Anna Howe 0:04

Welcome to Vitality by Design, the podcast where we explore what it really means to live longer and better.

Carey Howe 0:13

We're your hosts, Anna and Carrie, coming to you from Costa Rica, home to one of the world's blue zones, where longevity isn't a trend, it's a way of life.

Anna Howe 0:24

Each week we dive into the science, strategies, and mindset behind optimal health and intentional living. Blending modern longevity research with the rhythms, values, and wisdom of life well lived. Because longevity isn't just about adding years to your life, it's about adding life to your years. Let's dive in. Have you ever noticed that some people say they eat the same way they did in their 20s, but suddenly their bodies respond completely differently. Another thing I hear people say all the time is my metabolism is just slow. Usually they're talking about weight gain or feeling like they can't eat the way they used to.

Carey Howe 1:09

Correct. Metabolism tends to get blamed for a lot of things.

Anna Howe 1:14

But the more we've been studying longevity and metabolic health, the more it becomes clear that metabolism is actually much bigger than body weight.

Carey Howe 1:23

Exactly. Metabolism really determines how efficiently your body produces and uses energy.

Anna Howe 1:30

And the energy is what allows every system in the body to function. Your brain, your muscles, and your immune system.

Carey Howe 1:38

Which means metabolism is really at the center of health and aging.

Anna Howe 1:42

So today we thought it would be helpful to step back and break down metabolism in a way that actually makes sense.

Carey Howe 1:49

What is it? Why it matters for longevity, and some of the things people can do to support it.

Anna Howe 1:55

So let's talk about what metabolism actually is. Metabolism is one of those words people use all the time, but if you asked most people to define it, they'd probably struggle.

Carey Howe 2:08

Correct. I was one of those people. That's for sure. So at its most basic level, metabolism is the process by which your body converts food into usable energy.

Anna Howe 2:21

So essentially, how the body turns nutrients into fuel.

Carey Howe 2:26

Yes. Every single cell in your body needs energy to function.

Anna Howe 2:31

So your brain, your muscles, and your organs, everything.

Carey Howe 2:36

Right. And the body stores that usable energy in the form of something called ATP.

Anna Howe 2:42

Okay, let's pause there for a second because that's one of those terms that people hear all the time but may not it know what it is. So what exactly is ATP?

Carey Howe 2:53

ATP stands for adenosine triphosphate. It's a male yeah, it's a big word. It's a mole it's a molecule found in all living cells, and it's often called the body's energy currency of the cell because it sometimes stores and provides energy for many biological processes. The simple explanation is that ATP stores energy in its phosphate bonds. When a cell needs energy, ATP is broken down into ADP, adenosine diphosphate, and a phosphate group. This reaction releases energy that the cell can use. But for simple purposes, we're just going to call it the energy currency of your body.

Anna Howe 3:42

Okay. That sounds a little better, I think, easier to understand. So basically every process happening inside the body requires ATP.

Carey Howe 3:50

Exactly. Every time you move, digest some food, repair tissue, have a thought, or even breathe, your body is spending ATP.

Anna Howe 4:00

So that means our metabolism is really the system that keeps producing that energy for us.

Carey Howe 4:07

That's right. When that system works efficiently, the body functions smoothly. This is used for everything, right? Muscle contraction, active transport uh of substances across all your membranes, building molecules like proteins for making cell division, right? So when it doesn't work correctly, we start seeing fatigue, metabolic disease. Some of these things just look like flickering thoughts sometimes to somebody experiencing, you know, like memory loss or whatever. But and eventually many of these issues associate are associated with aging.

Anna Howe 4:47

Wow. So metabolism isn't really about calories.

Carey Howe 4:51

No. It's about how efficiently your cells produce energy.

Anna Howe 4:57

Okay, that's making a lot more sense to me now. Um what about metabolism myths? Let's talk about that. Because there are so many myths around metabolism.

Carey Howe 5:10

Um probably the biggest one is that people say, Oh, I'm just born with bad metabolism or it's hereditary, or it's in my family, or s or something like that.

