Clarissa

Berberine and Sleep: The Real Science vs. the Marketing

Berberine, nicknamed “nature’s Ozempic,” has become one of the biggest supplement trends of 2025 and 2026, and it does have real, well-documented mechanisms behind its blood-sugar effects: it activates AMPK, a key cellular energy-regulating enzyme, promotes glucose uptake into cells, and inhibits the liver’s glucose production. That part of the story holds up. Even so,

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Cortisol Face: What Doctors Actually Say About It

“Cortisol face,” the TikTok claim that chronically high stress hormone levels cause a rounder, puffier, “swollen” appearance in ordinary stressed-out people, is not a real medical condition. Endocrinologists have been direct about this: Dr. Luma Ghalib, medical director of the Pituitary Center at Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center, states plainly that there’s no real

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Microplastics and Sleep: What’s Real vs. What’s Marketing

Concern about microplastics is legitimate at a general health level: these particles have been genuinely detected in human blood, lungs, placenta, and, in a notable 2024 study, brain tissue. What’s much less established, despite a wave of social media and mattress-marketing content connecting the dots for you, is any direct research linking microplastics specifically to

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Peptides and Sleep: What the FDA Panel Actually Voted On

In July 2026, the FDA’s Pharmacy Compounding Advisory Committee narrowly recommended six experimental peptides, including Epitalon, which is promoted for sleep and longevity, for the 503A Bulks List, a decision that has already generated significant scrutiny. Three things are worth understanding clearly. First, this vote is not FDA approval: it’s a recommendation about whether compounding

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CGM and Sleep: What the New Research Actually Shows

Continuous glucose monitors (CGMs) have moved from a diabetes management tool into a mainstream biohacking product, now available over the counter without a prescription (Dexcom’s Stelo, Abbott’s Lingo), often marketed with promises about optimizing sleep through glucose insights. The underlying bidirectional relationship between sleep and blood glucose is real and reasonably well-established, but mostly in

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Reishi Mushroom for Sleep: The New Trial, With a Caveat

Reishi mushroom (Ganoderma lucidum) has over 2,000 years of traditional use in East Asian medicine as a calming tonic, and it contains compounds, triterpenes (ganoderic acids) and beta-glucan polysaccharides, with plausible mechanisms for supporting sleep, including GABA receptor activity and modulation of the stress-response (HPA axis) system. Most of this mechanistic evidence, though, comes from

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