Intelligence quotient is a measurement of your intelligence, reasoning ability, and potential. It is a type of standard score that indicates how far above or how far below is how a peer group and individual stands in mental ability. The good news is that IQ isn't a permanent figure one gets from birth. No, it is controlled by a lot of factors, including genetic and environmental conditions. For instance, a person's IQ can be influenced by parental IQ, genes, home life, parenting style, nutrition, and education. Anyway, as a result of this, a person can decide whether they want to improve their IQ or not. So I guess that you want to improve yours, that's why you are watching this video. So in this video, I'll share with you 7 smart ways to increase your IQ. If you are new here, consider subscribing so that you don't miss out on exciting videos like this. 1. Start with simple workouts. You know, 30 minutes of exercising daily cannot harm. When we exercise, our oxygen intake increases. Specific hormones get released, neurotransmitter changes, and a couple of other things taking place. In conjunction with improved nutrition, influence our brain on the molecular level and this makes us smarter. According to research in a 2014 issue of comprehensive physiology, physical exercise improves cognitive health and even enhances the functioning of brain regions responsible for controlling your cognitive processes. Exercise is believed to modulate metabolic mechanisms that support brain functioning. Also, as a result of the mood-boosting hormones released during exercise, it can reduce feelings of depression and stress, which can take their toll on the brain if prolonged. So start exercising today if your goal is to improve your IQ. 2. Replace machines with the mind. Thanks to our easy access to all sorts of devices, types of machinery, our reliance on them has increased more than ever. For instance, when was the last time you calculated 400 plus 500 minus 300 times 3 without the use of a calculator? Doing simpler arithmetic like this without the aid of your calculator can help improve your logical abilities and improve IQ. Even better, try to get these calculations done right in your mind without the aid of a pen, pencil, computer, or calculator. The good thing is that there are so many real-life activities that can help you put to practice simple maths such as when paying your bills, when tax filing, or grocery shopping, etc. Another way to employ your mind in place of an automated system is reading fictional novels over watching movies.  Also, instead of relying on your phone or laptop to correct your spelling errors, do it yourself. Whether you are texting, writing your grocery list, etc., write it yourself and check the spellings you are not sure of in the dictionary. 3. Follow ideas through to various outcomes. Coming up with ideas is good but coming up with different possible outcomes is even better because you can do a proper analysis. In doing that, you are putting your brain to work because you are forced to think deeply about possibilities that aren't on the surface. Doing this activity can help improve your IQ in more ways than you can imagine. 4. Practice mindfulness and meditation. Meditation or any other mindfulness technique can be considered a brain exercise that involves training the mind to be silent and the aim is to become more observant. Meditation is all about focused breathing but adding in a factor of visualization and meditation will help you improve your IQ significantly. When you meditate, your cognitive brain gets stimulated and you can then work on different muscles of your body.  According to a study that was published in Consciousness and Cognition, meditation improved visual spatial processing, working memory, and executive functioning. 5. Learning new skill, language. Learning shouldn't be something you only do in school. When you learn a craft, a new language, a musical instrument, or anything else, you help keep your mind active and stimulate areas of your mental functioning that may have been neglected. You can switch things up a little by learning via different means and platform. For instance, you can listen to podcasts, watch videos, read online materials, take courses, etc. Learning a new skill means navigating through new information and this helps to slow down your brain aging, building your mental muscle and help you become better at problem solving. According to a study from the University of Chicago, we stated the relationship between people who are multilingual and decision-making skills. It was observed that multilingual people tend to be better decision-makers when it comes to rational decision-making. So it might be challenging at first, but if you persist, you'll get better at it and the result will help improve your IQ. 6. Play puzzles and games. Games and puzzles like Crossword, Scrabble, and Sudoku are a few fun activities that can actually improve your brain's activity. For instance, puzzles stimulate motor skills because they involve using both hand and eyes simultaneously, helping you to focus better and improving the IQ in turn. Sudoku, on the other hand, brings into picture logic numbers and their proper positioning to make sense of the big picture. A study published in PLOS was carried out to find out the relationship between playing specific games and how it improved the brain memory. After observing young adults who were allowed to play games like Tetris and Brain Age, various aspects of their cognitive abilities, including their IQ, were measured. They found out that these types of games increased executive functions, working memory, and processing speed, but not necessarily a person's IQ. It means that while playing these games might not be responsible for the total improvement of your IQ, it will help exercise some areas of mental functioning. 7. Don't stop reading. Reading is always going to be an essential factor in human cognitive development. It is one of the best ways to learn. And when you learn new things, you stimulate areas of your mental functioning that may have been neglected and improve your IQ by far. So if you haven't been reading, it's hard to start now. Improving your IQ means to keep your mind sharp, your memory fresh, and your focus strong. Following these tips will help you achieve that in no time, and you'll become smarter. There you go. Good luck with this quest.


Welcome to the Hindu News Analysis by Shankar Iyer's Academy. The list of topics chosen for today's discussion along with the page numbers is given here for your reference. Here is the first news article. This news article states that Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs has approved changes to post-matrix scholarship scheme for students from the scheduled castes. The scheme is also going to include a new funding pattern of 60 to 40 ratio for center and states respectively. The scheme also provides a financial assistance to the students from scheduled castes who are studying at post-matriculation or post-secondary stage to complete their education. So, this is what today's news article says. So, let us take up this opportunity to see some of the important constitutional safeguards for the persons belonging to scheduled castes. The relevant syllabus is given here for your reference. See, as per Article 46, which is Directive Principles of State Policy, the Constitution asks the state to promote the educational and economic interests of weaker sections of the people with special care. In particular, the state shall promote the educational and economic interests of scheduled castes, scheduled tribes, and shall protect them from social injustice and all forms of exploitation. So, this is what Article 46 says. Now, let us see some of the social safeguards under the Constitution. Firstly, the Constitution abolishes untouchability in all forms. So, any person who practices, who preaches or causes untouchability shall be punishable according to the law. So, in connection to this article, two important legislations were enacted. First one, obviously, Protection of Civil Rights Act, 1955, and other is, Scheduled Cost and Scheduled Tribe Act of 1989 are popularly called as Prevention of Atrocities Act. Further, Article 23, that is Fundamental Right, prohibits traffic in human beings and beggar and other similar forms of forced labour. Here, beggar means forced labour. So, anyone who practices or indulges in trafficking or forced labour will be punished. This article has a special significance to persons belonging to scheduled cost, mainly because as majority of the bonded labour are from the depressed sections which are scheduled cost and scheduled tribe. In this regard, the parliament has enacted Bonded Labour System Abolition Act in 1976, which provides for abolition of bonded labour system to prevent economic as well as physical exploitation of weaker sections of people. Further, Article 25, that is Religious Freedom states that Hindu religious institutions of public character shall be open to all classes and sections of Hindus. This provision is relevant as some sects of Hindus used to claim that members belonging to scheduled cost or scheduled tribe have no right to enter the temples. Therefore, this provision from the constitution acts as a vital safeguard for the persons from scheduled cost to exercise their religious, social and spiritual rights. Simply put, all the temples of public character are thrown open to all sects of Hindus. If you are studying history, you might be knowing about temple entry movements. We have something called SNDP movement in Kerala. Even Mahatma Gandhi ji during Harijan movement have led many temple entry movements to open the Hindu temples for scheduled cost and scheduled tribe people. Coming to political safeguards, Article 330 provides for reservation of seats for scheduled cost and scheduled tribes in Lok Sabha. Because of this safeguard, more than 80 seats have been reserved for scheduled cost people in Lok Sabha. Similarly, Article 332 provides for reservation of seats in state legislative assemblies. Accordingly, Article 243 also provides for reservation of seats for persons of scheduled cost in Panchayat and Munspaldi, that is local governments. And coming to educational safeguards, Article 15 becomes relevant here. It states that state can make special provisions for the advancement of scheduled cost. This is in relation to admission to educational institutions including private bodies, whether aided or unaided by the state. So, we will conclude this article after discussing the significance of Pune Act. Yes, we are going to history here. See, Pune Act is regarding the political rights for the persons belonging to