Category: mental health

Choosing Sanity Over Vanity

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In here I’ll detail in this post further thoughts on a sane approach to consuming food and drink. Choosing sanity over vanity is what matters. Instead of caring how we look to others it’s healthier to think about whether we can live with ourselves at the end of the day.

It was the singer P!nk in a magazine interview easily a decade ago who told the reporter that if you feel bad about what you’re eating then you’re swallowing guilt.

Indulging in food or drink that we label a “good” or “bad” item has the tendency to make us think that we’re good or bad people for eating or drinking it.

Let’s face things so often what we choose to do is because we care how we appear to others. Taking the pressure off happens when we decide that the only person we need to impress or to have approve of us is ourselves.

My days of eating bags of chips are over. I stopped doing this for me.

What I’m saying and I’ve said this repeatedly before in one of the other blogs too is that whittling yourself down to skin and bones to attract others is what’s not ideal.

Are we really counting calories for our health? Are we choosing and using what to eat because the food improves our mood or does it just conform to what we think is healthy?

There’s a ton of products that the editors of the Nutrition Action newsletter expose as not really health-boosting.

Far better to indulge in a real food treat like a pastry every so often. Not bolt for a drink that’s supposed to give us energy or nutrients.

My goal is to share stories and teach others to be well as I’ve written before. Wellness is not the absence of illness. It’s not unachievable to be well when you expand the limits to the definition of wellness.

The online dictionary defines wellness as: the quality or state of being in good health especially as an actively sought goal. Within the limits we have with our bodies and minds we can strive to be in good health.

This starts when you and I ask ourselves: “What does good health look like for me? How can I get there? What do I need to do to sustain this lifestyle?”

Having the radical grace to be flexible and adaptable and open to change when this routine no longer fits our life. Just going easier on ourselves when we slip up or fall down here and there. Understanding that most setbacks are only temporary. Picking ourselves up and recommitting to the path we chose.

In the coming blog entry I’m going to talk in more detail about the ethic of going in a steady rhythm.

Breathe Mediterranean Diet Edition

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Breathe magazine has out a Mediterranean Diet edition. Though it costs $14.99 I think the issue is worth getting.

For the article like Glimmers of Hope that instructs readers to cue ourselves for “glimmers” instead of focusing on triggers. Glimmers are the experiences that give us joy peace and positive feelings.

Plus the Buon Appetito! feature that shows readers how to set the table for a communal meal like Italians do. Insieme is our word for together.

Really all the articles in this Breathe issue are worth reading.

Pots of Love talks about how cooking can be a valid form of therapy. Talking about using a food journal to jot down ideas about the recipes you’re making and what you think of them and how to improvise new recipes with the ingredients.

One suggestion that I’ve taken to heart for years so far is to set the table for cheer. At the start of each season to change the tablecloth and use a different color mug to drink water from.

I’ll end here with this quote:

A tavola non s’invecchia – At the table, one does not grow old.

Georgia Ede MD Disclaimer

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Dr. Ede has reported that patients who change their diet as she instructs with the Quiet Keto have better mental health.

However buried in her guide Dr. Ede states that most of her patients who stopped their Keto diet had their psychiatric symptoms come back. Nor can everyone reduce or eliminate their psych medication on the Keto diet Dr. Ede proposes either.

The number-one thing is to control blood sugar and insulin levels which this diet should do according to Dr. Ede. This MD believes that keeping on a whole foods ketogenic diet for life or long-term should be safe. Following her Quiet Keto diet could counteract medication side effects like weight gain and high blood sugar.

The caveat the catch is that you must remain on the Quiet Keto diet and not stop it. With the Mediterranean Diet there’s no effect if you stop using this food plan.

These two diets should be examined with professional guidance for a person’s individual needs.

I reported here on these two diets to give information that might help followers. It appears everywhere I go I act as a librarian outside of my job–giving people information they can use to have a better life.

