To forward-thinking women intent on preserving the full spectrum of their cognitive abilities indefinitely this warning from scientists who study the menopausal brain may actually be a blessing in disguise...

Foggy thinking.
Memory problems.
Depression and anxiety.
Even the mood swings may seem quaint once you discover that menopause has the power to inflict lasting neurological damage upon your brain...

stressed woman
 
But don't expect your physician to be warning you about the acute vulnerability of the female brain to neurodegeneration beginning around your 40th year. Most doctors are not even aware of the problem, let alone the recognized solution to it!
 
In fact many women will be dismayed to discover - after reluctantly enquiring about the unfamiliar symptoms taking place within them - that their doctor's understanding of menopause is at best rudimentary.

Take Anna for example, a 57-year old counselor to women for whom, until recently, menopause seemed to have passed by.

It is only now, looking back on a three-year loss of joy and desire, and anything remotely resembling the emotional highs and lows of her past, that it occurs to her she might have misinterpreted the signals of perimenopause - that hormonally-chaotic period in a woman's life leading up to the last period she will ever experience.

slice of chocolate cake
Chocolate cake. A common first treatment for symptoms of perimenopause. [Image: Pexels.com]
Terrified that the way she is feeling might represent her new normal, Anna has seen her days structure themselves around eating cake.

Before going through it herself Anna had assumed that when menopause finally caught up with her she would have a few hot flashes, her periods would eventually stop, and she would carry on feeling the way she always has...

No one warned her there might be joint pain, heart palpitations, and low-level anxiety.

No one alerted her to the possibility of endless trips to the bathroom in the middle of the night. But those appear to be nothing more than false alarms, needless dashes in the dark to perpetuate her insomnia and her body-saturating fatigue.

Even thinking, which she had always taken for granted, has become taxing.

So to avoid the complexity of decisions involving wardrobe and meal plans she has resorted to a daily uniform of black track pants and black tee shirt, and tv dinners served from the microwave.

This experience, and Anna's research into the cause of it all, leaves little doubt in her mind that her newly-acquired daily brain fog and the other debilitating symptoms she has "shrugged off as age-related wear and tear" are in fact the result of approaching menopause.

timepieces
Some menopausal upheavals may not fade gracefully with time, but instead quietly linger. [Image: Pexels.com]
As unpleasant as it is to deal with, all her reading suggests the topsy-turvy nature of her hormonal transition should at least be temporary - even if "temporary" is to be measured with a years-long yardstick.

The notion that her neurological symptoms might eventually let up but her underlying brain architecture might continue to quietly deteriorate never crosses her mind...

This is because brain shrinkage does not draw the same kind of attention from a woman as does the more immediate humiliation and desperation she derives from wild mood swings, urinary tract infections, painful sex, and vaginal atrophy - the not-so-celebrated causes of menopausal dread.

If the issue of shrinkage does ever drive women like Anna to raise embarrassing questions with their doctors it is NOT because of any suddenly-emerging interest in the long-term health of their brains...

Women are not taught to be suspicious about such a thing, and physicians are not trained to divert the thinking of their patients towards it.

Instead, once you have drummed up the courage to address why it is you no longer feel you can trust your own body not to find new ways to embarrass you daily, then rather than focus on the health of your brain...
 
Both You And The Doc Will More Likely Want To Discuss The Immediate Goings On Of Your Better Appreciated Lady Parts
 
The known territories.

The probed and spatula'd landscapes documented by a century or more of investigative women's health.

bikini medicine
Conventional women's health focuses more on those elements of the female body not shared with the opposite sex. [Image: Unsplash.com]
A woman's breasts. Her ovaries. Her uterus and vagina.

These are all fair game for speculation on the part of her physician.

But her brain?

What can a general practitioner properly surmise about the goings on in that butter-soft ball of gray matter which lays hidden away from the outside world by an opaque layer of protective bone?

And yet...

If your doctor could see inside your head he/she might be shocked by what the two brain scans shown below from the Department of Neurology at Weill Cornell Medicine reveal about the abrupt changes which can take place inside your head when you transition through to menopause.

Can you spot the difference in brain activity (energy consumption) between these two brains?

One belongs to a woman still capable of getting pregnant. The other belongs to a slightly older woman whose reproductive cycles have terminated.

Shades of orange and red indicate a warmer (energy consuming) brain, shades of green and blue signify a cooler, less energy-activated brain...
hypometabolism is characteristic of the post-menopausal brain
The story conveyed by this image is not of some anomaly in brain function experienced by the rare woman whose health unexpectedly goes south right at that critical time in her life when everything changes.

The new science of female-specific brain health is telling us this is not a rare occurrence.

Instead, every neurological circuit you had grown to depend upon before this critical transitional period beginning in your fifth decade of life - all the non-reproducible brain wiring that makes you uniquely you - suddenly becomes at risk of being "remodeled" to accommodate the needs of a soon-to-be non-reproductive body and a now energy-starved brain.

It is not a coincidence that extreme weariness and mental confusion often dog a woman's ability to perform in every area of her life in the years leading up to menopause.

It is because she is literally being stripped of the resources needed to power her brain!
 
Here's The Good News. For Many Women This Anxiety-Ridden Period Of Mental Destabilization Will Last Less Than A Decade.
 
Recently scientists from the Department of Neurology at Weill Cornell Medicine in New York, in collaboration with the College of Medicine at University of Arizona, performed brain scans on 160 women aged between 40 and 65 years [Ref. Mosconi-2021].

dr. lisa mosconi
Dr. Lisa Mosconi, the lead scientist from the 2021 women's brain imaging studies conducted at Weill Cornell Medicine. [Image: Ted.com]
They tracked the group of women for two years.

What the brain researchers found both surprised them and confirmed the results of earlier studies which had indicated the period of transition to menopause is both neurologically eventful and fraught with risk to the female brain.

The good news seemed to be that in most instances - even though a woman's brain is likely to undergo significant changes in structure and connectivity, changes which could trigger and exacerbate many of the common symptoms of menopause - the post-menopausal brain will recover much of its cognitive and emotional facility.

A brain subject to the destabilizing effects of menopause, the research suggested, will find a way to compensate and adapt.

However, this will not be the case for every woman.

About 1 in 5 women will experience lasting - sometimes debilitating - changes to the way their brain is structured and the way in which it processes information. This brain remodeling will set the stage for how this unlucky group of women view the world and interact with it for the rest of their days.

The results of the two-year long study were published in the journal Nature in June of 2021.

A graph from that paper, from which a great deal of useful if not so reassuring information can be inferred, shows a simple interpretation of the (decidedly not-so-simple) trends seen in the female brain as it is forced to adapt to the ever-mounting stress of estrogen and progesterone withdrawal.

I will interpret for you shortly this mysterious pattern of falling and rising biomarkers of brain activity and brain health.
time evolution of biomarkers of the menopausal brain
Lisa Mosconi, the lead scientist on the brain imaging study, was later asked by The Wall Street Journal about what her investigation had uncovered [Ref. WSJ-2021].

One of the most surprising findings, she said, was that gray matter volume - the amount of cell tissue allocated to information processing in the brain - despite dipping during the years leading up to menopause, actually recovers in some parts of the brain as a woman moves into her postmenopausal years.

She gets back a large part of the cognitive deficit she suffered during the turbulent years of menopausal transition.
 
"Our study suggests the brain has the ability to find a new normal after menopause in most women," declared Mosconi
 
Some women have interpreted this statement, and the results of the study which do suggest a woman's brain will find a way to compensate for the physiological changes forced upon it when the hormones estrogen and progesterone plummet throughout her body, to mean that women worried about the effects of menopause on their brains can now breathe a sigh of relief...

One writer for WomenAndHome.com who can be forgiven for perhaps reading too much into the findings (the published results are extraordinarily hard to decipher) chose to report the news with the decidedly upbeat headline Menopause and the brain: turns out it's not so bad [Ref. WAH-2021]

two thirds are women
Significantly more women fall prey to severe cognitive impairment than do men. [Image: uahs.arizona.edu]
Not so bad?

If that was true, why is it that of every 3 people who struggle with severe cognitive decline 2 of them are women?

If menopause acting on the female brain is "not so bad" then why is it that one woman out of every 5 whose brain undergoes neurological impairment during her menopausal years is fated not to recover her premenopausal faculties?

In what sense is this not so bad?

Clearly there is some level of disconnect between what is being reported to women, and what is being experienced firsthand, and for the first time as they enter menopause, by tens of millions of them across the globe every year.

So what is the truth of the matter?
 
