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Can diet affect your mental health?

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Replies

  • Clawsal
    Clawsal Posts: 255 Member
    In my opinion there is a spiral... you feel crappy, so you eat crappy, so you feel crappier so you eat crappier. Then you get fat(ter) and feel worse and you pretend you just don't care, so you don't take care of yourself and just keep feeling worse and worse. At some point you don't even recognize yourself anymore...

    (I should have written that paragraph in the first person.)
  • theresejesu
    theresejesu Posts: 120 Member
    perkymommy wrote: »
    Yes and it can affect a child's mental health as well. Give your kids sodas and sugary crap or fast food all day and you'll have a grouchy kid that won't listen to you. I've actually had days like that with mine when they had too much junk and it's drastically different than when they eat fresh fruits or veggies and meats all day :D

    I get grouchy if I eat fast food or anything greasy or get over full when I eat. Depends on the food though.

    I used to have a book about Food and Moods and it was very interesting. It showed lists of foods you should not eat together that would affect mood and it was very true because I tried some and could tell a difference.

    I used to have a book like that too, but lost it. Do you remember what it was called?
  • SiegfriedXXL
    SiegfriedXXL Posts: 219 Member
    My data is purely anecdotal but here we go:

    - When I restrict calories, I feel much better. Clearer mind, less anxiety, better sleep
    - When I exercise, my depression symptoms improve markedly, even from just getting my 10k steps in. On the days that I don't, I have less energy and spend more time in my own head
    - I've also been eating low carb and noticed an even greater shift in mental clarity and general lessening of anxiety. This could be attributed to the first two factors and I'm not sure it contributes but I've noticed steady improvement in all areas of mental health.

    Full disclaimer: I've been diagnosed with depression only, not an anxiety disorder or any more serious mental illnesses. Again this is anecdotal but it's what I've noticed.
  • Panda8ach
    Panda8ach Posts: 518 Member
    My data is purely anecdotal but here we go:

    - When I restrict calories, I feel much better. Clearer mind, less anxiety, better sleep
    - When I exercise, my depression symptoms improve markedly, even from just getting my 10k steps in. On the days that I don't, I have less energy and spend more time in my own head
    - I've also been eating low carb and noticed an even greater shift in mental clarity and general lessening of anxiety. This could be attributed to the first two factors and I'm not sure it contributes but I've noticed steady improvement in all areas of mental health.

    Full disclaimer: I've been diagnosed with depression only, not an anxiety disorder or any more serious mental illnesses. Again this is anecdotal but it's what I've noticed.

    Hey.. Every mental illness is as serious as the next. Yours is a bad to you as anyone's. I'm super happy you've found some relief :) Exercise produces the happy hormone that us peeps with depression struggle to produce so yes, it will help. I have depression and general anxiety disorder as well as BPD... The original claim was that poor diet CAUSES mental health problems which I believe it does not. There was a claim that schizophrenia can be cured by a low carb diet.... I just find that a ridiculous thing to say. I'm not belittling depression or any mental health problems.. I just think claiming I got poorly because of my diet and extreme thing to say.

    Again, super happy you've found something to ease your suffering :)
  • snickerscharlie
    snickerscharlie Posts: 8,581 Member
    WinoGelato wrote: »
    sporangia wrote: »
    Out of curiosity, what did she think the connection was between gut issues and ear infections? Just that a healthy gut might cure one problem so it might cure them all? Or was it to help re-establish his gut flora after the antibiotics did their damage to it?

    I think it was more about re-establishing gut flora because it might be so inter-related to our whole body. She'd say things like "Make sure he eats lots of fruits and vegetables and yogurt for the next month, you don't want to mess with bad microbes, we're going to be talking about guts a lot in the next 10 years."
    Depauperating the gut of bacteria can predispose it to colonization by non-beneficial microbes. The recommendation to consume yogurt and other foods with microbes is simply to aid recovery of a balanced, healthy community within the gut. Recent studies show the gut microflora responds very quickly to what we eat.

    I am extremely skeptical of diet being a primary cause of a mental illness, although in this case the OP did not define what was meant by "mentally unwell".

    It is not logical to think that humans have evolved to be so sensitive to diet that eating poorly results in erratic and "mentally unwell" behavior. However, the opposite seems logical... people who are suffering from a mental disorder may have diminished capacity to care for themselves and resort to eating foods that are easy to obtain, which typically means low quality (high fat, low nutrient) foods.

    It isn't a matter of humans evolving to be so sensitive, but rather we haven't developed the capacity to not be sensitive to anti-nutrients that negatively affect us, including negatively impacting our neurotransmitters.

    Garbage in, garbage out, in more ways than one.

    Ironic statement is ironic.

    Context seems to be so easily dismissed in these discussions.

    Yes. Yes it does.