Coming up one habit I’ve adopted. Then a dive into new recipes I’ve created using a cookbook and the Eating Well special edition New Mediterranean Diet magazine.

Georgia Ede MD Nutrition Advice

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Georgia Ede MD Nutrition Advice

It’s not as simple as choosing from the food items Dr. Ramsey lists and calling it a day. With Dr.
Ede’s recommendations you need to calculate your personal macronutrient amounts. Then adhere
to eating only certain foods in certain ways.

On the Keto Diet you are allowed to have a specific amount of carbohydrates like starting at 20
grams a day. Dr. Ede recommends ketone monitoring as part of this diet.

Dr. Ede has reported that patients who change their diet this way have better mental health. It’s best to buy her book or check it out of the library. There are specific rules as to what to eat
how much and how to eat (cooked versus raw).

You start out with a Quiet Paleo diet and transfer to the Keto diet.

Customize carbohydrates:
Carbohydrates on Quiet Keto come from fruits and vegetables.

Quiet Keto Food List:
Meat, seafood, poultry, and eggs.
Non-starchy Vegetables:
Lettuces like iceberg, romaine, Bibb, Boston, green leaf, red leaf, oak leaf, Batavia, and
butterhead.

Fruits:
Avocado, olives, squashes: zucchini, yellow squash, summer squash, pumpkin, and spaghetti
squash, strawberries, blackberries, raspberries, lemons, and limes
Crucifers cooked only and limited to one serving per day as in:
Arugula, bok choy, broccoli,, broccolini, broccoli rabe, Brussels sprouts, all kinds of cabbage,
cauliflower, collard greens, kale mustard greens, radish, Swiss chard, turnip, watercress.

This ends my review of the Dueling Doctors and Their Diets.


Drew Ramsey MD Nutrition Advice

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Like I wrote before when I quoted the NYC clothing store SYMS TV commercial: “An educated consumer is our best customer.”

In keeping with this I would like to educate followers about the nutrition advice of the Dueling Doctors and their Diets. Georgia Ede MD will follow. First up Drew Ramsey MD.

Dr. Ramsey nixes loading up on super sizes of the latest super food touted. Instead eat a balanced variety of food. To wit: “Eat what you enjoy.”

Per Dr. Ramsey:

“We are trained, from an early age, to eat to be skinny instead of healthy.”

He quotes Felice Jacka, a researcher at Australia’s Food & Mood Centre: “We need to get away from this idea that nutrition is about body size.”

In his book Dr. Ramsey refers to clinical trials that verify the Mediterranean Diet improves mental health.

I say forget trying to memorize how much RDA of vitamins and nutrients we need and what food provides these. Simply eat balanced food items from the list below every day and that should cover getting enough nutritional value. That is my $100 dollar holler.

Highlights of Dr. Ramsey’s review of required foods:

Brussels sprouts (I eat them often!), oranges, leafy greens, lentils.

Pumpkin seeds, cashews (I love ’em and eat them nearly every day!), oysters, spinach.

Seafood including wild salmon, anchovies, oysters.

beans and almonds.

Fresh fruits and vegetables like broccoli, sweet potatoes.

Oatmeal, Brazil nuts, mushrooms (I have ’em every week nearly every day!).

Grass-fed beef if you’re a carnivore.

Corn, bell peppers, tomatoes, cantaloupe, carrots, broccoli.

Eggs (my favorite breakfast!), pistachios.

Clams (love ’em!), mussels (my favorite feel-good food!).

Oranges, cherries, chilies, red peppers, mustard greens.

Turkey.

Avocadoes, berries

Kombucha, kefir, yogurt, miso.

Dark chocolate.

On Not Liking Chocolate

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Dr. Ede the author of Change Your Diet Change Your Mind parts ways with other experts giving nutritional advice.

The Integrative Health Coach I employ told me that beans, grains, and fruits break down into sugar. Sugar can exacerbate depression and anxiety.

