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“Our light is a nutrient and we need to really be careful about, like, really think about what kind of light we're exposed to throughout the day,” says Dr. Valerie Giangrande, a traditionally trained optometrist turned quantum health educator, who returns to the Quantum Biology Collective Podcast to illuminate just how profoundly light—or the lack thereof—shapes our overall health.
When her young son was struck with neurological symptoms and traditional medicine’s quick fixes left her cold, Dr. Valerie Giangrande set out on a personal and professional journey that led her to quantum biology. She shares how unraveling the intricate connection between sunlight, circadian rhythms, and ocular health transformed her approach to medicine and her own wellbeing. In a world awash with artificial light and rampant blue-light exposure, she reveals why most of us are suffering from a “21st century scurvy”—deficient in the infrared sunlight our mitochondria desperately need.
In this episode, Dr. Valerie Giangrande demystifies the science of light’s impact on hormones, metabolism, mood, and even blood sugar—explaining why grabbing your phone before bed may sabotage your health as much as a late-night junk food binge. She shares why red light therapy is trending, how our eyes act as master regulators for every system in the body, and what you can do, simply and practically, to harness nature’s most powerful medicine.
Tune in for a mind-expanding conversation about why “just getting outside” isn’t just a wellness cliché—it's quantum medicine for the modern world.
5 Key Takeaways
- Morning sunlight is a game changer—get outside first thing each day, let natural light hit your eyes, and reset your body's master clock for optimal health.
- Protect your nights like your nutrition—ditch overhead LEDs, install circadian-friendly bulbs, and put on orange blue-blocker glasses after sunset to keep your hormones and sleep on track.
- Every moment of light matters—skip artificial blue light at night, including phones and screens, to prevent unwanted cortisol spikes and blood sugar surges.
- Don’t underestimate your environment—just stepping outside, especially in green spaces, floods your system with healing infrared light and supports cellular hydration.
- The eyes are a window to your whole body—notice eye symptoms, educate yourself, and make light exposure a non-negotiable foundation of true wellness.
Memorable Quotes
"I just want to share that because I think it's one of the most important things that changed my life. The education piece of adding this extra layer of how light controls the entire body through our eyes, especially, is really important."
"When we're exposed to blue light out in the sun, we're getting a full spectrum signal—red and infrared, which are anti-inflammatory, balance the effects of blue light. Everything has a rhythm, and we need the sunlight to tell us what to do and when to do it. At night, it's all artificial; it's not our biology to release all these hormones at night."
"Our light is a nutrient, and we need to really think about what kind of light we're exposed to throughout the day. Why would we be able to live away from nature? Every other creature needs to be outdoors under the sun and with the earth, and we're the only ones who try to live indoors for such a big portion of our life."
Connect with Valerie
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/QuantumEyeDoc
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Transcripts
Doctor Valerie Giangrande, welcome back to the Quantum
Speaker:Biology Collective podcast. Thank you, Meredith. I'm so excited
Speaker:to be here. Oh, it's so good to have you again. Okay, so. So we
Speaker:had, like, a roaring Q and A session in the
Speaker:last live cohort of the certification of the applied
Speaker:quantum biology certification. And I was like, okay, we gotta get Valerie back on the
Speaker:pod. But before we get into all the new stuff that
Speaker:you're, you know, thinking about and looking at, could you just
Speaker:sort of lay out for us how a very traditionally
Speaker:trained medical practitioner
Speaker:ended up in this crazy world of
Speaker:fringe science? Absolutely. Yeah.
Speaker:It's. It started when I started when I had my son, you
Speaker:know, when I had kids and my son had health issues and they were
Speaker:neurological issues when he was 4 years old. He is now 17.
Speaker:Doesn't even realize that he had these issues, actually. But anyway, he had these
Speaker:issues that were going on. I remember going to the pediatrician and they just said,
Speaker:here, give him a medication. And I didn't like that option. Ended up going, kind
Speaker:of looking at holistic stuff. Tried to, you know, did all the natural things, went
Speaker:to a functional medicine practitioner, did all the things. And things were. Got
Speaker:so much better with all the changes that we had to make. Diet, nutrition
Speaker:supplements, all of those things. Toxins and, you know, but it. But then I
Speaker:started. It was such a stressful time for me that I ended up getting a
Speaker:lot of different symptoms. I had, like, fibromyalgia and just a lot of different things
Speaker:that I wanted help with. So then I went to a doctor for functional medicine,
Speaker:doctor as well. And one of the first things he said to me was, you
Speaker:need more sun. You need to get more sun. And I just. It,
Speaker:you know, took me back. I thought he was joking. And, you know, just. I
Speaker:know I've told this story many times, but I just. I was so conditioned. Now
Speaker:I got some when I was a kid, when I was a teenager. But, you
Speaker:know, ever since my early 20s and now 50, like I have been,
Speaker:I was always blocking the sun. I never got the sun. Even on a cloudy
Speaker:rainy day. I was always blocking it because. Because I thought I needed to. And
Speaker:it was so sensitive. And he pointed me to the
Speaker:research and to people who are in the space. And
Speaker:it just changed my life immediately. I could not believe all of the
Speaker:information and it's there, and it changed everything. So I made those changes in my
Speaker:own life. And when I say those changes, I mean, I go out in
Speaker:the morning at morning sun. I just get more Exposure. I did it safely
Speaker:and it changed everything. And I, you know, change the habits of my
Speaker:family. And then I started to tell patients, I just educate so much because I
Speaker:think this, this extra layer of how much light controls the
Speaker:entire body is such an important conversation to have that we don't know about. And
Speaker:you see a lot of different things that are going on in the eyes and
Speaker:our health that can be traced back to, to poor light or
Speaker:poor lighting environments. It's really interesting. So when you, When I
Speaker:educate patients, there's. It resonates with many, many people. And I
Speaker:see year after year, if they are, are listening, there are so many improvements that
Speaker:they feel, systemically they feel and just, it just makes a huge
Speaker:difference. So I think the education piece of adding this extra
Speaker:layer of how light controls the entire body through our eyes especially,
Speaker:is really important. I just want to share that because I think it's one of
Speaker:the most important things that changed my life. And I think it's really valid.
Speaker:The research is very valid and it makes a big difference.
Speaker:Yes. And once you start looking into it, the
Speaker:research is so extensive, going back many
Speaker:decades, in some cases even longer,
Speaker:it really, I think that's why so many of us felt
Speaker:so. Almost like we had to take on
Speaker:a promotional role in this. Because I think so we
Speaker:often think, well, once the research is clear, things will just change.
Speaker:And when you look at circadian rhythm and light, it's like
Speaker:that is not true. Like, the research has been there definitively
Speaker:since at least the 1980s. And then obviously, you know, the importance
Speaker:of sunlight is an ancient, an ancient idea.
Speaker:And yet it didn't shift. It didn't shift. And even
Speaker:now it's just starting to, like, you might be the only person
Speaker:in a patient's life who's giving them this
Speaker:information. I do find it interesting that we're seeing this
Speaker:explosion of red light therapy. Right. Even in the eyes. There's a ton of research
Speaker:on red light therapy. But if you look at it, the reason why it works
Speaker:is because that's what the sun gives us, especially in the morning. That morning sunshine
Speaker:that most of us aren't getting is red light therapy. And it does do so
Speaker:much. And I think that's so important. It's just so funny that even people who
Speaker:don't know this are promoting or talking about all this research about red light. Well,
Speaker:where do you think that comes from? The sun comes from all the stuff that
Speaker:we are depleted. And because we don't have that when we're indoors. So it's
Speaker:just so interesting. So I think there are some shifts, but not enough. Not enough
Speaker:at this point at all. Not yet. Yeah. Yeah. And
Speaker:the vision of the Institute of Applied Quantum
Speaker:Biology is that everyone in the world has access to at least one person
Speaker:who can teach them this, because that's all it takes.
