Dealing With Mental Health — Should Our Diet Play A Larger Role In Combating This Issue?

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What should we have for dinner?

This is the first line in Michael Pollan’s widely popular book “Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals.” It’s a question we all ask ourselves everyday and one which many of us continue to struggle with.

Michael Pollan is one of America’s foremost food writers. First published in 2006, Omnivore’s Dilemma is arguably his best book. In it, he issues this statement:

“This book is a long and fairly involved answer to this seemingly simple question. Along the way, it also tries to figure out how such a simple question could ever have gotten so complicated. As a culture we seem to have arrived at place where whatever native wisdom we may once have possessed about eating has been replaced by confusion and anxiety. Somehow this most elemental of activities — figuring out what to eat — has come to require a remarkable amount of expert help. How did we ever get to a point where we need investigative journalists to tell us where our food comes from and nutritionists to determine the dinner menu?”

The narrative of food and the way in which we consumed our nutrients, was back then, a must for any food journalist. Pollan’s book helped pave the way for a good food movement and spoke to many in society wanting things to be more pure and as they once were. Healthy eating was on the tip of the tongue for us all, and his wisdom and proverbial narrative charm stirred out a much needed discourse.

Thirteen years later, the textual seeds he planted have yielded monumental growth concerning healthy eating for all. But as nutrition and diet have come to play a vital role in the emergence of the organic and juice way of life, a new topic of importance, one centered around the well being of the mind, has slowly emerged. Pollan himself has been at the forefront of this discussion once again with his release this past year of a new book aptly titled, “How to Change Your Mind: What the New Science of Psychedelics Teaches Us About Consciousness, Dying, Addiction, Depression, and Transcendence.” In it, much in the same fashion of Omnivore’s Dilemma, Pollan takes the reader on a journey of discovery as he explores the world of psychedelics (some of which is first hand experience by the way) and the power they wield with regards to the mind and consciousness. As was the case at the beginning of Omnivore’s Dilemma, questions are posed in How to Change Your Mind with regards to well being, food and one’s mental state. In the spirit of both books, I’d like to offer up a few of my own questions with regards to the food we eat and how those choices affect our mental health.

  1. How important is food to our mental well being?

  2. Can eating certain foods help alleviate or even prevent some mental health issues?

  3. Should our diet play a larger role when dealing with our own mental health?

I ask these questions based solely on the rise and accepted notion that our mental health has for a long time been a neglected aspect of discussions around our nutrition. In combating this issue, there are some facts that should be noted.

As per the Canadian Mental Health Association:

  • In any given year, 1 in 5 Canadians will experience a mental health problem or illness.

  • By age 40, about 50% of the population will have or have had a mental illness.

In researching this column, I found the issue of mental health to be poorly understood. What I’ve come to learn was that there was way more to this issue than I and so many of you probably knew and probably wanted to believe.

Stereotyping and pop culture references helped to cultivate a stigma and image of what a person with mental illness looks like. Movies such as One Flew Over A Cuckoo’s Nest influenced my perception of mental health, when in reality there is so much more to it.

As I’ve come to learn, those who suffer from depression, post traumatic stress syndrome (PTSD), obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) or even anxiety are less likely to show the obvious symptoms one commonly associates with the more accepted and standardized forms of mental illness, thus treatment is often neglected, overlooked or simply untreated.

“I’m not crazy, why would I need help?” has been a common phrase many of us have probably thrown out to our friends and family or even to ourselves when assessing our mental health status. It isn’t easy to come out and just say, “hey, I’m dealing with x and I think I need help” since our culture has been bred on the notion that one must be tough. A call for assistance when struggling to “handle one’s shit” can and often does come across to many as sounding weak. Hence, what do many of us do? Nothing.

However, times have changed and our ability to see, catch, and recognize the patterns and early warning signs of mental illness, as well as our approach to dealing with these problems, has greatly increased to a point where awareness has now become a thing. I believe Mr. Pollan’s latest book is a perfect example of this.