When It Comes To The Vulnerability Of Your Brain To The Loss Of Your "Sex Hormones" At Midlife, Why Does It Seem So Hard To Get Definitive Answers About What Is Going On?
 
Hey there, my name is Stephen Carter.

I am a former physical scientist (Ph.D.) and an expert on matters relating to that fuzzy area where women's health and brain discombobulation begin to overlap.

Yet, in as much as this fusion of distinct medical specialties may sound promising (especially to you, my Female Reader), I have to admit it is a strange place for a man to hang out. Also, a kind of lonely one. Because it turns out hardly anyone gives a damn about women's brains.

Even so, for some time now I have investigated the research efforts of those scientists who do care about what is happening specifically to the brains of women.

But it did not start out that way.

Initially my interest focused on the work of leaders in the field of general brain science.

These are the little-known but highly dedicated researchers who seek to better understand how those of us who have reached the middle part of our lives can preserve our cognitive health for (hopefully) the rest of our days.

At first my exploration of the science of the aging brain was driven by practical considerations. I wanted to make sure I was doing everything I could to preserve my ability to make a living (by continuing to use my intellect) well beyond the age of retirement.

But then I made an interesting and unexpected discovery.

The demographic most likely to benefit from the practical information I was digging up was not men like myself. It was women.
 
The Human Brains Most Vulnerable To The Passage Of Time Belong Not To Males But Females
 
Furthermore, when it became apparent that female brain health is inextricably tied to the mechanics of the female reproductive system I realized the topic of brain health is a LOT more interesting than I could ever have suspected it might be.

disappearing woman
Here is what I have now figured out.

The average woman simply has NO idea about the challenges she faces on the neurological front as she enters the fifth decade of her life.

How could she?

The information on this topic is so new that you will not find it mentioned in any text book.

Nor is your doctor likely to respond with anything other than a blank stare should you query them about how best to mitigate the risk to good brain health imposed by the passage of menopause.

Consider estrogen therapy, you might be told - as though the solution to all "women's problems" is more estrogen (yet this is far from the truth!).

In fact, one has to stare long and hard at the science literature devoted to uncovering the connection between menopause and brain health before any of it begins to make any sense.

Take, for example, the previous color-coded graph which shows the ebb and flow of the biomarkers of brain health as a woman transitions through the stages of menopause.

It is not so easy to interpret!

You could take it upon yourself to read the scientific papers detailing the changes seen in the female brain as it passes from the premenopausal (PRE) phase, which represesents all the early years during which your hormones are regular and you are sexually reproductive, until the postmenopausal (POST) phase when you have ceased to be so.

If you do this you will occasionally come upon relatively easy-to-interpret data, like this "brain shrinkage" graphic from the Nature paper [Ref. Mosconi-2021] showing the population-averaged loss of white matter (WM) volume over time, both in the front and rear parts of the brain, as a woman passes from her premenopausal to her postmenopausal years:
disappearing white matter volumes
But for the most part the content of these papers is dense and opaque to the general reader.

An easier approach to understanding this complex topic perhaps, is to find a guide who can present to you just the bits you really ought to know about.
 
My Job Today Is To Help Women Understand And Accommodate The Changes Taking Place Inside Them, And Especially Inside Their Head, As Their Reproductive Biology Begins To Fail Them
 
Consider for a moment that initial graphic from the Nature paper - the one showing the evolution over time of SEVEN important biomarkers of brain health.

changing nature of menopausal brain
I have reproduced those curves here with less detail so as to remind you of the highly variable nature of the composition and architecture of the female brain as it passes through the years surrounding menopause.

For the labeling of the separate curves you can refer back to the full scale image.

One story that might be inferred from the multi-colored curves of biomarker intensity seen here - based on an interpretation of the plotted dark gray curve which represents gray matter volume - is that a woman's cognitive faculties are largely restored in the postmenopausal years.

This is the period during which the amount of gray matter in a woman's brain recovers.

In isolation this part of the story is not only true (cognitive test scores do recover after dipping in the perimenopausal years), it is also reassuring.

Even so, for the complete picture of how your neurological well-being is affected as you transition through menopause we need to also take into account the additional changes your brain may experience, as indicated by the remaining 6 (color-coded) curves in that tell-tale image.

And is there ever a tale to be told here...

This is where my job as a translator of inscrutable scientific papers begins to pay off!

Allow me to briefly summarize for you the hidden biology of the middle-aged female brain so that you can see where you really stand when your body begins to switch from its estrogen-dominant to its estrogen-depleted mode...

Note: The explanations in the seven colored sections below match up with the corresponding seven colored curves in the graphic from the Nature paper.

Here is what it all means:
Your brain loses power. Normally your brain accepts blood sugar and converts it to energy. Estrogen boosts the conversion process. But with estrogen shut off at menopause glucose metabolism in the brain drops by as much as 30 percent and never recovers - sometimes leading to disastrous consequences...
Your brain cannibalizes itself. Now starved of energy and in desperate need of a new source of fuel to power itself your brain begins to feed on its own white matter (the fatty material which protects your neural circuitry). This energy-compensation process causes parts of your brain to begin to shrink...
Your brain unplugs itself. In parallel with the loss of white matter (brain wiring) goes brain connectivity (as revealed by the fractional anisotropy measurement). Less connectivity means fewer pathways for signal conduction and more brain fog. Worse yet, your brain becomes increasingly fragile to destabilizing events...
Your brain engages in cover-up. Energized by the sacrifice of fatty white matter, your brain compensates for the loss of connectivity by growing/strengthening its neural (gray matter) linkages. The improved cognitive performance suggests good brain health but masks the ever-weakening neurological scaffolding...
Your brain begins to asphyxiate. More oxygen is needed to burn fat than to burn glucose. To meet the biochemical demands of its growing white matter metabolism your brain sprouts additional blood vessels to allow for more oxygen-carrying blood to be pulled from your body...
Your brain heats up. Metabolizing the fatty part of your brain for fuel causes its energy signature to soar (burning fat produces way more energy-providing ATP molecules than does burning glucose). But what happens when your brain begins to exhaust its supply of white matter and the energy spigot goes away?
Your brain begins to rust. Biological rust in the brain takes the form of slowly-accumulating noxious protein fragments called amyloid-beta. Around 1 in 4 men and women carry ApoE4, a gene which appears to predispose us to this "neurological rusting". And in women plummeting estrogen seems to get the process started...

Clearly a LOT is going on in a woman's brain at this time of her life!

Even so, the sketch I have provided you comes nowhere close to conveying all the changes which take place when a woman's estrogen (and progesterone) production begins to shut down.

To characterize the outcome of this potentially tumultuous period of your life as "not so bad", based on the apparent medium-term effect of it on your brain, is to gloss over some stark realities you might later discover was a mistake to have dismissed so quickly.

woman experiencing hot flash
The bodily discomforts do a fantastic job of distracting you from the much more worrisome changes going on deep inside your brain. [Image: 123rf.com]
Yet probably not 1 in 1000 women will ever become so aware of the vulnerability to which their brain is exposed during the menopausal transition that they would be inspired to take any measure of action ahead of time to protect their brain.

Instead, most women will become preoccupied with the well-known physical and mental discomforts of menopause...

The hot flashes.

The night sweats.

The insomnia, mood swings, forgetfulness, and overwhelming feelings of fatigue which drive exasperated women to forums and their physician's office in search of answers and relief.

And yet it may never occur to them that at the very same time they feel as though they might be losing their mind, the physical changes taking place inside them might be predisposing them for that very thing to happen in years to come.
 
Consider These "Unfair" Statistics Which Apply To You, By Virtue Of The Fact That You Are Saddled With, As Dr. Lisa Mosconi Calls It, A Double X (Chromosome) Brain
 
    lifetime risk of dementia
    The estimated lifetime risk of developing severe cognitive impairment in women is roughly twice that of men. [Image: alz.org]
  • FEMALE NEUROLOGICAL PENALTY #1 - By 45 years of age you will have acquired a roughly 1 in 5 chance of eventually succumbing to severe cognitive decline (twice the risk seen in men) [Ref. AAR-2020].
  • FEMALE NEUROLOGICAL PENALTY #2 - If you develop severe cognitive impairment the cost to your family of providing care is expected to be substantially greater than if you were a man because women tend to suffer for longer with the condition (Medicaid pays out 70 percent more for female care [Ref. ALZ-2021]).
  • FEMALE NEUROLOGICAL PENALTY #3 - If you carry the relatively common ApoE4 gene, then compared to a man, as you age you will likely develop worse memory performance, experience more rapid brain shrinkage (white matter and neuronal cell death), and exhibit more pronounced biomarkers of severe cognitive decline [Ref. Hara-2018].

