Patty Kikos interviews Rose Rowlson, a health and wellness advocate, a dementia educator and a clinical counselling consultant and trainer. She's a carer herself, and has worked in the community, as a consultant for nearly 20 years. She services a number of aged care facilities, providing training to staff, counselling for residents and families and grief counselling. GUEST – ROSE ROWLSON Rose Rowlson - https://www.roserowlson.com.au/ SOCIAL MEDIA: Follow The Benevolent Society on Instagram Follow Carer Gateway on Facebook Follow The Benevolent Society on Facebook CREDITS: Host – Patty Kikos Producers – Patty Kikos and John Hresc Sound Engineer – John Hresc GET IN TOUCH: Carer Gateway is proud to offer emotional and practical services and support for carers with the aim of making your life easier. You can call us on 1800 422 737 to find out more about peer support groups, counselling, coaching, online skills courses, tailored support packages, emergency respite, other government supports, as well as tips and information, or visit our online home at www.carergateway.gov.au Got some questions or thoughts for Patty or the team? Email us at cgconnections@benevolent.org.au and put ‘Attention Patty’ in the subject line. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS: The Benevolent Society acknowledges the Traditional Owners of the Land we have recorded this podcast on, the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation. We pay our respects to their Elders past and present and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures.
Patty Kikos interviews Rose Rowlson, a health and wellness advocate, a dementia educator and a clinical counselling consultant and trainer. She's a carer herself, and has worked in the community, as a consultant for nearly 20 years. She services a number of aged care facilities, providing training to staff, counselling for residents and families and grief counselling.
GUEST – ROSE ROWLSON
Rose Rowlson - https://www.roserowlson.com.au/
SOCIAL MEDIA:
Follow The Benevolent Society on Instagram
Follow Carer Gateway on Facebook
Follow The Benevolent Society on Facebook
CREDITS:
Host – Patty Kikos
Producers – Patty Kikos and John Hresc
Sound Engineer – John Hresc
GET IN TOUCH:
Carer Gateway is proud to offer emotional and practical services and support for carers with the aim of making your life easier.
You can call us on 1800 422 737 to find out more about peer support groups, counselling, coaching, online skills courses, tailored support packages, emergency respite, other government supports, as well as tips and information, or visit our online home at www.carergateway.gov.au
Got some questions or thoughts for Patty or the team? Email us at cgconnections@benevolent.org.au and put ‘Attention Patty’ in the subject line.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS:
The Benevolent Society acknowledges the Traditional Owners of the Land we have recorded this podcast on, the Gadigal people of the Eora Nation. We pay our respects to their Elders past and present and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander cultures.
Rose:
So I've cared for both of my parents with dementia and that puts me at a higher risk for cognitive issues.
So I had to ask myself, the question, is prevention possible? And it's not just dementia prevention, it's not just old age, it's about what we need to do to have a fabulously healthy brain, long into our older years, and in all the things that I've researched, it's possible.
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Billy:
From the Carer Gateway at the Benevolent Society, we welcome you to, Carer Conversations with your host Patty Kikos.
The Care Gateway is the Australian Government national care hub and provides reliable services, support and advice especially for carers.
This podcast is where we share interviews with guests that have specialized knowledge to help support carers to look after their emotional, mental and physical well-being.
We are recording on Aboriginal country, on lands which were never ceded. We acknowledge the traditional custodians and cultural knowledge holders of these lands and waters. We pay our respects to Aboriginal elders, past and present.
Always was, always will be.
Patty:
Today is an episode where we discuss what I think is a fascinating topic. It's about the seat of human consciousness, the powerhouse of the human body. My second favourite organ after the heart, and that is the brain.
The human brain has 100 billion neurons, and each neuron connects to 10,000 other neurons. Sitting on our shoulders is the most complicated object in the known universe.
Everything we do, every thought we've ever had, is produced by the human brain. But exactly how it operates remains one of the biggest unsolved mysteries, and it seems the more we probe its secrets, the more surprises we find.