Speaker:And you're that person for so many of your patients. And so, yeah, it is
Speaker:really interesting because there's more and more research coming out showing how effective red light
Speaker:therapy is. But one of the reasons is because it's
Speaker:filling us up with all the infrared light that we're totally deficient
Speaker:in because we don't go outside. Don't go
Speaker:outside. And because our indoor lighting is just so
Speaker:wrong. It's just not normal. Right. I love all the
Speaker:research from Scott Dimmerman and infrared and how it penetrates our
Speaker:eyelids and gets in there. And you know, how important that is and how we're
Speaker:just lacking so much of that, that it's just such an interesting image. Important
Speaker:piece that we really need to understand that just getting outside, we're getting those
Speaker:signals. Right. Okay, so let's talk
Speaker:about what's happening. You've mentioned light
Speaker:and going into our bodies,
Speaker:but particularly our eyes, is
Speaker:controlling a lot of things, if not everything. So what's going on there?
Speaker:Yeah. So we have blue receptors in our
Speaker:eyes that we have. I mean, we have cells that see the color blue, and
Speaker:then we have cells that are reading the color blue sky,
Speaker:basically, and it's reading the amount of blue that we're exposed to. And then it's
Speaker:sending those actual timing signals. Blue turns into light,
Speaker:turns into a timing signal, and it gets sent right to the suprachiasmatic
Speaker:nucleus, which is a master clock that we have right behind our eyes
Speaker:in the brain. And that clock, when it's wired by
Speaker:this blue light, and every time it gets a signal of blue, depending on what
Speaker:time of day it is, it's going to send signals to the entire body. It's
Speaker:turning on everything in the body. It's turning on our hormones, our
Speaker:metabolism. It's just sending messages. Every single cell in our body has a
Speaker:clock gene. And we need to know what time to do things. And when we
Speaker:get that blue, it's telling us exactly what time to do it. And
Speaker:the strongest signal does come from the eyes. And the way it works,
Speaker:I mean, it makes sense. When the sky, when the sun is rising, there's a
Speaker:small amount of blue and there's this beautiful red, and there's infrared and all these
Speaker:signals that tell us it's morning. And then as that sun is rising, that blue
Speaker:signal is getting stronger. So it's just going to keep resetting our body like a
Speaker:clock. So through our eyes and there's all the other layers that come with it
Speaker:that's very balanced and does different things throughout the day. So if
Speaker:we are never getting those signals through our eyes, our brain really doesn't know what
Speaker:time it is because we're spending so much time indoors. And
Speaker:unfortunately, indoors, we don't really have exposure to
Speaker:incandescent bulbs anymore, which used to be hot, used to have all the
Speaker:infrared, and kind of more of a gentle signal that was
Speaker:more like sunrise and sunset. But now everything is energy efficient. So they
Speaker:took out the heat portion and now we're exposed to LED lights. And if we
Speaker:look at those LED lights, there's this blue spike for
Speaker:the most part. And that blue spike is the same color temperature at 12 o'
Speaker:clock in the afternoon. So we wake up in the morning, we're not getting the
Speaker:sun signals. We're just getting these signals that say, our brain says, all right, I
Speaker:guess it's 12 o' clock in the afternoon. So here's this shot of cortisol.
Speaker:Like, it just, it doesn't make sense. We're getting different levels of hormones that we
Speaker:would get, as opposed to the gradual increase that we need from the
Speaker:sunlight. And then we're lacking infrared, so we're not getting any of those balancing
Speaker:healing wavelengths, red and infrared light. The reason why it is so important is
Speaker:because it powers up the energy cells that we have in our body, our
Speaker:mitochondria, which basically control the health of the entire body. But in
Speaker:the eyes, there's such a dense number of mitochondria because we can
Speaker:imagine how much light we're constantly processing. And red and infrared
Speaker:light help power that up. So we need those signals, especially first thing in the
Speaker:morning, to help give us that energy in addition to the blue.
Speaker:So all of those signals are, again, keep controlling our body. At the end of
Speaker:the day, we're not supposed to have any blue. We're not supposed to see any
Speaker:of that light because it's dark outside. But when we're indoors, we're still getting those
Speaker:signals. It is going to disrupt our clocks as well. And then we have the
Speaker:ultraviolet piece, which I can go into as well, that also gets layered in throughout
Speaker:the day, which is also something that is an important piece to
Speaker:our biology. And while there are safe ways to get those
Speaker:signals at different times of day to help Also trigger different
Speaker:mechanisms in the body having to do with our hormones and our mood
Speaker:centers, our sleep patterns. Melatonin. The eyes
Speaker:make retinal dopamine when we're exposed to morning signals. And we
Speaker:actually need retinal dopamine to help us see better during the day. It actually
Speaker:helps the contrast sensitivity. It's a whole cycle that we need. And then at
Speaker:night, we think of melatonin that gets made in the body
Speaker:through darkness based on light. But there's also retinal melatonin that
Speaker:also helps protect and heal and regenerate our eyes while we're
Speaker:sleeping. So light plays such a huge role. Again, when we're not getting those signals,
Speaker:we're really not. Those patterns aren't being formed. And you can get a lot of
Speaker:eye issues. But more than that, you can get a lot of downstream issues when
Speaker:we're getting those wrong signals.
Speaker:Yeah. Wow. It's so.
Speaker:It's so interesting to me because. Yeah. What
Speaker:you're saying, and the way that I've heard
Speaker:it put is that the eye is a
Speaker:circadian organ. Yes. Right.
Speaker:So. And it's. It just. There's so much.
Speaker:I don't know, I'm just a little. I always get a little
Speaker:kind of shocked when someone explains it so thoroughly because it's like there
Speaker:is so much going on that
Speaker:starts in our eyes. Yes. And I just don't think about
Speaker:it. And I know I was concentrating on the blue light signals, those
Speaker:melanopsin signals. But there are other receptors also that also help us
Speaker:locally local change the clocks in our eye and also help with other. Other
Speaker:rhythms in the body as well. So it's. Melanopsin is the main clock
Speaker:setter. But there's also things like neuropsyn, which they found in the eyes as well,
Speaker:which we need. And neuropsyn is actually a UVA receptor. It
Speaker:also. It collects violet and uva. So right at
Speaker:that border of UVA and violet. And that's also a signal that we need and
Speaker:we have it in our. So what's the significance of the. Of
Speaker:the fact that we now know there are neuropsychin receptors in
Speaker:our eyes? How does that change how we understand what's going
Speaker:on? Yeah. So there's a couple of things. The research shows with
Speaker:neuropsyn that it's responsible for our local
Speaker:circadian rhythm in the eye. Again, it does a lot of the. Without
Speaker:those signals, without the violin and the uva, the
Speaker:local circadian rhythm. So again, the retinal dopamine the retinal melatonin. Some of that wouldn't
Speaker:be credit. It turns on some clock genes locally. It also helps us with nitric
Speaker:oxide. You know, we're getting the UVA signals, we're getting nitric oxide,
Speaker:which is helping us have more nutrients. So I'm going to backtrack. Whenever
Speaker:we're exposed to UVA in our skin and in our eyes, our blood
Speaker:vessels will dilate and start releasing nitric oxide. And that's because
Speaker:our red blood cells want to collect that UV and it helps increase
Speaker:nutrients, nutrients
Speaker:delivery. So this is a good thing. We
Speaker:like that the sun increases nitric. Oxide, increases
Speaker:nitric oxide. It also is going to help up regulate a lot of these neurotransmitters.
Speaker:We have a lot of amino acids in our, in our eyes. And some of
Speaker:the aromatic amino acids, meaning amino acids that collect ultraviolet
Speaker:light can be triggered and optimized like serotonin and
Speaker:dopamine and all the hormones that we think of when we think of our mood.
