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Food, Mood and Women's Health – Be your healthiest, look and feel great!

Anxiety and panic

How to get a great night’s sleep

By Trudy Scott 26 Comments

“A 2009 poll by the National Sleep Foundation found that only 28 percent of those surveyed regularly got eight hours or more of sleep a night. The average was around six and a half hours on weekdays and seven on weekends. Those who slept less than eight hours a night typically had mood problems, including worry and anxiety, ate more sugar and unhealthy food and drank more caffeinated beverages!”

~ Trudy Scott, The Antianxiety Food Solution

It’s amazing how many people don’t get enough sleep and there is so much we can do from a nutritional point of view to change this.  Here are six things to consider:

  1. One of the first things I think about when a client can’t sleep is low serotonin.  Low serotonin symptoms include insomnia, depression, negativity, worry and anxiety, irritability, PMS and afternoon and evening cravings.  And low serotonin can be boosted with tryptophan, taken as a supplement and/or in food sources.
  2. Research has actually shown that a medical or functional food made with pumpkin seeds improved sleep, due to the good sources of tryptophan and zinc. In another study this same functional food was also shown to reduce anxiety and social phobia.Pumpkin seeds can be soaked in water overnight and then lightly roasted with olive oil, sea salt, pepper, turmeric and ginger.  Food-wise, pumpkin seeds are a favorite of mine for a healthy snack and my clients love them.  Here is an blog post that discusses the benefits of soaked nuts and a roasted pumpkin seed recipe
  3. When tryptophan is taken as a supplement, some is converted to serotonin and some to melatonin.  Melatonin is fabulous for resetting your circadian rhythm so your sleep cycle gets back to normal. If taking tryptophan doesn’t quite get you sleeping through the night then taking additional melatonin may help. Sublingual melatonin helps you fall asleep and the timed-release form helps you stay asleep.
  4. Other factors that should be considered when sleep is an issue: low blood sugar,  addressing low serotonin levels,  addressing low GABA levels, checking for parasites and dysbiosis, and making sure you don’t have high cortisol.
  5. Other nutrients that may be helpful:  vitamin B6 (which helps improve mood and reduce anxiety too), zinc (which is also important for skin health,  reducing anxiety, improving mood, helping with blood sugar balance and PMS), and magnesium (which is also calming).
  6. Of course, it also helps to use a comfortable soft eye patch to keep the room dark and to use earplugs to keep things quiet. Also, keep clock radios and cell phones away from your head and don’t use an electric blanket!  Having a warm bath with essential oil of lavender is also a great help to help you wind down at the end of a hectic day.

Try some of the above tips and get those eight hours of sleep and you’ll have less mood problems, experience less worry and anxiety, eat less (or no) sugar and unhealthy food and drink less (or no) caffeinated beverages!   Sweet dreams!

Eat to be Happy and Calm in Chatelaine Magazine!

By Trudy Scott 8 Comments

 

What do these have in common? grass-fed red meat, pumpkin seeds, real food, oysters and home-made salad dressing? They are all foods that are part of the Happy Diet, and featured in the July edition of the Chatelaine Magazine. I’m thrilled to have contributed to this super article and am happy to share it with you here! I really enjoyed working with Kat Tancock. I hope you enjoy it – and enjoy the wonderful pictures too!

Eating real foods like this, and doing things like treating a friend to lunch can bring you great joy and happiness, as well as keep anxiety and stress at bay.

(Click on each image below to enlarge.)

The author Kat Tancock (www.kattancock.com) holds the copyright to this article. Please contact her regarding reproduction or any questions you may have.

Exercise and nature for mood, social anxiety, memory and hot flashes

By Trudy Scott 9 Comments

Beautiful sunset at Lake Natoma, CA – after a fun time windsurfing

June is Celebrate the Great Outdoors month and June 15th was Nature Photography Day. These are just one of the many great reasons to get outside to exercise and enjoy nature.

I’ve blogged a great deal about exercise and the outdoors a great deal – when I reported back about food-exercise-biofeedback from the ADAA conference and nature and calm in Yosemite.

Here is some very recent research on some more great health benefits to motivate you!

(1)  Improved mood and better memory

A recent paper and titled Interacting with nature improves cognition and affect for individuals with depression and published in the Journal of Affective Disorders found that something as simple and easy as 50 minute walk in the park improved cognition and mood.