To effectively treat brain diseases and disorders, including dementia, schizophrenia, depression, motoneuron disease, and many others, we need to understand how the healthy brain functions and what makes these processes go a little off centre.
If you've been connected to Carer Gateway for a while, and have joined our online workshops, or have even attended some of our retreats, chances are you are already familiar with Rose Rowlson.
Rose is a health and wellness advocate. She's a dementia educator and a clinical counselling consultant and trainer. She's a carer herself, and has worked in the community, as a consultant, for nearly 20 years.
She services a number of aged care facilities, providing training to staff, counselling for residents and families, mediation, grief counselling and pastoral care.
Rose’s online home is www.roserowlson.com.au, which I'll share with you again at the end of the podcast.
So Rose, can you tell me why you developed the ‘Healthy, Happy Brain’ program, and why you're so passionate about it?
Rose:
Yes, Patty. I've worked in brain related fields all my professional life, so I've seen brain issues firsthand - the best and the worst of it, particularly in later years. I've worked in aged care, and I've seen dementia, cognitive decline, strokes, and just about every type of ageing, mental health issue.
Did you know that cognitive issues are one of the fastest growing diseases in the world and people are getting it younger and younger?
Patty:
Why do you think that is?
Rose:
There's a lot of reasons why we are seeing people with earlier dementias, and my thoughts on that is partly because of the lifestyles that we live.
The way that people are eating a lot of rubbish. They're stressed, they're not sleeping properly. I think that there's a reason, or these are reasons why we have so many people who are experiencing these cognitive issues a lot younger in life.
Patty:
And would you also include that over exposure to screens as part of the reason as well?
Rose:
Potentially yes, yes. We spend far too much time on computers because when we're on computers too, we are not out in the sunshine. We're not running around. We're not exercising. We're stuck in this place on a screen all the time and it takes us away from doing a lot of healthier things that we could be doing.
Patty:
Yes
Rose:
Yeah. So, I've cared for both of my parents with dementia and that puts me at a higher risk for cognitive issues.
So, I had to ask myself, the question, is prevention possible? And it's not just dementia prevention, it's not just old age, it's about what we need to do to have a fabulously healthy brain, long into our older years, and in all the things that I've researched, it's possible.
I'm not a medical doctor. I'm the first one to say that. I'm neuroscience trained in dementia, and so I've searched all the latest research for my program, and the research is out there and this fantastic research available.
So, we've put it together in an easy-to-follow format, so that people are able to use our program as a resource, and to get the best they can with their brain.
And it's interesting because in America, they have some other top neuroscientists who are out there researching and sharing a lot of resources with us, and they're telling us that it is possible to have a fantastic brain, until we're older and sharing that information with us and I think that's really fantastic.
Patty:
So, for our listeners that might be new to the world of neuroscience. Can you give us a definition of what that is?
Rose:
Neuroscience is basically the study of the brain. And that's a whole new science, you know, the brain is such an intricate, amazing organ in our body, and there's so many people who are dedicated now to studying, what it's about and what our brain does.
Patty:
And maybe I could ask you to step back and help us define what the brain is, and what it does in the simplest of ways. Could you do that for us?
Rose:
Absolutely! So if we have a think about it, every part of the brain is designed to tell you, or your body to do something.
It's in charge of everything. It has about 80 to 100 billion neurons firing. Now your neurons, these are the chemical messages that make the communication pathways, and the highways in our brain. This is how we communicate and the size of your brain, it's about 2 fists together.
And it weighs about 1.5 kilos, on average. And the brain holds the memories of everything we've ever done. Which is why it's so amazing.
Patty:
Ideally, what part of the brain do we need to nurture the most and why?
Rose:
Oh, absolutely, without a doubt, our neurons, because healthy neurons continue to communicate instructions. Without them, we can't think, we can't do anything. If you think of Alzheimer's, for example, the neurons can't communicate with each other because of the plaques blocking the pathways so the messages just can't get through.
Patty:
When you say ‘the plaques’, what do you mean by that?
