Nutritional psychiatry, what the hell is that?

During my time working on a psychiatric inpatient unit in a low socioenconic location, my supervisor asked me to team up with the nutritionist and run a group combining nutrition and mental health.  This sent me down an interesting journey of extensively researching what were the best foods to combat depression and anxiety.  I bumped into the field of nutritional psychiatry and was fascinated with the bidirectional impact of the gut to the brain and vice versa.   If you never heard of nutritional psychiatry you are not alone, it's an evolving field that all holistic practitioners should be paying close attention to.  Dr Naidoo (2019) says "In terms of nutritional psychiatry, we are learning through research that the food we eat impacts how we feel emotionally."

As I dove deep into the topic, I was excited to learn further about the gut-brain connection and the impact of how what we eat can significantly improve our brain functioning.  This revelation is quite empowering because with all the things we cannot control in life, food intake is something that we have control over. 

So what should I eat, you may be wondering? You may want to incorporate the following into your diet:

• prebiotic food (here are 19 options)
• probiotic
• organic and grass-fed meats
• diet low in refined sugar
• choose Non-GMO organic foods 

What you should avoid:

• meat products exposed to antibiotics
• process carbohydrates
• consuming pesticides and herbicides 

Reference:
https://www.psychiatrictimes.com/view/nutritional-psychiatry-gut-brain-connection

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