(2)  Improved sleep and reduction in hot flashes in menopausal women

Another recent paper titled Sleep quality and aerobic training among menopausal women-A randomized controlled trial and published in the Finnish Journal Maturitas found that aerobic training for 6 months may improve sleep quality and reduce hot flushes among symptomatic menopausal women.

(3)  Less social anxiety and depression

This recent paper titled A Randomized Trial of MBSR Versus Aerobic Exercise for Social Anxiety Disorder and published in the Journal of Clinical Psychology found that both mindfulness-based stress reduction and aerobic exercise “were associated with reductions in social anxiety and depression and increases in subjective well-being”.

Exercising has always been a big part of my life and I feel really flat when I don’t exercise. I grew up in a tennis family and played tennis for years and then switched to squash (similar to the US racket ball) when I got to high-school. In my 20s and 30s I did a lot of 5K and 10K runs, trail running and a few half-marathons – all in the beautiful Colorado mountains. I actually met my wonderful husband rock-climbing and we spent many fun years rock-climbing, ice-climbing and mountaineering!

These days we love to windsurf, hike and mountain bike in the summer. In the winter I telemark ski and Brad does snowboarding.

So I encourage you to get outside to celebrate the great outdoors, have fun exercising and take some beautiful photos.

At your next social event you’ll be chatty, calm and happy, will remember everyone’s name and you won’t be having hot-flashes! And you’ll come home and have a wonderful deep restful sleep.

Have fun and please share what you love to do for exercise now and what you loved to do as a child.

Bipolar, disruptive mood or gluten and junk food?

By Trudy Scott 27 Comments

A national study published in 2007 showed a surge in use of the bipolar diagnosis in children: the frequency of visits to doctors’ offices by youths 19 and younger for treatment of the condition increased from 25 per 100,000 visits in 1994-95 to 1,003 per 100,000 visits in 2002-03. I wonder what the numbers are now?

The above quote is from a story that appeared in the Boston Globe earlier this month [thanks to my friend in Boston who shared this story with me and urged me to write a commentary!]

The story, “Proposed diagnosis for bipolar disorder divides psychiatrists” by Patricia Wen, discusses issues with proposed revisions to the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders IV (DSMIV). The psychiatric association is expected to make final decisions for its fifth revised edition to be published in May 2013.

A panel appointed by the American Psychiatric Association is urging that a new, potentially more transient and less-stigmatizing diagnosis – “disruptive mood dysregulation disorder’’ – be added to the official manual of mental illnesses, which is undergoing a sweeping revision [this new disorder would be included in the manual in addition to the existing bipolar disorder, and this is where the division is].

The new condition would apply to children who have chronic irritability, as well as recurrent temper outbursts – three or more times a week, on average – that are “grossly out of proportion’’ to the situation the child confronts.

It can be as disabling to a young child as bipolar disorder, but would probably be treated with antidepressants, not antipsychotic drugs. As adults, these children would be more likely to develop anxiety or depression, rather than bipolar disorder.

Wow! chronic irritability, recurrent temper outbursts, “grossly out of proportion’’ to the situation, likely to develop anxiety or depression as adults

This sounds a lot like a combination of poor diet/junk food and food intolerances. And it’s no surprise when you consider what diets kids are eating these days! Let’s also throw in low blood sugar for good measure – how many kids do you know who eat a good breakfast that includes protein?

Let’s first look at food quality and bipolar disorder:

In the Journal of Affective Disorders, a 2012 paper titled “Diet quality in bipolar disorder in a population-based sample of women”, found a lower risk of bipolar disorder in those eating a quality traditional foods diet. Granted, this is epidemiological evidence, but this is exactly why more research is imperative. The authors do actually state: “Longitudinal studies are warranted”.

Lead author of the above paper, Dr. Felice Jacka , is also the lead author in a 2011 PLoS One paper that found diet quality in adolescents was associated with a lower risk of mental health issues. The author stated that this “study highlights the importance of diet in adolescence and its potential role in modifying mental health over the life course”

Let’s also look at gluten and bipolar disorder:

In the journal Psychiatry Research, a 2012 paper titled “Markers of gluten sensitivity in acute mania: A longitudinal study” states that individuals “with mania had significantly increased levels of IgG antibodies to gliadin” “which is derived from the wheat protein gluten”.

When I read this section in the Boston Globe story a light bulb went off….

What is ultimately added, subtracted, or revised in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, first put out by the American Psychiatric Association in 1952, is loaded with practical and cultural implications.