Rose:
“The plaques” is just the general term that we use for a protein. It's called amyloid protein, and the amyloid protein will suffocate the cells. Basically, it gets in between the cells, in between the neurons that are firing, and it stops that communication from happening.
So, there's a buildup of this so-called plaque, all through the different neural pathways, and so they're no longer able to communicate messages. So, instructions simple instructions, like “I need to go to the toilet”, to, “I'm hungry”, or “I need to lift my hand”, even basic things like that can be affected, because those communication pathways are not working.
And so, when we think about those things, that's why people can't remember things like who they're married to, for example. Those neuronal pathways made up of the connecting neurons help us to access our memories.
They help us to communicate information. They’re vital to us in every part of our lives, neurons are vital to the running of your brain. So yes, that's why I think we need to nurture them the most.
Patty:
OK, so you've just given us a great example of what happens when our brain changes in dementia. And is this a similar notion to neuroplasticity, the idea that our brain is quite similar to plastic and has the capacity to mould itself into a different shape?
Rose:
Neuroplasticity is our brain’s ability to expand its capacity.
And I could probably share this with you. There's a Ted Talk that I love to watch from Lisa Genova, and she talks about this concept of ‘cognitive reserve’, which is all about what neuroplasticity is all about and what the concept is, is that we continue to build this neuroplasticity or this extra capacity in our brains, so that later, if we do get some sort of cognitive issues, we have that reserve to rely on.
And so basically that's what neuroplasticity does. It helps to build this extra capacity. It makes our brains plastic.
Patty:
And gives us the opportunity to change concepts that we believe in, right?
Rose:
Yeah, yeah, absolutely we can rewire our brains all the time.
Patty:
You spoke of cognitive reserve before? Can you expand on this a little bit for us?
Rose:
Sure, again, it's just building up this extra capacity and we see this, if I was to use an example with someone having a stroke, for example. And we see that they've had a stroke and a bit later on, they're able to talk again or to use their arm again.
And that's because those neurons have found a different pathway to access. It's made a new pathway in order to use. And so, this neuroplasticity, this cognitive reserve, is about making new pathways, a lot more new pathways for us to use.
Because the brain is continually learning, we learn throughout our lifetime.
And that learning is the thing that creates all these new pathways in our brain. That's why children have such an amazing capacity to learn. You know, when they're little, they're learning about their world at such an incredible rate, that this is when their neuroplasticity is firing.
Patty:
So, what you've described in terms of that ‘cognitive reserve’, it's probably a little bit similar to our physical body, like we have to have some reserves in place for our physical energy so that we don't burn out, right?
Rose:
Yes yeah , same principle.
Patty:
You talked about our brain having the capacity to store our memories and give us the ability to access our memories. Can you share why someone with Alzheimer's can potentially remember some things but forgets other things?
Rose:
Yes I can. I try and break this down a little bit because that's a huge question. To help with this question, we actually need to understand how memory works.
With two different types of memory, we've got ‘procedural memory’, which is our learned memory, and we have ‘explicit memory’.
Now ‘learned memory’, is just as it sounds, it's the memory of things we've always done. Like we can drive a car, go to the bathroom or we can cook. You know we do these things even without thinking because they’re learned behaviour.
And that's why some people with Alzheimer's can still do things, because they've learned it all their lives, and so you know, they're able to do drive the car. They're able to write things, but it's the memory of the things they're just learning, the short-term memory, which is the most affected.
It's a misunderstanding to think that all people with dementia lose their memory because they don't. Some people have very little symptomology, and some people don't forget things. Some people don't forget who they're married to or who they who their kids are.
It depends a lot on where it is in their brain. It depends on how much of their memory is affected by their disease. There's a lot of things that impact why someone doesn't forget, and another person does.
Patty:
Or when someone still remembers, but can sometimes get a little bit confused with their timelines in their memory?
Rose:
Yeah, absolutely. And is this thing of selective memory real? Or is it just us being cheeky when we accuse our partners of remembering what they want to?