We’re no longer told to keep things in and deal with them independently. Seeking help is encouraged and those who do are lauded for being courageous enough to act in their own self-interest. NBA player Kevin Love of the Cleveland Cavaliers is a great example of this. He came out two years ago saying that he was and had been dealing with depression for some time. Individuals such as Mr. Love have recognized that they have a problem and it’s not a bad thing to do something about it. This is where organizations such as the new Vancouver hospitality driven non-profit Mind the Bar come in. Their aim is to provide resources for people in the hospitality industry who are dealing with thoughts of suicide, depression, anxiety, and workplace harassment. Ten years ago, I wonder if they’d even have existed?

**I spoke with two of the founders from Mind the Bar recently on my podcast. Have a listen if you’d like to learn more about their story.

Nevertheless, as I inquired earlier, how does our diet fit in all of this? If I were someone like Kevin Love, should I be looking at my diet just as much as seeking a psychiatrist?

Before I go any further, I’d like to try and answer the three questions I posed earlier.

  1. How important is food to our mental well being?

If you think about this question in its simplest form, your brain has to be at the center of your dietary health. It’s on all the time as it performs and regulates the body’s functions 24/7. Fuel and plenty of it, is what it craves. But it wasn’t until recently when scientists started correlating what the body needs and how this affects our mental state and moods.

As per the Harvard Medical School:

  • It makes sense. If your brain is deprived of good-quality nutrition, or if free radicals or damaging inflammatory cells are circulating within the brain’s enclosed space, further contributing to brain tissue injury, consequences are to be expected. What’s interesting is that for many years, the medical field did not fully acknowledge the connection between mood and food.

  • Serotonin is a neurotransmitter that helps regulate sleep and appetite, mediate moods, and inhibit pain. Since about 95% of your serotonin is produced in your gastrointestinal tract, and your gastrointestinal tract is lined with a hundred million nerve cells, or neurons, it makes sense that the inner workings of your digestive system don’t just help you digest food, but also guide your emotions.

  • Other studies have compared “traditional” diets, like the Mediterranean diet and the traditional Japanese diet, to a typical “Western” diet and have shown that the risk of depression is 25% to 35% lower in those who eat a traditional diet. Scientists account for this difference because these traditional diets tend to be high in vegetables, fruits, unprocessed grains, and fish and seafood, and to contain only modest amounts of lean meats and dairy. They are also void of processed and refined foods and sugars, which are staples of the “Western” dietary pattern.

What this information tells us is that food is vitally important when it comes to brain optimization. But what is optimization? What does the brain actually need to function nutritionally?

As per The University of Washington:

  • Your brain is like a car. A car needs gasoline, oil, brake fluid and other materials to run properly. Your brain also needs special materials to run properly: glucose, vitamins, minerals and other essential chemicals. For example, the fuel (energy) for your brain is glucose. You can get glucose by eating carbohydrates or other foods that can be converted to glucose.

  • Your brain must manufacture the right proteins and fats to do things such as grow new connections or add myelin, the fatty sheath to axons. You do this by digesting proteins and fats in food and using the pieces, that is, the amino acids and fatty acids, to make the new brain proteins and fats. Without the correct amount and balance of particular building blocks, your brain will not work properly. Too little (deficiency) or too much (overabundance) of the necessary nutrient can affect the nervous system.

2. Can eating certain foods help alleviate or even prevent some mental health issues?

The answer to this question is a resounding yes. Healthy eating does equate to positive mental health. You don’t need to be a doctor or psychiatrist to know this. As I’ve sourced out above, your brain is like a car and needs certain sources of energy to function properly. If it doesn’t get them, things begin to go wrong.

If you want a healthy body and brain, eating a diet rich in fruits, vegetables, fish and whole grains is the right way to proceed. Typically this is referred to as the Mediterranean diet. The key to this way of eating is getting us to follow what we know to be true. Most who smoke know it is bad for them. This however, has not stopped the public from smoking. The hope here is getting our society to realize that if you are struggling with depression or anxiety, as two notable examples, then what you are eating might have a larger role to play in how you’re feeling.

In the UK for example, use of antidepressants has more than doubled in recent years. This shouldn’t come as a surprise as it has been noted that citizens of the UK live an extremely unhealthy lifestyle. The Guardian put out a feature back in 2017 in which they quote a study led by Lina Begdache, assistant professor of health and wellness studies at Binghamton, New York, which “found that young adults (under 30) who ate fast food more than three times a week scored higher on levels of mental distress.” It should not be difficult to put two and two together. What you eat definitely has a massive impact on how your brain works.