    In fact, according to one of the foremost authorities on female brain penalties, "a woman with a single copy of the APOE4 gene is at greater risk of developing Alzheimer's disease than a man with two copies of the gene." [Ref. JFN-2017]
  • FEMALE NEUROLOGICAL PENALTY #4 - You are about 3 times more likely than a man to develop MS, an often devastating neurological condition which degrades the neural wiring in your brain, spine, and optic nerves [Refs. Ahlgren-2011, Wallin-2012].
  • FEMALE NEUROLOGICAL PENALTY #5 - You are about twice as likely as a man to develop a noncancerous meningioma (brain tumor) sometime in your life [Ref. Christensen-2003]. Despite being non-malignant these tumors can still cause terrible suffering and even death.
  • FEMALE NEUROLOGICAL PENALTY #6 - You are about 4 times as likely as a man to develop osteoporosis (a condition wherein extreme thinning may cause bones to grow so feeble they are able to spontaneously collapse) [Ref. NOF]. Unfortunately weak bones in postmenopausal women are known to be associated with more rapid cognitive decline [Ref. Brownbill-2004].
  • FEMALE NEUROLOGICAL PENALTY #7 - Throughout your entire life the odds of you suffering a major depressive episode will continue to be 50 to 100 percent more likely than if you were a man [Refs. Hara-2018, Kessler-1993].
Yikes. When it comes to your neurological health, once you reach your forties it's no fun to be a woman looking ahead in life, is it?

Not to mention the hard-scrabble existence that menopause itself can foist upon you during this time. I am not going to bother spelling out all the miseries associated with this chapter of your life because, well, if you are already living them then you know full well what that's all about!

Instead, what I want to tell you about is the stuff you have yet to take into account because nobody has pulled you aside to explain it. Either because they don't understand it, or because they also have yet to be taken aside...

If you look back at that list above you will see I have described all these shortcomings of being a woman as penalties. Because that is the way you should think of them.

And now I want to tell you about one of the most potent contributing factors to this lop-sided lottery of gender-specific brain dysfunction. It is one that reminds me of a popular game enjoyed by children and adults alike.

But trust me, there is nothing fun about how this game plays out...
 
What You Need To Know About Neuro-Destructive Jenga, The Menopause-Induced "Brain Game" No Woman Would Ever Willingly Choose To Play!
 
We actually touched on this extraordinary transformation of the female brain already.

It is bound up in that innocuous-looking light grey dot which appears in our list of explanations about the worrisome changes which get started in your brain during the years of the menopausal transition.

woman and jenga stack
Menopause has a kind of built-in Jenga penalty that acts on the brain. [Image: Yellow Octopus]
The defining characteristic of this most pernicious of the seven brain destabilizing processes is cannibalism.

In fact there are two main processes which compete with each other during this period.

The second mechanism (highlighted by the dark grey dot in that same worrisome list) is a positive one.

It involves a slow strengthening of the neural connections in your brain over time.

You will remember that this discovery, which has been touted as compensation for the first process which literally eats away at the white matter of your brain, caused one excited journalist to declare that perhaps things are "not so bad" when it comes to way the female brain evolves under menopause.

But the act of endlessly chipping away at any structure eventually has consequences, even if you continue to reinforce the parts that remain.

You can see how this works in the game of Jenga which involves players taking turns at removing wooden blocks from a pre-built tower.

The goal is to remove your block strategically so that structural integrity is maintained and the pile of blocks does not come tumbling down.

In the energy-starved menopausal brain an analogous process takes place as the fatty myelin coating on neural connective tissue is removed and used for fuel.

Remove too much and the entire neural network may collapse. Fail to reinforce the remaining parts of the network with stronger neural connections and the same thing may happen anyway.

And all the while this is happening, before the end of this macabre "game of neural deconstruction" draws close and the structure begins to show signs of instability, a woman is likely to remain quite unaware of what is happening to her.

Reader, you may remain blissfully unaware of what is happening to you!
 
As Parts Of Your Brain Shrink In Volume And Becomes Ever More Fragile, The Odd Behaviors You Do Notice You Might Chalk Up To The Effects Of Old Age Or Too Much Stress.
 
A woman may scratch her head, but nonetheless she will dismiss those instances where she found herself struggling to recall the names of people and objects with which she was once highly familiar.

She will completely overlook missed appointments, deliveries that failed to show up, and the reason she planted calibracoa and not petunias three months earlier.

And those misplaced car keys which finally turned up the refrigerator...

Surely someone was having fun with her!

Strange that these things keep happening. But still, easy to dismiss.

Until the day a destabilizing incident causes some part of the fragile architecture to collapse.

This could be due to a stroke, inflammation (possibly autoimmune in nature), a urinary tract or other infection, a fall, a prolonged misunderstanding about how much of a specific medication to take which leads to poisoning...

In fact, the ways in which a non-trivial change could be triggered in the delicate biochemistry of the brain are countless.

woman experiencing delirium
When delirium presents itself it is often overlooked or erroneously diagnosed as dementia which it is not (but may precede).
And then within a matter of weeks or days, sometimes just hours, the dwindling infrastructure is accelerated through a tipping point and what seemed to be a normally-functioning brain loses its ability to properly make sense of the world around it.

The diagnosis following such events sounds harmless at first because we usually associate it with passing illness and fever.

"Delirium," the doctor tells one of your family members as they shine a light into your eyes.

But sometimes that delirium is a sign of something much more sinister, and lasting.

In 2010 a study of postoperative delirium in elderly patients found that those who were already diagnosed with some form of cognitive impairment were more than twice as likely as those with "normal" cognition to be institutionalized in the months following a case of post-operative delirium [Ref. Joost-2010].

In fact, it is easy to think of two reasons why the risk that a woman might lose her mind when her weakened neural architecture is subjected to a neurological shock must be even higher than what turned up in the researchers' data.

The first reason is because delirium has been found to go unrecognized by nursing staff in as many as 7 out of every 10 patients with delirium with whom the staff interact [Ref. Inouye-2001].

The second reason is that "normal" cognition must also include unrecognized cases of cognitive impairment not tallied in the risk assessment for institutionalization (women are particularly good at learning to hide their disabilities from family members).

fallen elderly woman
Take care. Even something as simple as a fractured wrist could lead to an abrupt, debilitating, and sometimes permanent change to your brain chemistry...
Here is why this matters.

Every year close to 900,000 women in the United States fall and fracture their hip, ankle, wrist or other bones [Ref. Kim-2011]. A similar number of women in their sixties or older likely get back up and congratulate themselves on NOT having broken anything.

Yet, regardless of whether it happens as the result of delirium in the days following a surgery, or the medical attention received for a sprained wrist or scrapped knees, a certain number of these women suddenly discover they have no recollection of the faintly-familiar strangers who are now referring to them as "Mom".

Familial relationships can be dissolved in what seems like the blink of an eye - though in reality this is the end result of a slow dismantling of the neural wiring that defines our relationship to the world.

When a faltering brain is pushed beyond its tipping point even our own children can become strangers to us!

Fortunately, though it happens all too often, suddenly losing your grip on reality is perhaps the worst and least likely outcome.

seated woman
You never want to get to the point where the way you feel about yourself begins to mirror a sparse and muted abstract watercolor!
Most women just fail to counter the withering effect going on in their head and steadily lose their energy and drive.

This is a consequence of the myriad menopause-induced changes to the metabolism, architecture, and connectivity of their brains outlined earlier.

Not every woman is affected this way. Indeed, about 1 in 5 women scarcely even notice they are going through menopause. They wonder what all the fuss is about.

But for many other women the situation is quite different.

They lose their capacity for creative and self expression. They lose their sense of joy, pride, worth and purpose.

Even their desire for sex may go as their hormone-driven urges wind down and the opportunities for romance seem less and less worth the bother.

In short, they lose the plot of their lives as their cognitive capacity, social and romantic dexterity, and degree of self-reliance deflates like a damaged balloon from which the air is slowly being let out.

If the possibility of living out the rest of your days as a watered down version of who you are now strikes you as marginally terrifying and not the least bit fair, well, you are probably right about that.

Because - with the possible exception of the page you are reading right now - you do not get a whole lot of warning about what you might be up against.
 
No One Tells You, Not Even Your Doctor, That The Biological Cost Of Being A Woman Will Be Deferred Until You Reach Your 40s - At Which Point A HUGE Bill May Come Due...
 