Rose:
Hahaha.. Well, I don't think that there's any science that would actually back that up.
Patty:
I thought I'd ask just in case...
So ‘explicit memory’ is things like facts like birthdays, wedding dates. And then’ learned memory and explicit memory, they form part of our long-term memory. Is that right?
Rose:
Right yes yes yes. Whereas the short-term memory with people who have, for example people with Alzheimer's, they lose the capacity for the short-term memory. So, they're the things you're trying to teach them in the moment.
Patty:
So, I've got a question about brain fog. One, because I'm getting older and I'm experiencing it a lot more, but also because it seems to be a more common topic over the last few years, because of COVID and subsequent symptoms that people have experienced, possibly because of lockdown mandates and restrictions, and I even want to throw in an extra question about how much more frequently we are on devices. Is this impacting or contributing to the concept of our brain fog?
Rose:
Wow, that's a loaded question.
Let's try and unpack it a little bit to make it easier to understand.
So, what is it first? Brain fog is not a medical term or a scientific term, first of all, but it's a common term that's thrown around these days to describe when our thinking is sluggish and it's fuzzy, not sharp or focused, spaced out, sometimes. Kind of feeling out of sorts and I think we all experience this from time to time.
It might happen when you're sick or when you're stressed out, or if you've got the flu and it's often associated with COVID symptoms now. A lot of people that have had COVID are complaining of having, you know, a lot of brain fog.
And it makes it difficult to focus on the tasks at hand. It makes it difficult to remember things or pay attention to what's going on around you. And it's and it seems to make a huge impact on our day-to-day things.
We might experience confusion. Forgetfulness is a big one that a lot of people talk to me about, and a lack of mental clarity.
And so, when we look at what the cause is of it, my personal view is that a lot of it is due to overworking. Lack of sleep and stress is a big factor, as is exhaustion, and spending too much time on the computer. And for some, it’s menopause, or hormonal imbalances can cause that.
But one of the biggest things I think about it, is a lack of focus. And this is because we're too busy. You know, we are much too busy these days. There are too many things going on.
Patty:
We're often over committed, aren't we?
Rose:
Absolutely, and I and I think particularly the last couple of years again, because of covid, people are stressed to the max. They're trying to work from home around families, there's not enough time to do things. We're spending far too much nighttime on our computers to get work done.
Patty:
Yeah, which is not sustainable, is it?
Rose:
No, it's not. It's not so the brain is getting overloaded. The brain is getting very tired. And it's easy for us to blame getting older on this, but it's not a normal part of ageing.
You know it's a misconception. A lot of people think that memory loss, brain fog, cognitive issues, and everything is a normal part of ageing, but it's not. That's a real misconception and I think we need to start slowing down. We need to start taking a lot of that stress off.
And we need to stop not being able to focus on things. We're trying to focus on too many things rather than one thing. If I can share one thing with you, that might help with this. You know, the amount of people that tell me they keep losing their keys.
And especially when I tell them what I do and they go, “Oh God, I'm losing my mind. I'm getting dementia because I keep losing my keys”, and actually, we're just not remembering where we put them in the first place.
You know if you're a carer particularly, I know myself, you know you come home, you walk in the door, you throw your keys down, you put your phone down, you're having a conversation with the carer that's been looking after your loved one for a couple of hours, you're trying to workout dinner.
All these things when you walk in the door! And you haven't remembered where you put your keys in the 1st place. So, later, it's like I've forgotten where my keys are. Well, actually you didn't remember putting them down in the first place.
Patty:
Because you were so overloaded.
Rose:
And so, this is a really common thing that I see a lot of the time, this brain fog is partly because we're not focused in the first place.
Patty:
And what I'm hearing you say is that we might be overloaded for a particular period of time, but then we don't allow ourselves the time to recover.
Rose:
That's right.
Patty:
Yeah, because recovery is very important, just like we get that muscle fatigue with our physical body, we need to be able to give our brain the opportunity to do nothing in order to rest.