Speaker:And it also helps link to something called POM C in our brain, which is
Speaker:just another link to our metabolism.
Speaker:There's a big chemical in our brain that links uva helps link
Speaker:that through our eyes to our skin. And when we get those signals through
Speaker:our eyes to the brain, we, we're optimizing our metabolism,
Speaker:we're making endorphins, we're getting happy. We're doing a lot of different things, A lot
Speaker:of different chemicals are being made because of those signals through our eyes. And again,
Speaker:we're not staring at the sun, we're not going out and staring at uv. But
Speaker:those UVA signals happen about an hour after sunrise, depending on where you
Speaker:live. And just being outside at that time, along with the stronger blue
Speaker:signals, those are what's going to optimize our eyes even more, optimize the body
Speaker:through our eyes. So we do want to be mindful of getting outside, especially in
Speaker:the morning. Those morning signals are, are so important because they do so many things
Speaker:to jumpstart the day. Our metabolism, our mood, our hormones,
Speaker:links with our digestion, our hor, you know, everything again is linked. And if
Speaker:we're consistently missing that morning signals, those morning signals, we're actually
Speaker:missing so many important things. And we want to make sure that those hormones
Speaker:are, those neurotransmitters are regulated like serotonin,
Speaker:for example. We want to make sure that serotonin is optimized during the day. That's
Speaker:going to give us a lot of that energy. But at the end of the
Speaker:day when it's dark. So serotonin is the precursor for
Speaker:melatonin and we need a lot of that serotonin in order
Speaker:for the body to transfer to melatonin when it's dark. So it has to be
Speaker:very dark at night. So I think those cycles of very bright
Speaker:morning or daytime sunlight, combined with
Speaker:the night darkness, those two signals are super important.
Speaker:And it all happens again through our eyes, also through our skin. But our eyes
Speaker:are going to be the strongest signal for the brain.
Speaker:Wow. And to what extent was
Speaker:this covered in your traditional training?
Speaker:I'm sorry, I.
Speaker:That's. That's it. Yeah. I don't remember any. I don't remember any of
Speaker:it. And I don't know. Now, that being said, I. I mean, I've
Speaker:been in practice now 23 years or so, so I don't know.
Speaker:I will say, though, there is a new graduate that's working with us
Speaker:and she does know about melanopsin. She knows about circadian rhythm and she.
Speaker:They are teaching it now. I don't know what the extent is. I
Speaker:am hoping that at least they're telling people to get outside in the morning, you
Speaker:know, with. With naked eyes and to make sure I have darkness at night. I
Speaker:don't know if that's the extent of it. I would like. I actually should have
Speaker:found that out, but I know they are teaching that a little bit now, but
Speaker:when I was in school, they didn't. I don't remember. Unless my memory. I don't
Speaker:remember any of that.
Speaker:Yes. And I mean, it. It's sort of like nutrition
Speaker:and for. For. In medical school, it's like they cover
Speaker:it very briefly and then move on.
Speaker:And so even, you know, of course you're not going to remember it because it
Speaker:wasn't a focal point at all.
Speaker:And so is it. And I just like, you know, trying to get a sense,
Speaker:like your sense of things. I don't expect you to know, like, definitively,
Speaker:but, you know, this idea, like the melanopsin receptors, the
Speaker:neuropsyn receptors, there's just more and more research showing how important
Speaker:our eyes are and what we expose our eyes to make such
Speaker:a difference. Is that getting translated, like
Speaker:at conferences, or is it. You know,
Speaker:I know a lot of people think there's. There's like a pipeline
Speaker:of information and all of the doctors have access
Speaker:to it, and when something new comes, they just turn the tap on and get
Speaker:the new information. And it doesn't work like that. Like things are sort of
Speaker:scattered. But I Feel like red light therapy is being.
Speaker:Is being talked about a lot. Okay. The FDA is coming, you know, has come
Speaker:up with a new red light device for macular degeneration that I think. I'm not
Speaker:sure if it's being used in practice yet. But red light therapy is in conferences
Speaker:a lot. I don't know. I haven't seen any.
Speaker:I haven't. No. I don't know. There might be a few, but
Speaker:I don't really know. When I sign up for my continuing
Speaker:education courses, none of it is really circadian rhythm that I can think
Speaker:of offhand. There are a lot of holistic doctors talking about
Speaker:nutrition and vitamins and supplements and things like that. And that's been
Speaker:a big thing. People talk about lifestyle,
Speaker:but not necessarily light. This light piece is, again, a
Speaker:really important piece. I mean, I have a lot of. Even just in general, even
Speaker:diabetic patients, whenever they come in, and I always say, did your doctor tell you
Speaker:about how light at night can increase your blood sugar? Do they tell you to
Speaker:try to block that light? And they say, no, they told me to stop eating
Speaker:pasta and stop eating carbs. And I'm like, oh, my gosh, this is such a
Speaker:big piece of the puzzle. We need to talk about light. For so many different
Speaker:health issues and diabetes. Since it is such a big issue for the eyes,
Speaker:I think that is crucial. I think that has to be a conversation to have
Speaker:with people about light. I mean, how it affects everything. And
Speaker:a. Of different conditions are, you know, obviously are affected by light, and you
Speaker:can see that in the eyes. So that's why it's such a good way to
Speaker:educate people about it. Yes. Yeah. And I want to
Speaker:talk about how different things showing up in the eye can be
Speaker:connected to other conditions. But first you
Speaker:mentioned how artificial light at night raises our
Speaker:blood sugar. And I find this is one of those points
Speaker:where people are like, what?
Speaker:Like. Sorry, what? Like, I'm doing all like my,
Speaker:you know, I'm, as you said, like, I'm not eating my carbs and I'm doing
Speaker:this and I'm doing that. But. But I'm on my phone before bed and
Speaker:that's raising my blood sugar. Are you kidding me? Like,
Speaker:yes. Sorry. Could you explain
Speaker:how that's happening? Because it does sound
Speaker:fantastical to people who are not familiar with
Speaker:this world. So blue
Speaker:light, which is found in our phones and in these artificial lights
Speaker:will trigger melanopsin. So those melanopsin blue light receptors
Speaker:will trigger, based on different nanometers of light, I'M
Speaker:not gonna get into the numbers here, but those signals are in those artificial
Speaker:lights that again are triggering melanopsin. So melanopsin is going to send a
Speaker:message to the brain and there's a, you know, it's going to trigger
Speaker:the production of aceto of
Speaker:adrenocorticotropin hormone. It's going to tell our adrenal glands
Speaker:to make cortisol. And then cortisol's. What's that going to do? It's going to go
Speaker:to the liver and it's going to. The liver is going to release blood sugar
Speaker:and it's raising our blood sugar because it has to, because cortisol, we need
Speaker:cortisol. Cortisol is very important. It gives us energy, it keeps us awake. It's
Speaker:what we need in the morning, but we don't need it at night. Cortisol
Speaker:can lead to other. Can be a precursor to other hormones. So
Speaker:it has an ability to mess with our hormones as well as should testosterone, things
Speaker:like that. But cortisol inherently raises blood sugar, so it's going
Speaker:to release blood sugar and then it also makes us a little more insulin
Speaker:resistant because the body's not going to. Well, the body will
Speaker:release more insulin to try to get rid of this blood sugar, but cortisol blunts
Speaker:that responds a little bit. So now we have an epidemic of people who
Speaker:are insulin resistant in addition to this high sugar
Speaker:because of the cortisol. And then we have the whole leptin issue, which is a
Speaker:whole other issue in general, which is also a circadian piece. Leptin plays
Speaker:a role in how we, in our metabolism based on our fat cells, and
Speaker:that's also circadian. But just a basic. Cortisol is
Speaker:automatically just going to raise our blood sugar at the wrong time, and then we
Speaker:have nothing lowering it. Now it's just coursing through our body, this
Speaker:cortisol, which is also going to create more stress and it
Speaker:blunts melatonin. And melatonin cannot be released if cortisol
Speaker:is high. And that's another thing that's going to be an issue because melatonin is
Speaker:going to help the whole body heal. So cortisol will raise blood
Speaker:sugar just from having that blue light in our eyes. And a lot of people
Speaker:say, oh, I put my phone on night shift setting, I turn my phone
Speaker:orange. But that night shift setting on the phone, even on
Speaker:maximum setting, is only 50% blockage. So if you have
Speaker:50% of no blue, you have 50% blue and you need
Speaker:zero. I mean, you need, you need to not have any blue at night to
Speaker:not trigger those melanopsin cells. So it's, it's not enough. It's a kind of a
Speaker:false sense of security a lot of people think they're getting. So we want no
Speaker:blue. So we don't even want any bright light for the most part. Even if
Speaker:we have no blue and really bright lights, that could be an issue. But specifically
Speaker:blue, we want to avoid that. So phones, LEDs, overhead
Speaker:TVs, all of that, we want to try to eliminate it. And it doesn't mean
Speaker:that you have to turn off your lights and walk around with a candle. I
Speaker:mean, there are things we can do. We know about our blue light blockers and
Speaker:different circadian friendly bulbs. There are ways to get around that. But we just definitely
Speaker:need to be mindful that once the sun goes down, we want those signals to
Speaker:be correct so that cortisol does go down. Okay. So once the
Speaker:sun goes down, we need to be as mindful
Speaker:of our light environment as we would be of what we were eating. Right. Like,
Speaker:I know, you know, I think of all of the moms I know,
Speaker:like there is no way they would be allowing
Speaker:junk food into their bodies or the bodies of their children, like
Speaker:at, you know, late at night on a regular basis.