scheduled cost. So, in this regard, we need to know about the communal award of British, which was announced by the then Prime Minister Ramseh McDonald in August 1932. This award declared that depressed classes to be a minority community which are entitled for separate electorate. The term depressed classes may refer to scheduled cost people. See, we all know what is separate electorate, which means election of persons of depressed classes by depressed classes only. It means if a seat is reserved for depressed classes and if one person from depressed class stands in the election, in that constituency only scheduled cost people can vote, other people cannot vote. So, this move of British was completely opposed by Gandhiji as he saw this as an attempt to divide Hindus as an attack on Indian unity and nationalism. See, we all know that British is known for divide and rule policy. And this communal award also do not provide any answers to socially degraded position of depressed classes. Why? This is because once they are to be treated as separate community, that is minority community, the question of abolishing untouchability would not arise and the work of social reform would also come to a halt. Simply put, when you are classifying depressed classes as a separate community, the untouchability will continue. So, Gandhiji demanded that the representatives of depressed classes should be elected by general electorate, which means when a person belonging to depressed class stands in the election, all the people of constituency including non-depressed classes will also vote for the candidate. This is what we saw in the current day period also. Some seats are reserved for scheduled cars, scheduled drive. Even in that constituency, all the people, that is what we call as general electorate, will vote. So, Gandhiji went too fast and to death to enforce his demand. So, political leaders of different parties have asked Ambedkar to meet Gandhiji and have an agreement. The resulting agreement is Pune pact. The important leaders in the Pune pact were Ambedkar, Madan Mohan Malaviya and M.C. Raja. As per the Pune pact, the idea of separate electorates for the depressed classes was abandoned. The Pune pact also increased the seats reserved from them in provincial legislatures from 71 to 147. In the Central Legislature, that is the then parliament kind of thing, the pact provided for reservation of 18% of total seats. So, the seats both in Central Legislature as well as in provinces were increased. So, this is about the Pune pact, which on one hand politically empowered the depressed classes. On the other side, it kept Indian unity and nationalism intact. This pact holds relevance for the political affirmative action for scheduled caste, guaranteed by the Indian constitution. But even this pact also criticized by some people, because the caste Hindus or so called upper caste people, nominate people belonging to scheduled caste scheduled tribe who are obedient to them. So, as a result, even though reservation is being provided for scheduled caste and scheduled tribe people, they argue that the political leaders of scheduled caste and scheduled tribe have become puppets in the hands of upper caste masters. This is some kind of criticism and valid up to some extent. So, this is all about the discussion of this news article. We had a very comprehensive view of scheduled caste and how constitution is protecting the interests of scheduled caste people. We try to cover almost all the things regarding scheduled caste people. If we have missed any, please post them in the comment section. Let us move on to next news article discussion. Let us take up this news article which talks about a repetition filed by Tamil Nadu's political party in the Madras High Court. The petition challenges a decision taken by the Election Commission of India to permit voters aged over 80 physically challenged persons and those who under quarantine to opt for postal ballots. So, the petitioner alleges that creating a new class of postal ballots might pay away for malpractices. So, in this context, let us have a brief understanding on what is postal ballot system in India. First, what is postal voting? See, only a restricted set of voters can exercise postal voting. Through this facility, a voter can cast her vote remotely by recording her preference on the ballot paper and sending it back to the election officer before counting. So, who can avail this facility? First is service voters. See, a service voter is a voter having a service qualification, which means members of armed forces like army, navy, air force, members of armed police force of a state who are serving outside the state and government employees posted outside India and their spouses. Also, special voters such as president of India, vice president, governors, cabinet ministers, speaker of the house and government officers on poll duty have the option to vote by post, which means every person who wishes cannot use the postal ballot system. And as recently in 2019, Election Commission has given postal ballot facilities for absentee voters of essential services, senior citizens of more than 80 years. So, persons belonging to service voters category, special voters category, as well as absentee voters can use postal ballot system. Now, let us see how this postal ballot system works. See, the postal ballot papers to the eligible voters are sent by the returning officer. This is done after printing the ballot for each and every voter of the constituency who are eligible to cast postal ballot. So, after they are printed, they are sent to the concerned person. After receiving it, the voter can mark her preference with a tick mark or a cross mark against the candidate's name. And they also have to fill up a duly attested declaration that they have marked the ballot paper. The ballot paper and declaration are then placed in a cover and sent back to the returning officer before the prescribed time limit. Now, the shortcomings of this postal ballot system is, it takes a lot of time, lot of resources, lot of efforts, thereby increasing the chance of mistake. But to overcome these problems, a new system called electronically transmitted postal ballot system was brought. ETPBS, that is electronically transmitted postal ballot system, is a one-way electronic transmission of postal ballots. See, in the previous case, the returning officer will print the postal ballots and he will send it to voters. The voters will mark the choice and they will send back to the returning officer. So, now what happens is, the voter can directly download his ballot paper from the online and he can fill his preference and can send it to the returning officer. So, thereby removing one set of transport process. So, this complete process is secured by a way of multiple checks and transmission protocol. Upon receipt of postal ballot, the returning officer validates the receipt by a series of QR codes with that of the transmitted system. So, after having all the checks, the vote will be counted. So, this is in brief about postal ballot system, wherein the persons without visiting the voting centre can vote for their desired candidate. This is all about the discussion of this news article, wherein we have talked about what is a postal ballot and how it works and what are the recent changes like electronic system. Let us move on to next news article discussion. Let us take up this news article. See, we have heard about the shortfall in revenue collection of GST in the last 6 to 8 months due to COVID-19. We have also talked about the issues regarding compensation payable to states. So, what happened was previously the GST council had estimated the shortfall in GST compensation payable to states to be around 2.35 lakh crores. And if you remember, centre also gave two options to states to make this shortfall. But most of the states have rejected these two options. We will see what are the two options again in today's session. And coming to today's news, it says that National Institute for Public Finance and Policy have released a new research paper. According to it, the estimated shortfall of GST compensation will be around 1.95 lakh crores in the best case and in the worst case, it will be around 2.45 lakh crores. So, it means that if economy rebounds and GST collections also increase, then the shortfall in compensation will be as low as 1.95 lakh crores. If the collections of GST won't rise, then the shortfall will be around 2.45 lakh crores. This has been said by National Institute for Public Finance and Policy, which is a premier research institute in public economies and policies. So, this body was set up as an autonomous body as the joint initiative of Ministry of Finance and the Earth Well Planning Commission, several state governments and distinguished academicians. And know that it is not a statutory body. It is registered under Society's Registration Act of 1860. So, this is today's news. So, this research paper titled The Pandemic and GST Revenue and Assessment for Union and States says that revenue gap in state GST collections is expected to vary between 2.8 lakh crores and 3.27 lakh crores. Numbers are not important. GST compensation says collection will be between 82,000 crores and 90,000 crores. So, if you do the math here, shortfall in GST compensation will vary from 1.95 lakh crores to 2.45 lakh crores. So, this is what the research paper says. So, in today's discussion, we'll have a brief idea on what is GST, what is GST compensation, etc. in detail to benefit new aspirants. The relevant syllabus is given here for your reference. See, basically in any country, government taxes the people in form of direct taxes and indirect taxes to run the administration. If you see indirect taxes, the GST Act was passed in parliament as 101st Constitutional Amendment Act of 2016. So, this Act which came into force in 2017 has subsumed most of the indirect taxes concerned with supply of goods and services. So, for example, previously we had service tax, excise tax. So, these kind of majority of taxes were subsumed under GST. For the Article 279, A provides for constituting a GST Council. So, members of this Council are Union Finance Minister, who is the Chairperson, Union Minister of State in Charge of Revenue or Finance and the Minister in Charge of Finance or Taxation or any other Minister nominated by State Government. So, Union Finance Minister and Union Minister of State in Charge of Revenue or Finance are the representatives of Central Government and the Finance Ministers of each State will represent their State in the GST Council. So, this body is tasked with the duties to make important decisions and changes in GST. So, this