It is easy, when you are a woman, to take for granted the sexual power which enables you to bring forth entirely new human beings from your own body.

It is after all a superpower you were born with.

On the other hand, this superpower comes with a catch. And if your goal is to enjoy long-term, uninterrupted cognitive health, then this catch is not one you can afford to ignore.

You know, of course, that the ability to reproduce comes with an expiration date. This is menopause.

Much less well appreciated is that prior to this, during your fertile years, that ability to mother involves some insanely complex biology which your body is only able to sustain for 30 years or so by borrowing against its future.

mother and infant
The ability to bear children carries a hidden cost. It takes away from the long-term resilience of your neurological scaffolding and connectivity - unless you decide to take action to counter its effects.
That borrowing began the day you ovulated for the first time, at which point one could argue your brain stopped acting entirely of its own volition.

That's because from that point on it was periodically doused in messenger molecules from your ovaries which regulated your emotions and strongly influenced the way you viewed the world around you.

For most women those molecules, the hormones bubbling up from their loins, literally brainwash them to seek out a member of the opposite sex and utilize their womb for procreation.

Estrogen ensures your brain stays energized, wired, and focused on the objective.

Progesterone on the other hand sedates your brain and mercifully deflects from the physical discomforts associated with having to build and discard an entirely new potential biologically nursery every 30 days or so.

The result is that for years your body and brain ceaselessly maintain the machinery of incubation.

Then, if everything goes right, your body temporarily becomes an incubator. Then a supplier of food. Then back to maintaining the incubation machinery until the next cycle of reproduction...

To coordinate all of the hormone-driven processes required to see through a successful pregnancy a woman's brain has to be highly optimized for the reproductive decades of her life.

But that optimization comes at a cost (remember that catch I mentioned earlier?)

This is because the optimized responses of the female brain depend so critically on the presence of the hormones estrogen and progesterone.

And when these are taken away in the fifth decade of life the finely tuned machinery of a woman's brain begins to sputter. And for some women the machinery ultimately crashes completely.

The symptoms most commonly associated with menopause - the hot flashes, night sweats, mood swings from anxiety to depression and back again, the utter exhaustion - for most women these are the unrecognized signs of an energy-starved brain reconfiguring itself and causing turmoil as it tries to find a new equilibrium.

But from the point of view of human development there is no evolutionarily-honed final state of balance for the female brain.

For most of human history we simply never lived long enough for it to have evolved. The brain of a female human beyond the age of 50 years is very much an unfinished product.

It certainly has no warranty of any kind!

This is why the way your brain shapes up in the second half of your life is entirely up to you. Because in a very real sense Mother Nature has provided you with no plan for how to maintain it for the long-term...

And I think this means you need to come up with a plan of your own.

But that raises a couple of obvious questions, right?

Like, how would you go about that?

And what would a good plan look like once it was sketched out?

After having put a great deal of thought into what a good neuroprotection plan should entail, at a minimum, for a woman whose age is between about 40 to 60 years (the window during which the pursuit of such a plan is likely to reap the most reward) I was able to come up with a short-list of SIX requirements.

Would you like to know what I came up with?

These are the elements I think need to be taken into account when you formulate your own (female-specific) brain-protection plan:
The SIX Things I Think Every Good Women's Brain Health Plan Should Have
  • REQUIREMENT #1: A thorough understanding of the gender-based neurological penalties you will endure by virtue of having a female brain, the proper functioning of which is critically-sensitive to the varying amount of the hormones estrogen and progesterone coursing through you.
  • REQUIREMENT #2: Science-based strategies for addressing these hormone-induced penalties so that you can attempt to "level the playing field" by removing (during the most impactful period of your life) one of the major contributors to increased risk of non-negligible cognitive impairment in the years ahead [Ref. Brinton-2021].
  • REQUIREMENT #3: Science-based strategies for mitigating against invasive assaults on your brain. Commonly overlooked by those who obsess over Sudoku and other marginally useful "brain-boosting" techniques is a proper defensive strategy against the microbial world which can do a lot of neurological damage very quickly if given the chance.
  • REQUIREMENT #4: Science-based knowledge of foods conducive to lasting brain health. Research has shown that neuro-inflammation (which is exacerbated around menopause by the loss of estrogen [Ref. Villa-2016] and progesterone [Ref. Lei-2014]) is perhaps the main driver of both slow age-related cognitive decline and the accelerated kind due to disease. So you will need to devise for yourself an anti-inflammatory diet.
  • REQUIREMENT #5: A commitment to achieving excellent physical fitness. Low physical fitness, it turns out, promotes inflammation in the body - the kind that ratchets up your risk for brain dysfunction [Ref. Horder-2018]. You will need to convince yourself to put in the work, preferably with the least amount of physical effort so you stay motivated.
  • REQUIREMENT #6: Knowledge about what NOT to do to ruin your progress. We all make dumb mistakes. But you really should try to avoid making those which are entirely avoidable and involve obliterating the reduction in risk of cognitive impairment you have worked so hard to achieve elsewhere in your life.
If you keep these six principles in mind, as you go about formulating your plan for how to "keep the lights on", what you are likely to come up with is a solid approach to meeting all of the brain-health challenges I have brought to your attention today.

Alternatively, rather than try to figure out all of this on your own, you could have someone like me outline the basis for such a plan for you, which I have done. This is entirely based on the recommendations of those who have carried out the scientific studies which I will summarize for you.

If you have a few more minutes to spare I would like to tell you more about this...
 
Will You Allow Me To Show You How To Improve Your Odds Of Preserving The Full Cognitive Capacity Of Your Wondrously One-Of-A-Kind Brain Throughout Your 40s, 50s, 60s, AND THE DECADES BEYOND?
 
My educational program for lasting cognitive health was developed to cater to the specific biological needs and unique characteristics of a woman's brain - not a man's. That's why I have named it...
I know. A program designed by a man, but for the benefit of women only?

Why would I devote myself to filling in the blanks on a comprehensive educational program for cognitive health which categorically excludes my fellow men?

It's because when I looked closely at this topic it was the women who appeared to need the help most.

Not only that, but everything I have learned on the subject suggests you cannot address the issues of brain health maintenance without first adopting a gender-based approach to assembling the core material needed to create a worthwhile teaching and implementation framework.

The truth is that men also have their own needs when it comes to the maintenance of brain health. For example, they are far more prone to Parkinson's disease.

But women suffer in larger numbers from later-in-life brain dysfunction and disease. Plus the deck is stacked against them in another important way...

History suggests that from a medical point of view women's brains have just not been deemed all that interesting. Or at least not different enough from a man's brain to warrant any special consideration not taken into account by smaller size alone.

These factors by themselves might have been enough to persuade me to go all in on the study of women's brain health. But they were not the only ones which factored into my decision.

In my opinion the biology of the female brain is fascinating, not too well understood (especially by those who need to understand it), and its study is very much still in its infancy.

This subject is also somewhat impenetrable to the layman (or should I say laywoman) because the story of women's brain health, and the much-needed strategies to maintain it, are wrapped in the language of science.

That means one way to get a feel for what is going on is to be well-steeped in the art of both reading scientific journals and listening to the talks of the folks who write the papers discussed in those journals. Need I point out that this does not describe average woman!

Another way of getting to the root of a complex subject is to find someone able to do the legwork for you. Someone who can translate all the apparent gobbledygook into something meaningful and easy enough to understand.

You guessed it, I am that person - the former scientist turned translator of weird findings from the world of academia.

And Her Ageless Brain is the condensed laywoman-friendly summary of all the most important things I have learned about how to keep a woman's brain healthy and high-functioning for the longest possible time.

I like to joke that if I was writer for television shows I might have named my program The Hitchhiker's Guide To the Female Brain - And How To Avoid Accidentally Destroying It.

On the other hand, this alternative title is much less of a joke than it is an accurate description of my intent and what you can expect when you go through the program.

So if I have already managed to convince you of the worth of this goal of mine go ahead now and click on the button below so we can get started...
But if you do need more information about what we will be covering in the program you will find that detailed in the sections below.
 
Before We Jump Into The Details Of What You Will Discover Inside Her Ageless Brain, Let Me First Describe In Broad Strokes What You Can Expect From This Program...
 
I have designed Her Ageless Brain to be an educational and actionable course metered out over a six-month period.

However, you will be free to consume all of the material at whatever speed you feel is most comfortable. Entirely up to you.