And recalibrate and rejuvenate as opposed to finishing all our tasks and then concentrating on an email for the next day, or watching Netflix, and not actually having quality rest.
Rose:
Yes, and this is so true because people don't have the time to rest. That's a common thing again that I'm hearing all the time is there's no time and again, particularly for our carers. There is no time.
There's always constancy of doing things all the time, so I hear this a lot. You know, with carers particularly, we need to slow down. We need to give our brains time to stop the overwhelm, and the overload, and I think that's the only way that we're going to battle this brain fog.
Patty:
Yep, to get that quality rest.
Rose:
Yep, absolutely.
Patty:
So Rose, I'm not actually a big fan of maths, I'm not so technologically adept. I can write for hours, and I also can't draw paint to save my life.
Now, can you tell us about what it's like when someone is either, left brain dominant versus being right brain dominant? Or is that just a myth?
Rose:
That's a very interesting question. Research from years ago talks a lot about people being right brain dominant and left brain dominant. And I love the fact that neuroscience research is doing so much these days to break down a lot of these myths, and we discuss them in the healthy brain program.
The concept that left brain dominant was always associated with logic, precise thinking, being analytical and scientific, whereas the right brain has always been artistic and musical, free spirited and creative.
Patty:
And originally it was very masculine versus feminine quality wasn't it?
Rose:
It was! It was! And it stopped a lot of people from exploring other areas of learning, and in many respects, I think that this is really sad, that a lot of our people are older people, and haven't looked into some other things, because they've always been told, “you won't be able to do that, because that's not how your brains wired”.
But if you look at a brain map. I actually have a large brain map that I use and give out regularly to people to show them how all the different areas of our brain are.
And we know that the right and left sides of our brain actually do specialise in different kinds of tasks.
Obviously, people have different personalities, and they have different talents, but we use both sides of our brain all the time. We use all of our brains all the time.
And you know that comes into the other myth that says, you know, we only use 10% of our brains, which again is a huge myth because we use all of our brain. It's always functioning and being used.
If you take for example, music, music is very creative, isn't it. It’s healing and very creative, but it's also very structural, and we actually use both sides of our brain in order to use music and to write music. It's this engineering structural side of music.
And I think it's detrimental to our learning capacity, as I said before, if we think, “oh, I'm creative, so I may not learn technology because it doesn't sit in that side of the brain”, and it changes what people do or what they don't do.
So, we need to be teaching our children to embrace all of the capacities that they have to learn across a wide variety of things.
Patty:
We need to be encouraging people to be OK with being multi passionate, don't we? Multi capable even.
Rose:
Yes, absolutely, absolutely. You know we can use both different things, and I think if I could share my daughter, for example when she was in school, you know she's a florist. She has the most amazing creativity of anyone I've seen and in her leaving certificate, or whatever it's called now, she got a major in science, and a major in art! Two completely different areas of the brain, two different sciences, if you like.
And people would say that's impossible, but there it was, and that's the kind of thing that that just reaffirmed to me that these things are possible.
Patty:
Yes, totally. I actually really love the name of your program, Happy Healthy Brain, because I believe that happiness and joy is such an essential component to life.
Rose:
{Giggles} Hahaha it's actually ‘Healthy Happy Brain’.
Patty:
{Giggles} Oh sorry, I beg your pardon. Healthy Happy Brain’ but I love it, and I think that happiness and joy is our birthright. I also believe that it's a lot easier to complete tasks when we feel light and happy. Can you tell us a little bit about how happiness can affect our mindset?
Rose:
My own personal view is that happiness and joy is a lot to do with your mindset, because every day we are all faced with challenges, and we can choose to be grateful for the things that we do have, and the ability that we have to move forward.
Or we can sit at home in a chair and go. “No, it's too hard”.
Much of that is about life experience, resilience, support, your personality, your history, and how you've dealt with things in the past. But overall, we can still make a choice, of what we do in life, and a choice to do that.
