Sample Q&A

• What are the effects on the brain of general anesthesia, are the effects cumulative and what I do to get my memory back?
• How realistic is it to heal illnesses with just positive thinking?
• It has been 8 years since I had a traumatic brain injury.   My short term memory is still horrible. Are there things I can do to help it?
• What are the effects of social networking on the brain?
• What advice can you give an immediate family member of someone who just died of Alzheimer’s disease?
• How can you help refractory obsessive compulsive disorder?
• What do you think is the cause of the epidemic rise in autism?
• Should we be concerned about the radiation from cell phone use?
• What does the brain of migraine suffers look like and what I can I do about it?
• Have there been any studies on people going through a grieving process?   What can people do to help grieving?
• What is the effect of stress and emotional trauma on the brain?   What is the brain differences between people who have positive and negative coping skills?
• Using gingko, sage and huperazine for memory?
• Where can I get a series of brain scans to check myself out?
• Do people with healthier spiritual practices do you have a healthier brain?
• Is there a connection between spirituality and sexuality?
• What can I do to help my daughter who had ADD, depression and a lot of ANTs (automatic negative thoughts)?
• There is a lot of mental illness in my family, what is the best way to treat it overall?
• With treating mental illness, are people ever able to get off their treatments?
• What is the impact of secondary smoking on young children and the brain?
• What is the difference between the mind and the brain?
• I don’t have a question, but an endorsement “¦ I have seen a dramatic change since using your information over the past year. I wanted to thank you so much for the work you do.

Additional Stories

#1

Bonus Prescription: Beware of Your Inbox

The constant distractions we face everyday from emails, text messaging and voicemails may have a seriously negative effect on your brain.   In fact, according to one studysponsored by Hewlett Packard these distractions may be a greater threat to your IQ than marijuana.   In a study of 1,100 people, researchers found that those who felt as though they had to drop everything to respond to emails or text messages were significantly less productive at work.   Over a year the study found that these people had a 10 point drop in their IQs, more than double the four point loss found in studies of marijuana users.   Emails in particular had an addictive, drug like quality.   Always waiting for the next good e-mail is like waiting for the next black jack. Checking e-mail is an important way to keep in touch, but it is better to set aside specific times each day to work on it, and then leave it alone.

#2

Here is one of my favorite examples of using the 4 questions to kill the ANTs.

While I was writing this show our daughter Chloe, who was 4 at the time, wanted to get her ears pierced.   Apparently, one of her friends at pre-school had her ears done.   When her mother told her she would have to wait until she was 5 years old Chloe immediately started to cry.   With crocodile tears rolling down her cheeks she came into my library and climbed into my lap.   I asked her why she was crying.   What was the thought?   She said “I cannot wait until I am 5 years old to get my ears pierced.   It is too long.”   So we worked on that thought.

• Question #1: Is it true that you can’t wait until you are 5 years old to get your ears pierced. “Yes,” she cried, rubbing her eyes.
• OK “¦ Question #2: Can you ABSOLUTELY know that it is true that you can’t wait until you are 5 years old?   Initially she said yes, she couldn’t possibly wait.   Then I asked her if she thought she would die if she couldn’t get her ears pierced?   Surprised by the comment, she rolled her eyes at me and looked at me like I was stupid and said “Of course NOT”¦How silly.”   I smiled.
• OK “¦ Question #3: How do you feel when you have the thought “I can’t wait until I am 5 years old.   It is too long?” I feel sad because my ears are not cute and I feel mad because I want it done now.  
• OK “¦ Question #4: Who would I be without the thought “I can’t wait until I am 5?” I would feel painless “¦ she said.      
• OK “¦ now turn the thought around: “I can’t wait until I am 5.   What is the opposite of the thought?”   Here we spent a few minutes talking about opposites, such as big and small and hot and cold. She understood the concept and said “I can wait until I am 5.”   And then she jumped off my lap and went off to play with the dog.  

#3

In 2006, I gave a lecture to a 1,000 people at Skyline Church in San Diego.   The next year I was invited back.   As often happens, when I speak at a place for the second time, a number of people approach me as I walk into the lecture hall or sanctuary with their SPECT scans.   My lecture motivated them to come to one of our clinics to have their own brain evaluated.   SPECT is the brain imaging study we do in our clinics.   SPECT is called a functional scan, because it shows how the brain works; it measures blood flow and activity patterns.   On this occasion, a 35 year old man, Todd, came up to me to show me his scan.   Below you will see two brain SPECT scans.   The scan on the left is of a healthy person.   It shows full, even, symmetrical activity.   The scan on the right is Todd’s scan.   The Swiss cheese appearance indicates seriously low overall activity, the same pattern we often see in our drug or alcohol abusers.   As I looked at the scan Todd said, “You think I am a drug addict, don’t you?”