Dr. Lipman cut out the habit of consuming quantities of beans. Eating too much beans can cause a diabetes concern apparently.

The advice to have dark chocolate I haven’t taken to heart either. As I really don’t like eating chocolate. My Health Coach told me that in her practice they’ve turned away from recommending that people eat dark chocolate.

I have eaten dark chocolate too long ago to remember when the last time was that I ate it. In fact I stopped buying dark chocolate years ago.

The strange thing is that I don’t often do what experts who hang out a shingle tell you to do. I trust my Health Coach because of my intuition that she knows what she’s talking about.

Also: I trust what friends tell me that makes sense. Years ago a friend told me he became a vegan. It was likely for ethical reasons. His mood worsened. When he returned to eating red meat his depression lifted.

Armchair advice to be certain. Yet intriguing insight that could very well be true.

In this blog I would like then to touch on how exactly to get happy and get more energy. What specific action can we take to lift ourselves up?

I’ve begun doing these things and will report back on the effects.

Who and What to Believe

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I’ve come to take what John C. Norcross wrote in his book Changeology with a grain of salt. He said that his wife wrote down every day how many calories she consumed.

Why she did this is what I would like to find out. Separating fact from fiction isn’t easy. As in believing that the calories in versus calories burned approach is how to lose weight.

It’s the kinds of food we eat not the amount that counts. It was a Big Food Marketing Myth that it’s OK to buy those “100-Calorie Packs” as a snack.

I think a better option is to fuel yourself for afternoon energy with a 170-calorie serving of cashews. Then go outside your office building to take a 15-minute walk on your break. Anyone who works at a job should take a morning and afternoon break by the way.

One M.D. who published a book titled Hype claimed that standard nutrition advice was wrong. She said it’s not healthy to eat too much broccoli (this could be true yet who would eat too much broccoli to begin with).

In fact what I a simple blogger thinks is that if you’re having broccoli for dinner every day 5 days a week you should question that. I think you should “eat a rainbow” like the British M.D. wrote in his book How to Make Disease Disappear years ago.

The author of Hype claimed everyone (everyone not just most people) gets enough daily water in the food they eat. What if you’re on a low income and buy Lean Cuisine frozen dinners? Chomp on Frosted Flakes for breakfast. Have a Big Mac for lunch with French fries.

Ignoring the socioeconomic reality of how and what people eat reinforces the industry norm of using well-off persons as the standard when talking about eating habits.

This M.D.’s advice was shot for me when she wrote that she drinks Naked Juice nonstop every day. She was not a health coach. She was a children’s ENT doctor in a hospital. Right.

There’s a path we can follow along the lines of nutrition:

  1. Credible scientific advice.
  2. Well-meaning advice that is repeated in the health field.
  3. Industry-sponsored research that gets the result the food marketer uses to sell a product.
  4. Questionable claims about how taking a certain supplement leads to better health.
  5. Giving a food “product” a name that suggests it’s healthful like Skinny Pop or Kind bars.
  6. Quackery.

In all my adult life I haven’t consumed the total RDAs of vitamins and nutrients that were recommended. I think the reason I don’t have osteoporosis–even though I don’t drink milk and likely don’t get 1,500 milligrams of calcium per day–is because I’ve been lifting weights that is strength training for 14 years.

It comes down to common sense. Like I said in a months-ago blog entry we need to Act as Our Own Healers along with working with our treatment providers.

How to heal using adjunct approaches not just food and pills is coming up in here.

Real Talk About Mental Health

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Recovery is not a “one-and-done” deal. Healing is a lifelong process. Some of us will take pills. Others won’t have to.

When you’re not managing your condition as a full-time job it can free up your energy to focus on other things. I will refer followers to buy the summer issue of Magnolia Journal. To read the Chip Gaines Last Word essay. He wrote that choosing to wear the same outfit (the same brand of tee shirt, jeans, and boots) every day freed up his energy to devote time to the things that were more important to him than choosing what to wear.

