This Diary of a CEO podcast episode features Kristen Holmes, vice president of performance science at WHOOP, discussing the crucial role of circadian rhythms and sleep in optimizing health and performance. The conversation covers various aspects of sleep hygiene, including the impact of light exposure, meal timing, alcohol consumption, and stress management on overall well-being.
Here are all the mentions of alcohol from the provided transcript:
0:51-1:03: "...you can have trouble having children. I mean that's terrifying. We know that we haven't adapted to blue light, the light we get from screens. Yes, if you're viewing light between the hours of 10 p.m. and 4:00 a.m., it actually has a pro-depressive effect... a lot of people are like, 'I have to go to bed at 1:00 a.m. because I'm a night owl.' Total BS. You're making a choice..." (This section mentions the negative effects of light exposure at night, leading into a discussion about lifestyle choices, which later connects to alcohol).
30:13-30:31: "...alcohol is another one right...like you just to metabolize alcohol you're diverting all you know significant resources away from the regeneration and the recovery that needs to happen during sleep...so same sort of effect happens with food and we see this you know at population levels on the app. It's just very apparent that meal timing and alcohol are are really the two biggest disruptors to a good night's sleep..."
34:84-35:15: "...and when you are not having to digest you'll see your stress score is lower, you'll see your heart rate is lower, your heart rate variability would be higher in those situations. We want to make sure that when we're sleeping we are not diverting any resources away from sleep. I mean alcohol is another one right like you just to metabolize alcohol you're diverting all you know significant resources away from the regeneration and the recovery that needs to happen during sleep..."
43:46-44:17: "...even though for me personally, I made choices where you know I, I, I really have never drank alcohol right because I saw how it destroyed my family...but yet I was still hanging around with people who were engaging in these behaviors and and it just was impacting me at my core...and I was an environment at at a university where you know that was just like the norm..." (This section discusses the speaker's personal experience with alcohol and its impact within her social circle).
44:06-44:23: "...and a lot of this was you know related to you know I was an environment at at a university where you know that was just like the norm like it is just wild to me how educational institutions normalize binge drinking..."
51:53-52:06: "...I want to talk about alcohol. I've recently quit drinking alcohol. I think it was about 3 to 4 months ago now. Um, it was so interesting. I had a conversation with some of my best friends, I said this on a podcast a couple of months ago, and one of my friends was an alcoholic..." (This section introduces the speaker's recent decision to quit drinking and a conversation he had with friends regarding alcohol consumption).
52:06-52:42: "...so he managed to quit alcohol and he's writing a book about it...and then as I look across the group of my other friends, none of them are alcoholics, but they're all sort of casual drinkers...I was such a casual drinker. I would have maybe one glass of wine a week if that. There's probably months I've gone without any alcohol at all..."
52:49-53:09: "...so I couldn't think of a reason to quit. So really I was saying to him is there another book that someone else could write for me that just takes those people that are those casual drinkers that are right on the fence and just gives us a reason to nudge over the other side...and because I have this podcast I thought you know I'll just try and quit and see if see what the implications are for my life..."
53:15-54:09: "...well, I, I like to think about it, I love this, the principle of non-neutrality right...and this is is how I like to think about behaviors...and how I've kind of always thought about it is if you've got a series of behaviors we talked a lot about about sleep...and you've got the psychological things and they're either going to support your your values...or they're not...and I think that's the lens with which I look at alcohol...in what way is this supporting my values..." (This section discusses the speaker's philosophical approach to evaluating behaviors like alcohol consumption in relation to personal values).
55:27-56:31: "...is that such a thing as such a small dose of alcohol that it doesn't matter in your opinion? Yeah, I mean I think it depends on who you are...I know resveratrol is is something that's talked about a lot...in wine and grapes...but I think you'd have to drink like 10 bottles or something to get the amount of resveratrol to actually make a...to make a dent...so yeah I don't know that really any amount of alcohol is is going to be is going to be helpful..." (The speaker discusses the effects of alcohol, including the minimal benefits of resveratrol and its effect on health).
56:31-57:05: "...and we know from the literature that just one to two drinks per week can have you know negative implications on on health...it's actually I don't know that any like even in a moderate amount of alcohol is good for you. What's the implications for our circadian rhythms...yeah it's mainly because it impacts sleep. It's going to impact when you go to bed and when you wake up..."
57:11-57:57: "...I was reading some research from the Sleep Foundation and it says that a 2007 study with 29 young adults found that moderate doses of alcohol up to 1 hour before bedtime reduced melatonin production by nearly 20%...a 2018 study of 4,908 Finnish participants found that sleep quality was reduced by 9.3% after one glass of wine...after two glasses of wine...and by almost 40% after three or more glasses of wine...which is is really really staggering that your sleep quality will could drop 40% after three glasses of wine..." (This section presents research findings highlighting the negative correlation between alcohol consumption and sleep quality).
58:04-58:22: "...we just finished this analysis actually looking at alcohol and markers of recovery...and literally with every drink it is just there's a linear relationship in the decline...and it is significant...so I mean yeah it's we're talking even one drink will produce clinically significant reduction in heart rate and heart rate variability..." (This section presents further research findings indicating the negative impact of alcohol on heart rate variability and recovery).
58:29-59:13: "...this was maybe the most compelling motivator for me to quit alcohol was when I got my WHOOP the first time...and then I think it was someone's birthday or something so we went out and I had a glass of wine or something. I woke up the next day, looked at my heart rate variability...and it was flashing red...and it says on there when I clicked on the flashing red thing it was like like did you have a really stressful day? Are you sick? Or did you drink alcohol last night?..." (This section describes a personal experience that motivated the speaker to quit drinking).
59:52-1:00:11: "...and the average recovery reduction is six percent and that's relying on self-reporting right. So I wonder if there's biases in what there might there might be yeah. People that had 10 drinks think they had four. But I think yeah exactly. I don't really remember how many drinks I had so yeah. Any drinks I had interesting super interesting..."