Anna Howe 5:21

Right. People say that all the time.

Carey Howe 5:23

Yeah, but metabolism is actually extremely adaptable. It responds to the signals you give it.

Anna Howe 5:31

Which what do you mean by signals? I mean, does that mean diet, exercise, sleep, or and or stress?

Carey Howe 5:40

Yes, exactly.

Anna Howe 5:42

So another myth is that your metabolism suddenly slows down in your 30s and 40s. And to me, that's not a myth. I've just always believed that to be true, always, because I first noticed it in my 40s. And um, it just I wasn't able to eat whatever I wanted to anymore and and not think twice about it, and nothing it nothing would change. Now, or then in my early 40s, it was like, wow, okay, I actually have to be mindful because that weight just isn't coming off as easily, and I have to work a lot harder for it. So it wasn't just I'll skip a meal to fit in the dress the next night, and and it would nothing happen. Now I it doesn't work that way. So I just always believed that it was because of my age.

Carey Howe 6:30

Well, you you know you're not alone. A lot of people have that same belief system, right? But uh the interesting fact about that is that research shows that meta meta metabolism, it's all a tongue twister for me, stays relatively stable until around your 60s.

Anna Howe 6:48

Which means that what people think is aging metabolism is often just lifestyle changes.

Carey Howe 6:54

It's it's usually a combination of things, right? We're just not moving as much for sure. That's definitely one of them. Um, you're losing a little bit of muscle over time. Uh, your sleep can get off. You know, you and I talk about this all the time. Uh sleep being off is probably one of the worst things you could do. This is why traveling is so uh hard on your body.

Anna Howe 7:16

Um it's hard to get back on track.

Carey Howe 7:18

Correct. Your stress goes up, and all of that affects uh your metabolism more than people realize.

Anna Howe 7:26

Right. So uh metabolism, it's it's not broken. We've just changed the way that we're living.

Carey Howe 7:32

Exactly.

Anna Howe 7:34

One thing I find really fascinating is how many of the diseases we associate with aging are actually rooted in metabolism.

Carey Howe 7:42

Yeah. And I and I think this surprises a lot of people, right? Because when you look at things like diabetes, heart disease, even obesity, they're all tied back to how the body is producing and using energy.

Anna Howe 7:55

And even Alzheimer's, right? Um, which I feel like a lot of people don't realize.

Carey Howe 8:00

Yeah. Some researchers even call it type three diabetes because of how insulin resistant shows up in the brain.

Anna Howe 8:08

That's wild and honestly a little scary, I think. Um, it really shows how central your metabolism is to everything.

Carey Howe 8:15

It really is. When when your cells can't properly produce or manage energy, they just don't function the way they're supposed to. It's that simple.

Anna Howe 8:25

And that's when things start to break down over time.

Carey Howe 8:28

Right. And that's where you start to see inflammation, uh things being dysfunctional. Uh it could be movement, it could be thoughts, it could be a lot of things, digestion. Uh, and this eventually turns into disease. Yes.

Anna Howe 8:44

Let's talk about mitochondria.

Carey Howe 8:47

Ooh.

Anna Howe 8:50

It's something that always comes up in metabolism discussions.

Carey Howe 8:54

Yeah. Mitochondria are very interesting, right? And you hear this word all the time. And it's because when we talk about health, we're talking about on a cellular level, right? So the mitochondria are really the stars of the metabolism story.

Anna Howe 9:09

They're often described as the power plants of the cell.

Carey Howe 9:12

That's because mitochondria mitochondria are the structures inside our cells that actually produce the ATP we talked about.

Anna Howe 9:21

So they're essentially the machines generate generating our the our cellular energy.

Carey Howe 9:27

Yes. And the healthier your mitochondria are, the more efficiently your body can produce energy.

Anna Howe 9:34

And my uh mitochondrial health is becoming a huge focus in longevity research.

Carey Howe 9:39

Yes, because mitochondrial function tends to decline with age and metabolic stress.