“The thought had crossed my mind,” I replied.

“I have never used drugs,” Todd said.   “And, I don’t drink.   Before I came to your clinic I used to paint cars in my garage, without much ventilation.   I don’t do that anymore.”

“That is the sign of intelligent life,” I replied.   “New information causes you to change your behavior.”    

He went on to tell me that he and his wife had been in marital therapy for several years without any benefit.   After his visit to the clinic in Newport Beach he started to live a brain healthy life, taking a multiple vitamin, fish oil and the other brain healthy supplements we recommended, along with eating better and exercising.   The difference he said had been life changing.   After his brain was better he was able to be a better husband.   I wonder how many marriages are suffering because one partner has a brain problem that no one is aware of.   How do you do marital therapy with this brain?   It will never work, until you help heal his brain.

#4

• Depression is not one thing and giving everyone the same treatment for it invites disaster.  
• Yet, that is exactly what is happening across our country everyday.   Many patients tell their doctors that they are depressed and leave the office after a 5 minute appointment with samples of the latest drug, without any sense of the type of depression they are treating.

Here is an example”¦

Kate, a minister’s wife left her family doctor’s office with a prescription for Prozac.   Within three days Kate started to feel much better.   After a week she was feeling really great.  

While stopped at a traffic light, a man in a truck pulled up beside her.   He winked at her.   That was not an unusual event for Kate, as she was an attractive woman.   But what happened next was very unusual.   Kate proceeded to unbutton her blouse and showed the man her breasts. J Horrified at her own behavior she sped off, as he tried to follow her.   She had never done anything like that before.   That is when she stopped the medicine and came to see me.   When we scanned Kate, we found that she had the wrong brain pattern for Prozac.   Prozac and medications like it, lower activity in the front part of the brain.   Prozac works well when this part of the brain works too hard and we can’t let go of bad thoughts.   It can be a trouble for people who start with low activity here because it may make them more impulsive, like Kate.

#5

The president of a local college came to see me with her teenage daughter, Jennifer, who was depressed, struggled in school and had intense emotional outbursts at home.   Her SPECT scan showed too much activity in the front part of her brain, so I put her on St. John’s Wort, an herbal antidepressant that settles down brain function, along with fish oil.   Within three weeks Jennifer’s behavior dramatically improved as did her performance in school.   After treatment the overactive areas on her SPECT scan normalized.  

#6

When Edward came to see me he was driving a truck for a living.   He had just split from his second wife and frequently had the urge to drive his truck off a bridge.   As a child he did poorly in school and as an adult he struggled to keep both jobs and relationships.   His scan was consistent with ADD or attention deficit disorder.   There was low activity in the front part of the brain, an area that controls concentration, forethought, judgment and impulse control.   The very next day, on the right treatment, his brain already showed improvement.   Edward was a gifted artist but was never able to finish the projects he started.   As he continued on his treatment he finished paintings and was able to sell them.   Over the next year the demand for his work increased and he was able to stop driving the truck to do the work he loved.  

#7 Matilda

Here’s one of my favorite examples where it is critical to know the type of depression you are treating: When I first began our brain imaging work in 1991 one of my first cases was a woman by the name of Matilda.   She was brought to the hospital by her family after she nearly burned down her house by forgetting something on the stove.   Her family was at their wits end.   At age 69 she had been diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease and had been getting worse.   She had also lost her driver’s license because she had been in four minor accidents.   Five of her six children thought she should be in a care facility for her own safety.   One of her daughters, however, had heard about me and brought her for more testing.   “One more try,” she told me.   “You are our last hope.” This is something I hear a lot.   When I first met Matilda I thought she had Alzheimer’s Disease too, but the results of her SPECT scan was very different.   She had good activity in the areas usually affected by Alzheimer’s.   Her scan was more consistent with depression.   Sometimes in the elderly it can be hard to distinguish Alzheimer’s disease from depression, so I put Matilda on the antidepressant Wellbutrin.   Within three weeks Matilda’s memory was better, she became more talkative and even started to help other patients on the ward.   After a month I was ready to send her home.   Everyone was so excited by her progress.   Before she left she asked if I would write the DMV to help her get her driver’s license back.   I told her, “Matilda, I drive on the same highways you drive.   I need you to take your medicine, do the other things we discussed and if in 6 months you are still better and your scan is better than I will write the DMV.   Six months later she remained improved.   I repeated her SPECT study, which was now much better, so I wrote the letter to the DMV and she got her license back!