Go With Your Gut: The Link between Nutrition & Mental Health

by | May 5, 2020

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It’s 1pm, and you’re hit by light peeking through the blinds, wishing night would come and make outside look as dark as you feel on the inside. Lately, these episodes have you rethinking everything. Those long car rides with smooth lofi instrumentals no longer bring you joy, your favorite shows don’t make you laugh, and that album you once played for 2 weeks straight doesn’t even hit the same.

You’re depressed, you know it and everyone around you knows it. Family and friends may try to help but you just can’t shake the feeling that they will never understand. Everything that used to bring you comfort no longer does, well… everything but food.

It seems the only thing that makes you feel good is a 10 pack of Twinkies, ice cream, and maple covered bacon, oddly enough. Yet you feel guilty immediately after eating it and can’t help but think that your diet is making things worse.

Truthfully, you’re right, it is.

When it comes to depression, science, society and modern psychology all agree that it results from a chemical imbalance of norepinephrine, dopamine, and serotonin. However, one of these neurotransmitters outweigh the others in terms of its role in depression and it’s none other than serotonin! Serotonin is involved in controlling many important bodily functions, including sleep, aggression, eating, sexual behavior, and mood. It’s no question that all of these things are thrown out of whack when someone is depressed.

Despite agreeing on that much, the discourse within the ranks comes from the method of treatment. In a society where you are worth more to the pharmaceutical industry ill than healthy, it makes sense why doctors would push medication.

But what if there was a better way to treat depression?

 What if the answer was so simple, all you really had to do was go with your gut? Well, I am here to tell you that it is. Serotonin was mentioned earlier not only because of its particularly heavy influence in depression but because 90% of our body’s serotonin is produced in the gut! So, what if we could help treat depression by eating better and taking care of our gut health? It’s not too good to be true, it’s proven by science. Let’s dive into the research and see how going with our gut when it comes to depression can actually help you beat it way quicker than any drug ever will.

Going with your gut is more than just making healthy eating choices, it has to do with our inherent intuitive sense that tells us we can heal ourselves. Our bodies will heal themselves if we provide the right conditions, this is not only limited to our physical health but also extends to our mental health. So, what are the right conditions for us to heal from depression and other mental illnesses?

  1. Ditch the Processed Foods and Eat Better

First thing you can do is eat the right foods. A 2009 study done at The California Institute of Technology determined that enterochromaffin (EC) cells found in the digestive tract are largely responsible for producing serotonin, and these EC cells depend on microbes found in the gut to produce serotonin. This was concluded after demonstrating that mice or other model organisms with fluctuations in their gut microbes exhibit altered behaviors. This study also determined that serotonin deficiencies can be reversed, evident in mice through introducing normal microbes to the gut after analyzing germ-free mice who didn’t have those microbes to begin with.

Now what does this have to do with you? Well, this study demonstrates that having a healthy gut microbiome can help stabilize serotonin levels which play a major role in our mood. To have a healthy microbiome and to have high levels of tryptophan (the immediate precursor amino acid to serotonin) it is recommended that we eat the following foods:

  • Salmon

  • Poultry

  • Eggs

  • Spinach

  • Seeds & nuts

  • Soy products

  • Pre/Probiotics and foods high in digestive enzymes.

We also want to avoid foods that may be negatively altering gut bacteria, such as artificial sweeteners, trans fats, and processed and refined sugars. It may be comforting to eat junk food but in the end it does more harm than good.

2. Get More Sunlight

Many of us know that sunlight feels good on the body. We have millions of photoreceptors on our skin which absorb sunlight and sometimes we even feel charged up as a result. A new HBO show called Euphoria, follows the story of a misunderstood teenager who, while recovering from a crippling drug addiction, falls into a depressive episode. We see the protagonist spending 20+ hours in the dark, binge watching “Love Island” and eating heavily processed food.

It becomes clear that her choices aren’t helping one bit, as evidenced by her gradual decline. She was always in the dark physically and therefore she was also in the dark mentally. This link is very physiological, so it’s no wonder that getting proper light exposure is such an important aspect of “going with your gut.”  In fact, very little exposure to sunlight is commonly associated with low levels of serotonin, a trait found in people with SAD (seasonal affective disorder) as they experience depressive episodes during the shorter, darker days of fall and winter.

3. Get Your Bare Feet on the Ground

Remember when you were younger, how well you would sleep after being outside playing with your friends all day? Bare feet on the ground, fireflies prancing through the night, and the distant smell of smoky firewood. Those were the days. At some point in our adult lives we put on our shoes and stopped playing outside, neglecting our inner child.

Sound familiar?

You’re not alone. Millions around the world are remembering the benefits of “grounding or earthing”. Without getting too deep into the science, it has been shown that going barefoot for as little as 15-20 mins a day can affect our physical & mental health in such a big way. Respected psychiatrist, Dr. Tracy Latz, M.D. in an article published on EarthingInsitute.Net entitled Shifting Lives with Earthing – A Psychiatrist’s Perspective, states that “Earthing can help elevate serotonin levels in the brain as it decreases cortisol (an anxiety-inducing hormone released when people are stressed). As cortisol levels decrease and stabilize, we all become more centered, peaceful and calm… For depression, Earthing can also assist with boosting serotonin levels and decreasing depressive symptoms. Then energy improves and tolerance to stressful situations, pain, or discomfort improves.”

4. Exercise, Exercise, Exercise

Most of us know that exercise or movement is good for us overall. But when it comes to combating depression it is seen as a small piece of the puzzle. The research suggests it’s a much bigger piece than we might have originally thought of.

In a literature review published in the Journal of Psychology & Neuroscience, entitled “How to increase serotonin in the human brain without drugs” it discusses that the biggest piece of evidence in the work with humans looks at the effect of exercise on tryptophan availability to the brain. If you remember, tryptophan is necessary for producing serotonin.

 A large body of research demonstrated that exercise is associated with an increase in tryptophan and a decrease in the BCAAs (branched chain amino acids) that inhibit tryptophan transportation to the brain. Thus a decrease in these BCAAs results in a substantial increase in tryptophan availability to the brain. Simply put, going with your gut and getting some exercise on a regular basis can help us combat depression in a real effective way.

The hardest part is always getting started but if we make a small effort to eat better, get more sunlight, get grounded, and exercise regularly, we can begin to provide ourselves with the conditions needed to boost our serotonin levels, and by default give our body a fighting chance at beating depression.

Javier Robles

Javier Robles

Holistic Peak Performance Coach and founding fathers at "Modern Renaissance Man"

About the Author

Javier Robles is a Holistic Peak Performance Coach and one of the founding fathers at Modern Renaissance Man. He supports driven individuals design and implement a holistic and harmonious life guaranteed to have them in a consistent state of peak performance, presence, and productivity. His passions include health and nutrition, complete human optimization, consciousness, service, poetry, creative expression, and music. He currently lives in New Jersey.