includes determining the tax rate under GST, tax exemption rules, the due date of submitting GST forms, tax laws, deadlines, special exemptions, etc. So, simply put, all the issues regarding GST will be taken care by GST Council. In this Council, one-third of power is with Centre, while two-thirds of votes are with State Governments. It means 33% is with Centre, 67% is with States. But, to make any change in any policy or to bring a new policy, minimum votes required are 75%. So, even if all States come together, they cannot make a policy change without the support of Central Government. But, Central Government with support of few States can bring any policy change. So, this is very important here. And coming to compensation, payable to States, firstly, what is GST compensation? See, after the adoption of GST, States had to see it almost all their powers to impose local level indirect taxes because all these kind of taxes were subsumed under GST. In addition, GST is a destination-based tax, which means tax is payable at the final point of its sale. So, States which are producing a lot like Karnataka, Tamil Nadu are going to lose because of implementation of GST. So, initially they were reluctant to agree to the proposal of GST implementation before 2017. So, to make them agree to the new proposal of GST, Central Government has promised something called GST compensation. So, this provision is to compensate the States for loss of revenue arising out of implementation of GST. It says that Parliament shall on the recommendation of GST Council provide for the compensation to the States for loss of revenue arising on account of implementation of GST for a period of 5 years. So, here we can understand that it is Parliament which provides compensation on the recommendations of GST Council. And according to the current GST Compensation Act, States will get compensation up to 5 years that is up to 2022. So, for this purpose a GST compensation fund was created and this fund will get money through a compensation says, which is levied on de-merit goods or services. And as we said before, GST compensation says will be collected for 5 years that is 2022 and accordingly the payments received into compensation says will be paid to States which are losing the revenue because of GST implementation. And the method of computation of the compensation is given in the GST Compensation Act itself. Here, you should note that 101st Constitutional Amendment Act provides for implementation of GST. But to pay compensation to States a new Act was brought which is called GST Compensation to States Act 2017. Hope you are understanding. For implementation we brought a Constitutional Amendment for compensation we just brought a Parliamentary Act. So this calculation of compensation to each State will be done annually by assuming that growth rate will be 14%. For example, if Tamil Nadu collects 100 rupees this year as GST revenue, next year it will be calculated as 114 rupees that is projected revenue. So for all this purpose States tax revenue as of financial year 2016 will be considered as base year. Why 2016? Because from 2017 we started GST. So the preceding year of GST implementation is taken as base year. So if Tamil Nadu had collected 100 rupees in 2016, it is expected that Tamil Nadu will collect 114 rupees in 2017. So every year the growth rate will be 14% of previous year. So this is what we call projected revenue. But actual revenue means how much really Tamil Nadu has collected in form of GST collections. So for example in 2017 if Tamil Nadu has collected only 110 rupees the shortfall is 114 minus 110 which is 4 rupees which will be payable by central government to Tamil Nadu. That is called compensation. So this compensation will be calculated for 5 years that is until 2022. So these are the basic details regarding GST GST compensation and how compensation is calculated. And as we said at the beginning there is a shortfall in collections of GST compensation. So central government is saying that we did not get enough money in form of compensation says to compensation fund so we are unable to pay money to states. So the shortfall was around 2.3 lakh crores. And even central government gave two options to states to meet the shortfall in GST collection for the current financial year that is 2020-2021. So under option 1 states and UTs will get the facility of a special window for borrowings to meet the shortfall arising out of GST implementation. So in option 1 out of 2.35 lakh crores central government is saying that only 97000 crores can be attributed to implementation of GST. Remaining 1.38 lakh crores shortfall is due to COVID-19 which is act of God. So central government is not going to take responsibility for remaining 1.38 lakh crores. So under option 1 states can directly borrow the shortfall that is 97000 crores money from RBI. And if you come to second option the entire gap of 2.35 lakh crore rupees can be met by borrowing by the states in consultation with RBI. So in first option states will borrow only 97000 crores. In second option states will borrow around 2.35 lakh crores. In first option states are not supposed to pay either principal amount or interest amount. To pay the amount in first option the SES arrangement will be extended beyond the transition period and money will be paid from SES only. In the second option the principal amount 2.35 lakh crores will be paid from SES. But interest of this amount should be paid by states only. If you see in both the options it is states who has to borrow money. States rejected both the option saying that we will not borrow money it is the center which should borrow money and pay to states. So this was the issue regarding GST compensation payable to states. But now most of the states and UTs have decided to go for the first option wherein they will borrow 97000 crores for which states are not liable to pay either principal or interest. So this is all about the GST compensation issue. We have tried to have a very comprehensive coverage on this topic mainly to benefit new aspirants who are aiming for next year. Let us move on to next news article discussion. Let us take up this news article which says that 5 members of German parliament have written to German Development Bank expressing their concern over financing the construction of an integrated storm water drain network along the east coast road of Chennai. So the German Development Bank is funding this project so the members of German parliament have expressed their concern to the development bank that this project did not have necessary approval or social and environmental impact assessment which means this project is not assessed whether it is harmful for environment. So the project was ecologically unnecessary and could endanger the breeding grounds of olive ridley turtle. So let us briefly see what is environment impact assessment. This particular discussion is for new aspirants who are aiming for coming prelims. So what is environment impact assessment. See it is a tool used to identify environmental, social and economic impacts of project prior to decision making. So even before the project is given clearance we will assess the impacts of such developmental projects in the environment perspective. So the aim of EIA is to predict environmental impacts at an early stage, find ways to reduce adverse impacts and shape the projects taking the local environment in mind. So the basic idea behind EIA is precautionary principle. So we are taking precautions even before some damage happens to environment. In case of India EIA is backed by environment protection act of 1986 which contains provisions regarding environment impact assessment. So current EIA notification in India is environment impact assessment notification of 2006. So this notification has categorized the developmental projects into two categories, Category A and Category B. Category A are apprised at national level that is union level while Category B are decentralized to states. So generally there are four stages of environment impact assessment which are screening, scoping, public consultation and appriser. Screening means checking whether the project requires environment impact assessment or not. Category A projects mandatory need EIA so screening is not done. Uncommon to Category B projects once if a project is categorized as B1, environment impact assessment is required. For projects categorized as B2, environment impact assessment is not required. Second stage is scoping. So in this stage the concerned appriser committee will determine the detailed and comprehensive terms of reference to address all relevant environmental concerns of the project. Scoping may also include a site visit by a subgroup of appropriate appriser committee and next stage is public consultation. So this stage involves consultation with affected persons of proposed project or activity. The consultation will be on the effects of project on the affected persons. So public consultation is generally required for all Category A and Category B1 projects with some exceptions. So in this stage the public opinion is taken. Coming to last stage which is appriser. So in this stage there will be overall and detailed scrutiny of final EIA report which is presented to environment appriser committee or state expert appriser committee. So at this stage the concerned expert appriser committee shortly EAC considers the environmental aspects of the project. After this the committee may exit recommendations to regulatory authority whether environmental clearance could be given or not. So these are the basic details of environment impact assessment. We should remember the four stages screening, scoping, public consultation and appriser and also remember that the projects are classified into Category A and Category B. Category A are apprised at national level. Category B are apprised at state level. And if you remember recently the union government the union government has brought in a draft EIA notification that is draft EIA 2020. There are a lot of concerns regarding the new draft because the new draft notification dilutes or relaxes many stringent provisions required for strict environment impact assessment. For example it reduces the public consultation time. Additionally after getting the environmental clearance the companies have to submit a compliance report every six months. The new draft increases the time period for compliance to one year. So previously companies has to give two compliance reports in a year. Now it has been reduced to only one. So it benefits the companies. Further the central government can classify certain projects as strategic. So once they are classified as strategic the