Anna Howe 9:45

So are there things that people can do to support their mitochondria?

Carey Howe 9:50

Absolutely. And and most of it is fairly simple. I mean, there's definitely things, red light therapy, uh, photon therapy. There's things you can do in, you know, these biohacking centers and whatnot. But the good news is that a lot of them are actually pretty simple. We just don't always stay consistent with them. Things like resistance training and even short bursts of high-intensity exercises are huge because they signal your body to build and maintain strong, efficient cells. Then you got things like fasting or time-restricted eating, which is quite popular right now and has great results.

Anna Howe 10:26

Intermittent fasting, right?

Carey Howe 10:27

Intermittent fasting, yeah. Which give your system a break and help your cells clean up and function better. Even cold exposure, cold plunges, uh, cryogenic machines, you know, these things, cold showers, you know, people sometimes don't like these things, but they're great uh for your mitochondria. Well, what they're doing is these things are stimulating mitochondrial activity. And honestly, one of the most underrated pieces of all of this is just quality sleep. And you and I talk about this all the time. We don't, we don't uh, we don't mess with our sleep. We have that's super important. It's it's literally one third of your life is spent sleeping. So you might as well make it a good part of your life, right?

Anna Howe 11:12

Yeah, that's where your body's um repairing itself.

Carey Howe 11:15

Yeah, it's doing all of its repair and generation. Well, most of its repair and generation.

Anna Howe 11:22

Yeah.

Carey Howe 11:22

Regeneration.

Anna Howe 11:23

And when you don't get good sleep, I'm sure you've noticed, like for me personally, I'm I'm kind of in a bad mood, actually. You know, I don't have that that burst of energy. I love my morning routine and I just feel a little dull and everything. So it's even as simple as that, you know.

Carey Howe 11:39

100%. Because sleep is the key to recharging. You hear this all the time, right? So, I mean, people who monitor themselves, like we monitor with our whoop and and stuff like that, but with any like Apple Watch or something like that, you can monitor your sleep and you can tell when you don't get a good night's sleep and your deep sleep and your art your REM isn't uh, you know, a good amount of time, that your recovery rate is down. Meaning if you're gonna go to the gym, your performance is gonna be worse. If your your thoughts are gonna be more flickered, you're um you're just gonna be a little more foggy.

Anna Howe 12:11

Mm-hmm. Yes, that's so correct. It's interesting because many of those strategies um they create stress on the body.

Carey Howe 12:20

Exactly. Um that mild stress signals the body to build stronger mitochondria.

Anna Howe 12:28

So beyond lifestyle strategies, there's also growing interest in tools that can influence metabolic signaling more directly.

Carey Howe 12:37

Yeah, especially in the longevity and biohacking space, that's for sure.

Anna Howe 12:42

One area that's getting a lot of attention right now are peptides. I know. I'm so excited. I love talking about peptides, I think they're wonderful. Um, and it's just kind of everywhere lately. And uh I feel like everyone's talking about that about them, but not a lot of people know what they are. And it's you're just getting flooded by by so many, you know, so much talk. And then there's like all these people online. But for anyone who's listening and has zero idea what it even means, please tell me what peptides are.

Carey Howe 13:18

Yeah, that's a great question. And I'm glad you mentioned people online because there's definitely people who explain it simply, or you could, you know, uh Dr. Meyerbach, who I know we love, you know, he he really digs down deep in the rabbit hole and but uses a lot of big words that, you know, hard to understand. Yes. But um they're like little messengers telling your body what to do and when to do it. Some peptides can signal for more growth hormone release, for instance, and others can influence uh your metabolism or fat metabolism, um, support mitochondrial function or help with other things like tissue repair and cognitive thought uh and recovery. So there's a lot of peptides and a lot of information out there and a lot of different people giving it to you, right? So um it's important to understand that these are things your body already produces. It's just like you're waking up the signaling process within your body to sort of be back the way it used to be or to to improve it better than it ever was. Yes.