Speaker:And yet we don't have the information available to know that
Speaker:the artificial light is doing this, having the same effect.
Speaker:So yeah, just to like get through that point a little more. So turning off
Speaker:the overhead LEDs, that's a simple one because who, who wants those on
Speaker:anyway? They're awful. Especially when it's dark out. Your body
Speaker:just is like, ah, like it's too bright. So the
Speaker:overheads go off. We put on some lamps with a warmer bulb,
Speaker:incandescent or circadian friendly bulb.
Speaker:A little trickier is the screens. Right. Like I like to
Speaker:have a, I like to watch a little TV show or watch a movie.
Speaker:So let's talk about the glasses.
Speaker:Yeah, So I don't have them in front of me, but
Speaker:there's. Everyone heard about blue light glasses, right? We all know that there's
Speaker:blue light glasses. And I think a lot of people know that blue light
Speaker:keeps you awake. I feel like that's a pretty known thing. A lot of people
Speaker:hear it, they don't know the extent of it or they're like, oh, I have
Speaker:my blue light blockers. But there's such a big difference between blocking blue light during
Speaker:the day and night. And if you're getting, if you're Wearing a blue light blocker
Speaker:that has no color to it, you're not really blocking blue light, especially
Speaker:not enough. In order to block technically 100% of blue light,
Speaker:the lenses have to be orange. I mean, they have to be really amber or
Speaker:really orange. And you can see the wavelengths of whatever glasses you're using and make
Speaker:sure that they are blocking up to at least you know, at a
Speaker:minimum, 480 nanometers. That's the wavelength that
Speaker:most activates. Melanopsin is 480 nanometers.
Speaker:It's sky blue. But ideally, you want to go even a little further than that
Speaker:because melanopsin can also respond to some people, like, even in the
Speaker:green range. But that being said, the glasses have to be dark enough
Speaker:and orange enough to block that light. Even yellow
Speaker:glasses, Yellow glasses are not enough for nighttime. I tend to wear yellow during the
Speaker:day because it gives me a nice, nice 50% blockage of
Speaker:the harmful light that's going to damage the eyes during the day without messing with
Speaker:circadian rhythm. But at night, I tend to wear orange ones, and they
Speaker:just work so much better. And then I even wear red right before. But that's
Speaker:a little different. That really blocks all the way up to all the green, and
Speaker:it takes out a lot of the light. That's like my sleeping pill that I
Speaker:use. But orange is really important at night again, after the
Speaker:sun goes down. Okay. And I just wanted to make sure we
Speaker:covered that because I, I don't want
Speaker:people's. The way human nature is, our mind will go to, like, the worst,
Speaker:hardest part of any change, right? And it's like, what? Like, no more. No
Speaker:more tv, no more screens. No more. And it's like,
Speaker:no, just make sure that your eyes are fully protected.
Speaker:Right? And, you know, I know all of this, and even I
Speaker:sometimes I'm like, you know, I just pick up my phone and I'm like, oh,
Speaker:I forgot. You know, it's. But every,
Speaker:every moment of protection, every little bit of
Speaker:protection matters and, and makes a difference and is
Speaker:improving our body's ability to function
Speaker:and, and heal itself. So,
Speaker:yeah, really. So the, so the blue blockers are really, really, really
Speaker:important. And do you just, like, once the sun goes down, do you just put
Speaker:them on or do you put them on if you're going to, like, watch TV
Speaker:or something? I mean, I put them on. So I,
Speaker:I put them on as soon as the sun goes down. I mean, they're on.
Speaker:My husband does not. He waits a couple. He only puts them on a Few
Speaker:hours before bed, especially at this time of year when it's dark at 4:30.
Speaker:Right now, that being said, I'm at work. There are days I don't work. I
Speaker:don't work every day. But on the days I do, there is one night I'm
Speaker:working till seven and it's dark for a few hours already this time of year.
Speaker:And I will say that I wear the yellow. And the second I leave
Speaker:the office, I put on my orange. And I'm not. You're not supposed to drive
Speaker:with them. But I live pretty close to the office. So anyway,
Speaker:that being said, so I. But I put them on as soon as it's dark.
Speaker:But I also want to make sure I've eaten already. I tend to try to
Speaker:eat before the sun goes down as well because our digestive
Speaker:enzymes are not really active as much at night. We're supposed to eat with
Speaker:the sun. That's what we're designed to do, eat when the sun is up. Our
Speaker:digestion is really strong. So I like to make sure I eat
Speaker:and then, you know, darkness and then put them on and I leave them on
Speaker:no matter what I'm doing until I, until I go to bed.
Speaker:Whereas my husband's like, what do we have the lights off? It's 430. Why are
Speaker:you like, I don't care.
Speaker:But I mean, at least. And again, not everybody can do that. I recognize that
Speaker:people are working. I don't expect people to put them on at 4:30, you know,
Speaker:depending on where you live. But at least a few hours before bed. I mean,
Speaker:ideally when you get home and it's dark, put them on. You know, that's what
Speaker:I'm saying. It's a little bit harder for people who are at work and they're
Speaker:working late. And you really don't want to be walking around with orange glasses because
Speaker:you don't want to drive with them. But at least yellow in those situations. But
Speaker:if you're home and it's dark, you put them on. It would be just such
Speaker:an easy thing to do. Such an easy thing to do. And then you're
Speaker:protected from any little ambient light or any
Speaker:little anything that comes your way.
Speaker:Okay, so another question I had.
Speaker:You talked about how the
Speaker:artificial light at night spikes our blood sugar.
Speaker:How is it different? Explain to us how it's different from
Speaker:going outside at noon and getting a blue
Speaker:light signal. Why there's like
Speaker:the timing piece and you know, the fake
Speaker:light versus real light piece. So what, what's going on? Because
Speaker:I'm I'm hearing people's questions come through the ether.
Speaker:They're like, well she said there's blue light outside and you're saying it's so bad.
