Healthy Eating & Eating Disorders - Anorexia, Bulimia, Binging

Huberman Lab

Scicomm Media

Science, Health & Fitness, Life Sciences

4.8 • 26.2K Ratings

🗓️ 6 September 2021

⏱️ 136 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

In this episode, I discuss what drives hunger and satiety, and the role our brain, stomach, fat and hormones play in regulating hunger and turning off the desire to eat more. I also address how protein is assimilated better early in the day than it is later in the day, and why those using intermittent fasting might want to shift their feeding window to earlier in the day. Then I delve into the topic of disorders of eating: Anorexia Nervosa, where people starve themselves and Bulimia Nervosa where people binge and purge their food. I discuss some common myths about Anorexia such as the role of media images increasing the rates of anorexia and the myth of the "perfectionist" anorexic. I also review the symptoms, and the brain and chemical systems disrupted in this condition. I explain how anorexics become hyperaware of the fat content of foods and develop reflexive habits of fat-hyperawareness. Then I discuss the most effective treatments ranging from family-based models to those that target the habitual nature of low-fat/calorie food choices. I also discuss new more experimental clinical trials on MDMA, Psilocybin and Ibogaine for Anorexia, and both their promise and risks I review the latest work on binge eating disorder and brain stimulation, drug treatments and thyroid disruption in Bulimia and why the treatments for Bulimia are so similar to those for ADHD. Finally, I discuss "cheat days," body dysmorphia and the growing list of novel forms of eating disorders start to finish. As always, science and science-based tools are discussed. For the full show notes, visit hubermanlab.com. Thank you to our sponsors AG1 (Athletic Greens): https://athleticgreens.com/huberman InsideTracker: https://insidetracker.com/huberman Thesis: https://takethesis.com/huberman Supplements from Momentous https://www.livemomentous.com/huberman Timestamps (00:00:00) Introduction: Fasting, & Defining Healthy Eating (00:08:55) Morning Protein Is Important (00:22:04) Sponsors (00:26:29) Defining & Diagnosing Eating Disorders (00:29:00) Anorexia Nervosa (Overview & Myths) (00:33:44) Bulimia (Overview & Myths) (00:37:35) Binge Eating Disorders, EDNOS, OSFEDS, Pica (00:39:44) What is Hunger? What is Satiety? (00:42:00) Neuronal & Hormonal “Accelerators & Brakes” on Eating (00:46:17) Fat, Leptin & Fertility & Metabolic Dysfunctions in Obesity (00:50:30) Why We Overeat (00:55:30) Homeostasis & Reward Systems/Decisions (00:59:58) Anorexia (01:04:28) The Cholesterol Paradox (01:06:13) Psychological vs. Biological/Genetic Factors in Anorexia (01:09:44) Chemical Imbalances, Serotonergic Treatments (01:12:56) Altered Habits & Rewards in Anorexia: Hyperacuity for Fat Content (01:18:28) Brain Areas for Reward Based Decision Making vs. Habits (01:24:06) Habit-Reward Circuits Are Flipped in Anorexics: Reward for Deprivation (01:28:30) How Do You Break a Habit? (01:33:23) Family Based Models, Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (01:35:39) MDMA, Psilocybin, Clinical Trials, Ibogaine (01:40:35) Anabolic vs. Catabolic Exercise, Spontaneous Movements, NEAT (01:43:23) Distorted Self Image in Anorexia (01:47:54) Bulimia & Binge-Eating, “Cheat Days”, Thyroid Hormone (01:53:05) Inhibitory Control, Impulsivity, Adderall, Wellbutrin (01:58:00) Direct Brain Stimulation: Nucleus Accumbens (02:04:28) Anorexia/Reward. vs Bulimia/Binging (02:05:45) Healthy Eating Revisited (02:10:55) Synthesis, Body Dysmorphias (02:14:15) Support: Podcast, & Research Studies Title Card Photo Credit: Mike Blabac Disclaimer

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to the Huberman Lab podcast where we discuss science and science-based tools for everyday life.
0:09.0	I'm Andrew Huberman and I'm a professor of neurobiology and ophthalmology at Stanford School of Medicine.
0:15.0	Today we are going to talk all about healthy and disordered eating.
0:19.0	And indeed we are going to talk about clinical eating disorders such as anorexia, bulimia, and binge eating disorder,
0:27.0	as well as some other related eating disorders.
0:30.0	However, before we get into this material, I want to emphasize that today's discussion will include what it is to have a healthy relationship with food.
0:39.0	We are going to talk about metabolism.
0:41.0	We are going to talk about how eating frequency and what one eats influences things like appetite and satiety.
0:50.0	As well as whether or not we have a healthy psychological relationship to food and our body weight and so-called body composition, the ratio of muscle to fat to bone, etc.
1:02.0	So as we march into this conversation, I'd like to share with you some interesting and what I believe are important findings in the realm of nutrition and human behavior.
1:12.0	I know these days many people are excited about or curious about so-called intermittent fasting.
1:20.0	Intermittent fasting is, as the name implies, simply restricting one's feeding behavior, eating to a particular phase of the 24 hour or so-called circadian cycle.
1:32.0	Other forms of intermittent fasting involve not eating for extended periods of time.
1:37.0	For entire days or some people will extend to two days or three days, typically and hopefully they will drink water during those times, sometimes referred to as water fasting, which means that they are ingesting fluids.
1:51.0	And hopefully they are ingesting electrolytes such as salt, potassium and magnesium as well, because while one can survive for some period of time without ingesting calories,
2:02.0	it is extremely important to continue to ingest plenty of fluids and electrolytes.
2:08.0	And the reason for that is that the neurons of your brain and body that control your movements, your thoughts, clarity of thinking in general, etc.
2:16.0	is critically dependent on the presence of adequate levels of sodium, potassium and magnesium.
2:23.0	The electrolytes and that's because neurons can only be electrically active by way of movement of particular ions, which include things like sodium, potassium and magnesium.
2:32.0	So without those, you can't think, you can't function and it actually can be quite dangerous.
2:37.0	So why all the excitement about intermittent fasting?
2:40.0	Well, a lot of the excitement relates to work that was done by a former colleague of mine down at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies in San Diego, named Sachin Panda.
	...

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