Once you are a member I will send you weekly reminders via email of content awaiting you in the program. The course consists of SIX modules and the aim is to have you consume one module every month (but again, you can go at whatever speed you prefer).

As you will quickly discover, there is a lot of material in this program. This is partly why I recommend the six-month approach.

But in addition to this, the goal of the program is to entirely reframe your thinking on the subject of brain health.

The objective is to get you to recognize the importance of fully-functioning "grey matter" in your life. That and the need to make certain lifestyle changes LONG BEFORE you ever experience any of the worrisome symptoms of a brain neglected far too long.

When I tell you that you need to begin making these lifestyle changes early on I mean up to 20 years before the signs of neglect begin to show in your sixties and beyond.

This might surprise you.

Because what it means is that if you have not yet begun to implement a sufficient program of self-care by the time you are 50 years of age then you are already 5-10 years late in your efforts.

Better late than never, they say.

Yes, but if you are reading this page and you are in your sixties, or older, and you have yet to give your cognitive health the same consideration you might already have done for your cardiovascular, metabolic, respiratory, or immune system heath, then frankly...

This program might not be for you!

That's because I have assumed the age of the woman I can help the most is someone still in her perimenopausal or early postmenopausal years.

In other words, I anticipate that you are between the ages of about 40 and 60 years. But the younger the better, because then you will have more time to practice your cognitive health rescue plan and stave off the damages that might otherwise accrue over the years.

This is one of the reasons why I spend a good deal of effort outlining in the program what takes place in your brain throughout the years during which you spend in the menopausal transition window (from the ages of roughly 40 to 60 years).

This is a biologically critical period for every woman.

The consequence of being ignorant of its effect on the brain is part of the reason that at any given time in the United States you can find approximately 4 million severely cognitively incapacitated women who have paid the ultimate price for having been neglectful of what was happening to them.

Here's the good news.

If you meet the selection criteria I have spelled out, and you are in relatively good health now, then that sorry fate need not be your fate.

Even if your goal is to only slow down the march of cognitive decline, and not attempt to impede it entirely, you are well-positioned to do that still.

If you decide to act, there is still time to do so.

Let's take a closer look now at what I have included in your Her Ageless Brain membership which was created in accordance with the SIX requirements, or principles, outlined earlier for any good women's brain health program.

The program contains six modules, each of which addresses one of the six principles.

Here is the first of them...
 
Are You Ready To Take An Eye-Opening Dive Into The Science Of How Your Not-Really-A-Man's Brain Actually Works?
 
Linus Pauling, the Nobel Prize-winning chemist, in his book How To Live Longer And Feel Better said about the brain that "Of all the organs in the human body, the brain is the most sensitive to its molecular composition."

But in spite of the litany of neuro-sensitive chemicals he trotted out in his chapter on the brain - the drugs, vitamins, minerals, amino acids, and other nutrients which positively influence the brain or hasten its dysfunction - he never once mentioned the contributing effects of a hormone imbalance.

Pauling was far from alone in his limited thinking on "brain chemistry".

Back then, just a few short decades ago, no one seriously considered the long-term effects of an estrogen or a progesterone deficit on the functioning of the human brain.

It was as if, when it came to research associated with the female brain, the medical profession blinded itself to the decades surrounding menopause.

Today we know this was a HUGE oversight.

One consequence of this is that for more than a generation women have been fed an entirely erroneous dialog about the nature and operation of their brain.

Another follow-on from this oversight is that assisted living and memory care facilities today are overflowing with female patients who were never made aware of the sometimes harrowing challenges female brains will face around midlife which male brains will not.

Those women never learned that these challenges involve physical changes to the architecture, metabolism, and connectivity of the female brain - changes which may predispose that brain to severe cognitive dysfunction in the years to come.

In The Estrogenic Brain you will be introduced to recent discoveries in the science of women's brain health.

This is the critical first step to figuring out how to reduce your potential for slow (and sometimes sudden) loss of the neural circuitry that spells out everything about how you perceive and respond to the world around you.

Keeping a lid on what makes you the one-of-a-kind person you are today requires a basic understanding of the science outlined in this chapter.
module one: the estrogenic brain
CLICK FOR SOME OF THE HIGHLIGHTS YOU'LL FIND IN:
THE ESTROGENIC BRAIN
WHICH MAKES UP MODULE ONE OF HER AGELESS BRAIN
 
Do This When You're Faced With An Assortment Of Wildly Mis-Behaving, Lady-Brain-Enslaving Hormones...
 
Fifty-one years. That's the average age at which a woman in the United States hits menopause, the point after which she no longer menstruates and thus can no longer conceive.

But for a period of time leading up to this point, perhaps for 5-10 years, the effect of approaching menopause on the bodies of 4 out of every 5 women is like an unwelcome storm tide being pushed relentlessly in their direction.

The emotional waves and troughs caused by the advancing hormonal chaos of perimenopause leave some of these women feeling as though they are about to drown.

If you have been through this, or you are going through it now, you do not need me to spell out the nature of all the miserable symptoms you may experience as your reproductive powers gradually flicker out.

You are quite aware of the punishing effects of menopause on your body...

What you might not have tumbled to yet is your susceptibility to an additional neurological adversity which is tied to one of at least 24 different hormonal profiles which can describe the menopausal woman (use the information in this module to learn which one applies to you).

You might also be surprised to learn that the potentially debilitating effect of those sloshing, ultimately disappearing hormones on the long-term viability of your brain is now largely settled science.

In 2021 the results of a telling large-scale observational women's health study were published. The study, which involved 380,000 women aged 45 years or older, looked at the effect of hormone therapy on long-term cognitive health [Ref. Brinton-2021].

Researchers from the University of Arizona were able to confirm the long-suspected notion that loss of a woman's estrogen and progesterone at menopause is responsible for a significant fraction of all female cognitive impairment, whether short-term or long-term.

The study showed that putting the missing hormones back into a woman's body using hormone therapy dramatically altered the likely long-term outcome for a woman's cognitive health.

The authors of the paper claimed that for their female study group up to 58 percent of all cases of severe cognitive impairment appeared to be preventable.

For some specific hormone formulations, the calculated case reduction rate in the treated women exceeded 80 percent.

The only problem?

Most women cannot tolerate hormone therapies, which often worsen the effects of menopause.

So what is a woman to do?

How does she take advantage of her knowledge of the strong influence of hormones on her health, and the way she feels, to not only improve her odds of reducing the classic symptoms of menopause, but to also significantly reduce the lesser-appreciated risk of adverse long-term effects on her brain?

Well, one thing she can do is to attempt to balance her hormones.

The purpose of this module, as reflected in its title, is to show you some ways you might go about this - including handy techniques for monitoring your progress.
module two: balance your hormones
CLICK FOR SOME OF THE HIGHLIGHTS YOU'LL FIND IN:
BALANCE YOUR HORMONES
WHICH MAKES UP MODULE TWO OF HER AGELESS BRAIN
 
A Strategy To Reduce The Likelihood Of Your Brain (And Body) Falling Prey To Malicious Microbes And Cellular Sabotages...
 
Your body and your brain are constantly in the line of fire. The threat of a hostile microbial attack upon them is never so distant that we can afford to let our guard down.

We were reminded of this unfortunate and ever-present reality by the worldwide pandemic of 2020.

Millions dead and many times this number chronically incapacitated [Ref. Raveendran-2021].

And all of it due to the novel behavior of a virus which causes bodily injury that can extend far beyond the immediate battleground of the respiratory system.

If a coronavirus infection taught us anything it is that what starts in the lungs does not necessarily stay in the lungs...

Because of this your brain is vulnerable to the SARS-CoV-2 virus and other viruses like it.

Based on the results of post-mortem studies, research into the virus's ability to penetrate the human central nervous system shows that it can invade "the brain micro-vasculature, cerebrospinal fluid (CSF), as well as the neurons" [Ref. Whitmore-2021].

Another study carried out in Korea during the early months of the pandemic revealed that the risk of severe cognitive impairment increased by 40 percent in survivors of a coronavirus infection [Ref. Park-2021].

And according to an article published in National Geographic in 2021, "Researchers find that people who only suffered mild [coronavirus] infections can be plagued with life-altering and sometimes debilitating cognitive deficits" [Ref. Mullin-2021].

Of those who endured more serious disease and were hospitalized, the measured reduction in their reasoning, problem solving, and spatial planning abilities was similar to the average cognitive decline seen in an equivalent (non-infected) demographic at the end of 10 years of aging.

"I've never experienced anything like this in my life," said one woman quoted in the article.

She was just 32 years of age when severe brain fog and reading comprehension issues set in after infection.