It will help define what is considered normal behavior. It largely determines how clinicians diagnose conditions; what health insurers will pay for; what drugs are made and marketed; and what research will be funded by governments and foundations

Perhaps the division between bipolar disorder and disruptive mood dysregulation disorder is less important than my whole-hearted proposal to add gluten intolerance and celiac disease, junk food addict (and low blood sugar and a host of other nutritional factors) to the DSMIV!!!

I’m obviously saying this tongue-in-cheek but imagine a world where we:

  • Do get government research funding and studies done on mental health issues related to or directly caused by gluten intolerance and a junk food diet
  • Do get insurance coverage for nutrition coaching and consulting
  • Do see subsidies for organic food farmers
  • Do make this the first approach instead of medications…or at least use this approach in conjunction with lower doses of medications
  • Do see huge improvements …leading to say a 40-fold (or more) decrease in bipolar diagnoses in children (and adults) in a less than a year!

Yes! Add these now… please! If we need research for it to become mainstream then so be it! I’m volunteering to be part of any research in these areas. It works – I already know this, as do countless of other practitioners and people who have made these changes. Just read Michael Ellsberg’s compelling bipolar story on Forbes to be inspired!

Dr Katherine Falk, MD is in private practice in New York City and is certified by the American Board of Psychiatry and Neurology. She endorsed my book The Antianxiety Food Solution and said this:

Trudy Scott is an expert on the relationship of food and mood, an often neglected area in the health of persons with mental illness. This book provides practical information, clearly presented, which I believe to be an important adjunct in the treatment of not only anxiety and depression, but also of serious mental illness.

I would like to end by saying that I have no intention of minimizing the seriousness of bipolar disorder or any mental illness, I just believe there is so much more we can do on the food-mood front!

Aubrey Huff anxiety attack: could it be a food-mood issue?

By Trudy Scott 11 Comments

Photo by Jeffjeff08 (from Wikimedia Commons)

Do world-class athletes actually have performance anxiety and panic attacks? And could there be a food mood and nutrient connection?  Yes, food does have a big impact on our mood. And yes, anxiety can affect anyone and many athletes are affected! The most recent example is baseball player Aubrey Huff, from the San Francisco Giants. Henry Schulman wrote about Aubrey’s panic attack in SFGate in an article titled Aubrey Huff opens up about his anxiety attacks :

Aubrey Huff says his first panic attack lasted for eight hours.

Aubrey Huff was standing in his New York hotel room at 5 o’clock in the morning in the early stages of what would be an eight-hour panic attack. The Giant were to play a doubleheader against the Mets that afternoon and evening. Baseball was the last thing on Huff’s mind.

“I couldn’t breathe,” Huff recalled. “I felt I was taking short breaths. Right then and there I thought I was having a heart attack. I told myself, ‘I’ll be damned if I’m going to be sitting in this hotel room and die of a heart attack. I’ve got to get out of here.'”

I used to have social anxiety and panic attacks and it was horrible! And very scary! I really feel for Aubrey and would love to be able to help!

If I was working with Aubrey this is what I’d have him do (this is my approach for anyone who is experiencing anxiety and anxiety attacks/panic attacks):

  1. I’d have him keep a 3 day food diary and we’d look at his intake of real whole food (including grass-fed meat) compared to junk food and fast food
  2. We’d look at caffeine and sugar intake and reduce this and eventually eliminate it. Caffeine can induce anxiety and for many people it’s a tough one to eliminate so we’d have to address the underlying fatigue and reason for “self-medication”. For Aubrey, it could possibly be burned out adrenals. High sugar consumption also affects the adrenals and results in nutrient depletion of minerals like zinc and magnesium, both of which help with anxiety
  3. We’d also look at his gluten intake and assess for gluten intolerance and/or celiac disease and have him start right away on a 2 week gluten elimination trial. Whether or not gluten is a contributing factor to the anxiety, as Melissa Mclean Jory says in the Gluten-Free Edge, athletes perform better when gluten is not a part of their diets
  4. We’d have him start on the first of the 4 antianxiety diets: real whole food, good quality protein, good fats, plenty of organic veggies and fruit, and with no gluten. And make sure he eating a good breakfast that does include protein – keeping blood sugar stable is key for anxiety
  5. We must also always consider neurotransmitter imbalances. In the same SF gate interview Aubrey said this “I couldn’t control one thought in my head. There were so many thoughts going through”. Low serotonin can cause anxiety, panic attacks and ruminating thoughts, so assessing for low serotonin would be key. If low serotonin is a factor then using the amino acid supplements tryptophan or 5-HTP would be worth considering. Research supports the use of 5-HTP for panic. GABA is a calming amino acid and it’s likely that Aubrey would benefit from this too, especially if he has stiff and tense muscles
  6. I would also consider the possibility of pyroluria. In an interview on his blog, Aubrey stated: “I was very shy in high school, if you can believe it. I broke out of my shell at the University of Miami when I got around guys like Burrell. I learned how to believe in myself – and I learned how to project confidence even when I didn’t feel very confident.” As reported by Carey Vanderborg, “the Social Anxiety Institute says that social anxiety disorder, also known as performance anxiety, is a persistent fear of performance situations–such as an athletic event–in which you’re exposed to unfamiliar people or to possible judgment by others.” Zinc, vitamin B6 and evening primrose oil can completely eliminate social anxiety in someone with pyroluria. Here is the pyroluria questionnaire that I’d have Aubrey use for assessing if this is part of the issue. Raising serotonin levels also helps with boosting confidence so it doesn’t have to be learned or forced.