EIA is not required or the details regarding EIA will not be kept in public domain. So these are the different issues with the draft EIA. We have already covered the draft EIA in multiple videos in the past. Have a look over them if you need more clarity regarding the new draft. So this is all about the discussion of this news article. Let us move on to next news article discussion. Let us take up this news article which states that Tamil Nadu government has given permission for the traditional bullfighting festival which is called Jellikattu to be held across the state during the Pongal festival. The government also gave standard operating procedures to conduct the festival during COVID-19. So in this regard let us see what is Jellikattu and why many animal welfare bodies are opposing it. See basically Jellikattu is a sport conducted as a part of Mato Pongal. That is third day of Pongal festival. In Andhra it is called as Kanuma. So on the third day this festival is organized. And if you see this Mato means bull in Tamil. So this entire day of the festival is dedicated to cattle. The other names of Jellikattu are also given here like Eru Talavuthal, Manjivirathu, Vada Mahadu etc. See in this sport requires fighters to pounce on a running bull, try to hold on it to its hump and move along the animal without falling or getting hurt. As you can see in this picture this is how Jellikattu is organized. Now let us see what are the issues associated with Jellikattu. See bull owners resort to practices such as beating, kicking, even prodding the bulls and twisting and biting their tails and at some times even putting chili powder into their noses to instigate them so that they can win. So this kind of things violates prevention of reality act which says that unacceptable behaviors such as beats, kicks, overrides, overdrives, tortures etc. to any animal is prohibited. And also animals must not be used for human comfort as we must progress from anthropocentric laws to that is human-centric laws to nature's centric laws which include animals as well. And if you remember in 2014 Supreme Court even banned the Jellikattu as it violates Article 21 which is right to life and personal liberty. Supreme Court opined that Article 21 also includes animals because animals do have life. Also many animal activists feel Jellikattu as a sport is inherently cruel and has been proved by evidence submitted by Animal Welfare Board of India. And even in some cases during the Jellikattu the bulls will be so frightened that in desperation they jump off barriers which even resulted in fatal injuries. So simply we can say that according to Animal Welfare is Jellikattu is causing lot of harm to bulls and cattle. But due to lot of people's protests Tamil Nadu government has passed an amendment to prevention of cruelty act which received the center of president and so the Jellikattu has become legal again in the country. And since 2017 the Jellikattu is being organized in the state of Tamil Nadu. As we have just seen why people are opposing it there are even people who support the sport of Jellikattu. They argue that all the allegations made by Animal Welfare Board are false and Jellikattu should be conducted every year. See Jellikattu is a way through which farmers find the strength of their bulls show their love for their cattle and how well they have looked after them and a chance to find out the most potent bull to mate their cows. If you see in rural Tamil Nadu the bull is a member of family and traditional people argue that there is no way that these people who consider bull as a family will do anything to hurt it. So some people even argue that the bull taming or bull races is not due to country. There are even evidences dating as back as 2000 years. For example a seal which was recovered from Indus Valley civilization depicted a similar kind of practice wherein a man is shown taming the bull. There are even cave paintings which depict a man again taming the bull around 2500 years ago. And if you come to age old Tamil text books like Sela Padikaram there are references to people enjoying, witnessing and participating in Jallikattu. So this is all about the Jallikattu. One side animal welfare activists are arguing that this is cruelty. But on the other side the traditional people are arguing that this is their culture and it is their right to protect the culture under Article 29 of Indian Constitution which says that any section of citizens residing in the country having a distinct language, script or culture of its own shall have the right to conserve the same. And at the moment even Supreme Court is referring to this argument. So we have to wait and see what Supreme Court has to say in this. And bull festivals are not limited to Tamil Nadu we have something called Kambala in Karnataka which is a buffalo race held annually in the coastal districts of Karnataka and even bullock cart races in Maharashtra Andhra Pradesh are also seen as part of their culture. In addition to this there is something called cock fighting which is predominant in coastal districts of Andhra Pradesh. So these are all part of traditional culture for hundreds and thousands of years. So this is all about the discussion of this news article wherein we have talked about what is Jallikattu what are the arguments for and against for organizing the sport every year and also similar events across the India. Let us move on to next news article discussion. We have arrived at the last part of today's video that is practice questions discussion session. Question one with reference to postal ballot system in India consider the following statements. Two statements are given here and we are supposed to identify correct statements. Statement one Union cabinet ministers and persons who are employed under government of India and posted outside India are eligible to cast postal ballot. Yes the statement one is correct. Statement two, a person subjected to preventive detention under any law for the time being in force is not eligible to give his vote by postal ballot. This statement is incorrect because according to representation of people at 1951 any person subjected to preventive detention under any law for the time being in force can give his vote by postal ballot. So statement one is correct. Statement two is incorrect. So correct answer is option A one only. Consider the following statements. Statement one Kambala is an annual bull taming sport held in the rural parts of Tamil Nadu. Statement two Jallikattu is a slush track buffalo race held annually in the coastal districts of Karnataka. If you observe carefully the statement one and statement two are interchanged. The buffalo race is Kambala while bull taming sport is Jallikattu. So the answer is neither one nor two as both the statements are incorrect. Which of the following acts statutorily back environment impact assessment in India? Wildlife Protection Act of 1972, NGD Act 2010, EPA 1986 Water Act 1974. The correct answer is option C Environment Protection Act of 1986. See under this act in 1994 Union Ministry of Environment and Forests promulgated an EIA notification making environmental clearance mandatory for expansion or modernization of any activity in the schedule one of notification. Which means some activities were scheduled in the notification. So all the activities which are scheduled needs environmental clearance. Since then there have been 12 amendments and the recent notification is EIA notification 2006. Let us move on to main questions. This question is based on GST. Already there have been questions on GST in 2017 as well as in 2019. So it is a favorite spot for UPSC to ask questions and today's practice question is in an economy like India with significant inter regional disparities in the levels of living, higher degree of centralization is necessary for balance to growth. In the light of above statement, critically analyze the relative fiscal role of central and state governments with respect to taxation. Write the answer in 150 words. One more practice question on scheduled cost safeguards. The safeguards for persons belonging to scheduled cost and schedule tribe contributes to eradication of cost system in India. Comment. Write your answer in 150 words as this is a 10 marks question. There is an important announcement before we conclude today's news analysis on the account of Christmas that is tomorrow. There will not be Hindu news analysis on 25th December 2020. We will be resuming the Hindu news analysis again on 26th that is day after tomorrow. With this we conclude today's news analysis. If you find this session resourceful click on the like button, show your appreciation in the comment section and don't forget to subscribe to our YouTube channel.


Well, hello everybody. It's another episode of Dr. Jill live. I'm with a wonderful as a old friend, but neither one of us are old. It's that we for a long time, right? We won't go there, but I'm so excited to be here with Dr. Jolene Brighton. I'll introduce her in just a second. We're gonna talk about her new book. Is this normal? And we're gonna dive into some really practical questions and things. I love the cover, love the texture. So and I wanted to be sure to have it because my hair almost matches your book. I know your hair is on fire, like for real. So super excited to have you here, Dr. Brighton. Welcome to the show. Thanks so much for having me. It's so good to see you. I feel like post pandemic, like seeing people, like just seeing people. It's always like such a treat. Isn't it? I know even in my office patients are starting to come in and like, can I hug you? Like, can I ask? Can I touch? But it's so lovely to have that in person connection and same with, I know conferences are starting to come back and lately they've been full of people. People are excited to be in person. Well, let me introduce you and then we'll dive right into this topic. I titled it hormone balance for women, especially PCOS menopause and all things hormones. So we're going to dive in. Dr. Jolene Brighton is a hormone expert, nutrition scientist and thought leader in women's medicine. She's board certified in naturopathic endocrinology and trained in clinical sexology. Dr. Brighton is the author of Business Normal, a non-judgmental guide to creating hormone balance, eliminating unwanted symptoms and building a sexual desire you crave. A fierce patient advocate and completely dedicated to uncovering the root cause of hormonal imbalances, Dr. Brighton empowers women worldwide to take control of their health and their hormones through her website and social media channels. She's an international speaker, clinical educator and medical advisor within the tech community. I am so happy to be here with you. Talk about a topic that everybody has questions about. Oh, yeah. I can't wait to dive in. I mean, between PCOS, perimenopause, menopause, woes, there's a whole lot of like abyss out there, right?  