In researching this topic, I came across an excellent study titled, “Nutritional Therapies for Mental Disorders.” It was written by Shaheen E Lakhan and Karen F. Vieira from the Global Neuroscience Initiative Foundation. Here are some of their findings:

  • The four most common mental disorders that cause disabilities are: major depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, and obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD).

  • The most common nutritional deficiencies seen in mental disorder patients are of omega-3 fatty acids, B vitamins, minerals, and amino acids

Depression:

  • Decreased mood, increased sadness and anxiety, a loss of appetite, and a loss of interest in pleasurable activities.

  • Depression has for some time now been known to be associated with deficiencies in neurotransmitters such as serotonin, dopamine, noradrenaline.

  • Since the consumption of omega-3 fatty acids from fish and other sources has declined in most populations, the incidence of major depression has increased.

  • No matter which mechanism(s) prove to be true, epidemiological data and clinical studies already show that omega-3 fatty acids can effectively treat depression.

Bipolar Disorder:

  • A patient suffering from major depression may also present symptoms such as recurring episodes of debilitating depression, uncontrollable mania, hypomania, or a mixed state (a manic and depressive episode) which is clinically diagnosed as bipolar disorder.

  • Some biochemical abnormalities in people with bipolar disorder include oversensitivity to acetylcholine, excess vanadium, vitamin B deficiencies, a taurine deficiency, anemia, omega-3 fatty acid deficiencies, and vitamin C deficiency.

Schizophrenia:

  • Schizophrenia is a mental disorder that disrupts a person’s normal perception of reality. Schizophrenic patients usually suffer from hallucinations, paranoia, delusions, and speech/thinking impairments. These symptoms are typically presented during adolescence.

  • A Danish study showed that better prognoses for schizophrenic patients strongly correlate with living in a country where there is a high consumption of omega-3 fatty acids.

Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD):

  • Obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) is an anxiety disorder that causes recurring stressful thoughts or obsessions that are followed by compulsions, which are repeated in an uncontrollable manner as a means of repressing the stressful thought.

  • It is clear that nutrients which increase serotonin levels will reduce the symptoms of OCD. The amino acid tryptophan is a precursor to serotonin, and tryptophan supplements (which are better than 5-Hydroxytryptophan) will increase serotonin levels and treat OCD.

As can be seen here, a correlation between many of the necessary omega-3 fatty acids (often found in fish) and certain amino acids have come to show a binding link between four of the most prevalent mental disorders we knowingly face. Obviously a large variance of other factors are at play here, including hereditary and environmental. Nevertheless, what has been shown to be of factual interest is that a diet lacking in several fundamental building blocks of optimal brain health can and do have severe consequences on one’s ability to possibly alleviate or even prevent the onset of a mental disorder.

3. Should our diet play a larger role when dealing with our own mental health?

Absolutely!

In a recent episode of the Gastropod podcast, hosts Nicola Twilley and Cynthia Graber discussed how emerging research in Alzheimer’s treatment as well as a shift in approach from cure to prevention has led the leaders from the Alzheimer Prevention Clinic “…to see whether they can prove that implementing changes in diet and lifestyle in middle age can actually prevent Alzheimer’s.” This shift in focus at this level is amazing to hear as it proves that nutritional psychiatry is on the right track towards understanding the correlation of what we eat and how we feel physically and mentally. Aging gracefully should no longer be a term applied to one’s physical self. How the mind ages could sow the seeds for future prosperity and fulfillment.

In addition to this, The Lancet just published a report this week in which they conclude that globally, one in five deaths could be prevented with proper nutrition and diet. This number is staggering, and it reveals that changing our perception of food is vital when considering its connections to mental health. Getting the information out there, just as society once did with cigarette smoking, will not be enough to get people to eat better. Government and municipalities need to step in and lead the way towards giving people access and opportunity towards making smarter choices.

As the science and awareness towards the links between mental disorders and diet begin to converge and gain more prominence, understanding the implications and the choices we make each day should not be lost on anyone. What you eat will play a major role in how you act, feel and age mentally. The conversation has been started. Science is beginning to weigh in. It’s now on us to learn and move forward with this information. What we’ll want for dinner tomorrow depends on it.