"Your body just feels like it's breaking down. You lose your sense of self."

The implication?

That the days are over when you worried only about the toll an influenza infection might take on your lungs in the winter season.

Should you prove unable to fight off an infection of this new class of viruses in the future, your brain - indeed all your internal organs - could be at risk of serious damage.

Of course, we can often depend on vaccines and anti-viral medications for protection. Both are valuable weapons in the war against microbial disease. But they do have their limitations...

They both take time to develop, and they are very much targeted to a specific viral threat.

One out of the dozens, possibly hundreds of brewing threats monitored around the world by epidemiologists [Ref. May-2021][GRAY-2021].

Your immune system on the other hand was evolved to respond quickly to microscopic foreign invaders, and to respond to them regardless of whether or not they have been encountered in the past (this is something that vaccine-stimulated protection cannot do for you).

This fast and non-specific response of your immune system makes it the most potent form of natural defense available to you, to be immediately deployed against causes of infectious (and non-infectious) disease.

This means that, to cause you any harm, all current and future microbial threats to your central nervous system first have to get past your immune system.

This is why, as soon as I learned of the pandemic threat in 2020, I dropped everything I was doing and focused solely on putting together a comprehensive guide to enhancing the human immune system using strictly natural approaches backed by scientific testing.

Specifically, I decided to focus on the vitally important matter of how to fortify your respiratory immune system. That's because in the United States, even before the pandemic struck, a whopping 78 percent of deaths due to infectious disease were the result of a respiratory infection [Ref. Bcheraoui-2018].

The result of this intense research into how to maximize the protective capabilities of your immune system was Immune System Reboot which makes up the third module in the Her Ageless Brain program.

It will provide you with a summary of the known science for factors which have been demonstrated to help recruit your natural immune defenses so as to help protect your brain (and other internal organs) against the invisible microbial threats known to exist in the world today, as well as those we can expect to encounter in the near future.

This is an invaluable training.

It may be the most valuable health resource I have ever created.
module three: immune system reboot
CLICK FOR SOME OF THE HIGHLIGHTS YOU'LL FIND IN:
IMMUNE SYSTEM REBOOT
WHICH MAKES UP MODULE THREE OF HER AGELESS BRAIN
 
To Discover The Best Foods For Your Brain You'll Need To Master This Neuronal Equivalent Of "You Are What You Eat"
 
Imagine that you want to put yourself on a diet.

Your goal is to reduce the amount of excess fat in your body. But all you can get your hands on for guidance about the best way to go about it is a "woman's reducing manual" from the 1960s, a time when soda pop was advertised as wholesome and unreservedly approved by the medical profession of the day.

Don't you think you would drop that manual in the nearest trash can and look for something a lot more current and backed by the latest in nutritional science?

Of course you would. And I created the Brain Foods module for much the same reason.

It is the literal equivalent of a dieting manual, but one designed to rid you not of excess fat but of the excess risk of cognitive impairment brought on by consuming the wrong foods.

This compendium of edible risk abatement strategies contains all the as-yet-to-be-popularized information you need to know today in order to be able to reap the neuro-cognitive benefits it is designed (by scientists, and not by me) to provide 20 or more years from now...

I am going to introduce you to the female scientist (somehow women always seem to be the ones inside those white brain science lab coats) who asked a simple question and then answered it for herself.

Actually it was two questions she asked:

"Are there any popular diets which can be proven to be neuro-protective?

"And if there are such diets, what are the foods found in them that are providing the protection?"

It turns out that there are several popular diets which fit the bill.

From these an array of food types has been identified which are able to defuse the simmering neuroinflammation which typically accompanies the slow but hidden deconstructing of a formerly healthy brain.

You will learn about a brain health-optimized and clinically-tested diet based on these foods which has been shown to be able to reduce your future "brain age" by 7.5 years and cut your risk of brain shrinkage by more than half.

I am also going to show you how to find complete meal plans so as to remove any confusion about what anti-inflammatory, neuroprotective meals actually look like.

But it is even better than that.

Because when I looked into the nature of these remarkable foods I noticed something interesting. Most of them share two more characteristics that make them:
  • Perfect for helping you maintain a trim physique. This is because they represent nutrient-dense food types low on carbohydrates but rich in protein and fats.
  • Ideal for helping to curb the growth of microscopic tumors in your body. Inside this module you will learn how, through established science, exactly these foods are able to pull off this remarkable feat.

    INTERESTING FACT: Post-mortems carried out on accident victims show that 40 percent of healthy women between 40 and 50 years of age already have in their breasts these undetectable one-day-potentially-deadly microscopic growths [Ref. Li-2010].
Once you understand the "how and why" of the science behind this brain-friendly dieting protocol revealed in Her Ageless Brain you will be able to (if you wish) adjust your diet to include additional foods uncovered by your own research that also satisfy the protocol.

This means you will be in complete control of your diet.

You will gain all the brain benefits afforded by neuroprotective foods WITHOUT having to sacrifice your ability to decide which foods work best for you, based on taste, established eating habits, and budget. Whether you enjoy eating meat, or you prefer vegan dishes, the brain-healthy diet outlined in Her Ageless Brain will accommodate you.
module four: brain foods
CLICK FOR SOME OF THE HIGHLIGHTS YOU'LL FIND IN:
BRAIN FOODS
WHICH MAKES UP MODULE FOUR OF HER AGELESS BRAIN
 
The Key To The Mind-Body Connection Which Promotes Longer-Lasting Memory, Better Mood, And More Efficient Learning? It's Exercise.
 
In this fifth installment of the program we move on to the benefits of physical activity.

If you are not already exercising for your general health I am going to teach you why it is so critically important that you begin doing it for the health of your brain.

There is no drug on Earth that can stimulate in the human body the level of brain-boosting hormones and growth factors which are set free by vigorous exercise.

Not even the most neuroprotective food can do it - which is to say:

You cannot eat this additional layer of protection for your brain.

You literally have to manufacture it directly using willpower and the motivation I will provide.

But I am not going to lie to you.

You might never fall in love with the idea of working out as a proven approach to enhancing your odds of maintaining a steel-trap memory as you age, and as a means to minimizing your risk of ever being diagnosed with cognitive impairment or full-blown brain shrinkage.

But to help motivate you towards more physical activity, you ARE going to be shown the evidence for this approach to enhanced brain strengthening and resilience.

An example of this was the substantial 88 percent reduction in risk of severe cognitive impairment seen in the physically fittest of a group of 191 Swedish women aged between 38 and 60 years.

The study of the neuroprotective effect of cardiovascular fitness was carried out at the University of Gothenburg, and published in the journal Neurology in 2018 [Ref. Horder-2018].

Additionally, the researchers concluded the age at which dementia set in for women with high fitness was delayed by 9.5 years compared to women who demonstrated only medium fitness.

Hopefully this kind of population-study evidence will inspire you to try for a similar brain shrinkage-free result in your own life!

I will also point you towards the most efficient approaches to working out so that you can put in the MINIMUM amount of time and effort to stimulate the growth factors critical to your continued brain development.

As you'll see, and as Dr. Daniel Amen, the pre-eminent brain researcher, is fond of saying: "You are NOT stuck with the brain you have. You can change it, and make it better."

Vigorous, well-chosen exercise is, in my opinion, the most reliable and most powerful way to do this, and in this part of Her Ageless Brain you will discover how to go about it.
module five: brain workouts
CLICK FOR SOME OF THE HIGHLIGHTS YOU'LL FIND IN:
BRAIN WORKOUTS
WHICH MAKES UP MODULE FIVE OF HER AGELESS BRAIN
 
What Not To Do To Avoid Accidentally Destroying Your Brain Before You Are Done Using It
 
In this last educational portion of the Her Ageless Brain series we'll concentrate on clearing away any remaining (sometimes severe) obstacles to the lasting health of your brain.

It is no exaggeration to say that if you choose to ignore everything else I teach in this program and just concentrate on eliminating from your life the cognitive risk factors explored in this section your brain will likely benefit significantly.

We are going to take a close look at habits you may have picked up over the course of a lifetime. Habits which can:
  • Prematurely age your brain by as much as 16 years
  • As much as TRIPLE your risk of cognitive impairment (you're likely engaging in one such habit now)
  • Predispose you to life-threatening diseases like lung, liver, colon, cervix and pancreatic cancer
But that's just the tip of the iceberg.

Because every threat of chronic disease that might affect the other organs of your body is also a threat to the health of your brain.

