Biohacking for Beginners – Can you hack your way to health?

Dean Henry, Functional Medicine Coach, and Co-Founder of UAE Peptides and Clean Living Co. shares his tips for biohacking to optimise your health and wellness

What is biohacking?

Biohacking refers to optimising your environment and activities for peak performance and wellbeing. It has become somewhat of a buzzword, and there are extreme versions of biohacking out there – you may be familiar with 44-year-old Tim Gray who claims he has biohacked himself back to being “21-years-old” - but the concept is not entirely new.

In essence, biohacking refers to ways we adapt our lifestyle and behaviours to optimise our biology.

There is a wealth of ways which we can enhance our bodies and minds, from lifestyle and dietary changes to the use of data-producing worn devices which allow us to analyse our activity.

If you want to give your health an overhaul, Dean, shares some simple ways to start biohacking to your best self.

• Physical Performance: Use wearable tech, such as rings or watches which monitor heart rate, as well as measure calories burned, and adjust your workouts for optimal performance.

• Improve Cognitive Function: For head-to-toe wellness, the brain must not be neglected. Nootropic supplements can enhance cognitive performance, focus, and even delay aging of the brain, and staying hydrated is also vital for good brain function. A Nootropic is ia supplement or medicine that can help cognitive performance, be it, memory, focus, concentration or even to prevent the onset of neurological diseases such as Alzheimer’s.

• Optimize Sleep: Using sleep tracker apps or devices gives us often surprising data, which can allow us to adjust our routines and habits for improved sleep, and the right kind. Supplements such as a pineal bioregulator can further assist to improve deep sleep phases to ensure we are getting restorative rest. It does this by regulating the gland that that produces melatonin – our sleep hormone, and helps sleep quality by increasing or regulating melatonin levels. This helps regulate your circadian rhythm, signalling to your body and brain that it is time for sleep.

• Longevity and Anti-Aging: Supplements such as resveratrol and anti-aging bioregulators have anti-aging qualities . Active ingredients include antioxidants, peptides, retinoids, resveratrol or NAD+. These supplements tend to target at a cellular level to slow down aging, improve skin, and improve mitochondrial energy which is the core energy source for the whole body.

• Better Mood and Mental Well-being: Practices like regular meditation or the use of adaptogenic herbs like Ashwagandha can help manage stress and improve mood.

• Personalise Nutrition: A simple test can tell you if you are intolerant to certain foods, and adjusting your diet can have an enormous effect on everything from digestion to brain clarity. You may not have an allergy, but even a sensitivity can cause a breadth of issues throughout the body which you might have become used to living with. 
  

• Increase Energy Levels: Adjusting to a ketogenic diet can lead to a state of ketosis, where the body burns fat for energy, leading to consistent energy levels. A ketogenic diet usually consists of high protein such as meat, chicken, fish or eggs, high good-fats such as avocados, olive oil, nuts, seeds, and around 100-200g of carbohydrates a day.
  

• Tackle Dips in Energy: The use of supplements such an adrenal bioregulator can also help with energy levels and afternoon dips. Many people suffer from adrenal fatigue due to due to excessive caffeine intake over time, over training, past pregnancies, and sometimes just life. This can cause you to feel drained, have extreme afternoon dips and can even affect your sleep quality. Adrenal bioregulators are amino acid extracts from the bovine adrenal glands, and there regulate / reset your adrenals which can mitigate the issues associated with adrenal fatigue.

• Enhance Immune System: Incorporating foods high in Vitamin C, like oranges or bell peppers and using supplements such at a thymus bioregulator can help strengthen the immune system.

• Tailor Fitness Routines: Date is everything when it comes to wellness, so apps like MyFitnessPal which track activities, caloric burn, and adjust workouts based on performance metrics. Everyone responds

• Deepened Self-Awareness: Maintain a daily journal to reflect on physical feelings or mood swings, mindfulness meditation. The use of certain adaptogens such as Lions Mane can also help to pinpoint triggers or patterns. Adaptogens, derived from vegetables, have a natural method of adapting to the body’s stress responses. They can help balance the fight or flight response by creating calm when required or a little boost if needed, and and they help the body to maintain optimal homeostasis.