Anna Howe 14:27

But at a basic level, peptides are short chains of amino acids.

Carey Howe 14:31

That is correct.

Anna Howe 14:32

Yes. I mean you can think of them as just smaller pieces of proteins.

Carey Howe 14:36

But what makes them really interesting is that they act as signaling molecules in the body, and that's the most important part.

Anna Howe 14:43

Okay, so they're basically helping the body communicate with itself.

Carey Howe 14:47

Exactly. They're little messengers telling your body what to do, when to do it. Uh some peptides uh signal growth, like we had mentioned, others fat and metabolism. There's there's peptides literally for everything.

Anna Howe 15:02

Yes. Which is why they're becoming such a big conversation in the longevity space. Because they're they're not just doing one thing, they're kind of working on multiple systems at once.

Carey Howe 15:13

Right. And that's also why it can feel a little overwhelming because peptides is a huge category. Um, it's like food is a category, right? There's so many different types and flavors and whatnot, just like with peptides, all are very different, they have very different functions and use cases, and there's just a lot of them.

Anna Howe 15:34

Yeah, it's definitely not a one-size-fits-all situation.

Carey Howe 15:37

Not at all. But it's really exciting, Area. I know you and I are always delving into this on a daily basis. And there's a lot of research happening right now about it, um, especially around how they might support healthy aging and overall performance.

Anna Howe 15:54

I mean, this is a topic that we'll definitely get into more in future episodes because I feel like this is just scratching the surface.

Carey Howe 16:02

Yeah, I mean, we could spend an hour talking on one particular peptide. There's hundreds of them, right? So we'll definitely delve back into this and uh talk more about it in the future, that's for sure. But while we're concentrating just on metabolism, um, we'll give it a brief uh introduction, but we can move on from there.

Anna Howe 16:22

Okay. So um if someone listening today wants to support their metabolism, where should they start?

Carey Howe 16:29

Always the fundamentals. The fundamentals matter the most. Um, things like building and maintaining muscle, eating enough protein, keeping your macros correct, uh, maintaining stable blood sugar, uh, try to stay away from eating a lot of sugar, obviously. Yes. Uh, prioritizing your sleep. We keep coming back to this one, and you when we will continue to do it because sleep is so important. And then obviously, moving around regularly, right? You got to get up and move. The body is meant to move.

Anna Howe 16:59

Yeah, even if you don't have time, if you're a busy working person and you have your children, you have to take, I get it, not everyone has uh enough time to maybe do a full-on, you know, uh lifting exercise, but you have to move. At least go outside and walk around, walk your dog if you have one. You just have to move. Yeah, you can't just go from your bed to your car to then, you know, you just can't do that. It's it's not good for the body. So they're simple habits, but powerful signals for the body.

Carey Howe 17:29

Exactly. 100%.

Anna Howe 17:32

If there's one takeaway from today's conversation, it's that metabolism isn't just about weight.

Carey Howe 17:38

It's really about how efficiently the body produces energy.

Anna Howe 17:43

And energy is the foundation of health and longevity.

Carey Howe 17:46

And when your metabolism works well, your body has the resources it needs for repair, recovery, and to stay resilient over time.

Anna Howe 17:57

In future episodes, we'll dive deeper into some of the tools that can support metabolic health even further.

Carey Howe 18:03

Including peptides, right?

Anna Howe 18:04

Yes.

Carey Howe 18:05

And other emerging uh longevity. There's so much stuff that we're we're excited to talk about. Yes. And uh we'll get deeper into it as we move along.

Anna Howe 18:14

Yes, we sure will. Well, thank you so much for listening.

Carey Howe 18:17

We'll see you next time.

Anna Howe 18:22

Thanks for spending time with us today. If this episode sparked something for you, be sure to subscribe so you don't miss what's next. Share the show with someone who cares about living well and building a longer, more vibrant life.

Carey Howe 18:36

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Anna Howe 18:44

Until next time, live with intention, stay curious, and design your vitality.