Gaines knew our emotional energy is finite. The theme of the summer issue of Magnolia was boundless. The editors list the dictionary definition of this word: They contrast this to their definition of boundless:

Traditional Definition:

  • Having no boundaries; vast, unlimited, or immense.
  • Abundant; limitless. 

Magnolia’s Definition:

  • To see ourselves and the world around us through a lens of unlimited potential. 

Illness is not a dead-end. It offers us yes the chance for a boundless life. The fact is that if taking medication gives a person the potential to have a better life I say: Go For It.

Define unlimited: Not succumbing to internalizing that we’re hopeless. Not comparing ourselves to what other people can do and have. Expanding our limits and shifting our mindset to think: “What if?” and “Why not?” when it comes to dreaming.

What I’m against: In the evening TV news commercials sell drugs and state that a side effect can be fatal. You could die taking those pills. There’s a cost-benefit analysis to calculate: is this risk worth it to find relief from an illness?

The goal is to get rid of the shame that surrounds getting a diagnosis. A woman told me that when she was told she had breast cancer she didn’t want to tell other people. The woman thought they’d look at her with pity.

Shame lives in secrecy silence and judgment. Everyone should be proud of who we are and what we stand for. Our lives aren’t easy having an illness. Yet they can be better.

I know that if I didn’t have a disability I wouldn’t be the person I am today: championing that people living in recovery can have our version of a full and robust life.

We can have this life not despite our condition. Because of it.

The MMD (Modified Mediterranean Diet)

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This week I checked out of the library the book Change Your Diet Change Your Mind. In fact, Dr. Ede in her guide states that some of her patients choose to stay on medication while adopting the Keto Diet.

Dr. Ede is against using the Keto Diet for new or worsening psychosis.

I wanted to read her book to see exactly what she wrote and whether the hype in the YouTube interview was credible. As regards to the content it feels to me like she cobbled together evidence to make her case about the Keto Diet. She also refers to the Paleo Diet being an option.

I’ve created and coined the term MMD for Modified Mediterranean Diet as the kind of eating plan I’ve been adhering to.

My approach is what I’ve written here before: what I call my “little bites” philosophy. The strategy is to consume everything in moderation.

So that if you’re eating too much of a food Dr. Ede tells the reader is a no-no that could be a concern. Having adequate not excessive RDAs of food makes sense to me.

The issue is whether the standard RDAs recommended are valid. One M.D. in another book stated that these guidelines were set by food industry staff.

In fact, over the last 15 years, I can’t say I’ve consumed the RDAs of fiber and calcium at all. Not from drinking milk do I get enough calcium. I think lifting weights that is weight training has kept my bones intact.

What I have every day is around 60 grams of protein which is the RDA for my weight.

Only sometimes and not often always do I have the recommended “5 a Day” servings of fruits and vegetables. More likely I have 2 to 3 servings of a vegetable daily and a serving of fruit 3 or 4 times a week.

On page 281. Dr. Ede lists the fruits and vegetables acceptable in the Quiet Paleo Diet she goes into along with the Keto Diet.

These are food items I’ve been having all long with the eggs chicken and dairy in my weekly diet.

Think of choosing what to eat from these “diets” as assembling a tray in a cafeteria from the options on display. My Health Coach thinks it’s pretty hard to adhere to solely a strict high-fat diet like Keto.

My stance is that it comes down to what your intuition tells you to do as regards to what food and how much you should eat. Just like our intuition can guide us to make decisions in other areas of our lives.

Dr. Ede lists nuts and seeds as a no-no. I regularly have a serving of cashews when I need to maintain my energy in the afternoon. Dr. Ramsey the other psychiatrist who wrote a book about food and mood recommends cashews.

Dr. Ede gives mixed advice about what foods to eat and what foods to avoid. It appears she lists certain food items to avoid that are also listed in the category of foods to eat.