Speaker:So what's right? Right, Tell us. So when we're exposed
Speaker:to blue light out in the sun, we're getting a full spectrum signal. So we're
Speaker:getting red and infrared, which is is again anti inflammatory. Blue light is in addition
Speaker:to telling us what time it is, it's also a strong
Speaker:signal. I mean it has a very high wavelength, it's close to ultraviolet.
Speaker:So it is a stronger signal. But out in full spectrum light it is
Speaker:balanced by that red and infrared. Those red and infrared signals, which are longer
Speaker:wavelength and more anti inflammatory, they're going to blunt a lot of
Speaker:the inflammatory signals. Just as a side note, but when we are getting full
Speaker:spectrum light, we also have other pieces of light in there. We also have some
Speaker:depending on what time of year it is where you live. We're also getting some
Speaker:ultraviolet light and ultraviolet light helps break
Speaker:down our hormones. So we're designed to the way, the way we
Speaker:work is to release, you know, cortisol and start making hormones first thing in the
Speaker:morning. And then if we're outside getting these signals of full spectrum
Speaker:light, we are exposed to a little of ultraviolet and then ultraviolet gets
Speaker:stronger and then it gets weaker. And ultraviolet light helps break down those hormones.
Speaker:So our body knows exactly what to do. It's like a balance
Speaker:checks and balances. It's like, yeah, you're making hormones and then ultraviolet light helps
Speaker:start breaking them down. But at night, if we start releasing hormones, there is no
Speaker:ultraviolet light at night and we're not, nothing's breaking them down. So then they're just
Speaker:flowing through our body. But cortisol, you know, we're going to make it. We're supposed
Speaker:to make it, but we're also supposed to stop making it and do something to
Speaker:help get rid of it or help break it down with all of our
Speaker:hormones and all of the things that we're doing. Everything has a rhythm and we
Speaker:need the sunlight to kind of tell us what to do and when to do
Speaker:it. So that being said, I know middle of the day, sun,
Speaker:there are caveats to that. We're not going to have someone who's never been out
Speaker:in the sun and then go outside for hours. And all of that is a
Speaker:separate story. But the idea is that full spectrum light does exactly what
Speaker:we needed to do. We're supposed to have different things happening at different times a
Speaker:day. At night, it's all artificial. It's not our biology
Speaker:to release all these hormones at night. There's nothing. Then they just sit there and
Speaker:they create wreak havoc on the body.
Speaker:So amazing. So when we're outside
Speaker:there, yes, there's blue light, but there's lots of other kinds of light.
Speaker:And it's basically helping our body to digest all of our,
Speaker:all of the information. Whereas when
Speaker:it's dark out and it's fake light and it just has
Speaker:the very narrow stream, it's just bombarding our body with
Speaker:signals and our body doesn't know what to do and
Speaker:reacts in a way that's causing a
Speaker:lot of problems. So many problems, my friends. And this
Speaker:is why. Yeah, this is, we're going to get into them. And why
Speaker:I'm like such a maniac about circadian regulation
Speaker:because it's not necessarily, no one's saying it's
Speaker:going to, it's like a magic cure all. But there's so
Speaker:many symptoms and can related to
Speaker:dysregulated circadian rhythm that to have a regulated
Speaker:rhythm, at least you're ruling out, you know, you're covering your
Speaker:bases. So if you, you do need help with other
Speaker:symptoms, at least you know, you're not trying to like medicate circadian
Speaker:dysregulation, which is never going to work. You got to get that in place.
Speaker:Okay, so that's, that's why this just
Speaker:matters so, so, so much. What are the many reasons it matters so much? Okay,
Speaker:so, so you've explained how it all
Speaker:works and the things that can go sideways and how our
Speaker:eye is such a key, key organ in
Speaker:processing light. So when things do go
Speaker:wrong, you have
Speaker:noticed a lot of correlation between eye issues
Speaker:and different symptoms or conditions that are showing up
Speaker:in other parts of the body, Right? Yeah. So the eyes are always
Speaker:a nice window to what's happening in the body. And that's something that we've, you
Speaker:know, we did learn, we always learned that in school. That's, that's such a big
Speaker:piece. And one of the reasons that drew me to this profession,
Speaker:because you can look into the eyes and you can see so many things that
Speaker:happen in the body because you can see blood vessels and nerve tissue and brain.
Speaker:You know, you're seeing all these things without having to cut anything. And I just,
Speaker:it is fascinating. So, yeah, so anytime anything goes
Speaker:wrong in the body, we have to. In the eyes, we have to know what's
Speaker:going on in the body or understand that most systemic systems
Speaker:can show up in the eyes. So a lot of things that
Speaker:happen can be traced back to,
Speaker:again, like you said, the foundation of circadian rhythm. It is the foundation
Speaker:that we need. And it's not like you said, it's not going to. There
Speaker:can be other layers, but we have to get that light. Right. So when we're
Speaker:talking about from, from a retinal standpoint, and you can look at the
Speaker:retina and you're seeing blood vessels and you're seeing inflammation, you know, perhaps inflammation, a
Speaker:lot of people are getting, you know, macular degeneration and, and, and diabetic
Speaker:retinopathy and different things like that. And it can
Speaker:point to inflammation in the body, can point to poor
Speaker:circadian rhythm for all the reasons we talked about because of blood sugar,
Speaker:perhaps people are getting too much light. Macular degeneration.
Speaker:There's a big link to poor circadian rhythm, or in general, or just
Speaker:being exposed to these artificial signals of light, because the
Speaker:signals that are exposed, that we're exposed to tend to
Speaker:oxidize the retina. We're not designed to stare at a screen all day and just
Speaker:get these signals without any balance. And what it does, it actually
Speaker:oxidizes the cells of the, of the macula and we start getting these deposits.
Speaker:So that's kind of a clue. And there's also links to metabolic
Speaker:issues for macular degeneration. So a lot of different things can happen
Speaker:where the retina is not working as well. And, you know, it's because of things
Speaker:that are happening in the body. Hormones play a big role in what happens in
Speaker:the eyes. Dry eyes, especially, depending on, you know, women tend to
Speaker:get a lot of dry eyes certain, you know, after menopause or around menopause, and
Speaker:then later, a lot of times, there's hormones linked to that.
Speaker:Allergies show up in the eyes. Nerve issues show up in the eyes. There's so
Speaker:many, so many different things. There's a lot of inflammation can show up in the
Speaker:eyes as well, autoimmune issues, and all of those things that happen
Speaker:in the eyes and the body. We want to make sure that the foundation, like
Speaker:I said, that the foundation is there before we start fixing other things. Because if
Speaker:you're kind of like running uphill, if you're trying to fix those things without fixing
Speaker:the light, because even with blood
Speaker:pressure, blood pressure has a circadian component to it as well. We want to
Speaker:make sure we are getting the right signals. Nitric oxide, when we're exposed to those
Speaker:ultraviolet A signals, are going to lower blood pressure. It lowers
Speaker:eye Pressure. There's a lot of different pieces there. Melatonin is
Speaker:really extremely important. There's so many studies on melatonin
Speaker:and how it can help a lot of different eye conditions and obviously the whole
Speaker:body. And I don't mean that we take it, we want to make sure we're
Speaker:optimizing it. And the only way to optimize it is with light. I mean, it's
Speaker:a circadian hormone so that in and of itself, people who have
Speaker:dry eyes and are not sleeping, why aren't you sleeping? We got to look at,
Speaker:you know, are you, are you getting enough light so that you're making your melatonin
Speaker:in addition to all the other things that can cause dry eyes? There's so many
Speaker:pieces. I know, I'm just, I'm saying like a big jumble of things. But there's
Speaker:so many links to so many things in, in the eyes and the body. And
Speaker:then we layer in the quantum health with that. It's, it's, it's a no brainer
Speaker:to, to really fix light. Right.
