flights and a petsitter for my cats but for groceries, eating out, expensive items my ex-gf could not afford (Brompton folding bike, Macbook, etc.). Meanwhile she would remind me I wasn't doing enough to be supportive of her. Her situation was slowly getting worse--unhealthy parents, hoarding tendencies made worse by severe head trauma, juggling way too many things (a single parent with a 1 hour commute to work, daughter with a clubbed foot who would later develop epilepsy, a dissertation that she would never finish, etc.). Eventually the psoriasis developed into psoriatic arhtritis. I finally decided to break up with her; at the same time I also decided to cut ties with my immediate family.

COVID was probably the best thing that could have happened to me. Working from home allowed me to move away from a city my personality was fundamentally at odds with. I was afforded time to reflect upon my workplace, which I believed had some of the same traits as my family, which caused me to have a higher tolerance for it (~90% of the people who started working there when I did had moved on to different jobs long ago, in many cases because they considered the workplace to be toxic). Instead of putting excess energy in my work I started to use my knowledge and experience to do more with less, and focus on aspects of work I enjoyed. I took this time to get a better handle on my health.

Last September I quit that job. I decided to further focus on my health while looking for a new job, in a part of the country that might be a better fit for me. I somehow was fortunate enough to find work with a land management agency primarily focused on conservation and outdoor recreation on the opposite side of the country.

My life experience suggests there is a strong a link between inflammation, poor sleep quality, and diminished executive function. My ability to plan and function has been much diminished by my condition. I have had to do almost everything in my power to make my life simpler and easier in order to limit the number of personal responsibilities. ERE, simple living, etc. have really helped with this. Also, occasional cannabis use has really helped to remove me from a state of learned helplessness and be more pro-active about making big changes in life.

Gradually I think I have developed a stronger sense of healthy vs. unhealthy relationships. I am now much quicker to cut ties with people I feel are dragging me down, and to draw clearer boundaries when I think someone is violating them. I am also becoming more aware of unhealthy behaviors I have adopted over my life and finding healthier ways of self-expression.

Recently I went off all my arthritis medications because my rheumatologist refused to switch me from a medication that was having all sorts of side-effects, that he was trying to control by stacking more medications. I have been forced to rely on OTC anti-inflammatory medications because my old insurance isn't accepted in this part of the country and I am still a few weeks away from having health insurance coverage with my new employer. My inflammation has been surprisingly low, however intermittently I have experienced flare-ups which coincide with poor sleep quality.

For sleep, I rely on total quiet and dark, a comfortable bed, a cuddly kitten-like adult cat, and a rotating arsenal of OTC medications. When sleep is better I use MgCl salt in solution and low-dose melatonin, when sleep quality is worse I use the primary sleep-inducing and anti-inflammatory ingredients in Nyquil (doxylamine succinate (?) and acetominophen/tylenol). I use them because they work, if I don't take them no amount of good sleep hygene or mind tricks will allow me to sleep.

My sleep is light, usually I wake up in between sleep cycles (3-4 hours in), and closer to waking am in-and-out of sleep. But quantity helps compensate for lack of quality. My sleep is no longer worsening.

The new job is mentally stimulating. My workplace is very social and most people there seem very healthy and happy, and spend a lot of time outdoors for both work and play. The community here seems much more secure and stable, and as a result people here are more open and friendly.

A book that I think helped me understand the mind-body connection that might be helpful for others is 'The Body Keeps the Score' by Bessel Van der Kolk. Surely it has already circulated the forums here. I am convinced PTSD is analogous short-term dementia, which can become permanent if not remedied, including later in life when it is harder to remedy.

Something about sleep that I think it central to being restorative is dreaming. I tend to feel more rested when I experience vivid dreams and am in a calm state of mind. When this happens, I am free to enjoy the experiences within my dreams and as a result experience a wider variety of emotions more deeply. Often these are emotions I am not able to experience in my waking life, and they serve to remind me of who I am at my core. They bring to the surface healthy emotions I more often experienced when I was younger and healthier, in effect bringing my mind closer to its optimal state. They also bring to the surface memories of past experiences that otherwise seem so distant as to be lost forever. In the Van der Kolk book, EMDR is used to help resolve trauma; EMDR is a means of simulating dreaming while someone is in a waking state, so that a person can face a traumatic event from a calm and collected state of mind instead of being stuck in a cycle of terror that prevents one from processing the situation. Some of my dreams involve re-living traumatic family dynamics, but with a mind capable of navigating them.

I still have a lot to work through, but wanted to share my lessons learned since they are probably towards the extreme. Hopefully someone finds my experience to be a useful case example for how to navigate trauma and inflammation in order to hopefully steer away from developing early onset dementia.