Each person has their own unique biochemistry and there may be other factors involved but this would be a great start. This is what I wish for Aubrey Huff with this food-mood approach: totally free of anxiety, no more panic attacks, zero performance anxiety, feeling super-confident, have no ruminating thoughts, plus playing his best baseball ever!

I would LOVE to send a copy of my book to Aubrey so if you know how to get fan-mail to him please let me know. I tried the Giants office and didn’t have any luck.

You can find out more in The Antianxiety Food Solution: How the Foods You Eat Can Help You Calm Your Anxious Mind, Improve Your Mood and End Cravings, available in major books stores, at Amazon and via www.antianxietyfoodsolution.com.

Earth Day tips that are good for the earth and good for your mood!

By Trudy Scott 11 Comments

Take care of the earth and take care of yourself, your health and your mood! Earth Day is a day early each year on which events are held worldwide to increase awareness and appreciation of the Earth’s natural environment

There was great event in Sacramento and I shared a booth with Donna Kelley. I had samples (and recipe) of roasted pumpkin seeds and herbal teabags. Of course, I also had copies of my book The Antianxiety Food Solution: How the Foods You Eat Can Help You Calm Your Anxious Mind, Improve Your Mood and End Cravings. So much of what we do for anxiety and overall mood is just naturally also good for the earth – like eating quality food, avoiding pesticides, exercising and more! It was fun sharing a booth with Donna, a fellow nutritionist at Concepts of Optimal Nutrition. Donna had a drawing for potted herbs, a yummy recipe and information about her nutrition programs.

Here are some of the tips we shared:

  • Exercise outdoors! Good for the earth and good for your mood! : Ride a bike; Go for a hike in nature; Go for a walk or run; Grow a vegetable garden; Mow your lawn with a hand or push mower like a Brill (this is what I use and there is no noise pollution, no fumes and it is a great work-out)
  • Eat organic and GMO-free! Good for the earth and good for your mood! : Buy organic and GMO-free; Grow your own veggies, fruit and herbs – you can do this even if you don’t have a garden – check out this amazing rooftop garden concept; Make your own sprouts (alfalfa, lentil, mung bean); Eat real whole food; Demand labeling of GMO ingredients; Eat wild fish, grassfed meat, pastured chickens

We even made it onto KCRA/Channel 3 news at 5pm! Don’t blink or you may miss it – ha ha! It is right at the start as the announcer starts talking, at the 6-10 second mark, so a total of 5 seconds! It shows The Antianxiety Food Solution “You Are What You Eat Poster”. I’m “Zen Apple Girl” and Bruce is “Stressed Sugar Girl”! Here is the Earth Day video.

I think these little girls did a better job with being “Zen Apple Girl” and “Stressed Sugar Girl”. And the great thing is that the kids really got the food-mood connection with feeling awesome with eating good food versus feeling bad, anxious and cranky when they eat sugar and junk!

I’d like to end with this beautiful “Earth Day Anthem”

Joyful joyful we adore our Earth in all its wonderment
Simple gifts of nature that all join into a paradise
Now we must resolve to protect her
Show her our love through out all time
With our gentle hand and touch
We make our home a newborn world
Now we must resolve to protect her
Show her our love through out all time

It was super to see so many people out celebrating Earth Day. Great see some friend and clients and meet new people. It was also great to see all the other great vendors sharing about electric cars, organic produce and farmers markets and more. I hope you get to enjoy it every year and every single day of the year too.