Depression is really tough to cope with. No-one disputes this. It appears for a variety of reasons, but what I am addressing here today is the very strong link to diet for more people than was previously realised by many medical professionals. Now they see it.
Though it has many causes, strong links between nutrition and depression are recognised, studied and documented in publications by Harvard Medical School, Deakin University and Medscape (the doctors’ medical news site) – just to name a few.
Lifestyle changes and dietary changes may be enough in many cases to avoid, or limit, the use of medications. These should be the FIRST assessments and changes you make – not the last resort!
Nutritional deficiencies are quite common in depression. But every person is very different – individualised assessment is definitely required. I can help you with this.
Possible deficiencies may include zinc, magnesium, vitamin D, iron, omega-3, folate and several other B-vitamins (folate is a B-vitamin too!) – and these are just some of the basics.
So where do you start? Start with getting rid of refined foods – you know the stuff, it comes in bags and boxes on supermarket shelves and tends to have a long expiry date, and list of ingredients often not recognisable as foodstuff to a normal human. Not sure what I mean? What would be the key food ingredient if I was to put an ingredient panel on an apple? Apple. What about biscuits? Ever seen a biscuit tree? Does an egg need a complex ingredient panel? Nope – it’s an egg.
Nutritional deficiencies are common in depression and anxiety. Every person is very different – individualised assessment is definitely required. I can help you with this.
Possible deficiencies may include zinc, magnesium, vitamin D, iron, omega-3, folate and several other B-vitamins (folate is a B-vitamin too!) – and these are just some of the basics.
You may be able to make a huge difference to your depression just starting with diet changes. In a randomised controlled trial published in “Nutritional Neuroscience”, they found that in their participant group, those on a Mediterranean diet experienced a 45% reduction in the severity of depression compared to the control group.