As we'll see, every part of your body is connected to every other part through the 60,000 miles of veins, arteries, and capillaries which supply your brain with every molecule of fuel and oxygen and other essential factors needed to sustain it.

So, if you want to remain clear-headed as you age, keeping your "pipes" whistle-clean is likely to help with that. Blood will need to flow freely to and from your brain. And your metabolism will need to function optimally so as to produce all the energy required for peak mental capacity no matter what your age.

The solution to these problems which directly affect the performance of your brain involves simple awareness.

When you know what may be causing your brain grievous harm you can take corrective action. I will show you which habits carry the greatest risk to the long-term health of your brain and what you can do to curb them.

Here's how we will do it:
module six: risk factors
CLICK FOR SOME OF THE HIGHLIGHTS YOU'LL FIND IN:
RISK FACTORS
WHICH MAKES UP MODULE SIX OF HER AGELESS BRAIN
 
MY UNCONDITIONAL WEAK-STUFF GUARANTEE - EITHER YOU BEGIN TO SEE THE VALUE IN 60 DAYS OR YOUR MONEY BACK
 
When you elect to take this six-month (24-week) women's brain health reframing journey with me I expect you to be astonished by what you learn in the first 60 days. I expect you to see the value in adopting a cognitive health rescue plan which focuses specifically on the needs of the female brain.

This process, of transforming the way you think about the needs of your brain and how to stay motivated to protect it from this point on, is going to take time. In my opinion, at least six months of application is required to put the program's brain protection protocols fully into effect.

But if you don't literally FEEL you are beginning to experience some of the benefits of the training within the first 60 days (time enough for you to advance through the first two modules), you are welcome to take advantage of my failsafe "weak stuff" money-back guarantee:
STEPHEN'S WEAK-STUFF GUARANTEE
If you are not 100% satisfied you are receiving amazing value - if instead you're absolutely convinced that the content found in Her Ageless Brain is weak stuff and that you will never benefit from the training and actionable protocols which are presented and deemed credible in this program - you can request a full refund, no questions asked!
Why can I offer this level of guaranteed satisfaction or your money back?

Because the content which makes up the Her Ageless Brain program is comprehensive, well thought out, and is entirely based on scientific inquiry and tested clinical protocols.

Once you begin to gain familiarity with its teachings, and directly implement and experience the suggested practices, I am confident you will recognize the quality and worth of the information you are receiving as you make your way through the program from the introductory session on day one until the final wrap up session six months later.

I know that when you begin consuming the material in Her Ageless Brain, and implement its practices, you won't just feel you have made a wise initial investment. You will quickly discover that you want to complete the full six month journey as I continue to help you gain a new appreciation and understanding of your (uniquely female) brain, and how best to take care of it.

Here are 4 reasons why I am fully confident that after carefully inspecting the material contained in Her Ageless Brain you will agree that it presents exactly the kind of information needed to help you achieve the lasting cognitive health you deserve.

I think you will agree with me on this point because:
  • You'll see evidence that I have spent long months carefully researching the scientific studies that underlie the brain protocols found in the program, ensuring that these are not only widely accepted by brain science authorities, but also that, where possible, they have the widest applicability (so that the men in your life can also benefit from them).
  • You'll come to appreciate that I have been unafraid when telling the story of your uniquely female brain, to pull out for the wide angle view, or zoom in for the close up when I felt it necessary to help you get the appropriate and most illuminating perspective.
  • You'll recognize that I have thought hard about how to provide you with the LEAST amount of actionable advice that nonetheless is likely to provide a significant improvement to the current and future health of your brain.
  • And you'll understand from day one that I am invested in seeing you achieve the kind of high-performing mental performance and long-lasting brain health we each deserve. Otherwise I surely would not have gone to the trouble to create this massive library of researched material for you!
Remember, you are FULLY PROTECTED against making an uninformed decision when you sign up today to become the next Her Ageless Brain member.

Even if you only skimmed this page and did not take the time to read every little detail of my offer, you are protected against discovering later that you made an ill-informed decision about your purchase.

That's because you are covered by my "weak stuff" money-back guarantee.

You risk absolutely nothing when you sign up today and finally give the health of your brain the priority it deserves. You have my word that your future brain (six months from now) will regard your decision today to safeguard it against the threat of cognitive decline (or worse) as the wisest thing you ever did on its behalf.

And don't forget, you are not just investing in the health of your brain. I am also committed to helping you immunize the rest of your body to the ravages of age.

After all, what use is a healthy well-functioning brain if it is connected to a body that will not last?
 
For The Woman Who Is In Love With Her Mind Enough To Want To Continue Using It, And Who Is Determined Enough To Do What Is Needed To Help Prevent Her From Losing It
 
Still not sure you need to take action right this very minute to safeguard your cognitive health?

I'll be perfectly honest with you...

If you have yet to reach your 40s you may have as much as another decade to make the decision to get serious about the long-term health of your brain. It is always better to start early with a preventative protocol, but the real damage typically doesn't begin kicking in until your mid 40s.

After that, all bets are off and sticking your head in the sand is the surest way to one day find yourself facing a looming cognitive crisis - one you may be wholly unprepared to deal with.

Maybe this happens in your 60s, the most common age to begin experiencing worrisome changes in mental functioning. Perhaps your luck runs out before that. Either way, you can be sure what follows any crisis of this type will be highly unpleasant, downright scary, and possibly not only life-altering, but disastrously so.

Here's the good news.

Right now you get to CHOOSE the likely future you'll be forced to deal with.

One of them beckons with a sense of crystal clarity about what lies ahead. The other is murky and uninviting, and potentially harrowing.

In the murky world you might find yourself tasked with coming up with a new campaign for a client, something you have done successfully dozens of times before and on which your livelihood depends.

with cognitive impairment the challenging things can become impossible
Today you might thrive on being in control. But you'll need cognitive game to keep doing it! [Image: unsplash.com]
You have the brief before you. You know what is needed, and you know what you have got to work with.

But now your thoughts no longer shape up...

They wander in an aimless and unproductive way, then fizzle out before you can connect the dots.

Every time you remember agreeing to what now seems an impossible deadline you feel a surge of heat and anxiety, and for the life of you you cannot figure out why you have put yourself in this position.

Are you prepared to accept the kind of life in which you fail to finish the things you start because you can no longer focus on them sufficiently long?

Or would you prefer to remain in the crystal world where your mind continues to make those unexpected connections and you end up delighting the people on whom you depend to maintain your preferred way of life?

Remember, you get to choose.

In the murky world you may well be able to continue to enjoy cooking with your granddaughter, something the two of you have done for years. But more and more often you may also notice she has begun to surprise you with her requests.

One moment you will be happily scooping flour from a paper bag and the next minute she will say "Grandma, hand me the sifter," and you will have no idea what she is talking about.

grandmother and granddaughter cooking together
Having to choose between the way life should be and the way it MIGHT be if you elect to do nothing to protect your brain should not be difficult. The job of your brain is to protect you, so you need to do the same for it! [Image: 123rf.com]
"What's a sifter?" you will ask her.

But all you will get back is a blank look.

Can you live with the prospect of the sudden and possibly permanent disappearance from your memory of the once familiar?

Or would you prefer to stay tethered to the crystal world where you remember the names of the tools you have used a lifetime to carry out your favorite pastimes - so those precious interludes spent with family members are never interrupted by embarrassing and unexplainable failures of memory?

In the murky world taxes go unpaid because those once-figurable 1040s now seem like labyrinths of confusion and you push them aside until they slip your mind entirely.

In the murky world your friends inexplicably stop communicating with you, their faces replaced by strangers who seem to know you but you do not know them.

In the ever-changing reality that seems daily to be swallowing the world you once knew more and more you can no longer tell whether you are awake or you are still dreaming.

It is almost impossible to imagine the grief and the terror that advanced mental impairment forces on the lives of those it touches. When it happens, as the families of millions today can testify, you will be willing to pay any price to turn back the clock and reclaim your life.

But it should never have to come to that.

Especially not when you know ahead of time how to protect your brain with a protocol designed to help improve your current cognitive capabilities and lower your risk of neurodegenerative disease.

When you elect to become a member of Her Ageless Brain today you will be rejecting (and rightfully so) the dark and uninviting path forward which has become the default for so many women who were never shown an alternative.

If you would prefer to advance into the second half of your life with the confidence that comes from knowing you have done everything possible to forestall mental decline, and even to boost mental performance by adopting habits which encourage the continued growth and rewiring of brain cells no matter what your age, click on the button below to place your order and become the latest Her Ageless Brain practitioner.