Yeah, I think what's happened is in medicine, first of all, as medical doctors, we are not well trained on women's health, women's hormones and some of these things. Now, I've become kind of a hormonal expert and endocrine expert in my little field as well, but it's a lot of the education, especially with nutrients and herbs and just even what's normal, what's not normal, which we're going to dive into today. A lot of that education was outside of medical school. And I say that because you go to your doctor, especially the classical allopathic trained doc, you're going to get blank stare or like, maybe you need an antidepressant. Like these things that are really insulting to women, because now, even now, there is not the kind of education that we need. So this is such a needed resource. If you guys don't have a copy, go out right now and get your copy. It is just chock full. And what I love about this book, what you did, and I want to talk about how you got to write this book, is it's so practical, you could just almost flip to any chapter, any place and be like, oh, okay, here's some questions, are my hormones normal? Is menstrual cycle normal? And you got it so well laid out to just be like, you can read through it and it's amazing that way, or you can kind of flip to different topics and things. You've got checklist, you've got sidebars, you've got recipes and plans at the end. Tell us though, how did you, I mean, clearly there's a need for this information, but how did you go about deciding on this book? Oh, you know, it just became so clear as I wrote beyond the pill, that the reason that we find ourselves and to your point, you go to the doctor.  Your doctor says to you, well, do you want to have a baby? You say no, they say here's the pill. And you find yourself on that because you don't understand what's normal for you and what's not. And the majority of things that we face as women, like we don't have to go to the doctor for or our doctor doesn't even understand it. They don't even know about it. And especially all of the information about sexual health that I talk about in there. These are things that ones I made ask Dr. Brighton on Instagram anonymous that people were like, let me tell you the hush hush that I would never say to my doctor or my doctor shamed me about. And so that was a big reason for that. And then, you know, the other thing I want to say is that you were talking, we're talking about menopause as well.   And if you're having mood symptoms, we know that once we get into our forties and above women in the United States are the biggest recipients of antidepressants, anti anxiety medications and things that come with really heavy side effects that are very often not discussed. I mean, we saw just a few years ago that women in their forties were dying at a higher rate because doctors were prescribing benzodiazepines and not telling them that rose all day and benzos don't go together or a little not mommy nightcap and benzos don't go together. And so we see it's really limited in what women are offered. And so I wanted to start the conversation about what is and is it normal when it comes to your vagina, your breasts, your hormones, how do we understand our normal and then give you a plan on taking action so that you can fast track your healing.  Love it and so needed and like we started this conversation, the traditional alipath is going to say, this is dysfunction, but they're in the realm of normal what is normal. And what's not like, say a woman in their menopause is having vaginal dryness and wants to have better sex without pain. The doctor doesn't always have a good solution for that. And again, the pill is not going to help in many of these cases that may make things worse. Let's talk about that real quick because whether you have POS or your perimenopausal, or your postmenopausal, typically not postmenopausal, but a lot of these younger women are getting out for the pill. Why is the problem for some issues and not always a good idea. Yeah, well the problem with using the pill for every single lady part problem or hormone problem is that the question isn't being asked, why do you have those symptoms. That is in part leading to the misdiagnosis or delayed diagnosis of very serious conditions like polycystic ovarian syndrome, hypothyroidism, fibroids and the list is pretty broad in terms of endometriosis being another one of what gets overlooked or dismissed or doesn't get the attention it deserves. Now, the pill is a tool. We can certainly use that tool to manage symptoms, and that's what I think is important part of the conversation. Often doctors will say, so PCOS as an example, just take the pill that will fix your period. In fact, what is going on with PCOS is that we have an ovulatory cycle so we're not, we're not having ovulation, or it's a regular ovulation. Ovulation precedes menstruation. So if you don't see a period, we've got upstream issues with ovulation. The pill suppresses ovulation. Fantastic if you don't want to baby like love that if you do not want to become pregnant. But in terms of fixing periods in a condition where ovulation is the issue, how can a drug that suppresses ovulation fix that it can't. And then women come off of the pill. And one thing that will happen is they'll often look back and say the pill caused me to be infertile, when in fact the pill was masking all the ways your body was telling you we're about to have fertility problems in our future. And it wasn't the pill per saying that caused you to become infertile. It's that nobody worked you out for the PCOS. Nobody understood that PCOS, which is one of the top reasons why women struggle with fertility. So that was the cause. No one talked to you about it. No one talked about the fact that there is insulin issues, about 70% of women with PCOS have insulin issues, and there's inflammation going on as well. Those are also bad for fertility, but also cardiovascular disease, dementia, all of these things. So that's the problem with the pill. When we give it without a discussion, when we give it without an informed consent, and when we give it without actually asking why does this patient have these symptoms. Because certainly for some people, the pill can help with acne. It can help with some people it helps with hair loss, some people it makes hair loss worse. Some people it does help them get relief from their period or PMDD, which if people are not familiar with that. Now we say take PMS now amplify it by a million. It's the worst it could possibly be and then stretch it out for two weeks out of the month or six months out of the year, and you've arrived at PMDD. Some people are absolutely helped by taking the pill, but that is not the end of the discussion. And to your point about perimenopause, we don't, we have a lot better ways right to treat perimenopause and to help with those symptoms. We don't have a whole lot of research supporting pill use as having the same benefits as bioidentical hormones or hormone replacement therapy and perimenopause.  No, the headline was like, you're going to get that. And when you actually looked at the research, they were using progestin. The majority of people were using progestin. Progestin is the fake hormone that wants to be progesterone, but can't be progesterone that we know is problematic. Progesterone nourishes the brain, the nervous system, it helps with the myelin sheath, which is like the way that we run and fire our neurons, our thoughts, the whole ability to talk like, thank you, myelin sheath. Progestin does not have those same benefits. And if everybody would just like chill on trying to regulate the pill and we could have real conversations about it. I think we would get more research and a deeper exploration that would tell us that there are in fact problems with progestin. And we see this by way of the research that shows us that some people experience mood symptoms, especially teens. When they're on contraceptives that have progestin, or are progestin only. And that's important to understand. So if we know this in a younger population, like, and your mood is not separate from your brain. Sometimes doctors are like, there's two different things and I'm like, no, no, no, no. This is the same thing. If we know that in a younger population, it should be no surprise that we see dysfunction, right, that's induced by a medication. If we're using that progestin in an older demographic. Now we need a whole lot more research to understand all of the nuance of this. But, you know, just want to say, as I use the term dysfunction, love it when there's a medication that comes in and makes you feel dysfunctional don't love it when you're having a physiological adaptation that is normal that is a response to our environment. And I just want to say that because we're going to talk about vaginal dryness and pain pain with sex, and that often gets termed as like sexual dysfunction and I'm like, well, it's actually physiological adaptation, like you don't want to have sex, because it hurts. That's normal. Yes. Yes, what a great and right in the moment you said the headline which is the one I know is out there, I think in it you cut out I want to make sure people heard that I think it was the risk of Alzheimer's dementia with the hormones right the one that just came in and just like you I read that like, wait, this is literally our brothers and group which is all about dementia treatment was like, this is progestin. This is not progesterone. So I love that you mean distinction. Because with mental health to we're finding that actual real hormones have been shown to benefit aging brains. So that is absolutely clear, but not synthetic. You are an expert in PCOS I love that you talk about this because it is absolutely increasing incidence. You gave some symptoms but let's just frame it what might someone what what might a woman who has PCOS experience, how might they know. And then what are some ways to look at that besides giving them the pill. So there is a criteria that has to be met with PCOS and so these are the big ones number one is the polycystic ovary and syndrome that people think like you're going to have lots of sis. This is not only always true, but it is part of the criteria.  