DIETING WHILE FIGHTING DEPRESSION

BY: FITZ-GEORGE RATTRAY

If you often experience feelings of prolonged sadness, despair, anxiety, worry or believe you are suffering from depression, don’t stop at uncertainty or self-diagnosis. Speak with your family doctor regarding counseling options.

People have weight issues for a range of reasons including upbringing, society, habituation, genetics, friends, the effects of advertising, stress, and more, but we are looking at weight issues due to depression. It is an entirely unique emotionally connected state and as such it has its own unique connection with eating. 

For most people emotions are varied, times of happiness or sadness, elation or misery, lasting for a reasonable period then returning to a comfortable, functional emotional baseline.  But for millions of people suffering from depression, their baseline is anything but comfortable, regardless of their circumstances in life. Their baseline sits in a seemingly uncontrollably, deep, sustained sadness.  Their worst feelings of despair and angst gripping and enveloping their reality with no apparent means of escape.

Fortunately, new research is revealing that this pandemic of depression can be abated by something as manageable as dietary choices; but you will have to consciously decide to actively and consistently SELF-CARE regardless of your ups and downs.

Whether you have overweight issues or not, depression often impacts eating choices,

• causing overeating
• warping perceptions of what a portion sizes of foods should be
• causing undereating
• unhealthy eating patterns
• unhealthy eating times
• creating cravings for fattening foods
• craving for unhealthy foods
• alcoholic substances in general, wines, liquors, beer, spirits

These choices often result from defaulting to one, or both, of two main patterns of handling foods.  Apathy or/and addiction.  

Apathy

Under the emotional drain the energy to care about preparing, finding healthy foods, to even believing that it is worth the trouble is difficult to find.   This can result in not eating at all, which can cause undernutrition, malnutrition, anemia and even anorexia.  Or, making one simply grab whatever food is culturally or socially familiar and most readily available. In this society these foods are usually, cheap and common, over enriched, processed foods, often with injurious or deadly levels of processed flour and sugar.  These foods although giving momentary comfort, have been proven to worsen the depressive conditions.  

Addiction

Addictive foods create a self-perpetuating problem, causing potentially severe damage, worsening the depressive states while making it feel as if the indulgence was worth it. Justifying the choice to go in the opposite direction of the real solutions with, “I felt much better after”. 

But this never has to be you or anyone you know. There is support, there is help, there is the knowledge of which foods to avoid and there are healthy natural foods which are known to go a far way to creating improvements.

Eventually, as most aware people do, they may realize the damage and the potential for critical problems, then, they may attempt to seek a solution. But the solution can be challenging leaving you to believe that you can’t “get a grip” or don’t think you are ready to change for the better.  Before you fall into that trap, understand the following:

• Seeking comfort is about seeking drugs. Processed foods are unnatural, i.e.. They do not exist in that form in nature, and the low fiber unbound materials create  higher than usual endorphins and serotonin spikes in your brain, similarly to some hard drugs, and often eventually with more deadly results.
• Self-image is often spoken about with an overweight appearance, but this is compounded by an internal self-image, self-worth. You must label your own self-worth, and in your better moments confirm it. Compartmentalize it and keep it there for future you.
• Don’t justify giving up because of business or obligations. Many people hide behind what they have learned and believe is worthy. Family, children, work, career, meetings, travel, vacations.  This is an escape, a way to shift focus from themselves, to what they believe are solid walls to hide behind.
• Too often they talk themselves out of knowing that they are for a change. Ignoring all solutions and defaulting into giving up, entrenching work, causes, habits etc., ignoring deeper issues, and justifying old patterns.  The irony is, the solutions live in the challenges of change.

Studies on depression and foods

Among several studies finding a link between nutrition and mental health is a ten-year study published in BMC Medicine of over 15,000 participants titled “A longitudinal analysis of diet quality scores and the risk of incident depression in the SUN Project” which found that participants with a diet low in junk foods but rich in vegetables, fruits, nuts and fish had a substantially lower risk of depression.

Foods which are known to worsen depression

• Refined grains/carbohydrates, flour, sugars (corn syrup, high fructose corn syrup, dextrose etc.), pastas, breads, pastries, sodas etc.  Like drugs, they lift you up, drop you down, then set you up for wanting more, creating and maintaining a deadly cycle.
• Processed and/or Red meats
• Margarines and fake butters
• Meats high in antibiotics and hormones
• Foods which damage your healthy brain influencing gut microbiome such as sugars, sugar substitutes
• Alcohol, is not a mood booster, it is a depressant, inhibitor and a relaxant which is often mistaken for anti-depression. The type of alcohol does not matter. Whatever you are drinking the alcohol content is the active ingredient.
• Caffeine, yes, it can give you a boost but the crash is known not to help depression, and continuously ingesting enough caffeine to avoid the crash is in itself a health risk.  Green tea is a better choice.

Foods which are great for your mental health

Generally foods rich in vitamin B6, folic acid, omega-3 fatty acids, brain healthy fats/oils, natural complex carbohydrates, anti-oxidants, microbiota (good gut bacteria) healthy probiotic and high fiber foods.  These include:

• Whole grain carbohydrates
• Ground provisions such as sweet potatoes, serotonin ( a mood elevating hormone) inducing, plus carotenoids (which give them their color), a type of antioxidant known for fighting depression
• Dark green leafy vegetables, collard greens, spinach, callaloo, broccoli
• Colorful vegetables
• Fresh fruit and berries, all fruit, the more colors the better
• Dark chocolate, filled with flavonoids, not that pretend snack company brand of dark chocolate, if it does not say 70%, 75%, 80% or more on the label then it is just dark colored almost regular candy.
• Free range poultry including turkey, rich in the amino acid tryptophan which is used by your body to make serotonin.
• Legumes, nuts, seeds and beans
• Avocados
• Turmeric
• Fish including deep sea salmon
• Fermented foods, kimchi, kefir, sauerkraut, natural yoghurt
• Many other healthy natural foods including mushrooms, walnuts, flaxseed,

The potential solutions are simple enough, but getting an individual suffering from depression (whether they know they are or not to adhere to them is supremely challenging.

• Seeking counseling is highly recommended, and remember, therapy takes time, and if one therapist doesn’t do the job for you, then find another. There is a good one out there for you.
• For your nutritional challenges, find a coach or a system which offers coaching
• Recruit friends and family in supporting your goals. People are often surprising, most will understand that you have special dietary requirements.
• All forms of exercise, aerobic, a sport/game, weight lifting have equal levels of success in alleviating depression in men and slightly more in women.
• Most of all, adhere, be honest and open with your own plans, do not cage up and cut communication, understand that the depression is real but the indulgences are a choice, an unnecessary compounding devaluing choice.

Depression is a mega trigger for those of us who will turn to comfort foods or drinks. Depression is highly severe and sustained. It sits in the impact fullness of grief and crippling anxiety, making us WRONGLY perceive the damaging foods as a solution of sorts. This can make healthy depression fighting change a long and challenging path, and often feels impossible. Take that first step, keep progressing and hold fort day by day.

Initially you may not even recognize a change, but with consistency change certainly can come.  We know that these solutions have worked for many people. Join them, you have been struggling with yourself long enough, it is time that you won. Always seek support, an objective therapist, friend or coach is invaluable.  Make change work for you and introduce yourself to a life you only hoped for before now.