Speaker:So the eyes are a window to all kinds of systemic
Speaker:issues. And the eyes are
Speaker:also the main processing unit of light. So
Speaker:the circadian organ. So just another
Speaker:way of saying. Yes, how important light is. Let's dig
Speaker:into a couple of those a little bit. So
Speaker:talk to me about dry eye and
Speaker:hormones. Okay. Yes. So
Speaker:estrogen in general is important in
Speaker:keeping our eyes moist in general. So a lot of women will start
Speaker:getting dry eyes because our lacrimal glands will stop making. The lacrimal
Speaker:glands are what secrete water basically, or the aqueous portion of the tears.
Speaker:And it does go down a bit. Estrogen helps keep things moist. So when we
Speaker:have a little bit less of that, sometimes we're not making as much of the
Speaker:aqueous portion of our tear film. And also our glands tend to get a little
Speaker:more clogged. And our oil glands, whenever we blink, we're secreting oil for our
Speaker:tear film and they tend to get clogged a lot in women, especially
Speaker:just in general. And again, hormones, while
Speaker:menopause is a natural thing, we can optimize that a little bit more.
Speaker:Right. With circadian rhythm. If we help optimize hormones, we want to make sure we're
Speaker:doing all of that to help. Gosh,
Speaker:I'm drawing a, drawing a blank on other things right now.
Speaker:I'm sorry, I'm completely drawing a blank here. Okay, we'll
Speaker:just tighten this up later. Yeah, you can edit this out. Actually, I'm going to
Speaker:Plug my computer in. So let's make a note. At 35
Speaker:minutes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Just feel like I'm. I'm not. No
Speaker:problem. Completely. Right now I realized I forgot to
Speaker:plug it in, and it's getting low, so I'll be right back. Okay.
Speaker:I mean, I don't know that that's really answering anything anyway. I'm not really sure
Speaker:if I even answered anything, really. I don't know. I'm drawing a blank on that.
Speaker:Menopause. It's hard to say that's fully circadian because it's.
Speaker:It's like we're losing hormones at that point. So it's like, almost.
Speaker:Yeah. And that, like, I'm not looking to say it's fully
Speaker:circadian. I just, like, even the idea that you're. That is a
Speaker:symptom of a hormonal. Imbalance, it's like, oh, I see what
Speaker:you're getting at. Okay. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. I'm just trying to think of
Speaker:other testosterone I don't know. I don't know much about.
Speaker:It's mostly estrogen, honestly. So tell me when you want to restart.
Speaker:Okay. Want to ask that again? And I'll. Sure, I'll. Yeah, sure.
Speaker:I'll just pick it up.
Speaker:Yeah. And as I was saying, like, it's. It's more just like
Speaker:most people have no idea. They're like, oh, I have dry eyes. Like, they don't
Speaker:even. Wouldn't even connect it to a phase of life or to a
Speaker:hurt. You know, they just get drops, and that's it.
Speaker:So those are. That's sort of who I'm talking to. Okay. It's like
Speaker:that. The idea. There's a lot of different
Speaker:reasons for dry eyes. I mean, I'll tell you before we continue. Like, there's
Speaker:medication side effects. There's, like, histamine issues that we can get, which can
Speaker:also be immune issues. Okay, well, let's do that, then. I'll let.
Speaker:How about this? I'll just ask about dry eyes. Right. And then it
Speaker:might be easier to do that because the only, like, example I have would be
Speaker:menopause and that. Yeah. Okay. So. Yeah, we can start that again.
Speaker:Okay. So I want to circle back to a symptom you mentioned, because this
Speaker:comes up a lot on Q&As, and I hear people wanting to know more about
Speaker:it, and that is dry eyes.
Speaker:Most people I know get dry eyes. They go get some drops,
Speaker:and they put the drops in, and they're like, now my eyes aren't dry anymore.
Speaker:Right. And that's kind of it, right? Well, with.
Speaker:It's actually very frustrating because when people get a drop, a lot of times those
Speaker:drops will help for a few minutes and they're really not helping the actual
Speaker:problem. So there's a ton of reasons why people can get dry eyes. There is
Speaker:the circadian piece to that, but in general, there are, you
Speaker:know, hormonal issues, there's side effects from medications. So people who are
Speaker:basically, if you look up any medication, blood pressure medications, birth control
Speaker:is a huge, huge cause of dry eyes in general. But if you're taking
Speaker:a systemic medication and you look up side effects, dry eyes is
Speaker:usually one of those side effects. So most people who are on medications,
Speaker:I'm thinking of like antidepressants, you know, psychiatric medications,
Speaker:blood pressure medication, any hormonal medications, antibiotics,
Speaker:things like that can absolutely disrupt the tear film. So that's.
Speaker:That's the thing that most people are on medications. And it's. It's one of the
Speaker:most common symptoms, dry eyes. So you have the medication
Speaker:piece, the hormonal piece. So again, people, especially menopausal women, when
Speaker:estrogen starts to go down, it's going to dry us out. It's going to mess
Speaker:with our glands. Our oil glands are not secreting oil as well. The
Speaker:water portion, the lacrimal glands are not making as much of the aqueous or the
Speaker:water part of our tears. Our tear film is made up of mucus,
Speaker:water and oil. So we need those layers to be nice and full in order
Speaker:to have a good tear film. So you get people who even have immune issues,
Speaker:allergies, they get too many, a lot of cells,
Speaker:mast cells that's secreting a lot of histamine or a lot of mucus.
Speaker:So that can also disrupt the tear film and relate to dry eyes. And
Speaker:we have environmental issues. People who are sitting on screens, just in general sitting
Speaker:on screens, we don't blink as much. We're not pumping out that oil. Our eyes
Speaker:are going to be dry. So there's a lot of lifestyle changes
Speaker:and a lot of systemic changes that can actually have an effect on that. There
Speaker:are autoimmune conditions that can actually lower the production of that water as
Speaker:well. Inflammatory conditions. There's
Speaker:almost everything, even digestive issues, even if our microbiome is off,
Speaker:if we had recent any issues with digestion, and
Speaker:there's a gut eye connection, there's a mouth eye connection,
Speaker:sometimes there's issues with dental work that can affect
Speaker:things. There's really so many layers. There's even issues with
Speaker:Say lymph stagnation. If we have issues where we just
Speaker:have stagnation and our lymph flow is not
Speaker:flowing for many reasons, even postural issues,
Speaker:we can have more dry eyes. A lot of people say I wake up in
Speaker:the morning and my eyes are puffy or my eyes are just watery in the
Speaker:morning. It's a lot of. There's all, excuse me, there's a lot of lymph tissue
Speaker:around there. And we need to make sure that that's moving, that we're releasing
Speaker:toxins, that we're hydrating, that we're getting, you know, all the, even circadian. There's
Speaker:a big circadian piece to how our lymph is flowing as well. There's
Speaker:kidney, you know, kidney function also plays a role. Liver
Speaker:function plays a role in our eyes and how we're releasing toxins. If we're
Speaker:exposed to too many toxins, it's going to
Speaker:show up in the eyes. Even poor air quality, right. If we're exposed to
Speaker:dust, if we, you know, I like having an air purifier in bedrooms. I
Speaker:think that's a nice way to just make sure we're exposed to clean air while
Speaker:we're sleeping. Because a lot of people don't realize that it's their, what they're
Speaker:exposed to that's, that's creating dry eyes. A lot of products
Speaker:create dry eyes. We have to be careful with cleaning products. Right. So
Speaker:many people are still using bleach and all these
Speaker:toxic, even fragrances. Oh, it drives me crazy.
