Simple Lifestyle Strategies for Improving Mood, Cognitive Function and Overall Health!
- Kerry Thomas
- Oct 20, 2019
- 8 min read
Updated: Dec 17, 2019
Article written by Kerry Thomas M.Ed., LPC
We are living in a really exciting time in the field of mental health! The frontiers of medical research are uncovering a completely different understanding of what underscores our physical and mental health and showing us just how intertwined these are. These new revelations are also showing us how much power we have to help elevate our moods and enhance brain function and overall health. The side effects are life enhancing across the board and include a much stronger immune system, higher levels of energy, mental clarity and the ability to focus.
So what are some simple strategies that you can use to begin the process of taking back your mental health when it comes to diet and lifestyle? Let’s get started!
Strategies to Decrease Inflammation.
There are multiple studies that demonstrate the relationship between inflammatory processes in the body and the onset of depression and anxiety (1,3,4). Therefore, it is imperative that we keep an eye on limiting our exposure to environmental toxins and engage in strategies that will help lower inflammation in the body. It is important to note that inflammation is the first response of your body’s immune system, so engaging in these practices will help you stave off illness as well as enhance mood. Bonus! So, here are just 3 simple ideas to help you decrease inflammation in the body.
1) Consume adequate omega-3 fatty acids. Studies have shown that consuming omega-3 fatty acids can have a powerful impact on fighting depression. (5) And of course they do! They are powerhouses when it comes to fighting inflammation. I know there is a lot of hype around using fish oil to accomplish this task. I am a little concerned about the mercury associated with consuming fish products to this degree. Instead, how about adding some seeds to your diet? Seeds like pumpkin, chia, flax and hemp seeds are not only a wonderful source of omega-3’s, they are also packed with other important vitamins, minerals like magnesium shown to enhance mood and lower anxiety, and are also a great source of protein! You can put them on your salad, hide them in your morning oatmeal or add them to your favorite smoothies!
2) Choose healthy fats. Our brains are composed mostly from fat. Yes, as disgusting as that sounds, it is true. So, limiting our consumption of fat has eerily corresponded with significant rises in Dementia and Alzheimer’s. In fact, I remember seeing a study that demonstrated significantly improved mental clarity in dementia patients just by giving them two tablespoons of coconut oil. However, much of the options that we are offered are highly processed and extremely unhealthy. Just replacing the highly processed vegetable oils high in trans-fats with extra virgin olive oil, avocado oil and coconut oil as well as making sure we are eating plenty of avocados, almonds and salmon go a long way towards improving brain function and lowering inflammation.
3) Sweat! Yes, that’s right. Sweating is one of the body’s primary means of detoxing. If you aren’t sweating, the toxins that we are all being exposed to whether in our food, water, air or in our personal care products are all building up in your system with no where to go. This is a recipe for inflammation. For those of you who don’t like to work up a sweat exercising, try spending some time in a sauna at your local health club. Even if you were to add one sweat session a week, you’d be better off than never sweating at all!
Enhance Your Microbiome
Turns out we humans are complex, host organisms for extremely diverse communities of microbes that we have evolved with since the dawn of our arrival on this planet. Our relationship to this community of microbes has been very mutually beneficial as we serve each other in important ways. In fact, our gut microbiome is now known to be the chemical factories for our brains, as most of the ~200 neurotransmitters are either made here or made by the by-products of these microbes, as well as being the home of the vast majority, like roughly 80-95%, of our immune system. There are so many studies now that confirm that the microbes in your belly effect mood and cognitive function and overall health it is staggering (6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13). So, enhancing this organ with its diverse population of bacteria is like a one-two punch for improving our overall health and mental health. How can we support this enormously important community of microbes?
1) Drink water that is not full of chlorine. I love when I see my clients coming in to my office carrying their water bottles! We need to be drinking half our body weight in ounces of water every day! For example, if you weigh 140 lbs., that means you should be drinking at least 70 ounces of water every day. This helps brain function and improves your body’s ability to engage in that all-important detoxing we discussed earlier. However, if you are drinking water with chlorine, well, what does chlorine do? It kills bacteria. While that may be a very important thing for us to do in our water, it does not equate to wonderful outcomes for our gut bacteria. Find a good outlet for some chlorine free water where you live. I have been getting reverse osmosis water from my local Whole Foods or Earth Fare. Health food outlets typically have water dispensing options for this reason. There is also the option of contacting a water company and having them bring a healthier version of water into your home. Or, last but certainly not least, putting a reverse osmosis filter on your home’s water system.
2) Drinking and eating foods that will put lots of healthy bacteria back into your gut. We all need to do this, no one’s microbiome hasn’t been compromised. There are simple ways that we can enhance and repopulate our microbiome through what we eat and drink. For example, drinking kombucha and kefir, eating fermented foods like sauerkraut and kimchi from time to time. Taking a high quality, liquid probiotic is also a really good idea.
3) Limit or eliminate low quality, nutrient deficient processed “foods.” As good as those foods may taste, a poor diet loaded with refined sugars, trans fats, artificial flavorings, and other harmful ingredients that cause shifts in your microbiome that are detrimental to your microbial balance. Processed foods break down into compounds that the bad guys in your gut love to gobble, and if you feed them too much, they’ll grow to outnumber the good guys — a clear marker of an unhealthy gut. When this happens, not only can this lead to impaired cognitive function and mood, it leads to issues like Leaky Gut and autoimmune disorders.