And it through our cycle, we develop follicles and this is where the egg is housed and then as you get closer to ovulation, there can be only one one that wins and you know estrogen LH as the whole hormone symphony is like choose your champion and let's release it with PCOS because we're not getting that same level of brain hormones and ovarian hormones. What we see is that there's a lot of follicles trying to win the race and so that's what looks like the way will you know be terms like the pearl necklace that appearance of a strand of pearls.  So that's, that's one of the three criteria now you only need to. And the other two are high androgens, which doesn't have to be diagnosed via blood work this can be a clinical diagnosis so you can have hercetism hair growth on the chin chest abdomen. I often get people who are like, or it's just your ethnicity and I'm like, listen, I'm a Latina and I'm gonna tell you, this is not an ethnicity thing, you have very dark course, thick hair, and it is showing up like a beard around your areola. It is showing up what people call the happy trail or even extending down your thighs. And it is to the point where you're like, I noticed and this is problematic. You may not always have hercetism, maybe what you experience instead is hair loss on your head. Yeah, it starts with a miniaturization of the follicle. So DHT, which is the type of androgen that's causing our follicle to get really small.  And I just dated myself, but that's okay. So your hair is getting weaker and thinner and not Superman anymore. That can be a sign of excess androgens and what most people think of as testosterone. So you have oily skin and acne. Those are two other really big ones. So that is the second out of the three criteria. And then the third is where is your period, or your period shows up, but it's super unpredictable. It's going beyond 45 days. That is due to ovulatory issues. So we have irregular ovulation or lack of ovulation. So these are the things we're looking for with PCOS to make the diagnosis. It is a diagnosis of exclusion, which means that if you just have an irregular period showing up, you need to make sure it's not hypothyroidism that it's not something else going on. Now things not talked about with PCOS and that aren't part of the diagnosis is that you can have high insulin levels. So you might notice that you have blood sugar dysregulation or that you're having dark velvety skin. I talk about this and is this normal? It's showing up maybe on the back of your neck or in fold. You're seeing this dark velvety skin or skin tags that can be a sign of insulin resistance taking place. You may also notice that you have mood symptoms. So anxiety, depression, very common among women with PCOS, often overlooked, often not, you know, something their doctor even talks to them about when they get the diagnosis. As you can imagine, if you are not ovulating regularly infertility, so inability to conceive is another way that and it might be the first time you come off the pill that you start paying attention to that. And you're like something, something is going on here. And then the last thing we'll say is waking. And this is waking that no matter what you do, you can't seem to get the weight off. And maybe, you know, you're somebody who's like, I've been strength training, and I'm very strong. But I'm noticing, especially around my midsection, that I'm starting to gain weight.  And I'm always like, you know, I actually said, and is this normal? Like that is some dietary dogma that never should have been in women's medicine because it is such, it is such a disservice and such a tool of dismissal. Yeah. Hey, everybody, I just stopped by to let you know that my new book, Unexpected, Finding Resilience through Functional Medicine, Science and Faith is now available for order wherever you purchase books. In this book, I share my own journey of overcoming life-threatening illness and the tools and tips and tricks and hope and resilience I found along the way. This book includes practical advice for things like cancer and Crohn's disease and other autoimmune conditions, infections like Lyme or Epstein Barr and mold and biotoxin-related illness. What I really hope is that as you read this book, you find transformational wisdom for health and healing. If you want to get your own copy, stop by readunexpected.com. There you can also collect your free bonuses. So grab your copy today and begin your own transformational journey through functional medicine in finding resilience. Yeah. I love that you say that because so many women are told or, and this goes for PCOS but also menopause, right? Yeah. Or in fact, I just saw a diagram. It might have been even from you where the cortisol insulin high testosterone medium and estrogen progesterone lower is the classical, I can't lose one for both PCOS and for menopause. So I love that you're saying this because truly the hormones are much more regulatory on our weight than our diet and exercise. So thank you for framing that.  Why would they maybe not want to we already framed this, but why would they maybe want to do something different? And what else could they do if they're just diagnosed with PCOS besides going on the pill? Yeah. Okay.  I need to have. Yeah. Like I need interventions. And so I just want to say that because I think I'm. I love that. And it's really easy for women who have never walked that path to be like just never use the pill. And it's like, yeah, but you're about to memorialize and a life event, major life event for the rest of your life. These photos will live on your wall if you want to have clear skin, like totally get that. I think it's important for people to understand you can use the pill and use the nutrition and lifestyle interventions. You can use spironolactone and use the nutrition lifestyle interventions. You can use metformin for your insulin and your blood sugar as a tool. Well, you also build that foundation. And neither of those drugs that I just mentioned have to be with you forever. Yeah. And so you might want to use it. You're like short term. I just need the results. And now I want, but I'm going to work on all this other stuff because I don't want to be dependent on those. So I do want to say that.  So number one is build muscle mass. I think so back when I was in my master's for nutrition. My research was on sarcopenic obesity. So for over 20 years, I've been like build muscle mass everybody and eat adequate protein. Most people are going to need more like one gram per kilogram of body weight of protein to maintain muscle mass, especially as you get past 35. Super, super important. Now your muscle is in itself an endocrine tissue. It's going to help with sensitizing to insulin. It's going to help with modulating those estrogen and testosterone levels. So although I talked about testosterone in PCOS estrogen can also be problematic because estrogen is part of the let's get an egg out. But then it never happens. And without ovulation, we don't get progesterone. So estrogen goes on unchallenged. So a lot of what people call estrogen dominance that you will see I do have to share it as a side. I had someone on social media saying, Oh, Dr. Brighton is the one who invented estrogen dominance and invented this term. And I just laughed because I was like, if you go to PubMed, there's research that says estrogen dominance that came out before I was born. I was not named. I just happened to be noisy about it. So with that estrogen access. This is what puts women with PCOS at higher risk for endometrial hyperplasia, building up of the endometrial lining.  This is a reason a doctor will say, This is your only way to prevent endometrial cancer because you have PCOS and you're going to get that. No, just because you have PCOS does not mean you will get endometrial cancer and the pill is one tool that can trigger withdrawal bleed, make the endometrial lining shed. But what's our primary goal? Let's get you to ovulating regularly. So building muscle mass is one thing that we can do. The other thing that we can do is work on our inflammation. So with inflammation, that is going to cause chaos for the adrenal glands is going to cause chaos for your estrogen testosterone balance. It is going to cause chaos in terms of your ability to get back to ovulation. And when your cells feel about inflammation, they're not filling the hormones. So the receptors actually won't be as accepting to the hormones and you'll lose sensitivity that way as well. So that can look like, you know, keeping our stress low doing our exercise, but also our dietary choices. So lots of fresh fruits and vegetables and I don't care that you have PCOS eating fruits are going to, it's going to provide you with so many antioxidants. It's going to provide you with a lot of things that are supportive, not just for your overall health, but your ovarian health. I always tell patients like, look at berries. Do berries not look like an ovary? Like really trying to like it reminds me of PCOS. And we know those antioxidants that are in berries are super beneficial for our ovaries. So making sure that you're getting fresh fruits and vegetables in as often as possible. You got to do frozen. You got to do frozen. Like that happens. I'm like, I'm like, I'm where I'm at right now. The only way to get organic broccoli, which I eat a lot of is frozen. And you know what? I'm still going to get the dim. I'm still going to get the sulforaphane. I'm still going to get the nutrients. So in eating all those fruits and vegetables, you're not only going to deliver nutrients and building a nutrient dense diet. You're also going to be increasing your fiber. So we want to aim for at least 25 grams of fiber. We know from the research. So even if you don't have PCOS, please listen up. If you struggle with your weight at all, 25 grams of fiber every day, less than 25 grams added sugar every day. Okay, so less. You want to get that fiber up and tending to your gut microbiome. So there's been research showing that microbial diversity in the gut. People who have lots of critters in there and that lots of different kind, they have lower incidences of belly fat and it's easier for them to ditch the belly fat. Now, why does this matter? For people listening, we're not talking about aesthetics. We're talking about visceral adiposity.  It is pro inflammatory.  