Fall is here, and I keep hearing the same thing. People tell me they feel a little tired, as if hibernation is coming. Some say their dogs are sleeping more too. I feel kind of the same. My mornings are lazier and I would love to just cuddle up with Pax on the sofa, and read a book.
For the next few weeks, my plan is to talk about recharging your and your dog’s batteries. Everyone wants good energy. We want to feel happy and rested without needing four coffees a day. We all know what comes after drinking too much coffee. The crash.
So buckle your seatbelts. Here we go:
Have you ever wondered why two dogs of the same breed and the same age can be so different? One bounces back from a long hike by the next morning. The other needs two days on the couch. One shrugs off an illness. The other struggles.
A big part of the answer is metabolism, or how well each body turns food into energy, and how it's used.
Here is how it works, in plain words.
When your dog eats, the body breaks food down into its smallest pieces. Carbohydrates become glucose. Fats become fatty acids. Proteins become amino acids. All of these roads lead to the same place: the mitochondria.
Inside the mitochondria runs something called the Krebs cycle. You know how passionate I am about the Healing Cycle. This is a different cycle, but just as important.
The Krebs cycle takes the fuel from food and pulls the energy out of it, piece by piece.
This is where NAD comes in.
Think of NAD as the delivery truck. It picks up the energy from the Krebs cycle and carries it to the final step, where the cell charges its battery with energy.
That energy source is called ATP. When it's spent, it becomes ADP. When it's recharged, it becomes ATP again. This happens over and over, all day long.
Every heartbeat, every muscle contraction, every bit of body heat and every organ doing its job runs on ATP.
ATP is the golden currency of energy for every cell in the body. See it similar to electricity, gas or gasoline.
Now here's the problem. NAD, that charges the batteries, drops with age. In people, it falls to about half by middle age, and it continues to decline as we age. It is one of the reasons why older people are weak and frail.
In dogs, it can drop by half by age five to seven, depending on the breed.
Less NAD means slower charging. And giving NAD itself doesn't help much, because it is unstable and it can’t be supplemented effectively.
So what do we do?
We give the body the building block it uses to make its own NAD: nicotinamide mononucleotide, or NMN for short.
And no, I don't mean M&Ms. I know many of you love them, especially the green ones. Or do you like another color?
Anyhow, NMN converts into NAD inside the body, and NAD keeps the batteries charging.
You know what happens to an old phone. It still works, but it doesn't hold a charge like it used to. So you carry a power bank. That's how I see MitoBoost. It's a power bank for your dog's cells.
In part two below, I'll tell you one of my favourite stories in all of biology: how the mitochondria got into our cells in the first place. Here's a hint. They weren't always part of us.
PART 2
How's your energy today?
Last time, I complained a little about wanting to hibernate. All I wanted was to curl up on the couch with Pax. Today I feel more energized. Maybe it's because I've been paying close attention to my NAD and ATP and feeding my mitochondria with MitoBoost and doing the same for Pax.
Imagine, all the peeing and lifting his leg all day. That uses a good dose of NAD!
Last week I told you how the mitochondria make energy.
Today I want to tell you how they got into our cells in the first place. It's a bit of a drama series.
About two billion years ago, a stray bacterium found its way inside another cell. You'd expect a fight. One of them should have destroyed the other. But that's not what happened.
The bacterium stayed, and the two of them formed an alliance. They've lived in peace ever since. That's a better track record than most countries these days.
That bacterium became the mitochondria. Basically we could see it as a marriage where the bacteria had a name change, and started looking after the energy budget.
To this day, mitochondria carry their own DNA, separate from the rest of the body's DNA. You and your dog inherited yours from your mothers, and they from theirs, going all the way back.
So a foreign guest lives in harmony inside every one of us and powers almost everything we do. It's like having a friend who shows up to help you build a house, do the laundry and carry boxes on moving day. And they never leave.
I know many people are afraid of bacteria. But without that one helpful bacterium, none of us would be alive. Not you, not me, and not your dog.
That's why I want you to see mitochondria as more than batteries. They are your greatest allies, and allies need looking after.
A single cell can hold anywhere from a few hundred to several thousand mitochondria. They are most densely packed where the work is hardest: the heart, the brain, the muscles, the liver and the kidneys. A heart muscle cell can carry thousands of them.
Think of your phone again. Some apps drain the battery faster than others. The organs that work the hardest need the most batteries.
Mitochondria make about 90% of the body's ATP. Remember ATP? NMN turns into NAD, and NAD keeps ATP charging.
But energy is only part of the story. Mitochondria also:
- Sound the alarm. When a cell is under stress, the mitochondria send out warning signals.
- Keep calcium in balance. That keeps the muscles, the heart and the nerves steady and strong.
- Decide the fate of damaged cells. They choose whether a cell gets repaired or is broken down and recycled.
- Guide the immune system. They help switch immune cells from attack mode to repair mode once the battle is over.
So there you have it. Every living thing that moves, grows and heals runs on mitochondria. This is why I want you to understand them. And it's why I'm so happy we have MitoBoost, made with NMN and trimethylglycine sourced from Austria and the Netherlands.
Next time, I'll tell you what trimethylglycine is and why I added it. Here's a hint: even the best power bank works better with the right partner.
Until then, if you'd like to learn more, visit the MitoBoost page here.