ARE YOU READY TO BEGIN YOUR HER AGELESS BRAIN JOURNEY?

Before I leave you to decide about whether or not you would like to join my program today I have one last suggestion...

Take a moment to think about all the things in your life you have put off doing for another day. The stuff you have placed on your mental list of things to look forward to when you finally have the time for them.

Maybe it is as simple as time spent kicking back and enjoying the company of your grandchildren.

Maybe it is a long-planned-for trip to Europe during which you will finally get to experience firsthand the marvelous works of the Renaissance artists of the 15th and 16th centuries. Because secretly you have always wanted to stand beneath the painted ceiling of the Sistine Chapel, and also see with your own eyes the impossibly-beautiful marble sculptures which still adorn the cathedrals of Italy.

Or maybe you always imagined you would one day be able to write that novel which has been kicking around in your head, or begin a series of daring romantic episodes unencumbered by the overly-precautious nature of youth.

What would you say might be the sum total worth to you of all these future opportunities which you might still avail yourself of in the remaining decades of your life?

And which will require your full mental energy, focus, and cognitive wherewithal to make happen?

Try to put a dollar amount to it.

And if you don't think the investment of a Her Ageless Brain membership pales in comparison to the number you come up with then click away now and forget everything you have learned today about the value of your cognitive faculties and their enhanced vulnerability due to your possession of a pair of double-X chromosomes.

Otherwise... Consider clicking on the green button below to become a member of my Her Ageless Brain program and discover the story and the science behind the protocols shown to improve and help preserve the full cognitive spectrum of your uniquely female brain!

Yours for better cognitive health,

Stephen Carter, PhD.

Just $497

CLICK HERE TO SIGN UP FOR HER AGELESS BRAIN
IMPORTANT: This program is administered as a membership portal which you will receive access to using your member email address and a password issued immediately after payment.

 
Pssst! Would Your Own Doctor Wade Through This Much Scientific Research On Your Behalf?
 
Don't get me wrong...

If you wake up with an unexplained pain in your chest I would be the first person to recommend you seek immediate medical advice from your physician.

I would also encourage you to ask about preventative measures for high cholesterol, hardening of the arteries, high blood pressure... all the common afflictions we could both reasonably expect your doctor to know something about.

But when it comes to the ongoing health of your brain?

Strategies proven to help avert the kind of life-altering brain shrinkage which can begin as early as your forties and fester unrecognized for decades?

Highly risky is the way I would describe betting the future welfare of your mental health on your physician's ability to catch any problem early. Especially given the average general practitioner's knowledge about the workings of the human brain can probably be traced back to three cursory lectures attended during the first year of medical school.

Knowledge about the specific inner workings of a woman's brain? Forget about it.

Your doctor may be able to spot a tell-tale shadow on a brain scan and refer you to a specialist for more information about what it might mean. He may be able to agree with you that something is "off" with you.

But that's about it. When it comes to offering actionable steps on how to treat the common symptoms of age-related (not even hormone-related) cognitive decline, or worse, your doctor is likely to be of little use to you.

This is the reason I have relentlessly researched on your behalf the factors which influence age-related, hormone-related, and disease-related cognitive decline. It is so that you do not have to depend on the unlikely circumstance that anyone else in your life has done it and will fill you in on the necessary information as time goes by.

I have looked into the causes of fading memory, physical and social clumsiness, disorientation and erratic behavior, change of personality... plus all the other hallmarks of a brain showing the warning signs of serious mental deterioration.

I have had to repeatedly go back to original studies to figure out what the researchers were really looking for and whether they actually found evidence for it. And if they did find evidence for an effect that helps to prevent or forestall the miseries which accompany a life marred by a diseased, or shrinking, or otherwise impaired brain, then I asked:
  • How strong was that evidence?
  • Did the conclusion of the study warrant me advising others to consider adopting the lessons that came out it?
  • Was I prepared to tell others to follow for life one strategy or another based on those lessons?
  • Was I personally prepared to follow the same strategies in as much as they applied to me?
When you become a member of the Her Ageless Brain program you bypass all this knowledge filtering. You won't have to spend anywhere near the amount of time I did vetting scientific studies for solid, actionable, and worthwhile lifestyle habits that legitimately have the power to help to preserve for life most of the brain function you were born with.

That's because I have already done the hard work and I am happy to share it with you.

This means you literally get to spare yourself years of wasted time. Time you might have spent following dubious "brainpower boosting" practices. Or gulping down pills, powders, or potions weakly positioned as exotic brain-saving remedies you cannot afford not to take a chance on - even if it might cost you thousands of dollars each year to keep your dietary supplement subscriptions going.

And even if ONE of those subscriptions actually is providing some kind of benefit, the odds of the others doing so too? It's slim.

Why take that kind of bet on popularized but usually highly-speculative brain-saving schemes when the payoff is so hard to quantify?

Instead, use the results of the research outlined in Her Ageless Brain to make smart decisions about actions you can take today, based on proven science, to help protect the health of your brain.

I guarantee, you'll find it's one of the wisest decisions you could ever make about how to safeguard your most valuable asset.

References


  1. [Mosconi-2021] Menopause impacts human brain structure, connectivity, energy metabolism, and amyloid.beta deposition

  2. [WSJ-2021] The Surprising Good News on How Menopause Changes Your Brain

  3. [WAH-2021] Menopause and the brain: turns out it's not so bad

  4. [AAR-2020] 2020 Alzheimer's disease facts and figures (Alzheimer's Association Report)

  5. [ALZ-2021] 2021 Alzheimer's disease facts and figures

  6. [Hara-2018] How does alzheimer's affect women and men differently?

  7. [JFN-2017] The Judy Fund Newsletter, Fall 2017

  8. [Ahlgren-2011] High nationwide prevalence of multiple sclerosis in Sweden

  9. [Ref. Wallin-2012] The Gulf War era multiple sclerosis cohort: age and incidence rates by race, sex and service

  10. [Christensen-2003] Incidences of Gliomas and Meningiomas in Denmark, 1943 to 1997

  11. [NOF] What Women Need to Know

  12. [Brownbill-2004] Cognitive function in relation with bone mass and nutrition: cross-sectional association in postmenopausal women

  13. [Kessler-1993] Sex and depression in the National Comorbidity Survey I: Lifetime prevalence, chronicity and recurrence

  14. [Joost-2010] Delirium in Elderly Patients and the Risk of Postdischarge Mortality, Institutionalization, and Dementia

  15. [Inouye-2001] Nurses' Recognition of Delirium and Its Symptoms

  16. [Kim-2011] Hip fractures in the United States: 2008 nationwide emergency department sample

  17. [Brinton-2021] Association between menopausal hormone therapy and risk of neurodegenerative diseases: Implications for precision hormone therapy

  18. [Villa-2016] Estrogens, Neuroinflammation, and Neurodegeneration

  19. [Lei-2014] Anti-inflammatory effects of progesterone in lipopolysaccharide-stimulated BV-2 microglia.

  20. [Horder-2018] Midlife cardiovascular fitness and cognitive impairment: A 44-year longitudinal population study in women.

  21. [Raveendran-2021] Long COVID: An overview

  22. [Whitmore-2021] Understanding the Role of Blood Vessels in the Neurologic Manifestations of Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19)

  23. [Park-2021] Dementia Risk among Coronavirus Disease Survivors: A Nationwide Cohort Study in South Korea

  24. [Mullin-2021] How does COVID-19 affect the brain? A troubling picture emerges.

  25. [May-2021] Tomorrow's biggest microbial threats

  26. [GRAY-2021] Mitigating Future Respiratory Virus Pandemics: New Threats and Approaches to Consider

  27. [Bcheraoui-2018] Trends and Patterns of Differences in Infectious Disease Mortality Among US Counties, 1980-2014

  28. [Li-2010] Can we eat to starve cancer? - William Li (Youtube)


Disclaimer


This content is strictly the opinion of Dr. Stephen Carter (PHD) and is for informational and educational purposes only. It is not intended to provide medical advice or to take the place of medical advice or treatment from a personal physician. All readers/viewers of this content are advised to consult their doctors or qualified health professionals regarding specific health questions. Neither Dr. Carter nor the publisher of this content takes responsibility for possible health consequences of any person or persons reading or following the information in this educational content. All viewers of this content, especially those taking prescription or over-the-counter medications, should consult their physicians before beginning any nutrition, supplement, or lifestyle program.

PRODUCT WILL BE PURCHASED USING STRIPE, A SECURE ONLINE PAYMENT INTERFACE


 
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