Choosing the eating plan that will benefit us I think comes down to researching and hooking up with a reputable Integrative Health Coach. Not deciding on our own like one woman I knew who limited her “diet” to 700 calories per day so she could lose weight.

The obsession with losing weight and being thin must stop. Dr. Ede in her guide states the often-parroted ideal weight scheme that I’ve been against for decades: If you’re 5’0″ you should weigh 100 pounds plus 5 pounds more for each inch over 5’0″.

No I don’t think so. I’m 5’0″ and today I weigh 107 pounds.

This ideal weight guideline I don’t think is realistic.

Coming up in July after this blog carnival about food and mental health I’m going to review a couple of recent cookbooks I’m using to create recipes with.

Health Coach $100 Dollar Holler

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On Sunday morning I reported on the YouTube video I watched because I think it’s worth exploring a food-based option when all other treatment fails. For those of us who have a better life because we take pills I say not so fast to discontinue this treatment.

However I know that the food we eat plays a big role in how healthy we are. Mangia Bene Vivere Bene Eat Well To Live Well is a truism.

I won’t tell others: “This is my 2 cents.” I think the information I give is worth way more than 2 cents. That’s how I created the term $100 Dollar Holler.

Today’s advice comes from a reputable Health Coach I’ve talked with after viewing the YouTube video. In fact I think in the interview Dr. Ede said not everyone is helped with the ketogenic diet. I will have to watch the video again to verify this.

What I agree with Dr. Ede about is that so-called experts are giving advice that is not credible. I think what she is saying about the erroneous information is right.

Like the idea of having smoothies. I don’t drink smoothies at all. In the era of anti-science government leaders I think we need to educate ourselves more than ever.

The profit-driven Big Food marketers will claim anything to get us to buy their processed food. Maybe it’s because I have come to question the authority of elected leaders that I’m wary of believing the claims about health and nutrition that the current regime is passing off. In the form of essays that no reputable M.D. has published and that are not peer-reviewed but written by lackeys parroting the president.

Who can we trust to give us the right information?

Per the Health Coach:

“Doing a keto diet is not great for everyone, but incorporating healthy fats is an important part of diet for mental health, hormone health, and so much more. A high fat diet is pretty hard to execute.”

This is why I’m no fan of outright discontinuing psych meds if those pills enable a person to have a full and robust life they wouldn’t be able to live otherwise.

The idea that anyone can hang out a shingle as a nutrition expert is what alarms me. In the early 2000s I contacted a woman. She charged $1,000 per month for her advice. Where did she get her training?

The keto foods I eat that are “animal” fat are eggs and chicken every week. The other fat I get is from a handful of cashews every day and a tablespoon or 2 of organic peanut butter. Plus the healthy omega-3 fatty acids in seafood.

The Health Coach thinks a whole foods, low carb, healthy fat diet (like the Mediterranean diet yes!) is a great balanced diet for most.

Her eating plan is exactly the one I’ve used for over 10 years. Minus the smoothies. Minus grains. Minus meat.

In fact the Director of the USDA is often a person chosen who used to be a Big Food industry person. As early as 1993 I bought and read the original Mediterranean Diet paperback guide.

Decades ago on the government food website the recommendation was to have 6 servings of grains per day. This was obviously because the government subsidized farmers who grew wheat.

There’s a book I think it’s called Grain Brain that talks about eating grains. For 20 years I haven’t eaten grains. Only every so often.

I’ll end here with this: it’s worth exploring other options for achieving optimal mental health when everything else has failed.

My take on this is that I think some people have what I call “beautiful brains” and this is why the medication works. What a person eats can be a factor in why treatment works too.

More than the food we eat our lifestyle choices can buoy our mood and mindset.

Coming up after this blog carnival I will talk about the simple effective changes I’ve made in the last 2 months that have transformed my health.