And that is the big risk for everybody in terms of cardiovascular and metabolic disease. So for everybody, tend to your gut health. Eating all that fiber is going to help. You may want to take a quality probiotic and decreasing that sugar is definitely going to be helpful. And I know that the anti diet culture, they're going a little too far in my opinion, some of them where they're like anyone who talks about sugar is like, you know, part of the problem and I'm like friend, am I supposed to ignore all the research? Am I supposed to lie to you because like the diet industry lied to you like no, we're going to tell the truth and you're going to view this through the lens of what's true for me. And just like I say, and is this normal? We're going to have our cake and our balanced hormones to because, you know, as you and I were talking, I was just in Paris, I very much adopt the French way of living in terms of pleasure is necessary for a balanced happy life. Okay, we talked about diet. We talked about exercise. The last thing I want to say is sleep. If you are not getting quality sleep, then I don't care how good you eat it is going to be an uphill battle. So there, the piece I want to talk about in is this normal I have a whole diagram, you can see the insulin resistance, the inflammation, the an ovulatory cycle so not ovulating, all of that can occur if you're not sleeping well. You want to hone in on melatonin. Melatonin, everybody's like great sleep hormone, don't get jet lag, it protects your ovaries. If you are struggling with infertility, and you are 35 plus in my clinic, we're going to bring melatonin in as a way to support ovarian. Melatonin is an antioxidant. It also protects the brain. Now, in terms of research of like, oh, do we have great research on like if you take melatonin long term or any, no, we don't.  And so with PCOS, with perimenopause, with every woman on this planet, protect your ovaries by getting good sleep. And the things that you do to protect your ovaries are actually going to protect you for longevity. And I don't know about you. I'd love to hear your opinion. But I'm very much of the mindset that if David Sinclair can be out there saying like, hey, based on my research, we don't have to die and ourselves should live longer and they can remember, then our ovaries should be able to as well. And it makes no sense why it is that we live so much longer than even generations ago, but that we are still going through menopause and struggling with perimenopause when we do, we should be able to extend that lifetime. And I'm convinced it comes down to all the things that we do to support our mitochondria and that every biohacker or health optimization person or longevity expert, you know, whatever people are calling themselves these days, they're all talking about the same stuff to like make yourselves work and go the distance. We should be able to do that with our ovaries as well. Amen, sister. I'm just sitting here nodding and smiling so big because you've just given us a such a depth of wealth of knowledge and what I love is you always bring the practical tips to and also like, yeah, a little sugar is okay, but really, really do watch this thing like it is important. Glycemic index has everything to do with diabetes, heart disease, obesity and cancer risk. So it's very real we can't ignore that but also pleasure is important. So I love that. One thought I had when you're talking about diversity of diet and the microbiome and all these things you know I love the gut and recently I've been doing research on nitric oxide and some of the codes for that loss of hormones loss of nitric oxide are really the core of aging.   Yes, yes, no this and here's the fact I bet I just read this I did not know this till literally Sunday night I'm doing the research to do a presentation on nitric oxide. Hemoglobin A1C is that goes out that literally binds free nitric oxide, not nitric oxide. I didn't know that. I know me neither. Oh my God that makes so much sense. So basically an insulin and basically it creates more insulin resistance because the receptors and because of blood flow so just so those of you don't know we're getting excited about this nitric oxide nitric oxide is naturally made by your body it's made from fruits and vegetables. You can now take pills and things that are like beet juice that's great but truly food is a source of nitrates which are converted in your microbiome in your mouth to nitrites, which then your body uses to convert to nitric oxide nitric oxide is a vasodilator opens blood flow to the brain to the heart to the penis to the clitoris like to the all the organs where we need this so men and women especially as we age most of the time, and especially if you're a man out there we're not really talking to men today but if you're a man you're listening, and your Viagra isn't working anymore. That means you don't have enough nitric oxide because that works based on the fact that you have nitric oxide and same with women so this is such a core. And like I said I was reading about the metabolic dysfunction with low nitric oxide and it involves the fact that higher A1C is going to bind that up.  And let's just like I want to just double tail on that and saying, we have recognized for decades that cardiometabolic issues lead to sexual dysfunction, erectile dysfunction in men. Well accepted medicine resisted this concept in women, being like it has no bearing it doesn't it doesn't relate. The reason is, is because the doctors are so poorly trained in clitoral anatomy. In fact, is this normal has three diagrams of the clitoris because the average medical textbook the majority of medical textbooks don't even have one that is actually representative and I actually, I had an artist draw all these up for me. And I had them do a cross section, showing like the corpus cavernosa and all of that my editor was like gone too far like. But what I was showing is that if I took a cross section and a cross section of the clitoris it is the exact same tissue, because that was embryos, it was the same same. Testosterone came in and the penis is the one that differentiated from the clitoris clitoris is always what it was planned and and testosterone and a gene on the y chromosome.  And where it may show up first is that place of your body, and that may be the first place that you, you tune into because so many other things were told are normal, like, you're starting to get old and your vision is changing. Okay, true, I just change as we age. However, those can also be signs of serious cardiometabolic issues. Yes. Yes, so just to repeat for those of you listening men are women and again probably right now majority of the artists women but if you're having to live with men, or they know men. Yeah. Either way though, if you're having sexual dysfunction, like Dr. Joellen Brighton said she said, if this is a sign that there could be a vascular cardiovascular issue it's literally the very first clue a lot of times for endothelial dysfunction or vascular dysfunction. So there's a way bigger importance than just sex here, although that is important, right. It could be your health. Let's talk about menopause of women. I'm one. I had briefly tell you so I had chemo at 25 for breast cancer my period stopped for two years my poor ovaries back then but then they started and then I had undiagnosed celiac and anemia and I stopped my periods amenorrhea because I was undiagnosed celiac for two years in my 30, and then they came back and my I'm just like so happy with my little ovaries because they have just like fought and fought and fought, but then when I turned about 45 they started sputtering outside I don't know that's kind of early but not super early considering what I've been through. So I am in was I'm not afraid to say that but let's talk to those women out there. What's average age what symptoms and then what do these women do about it because a lot of doctors don't know how to console them, and it doesn't mean you're you have to have vaginal dryness or poor sex or poor libido or poor functional function or poor sleep. Let's talk about these women in menopause. Yeah, we would never accept that for men. This is what just really chafes me is that when you look at how women are treated, and it is changing but it's only people are like so much has changed in medicine I'm like only in the last couple years because a hell of a lot of celebrities, we're like we're not going to be quiet about this, we're going to start organizations we're going to get loud. We're going to like make our own networks and I'm like, man, like, you see what the Kardashians do and then you see what these other celebrities do and I'm like, I feel so spider man with great power becomes great responsibility.  Let's talk about it though because when when we talk about menopause like what exactly are we talking about what's Perry menopause so it is normal to go through menopause at age 45 that's the youngest accepted age and the average woman is going through it about 51. Okay, however, Perry menopause can start seven to 10 years in advance.  The regular periods and the periods stretching out beyond like seven days or more like being long, or, you know, going, going be like used to be like 28 days and now you're like 35. It's happening more the tail end of Perry menopause in the early Perry menopause. This is where like the hot flashes start to come up mood symptoms. So as our hormones change, they it's changing in the brain as well. We might notice weight gain loss of muscle mass. We might notice that now we're starting to get like hair growing in places and unlike the PCOS picture that was happening much earlier on the acne. That's so lame like who wants to 40 with acne. I just laugh about it because I went through that and I shared it online just a couple weeks ago. Thanks to like the hormones that I'm using. So with that, there's this collection of signs and things with Perry menopause itchy skin as estrogen starts to decline. When we get to menopause menopause is a one day event. It arrives 12 months 12 consecutive months of no bleed. So no ovulation no bleed. You are now menopause tomorrow the next day you are now post menopausal. Now with the hormones, people always think like estrogen is so problematic and estrogen is where we need to start. I sometimes see people saying like Perry menopause, you should start estrogen now and I'm like hold up. So this is where it can look more and more like that PCOS picture that we talked about before it's not PCOS just so we're clear, but since people already heard that just to link back in in that when ovulation becomes more irregular, progesterone production becomes more regular because the only way to progesterone is to ovulation. And so estrogen is unchallenged. As you're becoming irregular in your cycles, your symptoms may be related to estrogen, but at the root of it. It's because of what's going on with progesterone. So if we're going to use hormone replacement therapy progesterone is where we start. DHEA is another consideration, and it's important for everyone to understand this is a anti aging hormone that our dream lands make it starts as decline at 25, which is so lame because for menopause we need it because we turn DHEA into estrogen and