4) Eat a diet high in fiber rich vegetables. Much like the bad bacteria like to eat the simple carbohydrate, sugar rich, ultra-processed “foods”, the good bacteria will feed off the vegetables. Makes sense, right? As an added bonus, you will be introducing more nutrients into your diet. Your brain is the most nutrient demanding organ in your body. Most of the nutrients you take in go towards helping your brain function, not to mention they will go a long way towards helping all of your other organs function better as well!
5) Choose organic food options whenever possible. Now you might be wondering why switching from the genetically modified, industrially raised foods to organically grown food has anything at all to do with your microbiome. First and foremost, the modifications made to the food were made in order to allow the food to be liberally doused in the herbicide glyphosate. So why would this be an issue? Glyphosate, which is the chief chemical ingredient in the herbicide RoundUp, is an antibiotic. Second, the vegetables grown in this fashion have a much lower vitamin and nutrient profile. Simply put, these agricultural chemicals chelate nutrients from the soil and thus inhibit the nutrients available to the vegetables as they grow. Nutrient deprived soil leads to nutrient deprived food. And as the human brain is the most metabolically demanding organ in your body, meaning it requires more nutrition than any of your other organs for proper function, making sure it is well fed is essential to mood and cognitive function.
What you have just read is a very basic beginning to how we can enhance mood, sleep, cognitive function, overall health through dietary and lifestyle changes. Just by adopting some of the strategies here, you will begin to feel enormous, positive shifts in how you feel both physically and mentally. I love to hear how making these types of changes improve my client’s moods. It is impossible to overstate how much of an impact simple changes like this can make. Try them for a month and see if you don’t begin to feel better. You have nothing to lose and everything to gain.
Kerry Thomas M.Ed., LPC is a Cognitive Behavioral Therapist with 20 years of experience specializing in the treatment of eating disorders, depression, and anxiety in both adolescents and adults. Her therapeutic approach integrates traditional as well as holistic methods of addressing mental and emotional wellness. Kerry has worked with clients all around the United States as well as internationally. Kerry can be reached at klthomas14@hotmail.com.
Sources
1)Study; Inflammation and Its Discontents: The Role of Cytokines in the Pathophysiology of Major Depression
2)Study; Efficacy of anti-inflammatory treatment on major depressive disorder or depressive symptoms: meta-analysis of clinical trials.
3)Study; The role of inflammation in depression: from evolutionary imperative to modern treatment target.
4)Study; Inflammation causes mood changes through alterations in subgenual cingulate activity and mesolimbic connectivity.
5) Omega-3 Fatty Acids and Depression: Scientific Evidence and Biological Mechanisms
6)Study; “Gut microbiome composition is associated with temperament during early childhood”
Differences in gut microbiome composition, including alpha diversity, beta diversity, and abundances of specific bacterial species, were observed in association with temperament in toddlers. Among both boys and girls, greater Surgency/Extraversion was associated greater phylogenetic diversity. In girls only, higher Effortful Control was associated with a lower SDI score and differences in both beta diversity and Rikenellaceae were observed in relation to Fear.
7)Microbiome, Mental Wellness and Mealtime. Ted Talk, Lisa Kilgour
8)How Your Gut Influences Your Mental Health: It’s Practically a Second Brain Dr. Emeran Mayer
9)Article; Scientific American, “Mental Health May Depend on Creatures in Your Gut.”
10) Article;Changing gut bacteria through diet affects brain function
UCLA researchers now have the first evidence that bacteria ingested in food can affect brain function in humans. In an early proof-of-concept study of healthy women, they found that women who regularly consumed beneficial bacteria known as probiotics through yogurt showed altered brain function, both while in a resting state and in response to an emotion-recognition task.
11) Paper, Beneficial gut bacteria reduce anxiety and depression in mice. Bravo et al, Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. Aug 29. [Epub ahead of print], 2011.
The mice who received the probiotics showed significantly fewer stress, anxiety and depression-related behaviours than the unsupplemented mice (controls). Not only was their behaviour different, but their levels of stress hormones were lower too. The researchers also observed altered neurotransmitter activity in the brains of the supplemented mice, suggesting a direct effect on brain chemistry.
12) Study; Control of Brain Development, Function, and Behavior by the Microbiome
This study coming out of the Division of Biology & Biological Engineering, California Institute of Technology,
It is becoming increasingly recognized that psychiatric and neurological illnesses are often highly correlated with gastrointestinal distressincluding schizophrenia, autism, neurodegenerative diseases, and depression.
40 to 90 percent of all children with autism suffer from gastrointestinal symptoms
They go on to say that not only does the microbiota have a huge impact on the hosts’ neurological function, leading to effects on mood, like depression and anxiety but emphasize the effects on host behavior, including social behavior, and even mate choice. They echo the profound impact in shaping the host immune system, discuss the effects on neurodegeneration and repair during the process of aging, neurological trauma, and disease
13)Study; The Gut Microbiome and the Brain
They (bacteria) influence memory, mood, and cognition and are clinically and therapeutically relevant to a range of disorders, including alcoholism, chronic fatigue syndrome, fibromyalgia, and restless legs syndrome. Their role in multiple sclerosis and the neurologic manifestations of celiac disease is being studied. Nutritional tools for altering the gut microbiome therapeutically include changes in diet, probiotics, and prebiotics.
14) Study; Social behavior and the microbiome
We focus on two recent discoveries: (i) that social interactions can affect the taxonomic and genic composition of animal microbiomes, with consequences for microbiome function and potentially host fitness, and (ii) that microbiomes can affect host social behavior by producing chemical signals used in social communication and by directly influencing host nervous systems. Investigating the reciprocal relationships between host behavior and the microbiome thus promises to shed new light on both the evolution of host social behavior and microbial transmission strategies.
Comments