I love the concept of “AND” I use it a lot in when I talk to carers particularly and it's like we can have joy AND sadness, in the same place, we can have grief AND joy. We can have sadness AND happiness in the same place. ‘And’ is a concept that brings everything together and it's still a choice at the end of the day.
Patty:
Rose, what can we do as carers to ensure that we are maintaining a healthy, happy brain?
Rose:
I have actually got my 12 secrets for a healthy, happy brain and you can find this on my website. It's a free infographic that anybody can download, and it looks at the 12 different areas that I based my program on.
This is according to the research, that all these things can lower our risk factors is physical exercise. The most important one of all the different things we can be doing, is doing physical exercise, because it keeps our brain and our body fit and well.
Good sleep is the next one. Most people don't know that your brain only cleans itself when you're asleep, so that buildup of all the toxins and everything that we accumulate every day, because we all get a toxic buildup in our brain every day is only washed out when we sleep. So, sleep is so important in terms of our brain health.
We need to stress less. Stress inflames our brain, it inflames our body, it's responsible for our mental health issues.
You know, we need to be watching our mental health. There's such a high rise in mental health issues now, and a lot of it is because we're eating very badly. I think there's a huge correlation with what we eat to our mental health.
We need to ditch the sugar.
Patty:
I was hoping you wouldn’t say that
Rose:
Yes I’m sorry! This is a truth now, and we have so much research that backs it up that sugar is one of the worst things for your body and your brain. It inflames your brain. And it's in everything these days. Everything these days has sugar in it, so it's such a bad thing.
We need to check your hearing.
We need to train your brain using neuroplasticity that we talked about before.
We need to eat real food.
We need to mind our gut.
Don't smoke. I'm surprised how many people still smoke.
We need to protect our brains. You know, wear a helmet.
Lower your alcohol consumption.
Stay social in your community.
They're my big things.
Patty:
I like them all except for the ‘no sugar’ {both giggle} but I’ll allow it.
Rose, let's do a rapid fire wrap up. OK, so my first question to you is.
Your name is Rose, but what is your favourite flower?
Rose:
I love red roses.
Patty:
Was there one event that's turned your life upside down but somehow made it the right way up?
Rose:
Yes, I actually married a rock star, and I followed him around Australia, and I settled in Sydney. This was 35 years ago. I'm from this little farming town in Adelaide, I was little Rose. Nothing in my future and I came to live in Sydney, and it opened the door for me to what I do now.
And what I've spent so many years teaching, speaking, doing all the things that I love, and that would never have happened if I hadn't met my rock star.
Patty:
If there was one thing you wish everyone knew about the brain? What would it be?
Rose:
It's never too late to start looking after it. Cognitive issues are not just for old people. They can start as early as 20 years or younger, so look after your brain. It's never too late.
Patty:
Is there an activity or activities even, that you recommend people do to maintain a happy, healthy brain? And if there are, what are they?
Patty:
Learn! Learn a language. Learn a musical instrument. Do a course! You know the old Sudoku and the crosswords just don't cut it.
Patty:
So learn music, learn a language, learn to dance.
Rose:
Yes, Yep yes, because it actually creates neuroplasticity in your brain.
Patty:
I love it.
Folks we’ll leave it there for today and a reminder that Rose’s online home is https://roserowlson.com.au/
Many have said that a sense of humour is a sign of intelligence and being funny suggests that your brain has the capacity to work fast.
It's the ability to flip a switch and see the same thing from a different perspective, because sometimes when our world does get turned upside down, it can actually be the catalyst for amazing change, growth and transformation.
If you found this podcast helpful, we'd be grateful if you helped us share the love by leaving us a 5-star review and subscribing on your favourite platform.
Make sure you do something wonderful for you today and until we meet again, take good care of yourself and be well.
Billy:
If you are caring for a relative or a friend who has a disability, a mental health condition, a life limiting health or medical condition.
Or they are frail because they're getting older. Please contact us at Carer Gateway on 1800 422 737, or look us up on www.carergateway.gov.au
And if you are a carer, you're allowed to take time to look after yourself. You are just as important as the person you take care of.