Diet for Brain Health

Diet for Brain Health

-Diane M Stein MD 5.25.2010

If you have epilepsy, headaches or other pain, attentional or learning trouble, family history of strokes, memory trouble, multiple sclerosis or other brain disorders; then I recommend that you use more than pharmaceuticals (drugs) to treat yourself.

Diet is one aspect of health. There are many aspects to giving your body good nutrition.

The first line is optimizing the body’s chance to have regular blood hormone levels by avoid carbohydrate – sugar – rushes. With a sugar rush you get instant energy or pain relief but then the insulin level increases. (This is what can lead to diabetes if it occurs too much as the cells get insensitive to insulin.) Then the insulin gets the sugars to leave the blood stream and go into cells and increases the growth of fat cells. When the sugar level gets low you feel bad and get increased glucagon hormone which makes you hungry so you eat more. The variability of the blood sugar, insulin, and glucagon led to variation in other hormones and in how the brain can respond. The brain will work at its best when the body is in constant routine. (Sleeping the same every night, having same blood sugar, same daily routines are all good for the brain in general.)

The first step to getting regular blood sugar is either decreasing the amount of carbohydrates that you eat OR having carbohydrates eaten with meals and choosing carbs that are only slowly absorbed so that there is no peak in the blood sugar. To learn more:

The New Glucose Revolution: The Authoritative Guide to the Glycemic Index--the Dietary Solution for Lifelong Health
Jennie Brand-Miller (Author), Thomas M.S. Wolever (Author), Kaye Foster-Powell
(Author), Stephen Colagiuri (Author)

There are a lot of other healthy habits for brain health, this is my starting point.

Supplements:

Omega 3

Vit D

Folate

Calcium

Food Choices:

Eat Food, Mostly Plants, Not too Much.

Micheal Polland An Eaters Manifesto