testosterone. And so during this time during this phase this Perry menopausal phase like we want to support the ovaries and producing progesterone regularly ovulating doing everything they can when they when they don't got it in them anymore. That's where we look first at progesterone bio identical. I really love oral because it gets metabolized and it's metabolites are what help you sleep. Gabba anxious. And so that insomnia that inability so if you were trackable like I do. So these wearable technologies are great way for you to tune in what's going on. And what I'll say is that if you are tracking your cycle and you're looking at your body temperature and your sleep. And you are in your 40s and you are finding body temperature like body temperature goes up after ovulation because that's what progesterone does, but it's going a lot higher prior to your period and your sleep you have more sleep disturbance. You're not getting as deep sleep you're starting to have those issues. That's a sign that you are in Perry menopause and that you might not even fill it yet you might feel tired in the morning but you're not cluing into what's going on. And that technology may very well be cluing you in and showing you okay this is the pattern and this is what's happening here. But in the menopause this is definitely a time that we should consider hormone replacement therapy so extra diol E2 for the vagina E3 astral that is lovely for vaginal dryness and for anyone who has hesitancy around this because there's a lot of doctors that are like that's just going to give you cancer and it's horrible. So about 60% of more of women go into elder care facilities because of incontinence. They're they're not able to make it to the bathroom on their own they have to have somebody tending to them for that. We can prevent urinary incontinence by getting people with occupational therapists or pelvic floor therapists who work in that area, and making sure that they have hormone stimulation to that tissue.  It also helps with the musculature and the tissue of the pelvic floor so that we are less inclined to be heading down the road of vaginal atrophy atrophy so thinning of the tissue and this can be uncomfortable to walk or you wipe with toilet paper after urinating and you bleed. And all of that's going to affect your urinary tract system as well and so that's a reason to consider topical estriol E3 and this is the hormone of pregnancy. It is a weak hormone, it will get its job done down there, but it is a weak hormone estradiol is the one that is a much more potent hormone. And that is one that I'm always like just topical friends because it's when we take it orally that we see the increased risk of clots and the so for everyone to understand anytime estrogen goes up clotting factors follow. This is why the pill pregnancy, any oral estrogen therapy is going to be a risk for a clot so stroke, pulmonary embolism, we don't we don't want to end up that stuff so if you're afraid of that that's something to understand that we don't we don't want to be going the oral route. So we talked a little bit about the estrogen and I don't want to like just to hear a preach from so to speak but testosterone is another therapy that often gets overlooked if you're doing DHA I don't recommend doing testosterone and never recommend doing DHA without knowing your estrogen your testosterone how your enzymes where it's going right. Exactly because you might cause hair loss or you might cause any and you don't want any of that but with testosterone therapy. This is really important for women. A lot of doctors, even doctors doing hormone replacement therapy are like women don't need testosterone and I'm like, we do. Because it's important for our mood. If you find you're crying all the time you lack motivation you can't get up in the morning you're losing muscle mass, you probably have testosterone problems and the libido will also be a problem but notice I didn't start with the libido. Because it's going to be a whole lot of other things going on than just libido if you have low testosterone symptoms. So that was a whole lot of information. The, the other thing I want to say so I shared with you before we started recording.  I'm injecting brain hormones that make my ovaries produce estrogen and build follicles, but my estrogen man, my brain I'm like my brain has never worked so well.  Right, right, right. But like being like, did I do something. Should I attend to this. Is this my fault. I'm just like, no, no, no, no, no, like this is not the way it is. I will not be talked to it will not be treated like that and I'm I just like watch all of this like observing and I'm always like this and a one and I'm like man. That is so much I feel like this is part of the conspiracy of why we why they don't want to give women estrogen. My goodness, we are brilliant. We are powerful. We are all the things that this world needs us to be when we have estrogen complacent is not one of them. I love that you say that all my life my sister and I have been prone to PCS I don't think I've been full blown because I didn't have a lot of clinical symptoms but knowing that my testosterone has always been okay. I mean, postmenopausal that has not been my issue but estrogen was the big thing that I noticed and just like you said all of a sudden lack of motivation lack of like clarity planning executive function. That was all I actually realized that's not testosterone because my testosterone was normal. It was right. So I love that because I really realized I'm like wow this estrogen is really important and because of my history of breast cancer I was always more careful. I want to speak to that of course I'm 20 years out so but so many doctors are afraid even with a history of breast cancer now use this under use your you need to talk to your physician about this, but it is safe to replace estrogen in the right cases when you're doing the right forms, even after breast cancer if you're enough years out the study support this. And I don't want to be protective. Yes, yes, especially when you use it with progester or yeah because you're dividing cells and then you're differentiating so I want to say. Oh, sorry, I was going to say the amount you have to use to get symptom relief is so little and it, you know, no shade to Suzanne summers she was trying to she was doing the best you could with the information that she had like we all do.  So just giving you enough hormones to make your uterus leave like what what are you doing there that's not. That's not in harmony with the way that things were designed so you don't need much I mean right my patients are very very little amounts of estrogen and I'm always surprised at how good they feel like on so little and I'm like if it works for you. Let's go. And you know in the case of auto immunity. We see auto immunity gets a lot worse in menopause as well because we lose that estrogen that helps modulate the immune system. And so with that, that's, you know, and I will say insulin makes us excuse me estrogen makes us sensitive to insulin as well which we know blood sugar regulation ties in to immune system function. But there are women who that are struggling with MS who are struggling with rheumatoid arthritis who are struggling with all these things that I mean rheumatoid arthritis and great disease oftentimes I'll see doctors be like no you can't have any estrogen, but a little right. Done just right and well monitoring that patient can actually help their symptoms immensely and what, what do we really want here, we want quality of life, like we want, we want every single woman in that wise woman phase able to pass on that wisdom, I know I do. Yeah, no great great summary and I've always said here again, because I've had breast cancer I can speak from that perspective, and I don't have to choose but if I had to choose between breast risk and brain risk. It's my brain. So even in that, it's a hard choice right but again, and I'm not we don't have to choose. There are safe ways for post breast cancer patients when they're far enough out with the right topical doses, low doses that are absolutely safe. Of course with your doctors input right being monitored, getting the right testing and having the methylation support that we know protects you against DNA damage that's. You can use the back like full circle to what we were talking about with the pill like you can use the pill, you can use hormone replacement there but you can use these interventions but we have to individualize it and we have to support you beyond that. And that has been such a disservice that modern medicine is done is like here's a pill, it's going to fix everything. Yeah, and I'm sorry friend that I can't give you something to fix everything because like I know that'd be super easy. This is unique every single day that is the major mover in medicine and that's what makes pharmaceutical interventions work better and have less side effects and yes you do have that much power. Love it, what a way to end with the empowerment of women and I love gosh, we could talk a whole other hour, but everybody the big thing is, grab a copy of her new book Dr Brighton this is brilliant it's so great because it's one of those you can keep. It connects to you and literally like reference it when you need help when you have questions if you need dietary but it's all in here, including the diagrams. So, love, love, love it love that you have put out your great work in the world. Where can people find you where can they find the book, give us a little bit of info about you. All right, so Dr Brighton.com DR BRI ghtn.com. That's my main hub where you will find tons of free resources to support your hormones. The book is there as well as all over in bookstores. And you can also find me on social media so at DR Jolene Brighton, whether it's Instagram YouTube Tiktok threads now. I know I'm like, I tagged you the other day, someone was like asking me about mold and I was like, Dr Jill Karnahan. And I was like, thank God she's on threads because I know right when I want to give somebody a resource or referral. If they're not on social media, I'm like, I'm going to give this person your name and then and then they're not going to they're probably not going to search it they need this help now. So cool. Well, everybody go out check a copy get your copy of this book so worth having it next to you. And thank you Dr Brighton for your work in the world. Thank you for your enthusiasm. Thank you for that estrogen power. It's great to talk to you today. Yeah, thank you so much for having me so good seeing you and thank you to your audience for listening to us go off about hormones and how to help yourself.