Speaker:Fragrances, those chemicals every. Tell people, every time
Speaker:you're wearing, if you're wearing perfume or anything with a fragrance. Every time you
Speaker:smell that, your, your liver has to detox, has to detox
Speaker:those, those scent molecules. Like it's adding a burden, a toxic burden to the
Speaker:eyes, Women, contact lens, just in general. Contact lenses are a
Speaker:big cause of dry eyes in general because you're literally putting a piece of plastic
Speaker:on your eyes and disrupting the tear film if, if you're over wearing them, if
Speaker:you're not taking care of them properly or if the contact's not fitting properly
Speaker:or if it's not a good contact for you. But makeup, that's another thing. So
Speaker:I know you're asking about systemic conditions, but there's, there's so many different reasons for
Speaker:dry eyes. Like depending on what kind of makeup we use,
Speaker:there's a lot of different false eyelashes. You see that a
Speaker:lot. That's so interesting. There's so many people who have them. And I
Speaker:Saw a study about how eyelashes are designed to be a certain length
Speaker:because they have a certain airflow.
Speaker:And when we change that length with artificial false lashes, we're actually changing
Speaker:the airflow and the air. There's more air hitting your eyes and we can get
Speaker:more dry eyes. Just. Wow. So again, there are so many
Speaker:layers to dry eyes and there's a lot of systemic issues. Bottom line,
Speaker:folks, do not mess with nature.
Speaker:I mean, going to a party, you want long eyelashes for a night, fine. But
Speaker:like, I would like. Yeah.
Speaker:Wow. No wonder everyone has dry eyes.
Speaker:That's like everything. Allergy medicine, a lot of
Speaker:people are taking anti. That will automatically dry out the eye. It's gonna.
Speaker:It dries out the mucous membrane, so you can get more dry eyes
Speaker:from that as well. So again, there's so many. So many layers. And again, I
Speaker:like to have that quantum layer in there because again, quantum or circadian
Speaker:biology is such a good foundation for a lot of these systemic issues that
Speaker:perhaps we can improve upon to help reduce the
Speaker:systemic issue, which might also help improve the dry eye
Speaker:issue. Right? Is look. Yeah. I mean, looking at it from
Speaker:the. From the circadian perspective, it's getting all of the processes
Speaker:in place with the correct light inputs and then going down
Speaker:to that deeper quantum layer where boosting that bar.
Speaker:Easy water. The big thing, which I didn't even. Which I
Speaker:obviously probably obvious, it's blue light. You know, we're exposed to
Speaker:artificial blue light without the balance of the red and the infrared. We are literally
Speaker:oxidizing and dehydrating our eyes automatically just by being
Speaker:exposed to this signal of blue light that doesn't exist in nature.
Speaker:And the other piece of that is also WI fi signals, which are also
Speaker:just dehydrating us on that cellular level, which we can't get away from.
Speaker:I understand that that's a whole other, you know, conversation, but in
Speaker:general, our environment makes it really hard to not have dry eyes. We have to
Speaker:do a lot of work, a lot of work to. To really try to keep
Speaker:our eyes moist. And even as simple fact as just blinking, like, just remember to
Speaker:blink when you're on screens. You know, a lot of things like that can help,
Speaker:right? Yeah. I notice when I'm like editing the
Speaker:editing podcasts and there's a lot of me just listening, so I just.
Speaker:And I'm like, I am blinking like every other second.
Speaker:I was like, is there something wrong with me? Why am I blinking so much?
Speaker:Oh, but that's my body responding to the fact that I'm on a screen,
Speaker:trying to keep. Trying to keep my eyes safe. Okay,
Speaker:so what's going on? I know you've talked
Speaker:about how there's just more and more research coming out
Speaker:about the role of the eye
Speaker:and its connection to health and its connection to light. Like, what are your
Speaker:favorite things to think about right now? Yeah, it's interesting.
Speaker:Everyone's extremely afraid of ultraviolet light, right. Hitting the eyes. And I
Speaker:get it, because there is an oxidative reaction that can happen with ultraviolet light, especially,
Speaker:especially if it's too much. But there are some studies and some of these are
Speaker:animal studies. So it's not necessarily. But a lot of the animal studies
Speaker:usually can be extrapolated to humans. But, you know,
Speaker:UVA and violet light has been found to help with
Speaker:corneal wound healing. And I believe it was done in rabbits, rabbits or
Speaker:mice. But when exposed to uva, when, when, when the cornea
Speaker:gets wounded, it's actually neuropsyn, those neuropsychin receptors
Speaker:that get upregulated, those UVA receptors, and they help heal the eye, eyes, which
Speaker:is so interesting. It's like, well, you know, obviously we have neuropsychin for a
Speaker:reason. We need these signals. Sometimes these signals can actually help us.
Speaker:There's also the study, I believe it was done by Harry Moto is
Speaker:one of the researchers, that when UVB was,
Speaker:when the cornea was exposed to uvb, they found an upregulated
Speaker:Alpha MSH in the body. Alpha MSH is
Speaker:melanocyte stimulating hormone. It's a very important, important
Speaker:hormone that helps with so many different things. Again, that's a whole other topic.
Speaker:But it's just interesting how we can get systemic effects
Speaker:from signals in the eye. Same thing with uva they found
Speaker:there was another study about UVA and upregulating through nitric
Speaker:oxide signaling that there is other systemic effects as well. So we can
Speaker:see that ultraviolet light in the eyes does play a role in
Speaker:our systemic effects. What I do love, I really love
Speaker:Scott Zimmerman's research on infrared light. I just love that, you know,
Speaker:how, how well we know how important infrared light is
Speaker:again for our mitochondria, for our general health. And how when we're in these green
Speaker:spaces, we're getting even more of that and it penetrates the eyes so
Speaker:well that it can go through our, our eyelids just being outside.
Speaker:So being in these green spaces is such a healing thing that we can do
Speaker:for the body. So we can sit in the shade, sit under a tree,
Speaker:you know, even if it's in the middle of the day, and we're getting such
Speaker:amazing benefits. And we don't really get that. Most of us aren't getting as
Speaker:outdoor time as much as we need to. And the infrared portion of
Speaker:that is extremely important. It's actually going to hydrate. The retina needs
Speaker:hydration. The eyes need hydration. In addition to all the
Speaker:signaling. And infrared light is what does that. It actually gets absorbed by the water.
Speaker:It's actually helping us increase our cellular water, and it helps things
Speaker:work better. We can't work if we're dehydrated. And again, the sun
Speaker:or being outdoors is a big piece of making sure we stay hydrated.
Speaker:So I talk about hydration a lot with patients, and they're like, oh, I drink
Speaker:water all day long. I'm like, oh, that's not what I mean. I mean, that's
Speaker:not. It helps. We want to make sure we're getting minerals and we're getting clean
Speaker:water, but we really need that piece. We need the full spectrum sunlight,
Speaker:especially first thing in the morning, to help us increase that hydration.
Speaker:Wow. And so, yeah, let's
Speaker:talk about that a little. So tell us a little more.
Speaker:Being outside. And yeah, I love talking to Scott.
Speaker:And I love. Because it's. Every time I talk to him, I'm like, oh, just
Speaker:go outside. Right. Like, it's. In order to make vitamin
Speaker:D, you might need to have your skin out a certain time of year at
Speaker:a certain time of day. But in order to get the benefits of infrared
Speaker:light, which you're talking about, you just got to, like, walk out. Walk
Speaker:out that door, be on the other side of the glass. So what's. What's happening?
Speaker:How is infrared light, which is
Speaker:amplified under leaves and trees, which is so cool,
Speaker:or red light therapy, if that's the way we're doing it. How is
Speaker:that hydrating our bodies and our eyeballs?
