The food-mood connection

If you’re suffering from the blues, don’t waste your time looking for the right med– look in your fridge instead.

Two new studies confirm what many of us in the natural healing community have been screaming for years: Poor diets are at the heart of many depression cases.

That’s because the real cause of many mood disorders is nutritional deficiencies… and the real reason for many of those deficiencies are diets based on processed junk and other foods that fill the belly and starve the brain.

They’re also pretty good at making people big, unhealthy and prone to diabetes–all contributing factors to depression.

British and French researchers looked at data on nearly 3,500 men and women who participated in the Whitehall II study. They were able to divide them into two patterns of eaters: “whole food” and “processed food.”

The researchers found that those who ate the most processed food had the highest likelihood of depression. They also found that whole food eaters were the least likely to be depressed… and the more whole foods they ate, the less likely the depression, according to the study published in the British Journal of Psychiatry.

Another study on women found very similar results.

Australian researchers found that women who ate mainly processed foods and carbs over the course of 10 years were 50 percent more likely to suffer from mood disorders. Women who ate a more traditional Australian diet of lamb, fish and whole grains were 30 percent less likely to suffer from depression and other mood disorders, according to the study published in the American Journal of Psychiatry.

Other studies have made the same connection–the real problem is not the research, but the fact that the drug companies never want to compare their meds directly to the dietary changes that would benefit so many people.

After all, Big Pharma is having a hard enough time with placebos!

Not every case of depression is caused by diet. Depression can be triggered by any number of factors, and can also be the result of several conditions striking at once. In many cases, key deficiencies are behind the blues–especially amino acids.

A doctor experienced in natural medicine can diagnose and treat those deficiencies– without having to resort to dangerous meds that don’t work.

So if you’re depressed, make that appointment. But while you wait, clean out the fridge and cupboard, and get rid of all the junk food–especially processed foods, sugary snacks and other carb-loaded garbage.

Replace those items with real food–meals you need to cook yourself from fresh ingredients, and healthy snacks like nuts and vegetables.

By the time you visit the doctor, you might even be well along the road to recovery.