Peter Attia on the connection between stress and insulin resistance

This clip is from “Ask Me Anything” (AMA) episode #17, originally released on November 9, 2020.

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Show Notes

Ways to reverse insulin resistance

Insulin resistance can be combated with all 5 tools in the toolkit: 

• 1) Pharmacologic agents 
• 2) stress/cortisol management 
• 3) sleep strategies  
• 4) exercise, and 
• 5) nutrition

Stress/cortisol management

• When you’re under stress (physiologic or psychological), you’re producing cortisol and that’s going to exacerbate insulin resistance
• Stress (i.e., hypercortisolemia) can be addressed pharmacologically and therapeutically (e.g., psychotherapy and/or meditation)

⇒ Patient example: 

• Peter had a patient who was dialed in on basically everything but metabolically he wasn’t responding
• This patient had never dealt with a very traumatic event in her life
• And it was only when attention was finally turned to really dealing with that with psychotherapy and the correct pharmacotherapy that all the other metabolic things got in place
• This patient was discussed in the episode of The Drive with Paul Conti

“There’s a clear mind/body connection that is not just some sort of touchy-feely nonsense. It’s completely and it can’t be discounted.”