Why can one person drink a flat white at 3pm and sleep soundly, while another lies awake until midnight? Why does one glass of wine turn some people bright red? A lot of it comes down to your genes.

In this solo episode, I break down the caffeine and alcohol genes I look at in my clients' myDNA reports, what your results can and can't tell you, and the simple changes that follow.

In this episode:
- How CYP1A2 shapes how long caffeine hangs around, and why your cut-off time matters
- What the research shows about caffeine, genetics and athletic performance
- ADORA2A, and why some people feel caffeine far more strongly than others
- The ALDH2 variant behind the alcohol flush, and why it matters for more than a red face
- The ripple effects: vitamin B1, REM sleep, APOE, and the unfiltered coffee and cholesterol link
- Why genetics loads the gun, and environment pulls the trigger

Find out what your genes say with my DNA Blueprint Package, available in New Zealand, Australia and the USA:
genetics, DNA test, nutrigenomics, myDNA, caffeine, coffee, alcohol, alcohol flush, red face after drinking, ALDH2, CYP1A2, ADORA2A, APOE, caffeine metabolism, sleep, REM sleep, thiamine, vitamin B1, cholesterol, longevity, personalised health, functional medicine, Lisa Tamati, Pushing the Limits

More on thiamine: my full interview with Elliot Overton
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8qwb_XmDqqk

Chapters:
0:00 Same coffee, different genes
0:18 Why blanket health advice fails
1:00 Your caffeine gene: CYP1A2
2:48 Caffeine, sleep and the cut-off
3:27 Caffeine and athletic performance
4:34 ADORA2A: how strongly you feel caffeine
5:35 Alcohol and the ALDH2 gene
7:45 Ripple effects: B1, sleep, APOE and coffee
10:25 Genes load the gun
11:14 Your next step

Educational content only. Genetics shows tendencies and priorities, not diagnoses.

I ran 70,000km across the world's toughest deserts to lose weight, and I got heavier, more inflamed and sicker every year. I assumed the problem was discipline. It took one genetic test to show me it never was.

In this solo episode I make the case that your DNA is the single most valuable test you will ever do. Not because it tells you the most, but because it is the only test whose result is still true in fifty years. Your bloods reflect the last few weeks. Your microbiome shifts with every trip and every course of antibiotics. Your hormones move across the month and the decade. Your DNA does not move at all.

I go through all eight areas a comprehensive genetic panel covers, what you actually learn from each one, and why a variant is a tendency rather than a verdict.

IN THIS EPISODE

My own results, and the cascade that explains twenty-five years of getting it wrong
Why genetics is different from every other test you will ever do
Genetics loads the gun, environment pulls the trigger: what that actually means in practice
The single-gene trap, and why the MTHFR obsession has it upside down
Digestion, energy, hormones, stress and cognition, inflammation, athletic performance, DNA repair and detoxification, one at a time
The difference between nutritional dosing and nutrigenomic dosing, and why more vitamin D was not working for me
Why genetics alone is not enough, and what has to sit alongside it
Why it is almost never discipline

THE DNA BLUEPRINT PACKAGE

Practitioner-only genetic testing, ninety-two genes and a hundred and thirteen variants across a report of roughly a hundred and twenty-one pages, read by me alongside a full Cell Blueprint assessment and turned into a complete personal health programme in a ninety-minute one-on-one.

Available throughout New Zealand. Australia coming soon.
https://www.lisatamati.com/dna/

GO DEEPER

Dr Sam Shay on methylation, inflammation and exercise-induced obesity:
https://www.lisatamati.com/podcast--dr-sam-shay_1/

Dr Mansoor Mohammed on how your variants change what you eat and how you train:
https://www.lisatamati.com/podcast-mansoor-mohammed/

Read the long-form article:
https://www.lisatamati.com/blog/

ALSO FROM LISA

Re:juvenate Pro, the foundational immune ageing formula from Aevum Labs:
https://shop.lisatamati.com/pages/rejuvenate

Re:NRG, our next-generation NAD support, is coming. Join the waitlist for first access:
https://shop.lisatamati.com/pages/nad-next-gen-waitlist

Weekly longevity insights, free:
https://www.lisatamati.com/lisa

Questions or feedback: lisa@lisatamati.com

Pushing the Limits is hosted by Lisa Tamati, genetics practitioner, co-founder and Chief Science Officer of Aevum Labs, and former professional ultra-endurance athlete. Author of three books and one audiobook.

Your Immune Age Is Lying To You. Here's How To Read Your Blood And Fix It.

How old is your immune system, really?

It's probably not the same age as you are — and that gap may be the single biggest hidden driver of how well you age, how fast you recover, and how long you stay healthy. In this episode I break down what actually happens to your immune system as the years tick over — immunosenescence (the immune system getting weaker) and inflammaging (the silent, smouldering inflammation that never switches off) — and why almost every disease of ageing sits somewhere on that spectrum.

Then I get practical. I'll show you how to measure your immune age from a standard blood test you can get anywhere in the world, using seven scientifically validated ratios (NLR, PLR, MLR, LMR, SII, PIV and ELR) synthesised into a single Immune Resilience Index. We cover the cutting-edge science from Dr David Furman's 1000 Immunomes Project and the iAge inflammatory clock, the TRIIM and TRIIM-X thymus-regeneration trials, the gut-immune connection (70% of your immune cells live in your gut), the cytokines of ageing (IL-6, TNF-alpha, IL-1 beta, NF-kB and IL-10), and how our Re:juvenate Pro formulation was built to target exactly these pathways. If you want to stop guessing and start tracking the system that runs your healthspan, this one's for you

RELATED EPISODES — WATCH THESE NEXT

Dr David Furman | The 1000 Immunomes Project and the inflammatory clock of aging: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HFOSqEY7CNY

Dr Rod Claycomb | Colostrum, immune proteins and immune resilience: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VyOfcx9gvbE

Aevum Labs panel | Peter Lehrke, medical herbalist Mike Eyres and Dr Rod Claycomb: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EstwHB3p3nI

Dr Elizabeth Yurth | Immune aging and how to slow it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h_-_rFXcBIA

THE SCIENCE + RE:JUVENATE PRO Re:juvenate Pro at Aevum Labs: https://aevumlabs.co.nz/products/re-juvenate Aevum Labs: https://www.aevumlabs.co.nz

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