Speaker:Yeah. So it works through our mitochondria. And our
Speaker:mitochondria we've probably remember as being our powerhouse that makes
Speaker:ATP and our energy. But mitochondria also
Speaker:make water. When those electrons are flowing through the
Speaker:membrane, they're kind of jumping through these different proteins in the membrane of the
Speaker:mitochondria at the fourth. The cytochrome. It's the
Speaker:fourth membrane, the fourth protein in that membrane, One of the
Speaker:byproducts is water. And research, obviously, from
Speaker:Dr. Pollack and all these other water researchers has shown that the
Speaker:water that gets made from the mitochondria actually ends up becoming a
Speaker:battery. It turns into. It's not just sloshing around our body. It actually
Speaker:turns into this kind of structured or this crystalline
Speaker:gel, this lattice of a battery. And it gets
Speaker:rearranged into a negative and positive charges. And it
Speaker:surrounds everything in the body. It's surrounding our mitochondria. It's surrounding every
Speaker:single, every single atom or every single
Speaker:surface that is hydrophilic or
Speaker:attracts water so that everything's hydrated. And that's what makes it work
Speaker:because that's what's supplying the energy in the body. And red light and
Speaker:infrared light actually power up that
Speaker:cytochrome C oxidase, which is the protein in the membrane that's
Speaker:making water. So it gets powered up when it's making more of that
Speaker:water. It's actually knocking off nitric oxide that can get
Speaker:stuck there and it allows oxygen
Speaker:to bind. And then it's going to make more water for us. And that water
Speaker:ends up turning into what we call exclusion zone water or coherent
Speaker:water or just water that helps our body work. And same thing
Speaker:happens in our eyes as well, that those mitochondrial cells eat up the red light
Speaker:and the infrared and they're actually going to make more water for us, us. And
Speaker:that happens on a cellular level that is not the same as the water that
Speaker:we drink. It is really happening throughout our entire body. One of the most important
Speaker:things we can do for the body because we are electrical and it's
Speaker:amazing how light is controlling things on such a, such a level. That light is
Speaker:going to interact with electrons and those electrons are what's going to
Speaker:help move things in the body. And then it's going to make that water. And
Speaker:then we have this battery and we want that battery, that water to be very
Speaker:thick and healthy. And infrared is powering that up. It's actually going to explain
Speaker:expand that water throughout the entire body. So works
Speaker:beautifully. Wow.
Speaker:So our bodies, so we are bioelectric,
Speaker:not just biochemical. There's an added layer there.
Speaker:And this, the light piece is what,
Speaker:you know, charges us. And the eyes are
Speaker:really like the key organization. I mean, we're
Speaker:absorbing light all over our body all the time. Yes, but, but
Speaker:the eyes have all of these very specific mechanisms
Speaker:and there's. A direct link to the brain. Right. It's right there. So it's just,
Speaker:it's such a direct link to the masterpiece and
Speaker:then it goes right, you know, all throughout the body. So it is a really
Speaker:important piece. And not to say we can't get some benefits
Speaker:obviously from the skin because that's the other, the other part of it. But the
Speaker:eyes are just. Is crucial.
Speaker:So. Amazing. Well, Valerie, do you have anything else
Speaker:that you want to add or anything that's on your mind about.
Speaker:About all of this? This has been a lot and I want to sort of
Speaker:give. Give people a sec. A second to digest and
Speaker:I, I really love how you explained everything so
Speaker:beautifully because it, I think, you know, that
Speaker:we, we can't hear this too many times. I just, again, just
Speaker:want to reiterate that we really, our light is a nutrient and we need to
Speaker:really be careful about, like, really think about what kind of light we're exposed to
Speaker:throughout the day. If you are in an office or you're in a place that
Speaker:has LEDs, just get outside as much as you can. Just take breaks outdoors. You
Speaker:don't need, you know, we don't need. You don't need to be outside all day,
Speaker:but just get outside, take those breaks, make sure we're getting those signals and
Speaker:safely. You know, there's obviously safe, safe safety involved there, but we
Speaker:don't want to be exposed to all these signals. It's just, it's just not natural.
Speaker:And it makes sense if we think about it. Why would, why would we be
Speaker:able to live away from nature? Like every other creature needs to be
Speaker:outdoors under the sun and, you know, just with the earth
Speaker:and we're the only creatures that are able to live
Speaker:indoors for such a big portion of our life. You know, we're really not
Speaker:connected anymore. And even if we're outside sitting under a tree, you know, it's
Speaker:fantastic for us. So we just, especially morning is the most important thing that we
Speaker:need to think about. Sunset as well is also a nice time when there's a
Speaker:lot of red and infrared light. We need the other signals throughout the day as
Speaker:well, but we have to make sure we're getting those early morning signals
Speaker:and even sunsets another time and then darkness at night. And that's what's going to
Speaker:optimize our rhythm very well.
Speaker:Right? Yeah. I love that idea of
Speaker:light as a nutrient and we, we are deficient again. And it's. Scott
Speaker:Zimmerman has said it's like 21st century scurvy,
Speaker:the infrared light deficiency. And when you talked about it, you
Speaker:talked about like our mitochondria being starving.
Speaker:Right. So that's the. I find these images
Speaker:so powerful. Right. Like we have inadvertently starved
Speaker:our cells of their vital life
Speaker:force. And then we wonder why we have all these problems
Speaker:with energy and sleep and digestion and.
Speaker:Yeah, it's amazing. Well,
Speaker:Valerie, where can People find you. And again, thank you so much
Speaker:for putting your, your brilliant mind onto all of this
Speaker:work and explaining it to all of us. Like, it really makes such a huge
Speaker:difference. Thank you. Instagram. Go on Instagram. I'm Quantum
Speaker:IDOC on Instagram. That's where I'm the most active. And there's some links there
Speaker:for my websites, resources and stuff. It's mostly, mostly
Speaker:education at this point. So I would say Instagram is the fastest
Speaker:and easiest way. Okay, so that's Quantum
Speaker:IDOC doc at Quantum IDOC
Speaker:on Instagram. If you live
Speaker:in the Long island area, you can make it an in person
Speaker:appointment at the clinic. If you
Speaker:don't, then yes, yes, definitely follow Valerie on Instagram. And
Speaker:she has a lot of amazing free resources. And of course, she
Speaker:is a faculty member at the Institute of Applied Quantum Biology. So if you
Speaker:wanted to study under her as a practitioner and
Speaker:learn how to apply all of this in your, in your work,
Speaker:you can find her there as well. Thank you. Yes. The Apply
Speaker:Quantum the program is just fantastic. I have to say I love the
Speaker:program so much and I'm honored to be on the faculty. But then that the
Speaker:Applied Quantum Biology program I just find so helpful.
Speaker:Again, I've learned about this since I would say 2017,
Speaker:and I read as much as I could and I learned as much as I
Speaker:could and I made the changes. But honestly, it wasn't until I went through the
Speaker:program that I think I really understood it or how to apply it and
Speaker:how to really live and not be so stressed out about it all the time.
Speaker:So I think it's really helpful. And I don't think you have to be a
Speaker:practitioner to go through the program. I think it's a great program just to understand
Speaker:and just know how to change your life. I mean, it really is life changing.
Speaker:And I love the way things are explained in the program. I just highly recommend
Speaker:it. I love it. Oh, Valerie, thank you so much. I
Speaker:really appreciate that. Yeah. And that is the point of it. It's like it's an
Speaker:integration program. It's not academic, it's not
Speaker:theoretical. Like, we sometimes have people who just want to like
Speaker:talk about electron tunneling for five hours. And I'm like, I will
Speaker:refer you to some other places where they. That's their
Speaker:focus for us. Yeah, it's like we want to understand
Speaker:what's happening so that we can do, so that everyone
Speaker:can do something practical with it. So thank you so much for,
Speaker:for. Articulating that because that's, that's the point. It's
Speaker:like, the information is wonderful, but if we
Speaker:can't live it out right, who cares?
Speaker:Sitting on a Lincoln PubMed.
Speaker:Thank you again, Valerie. And I look forward to doing this again.
Speaker:Thank you, Meredith. Me too.
