How food helped my friend’s brain fog

Close up portrait of a healthy older woman smiling outside

My friend appeared dumb… but more on that later.

Some of the things I hear constantly are, “I can’t think properly”, “I can’t concentrate”, “I can’t remember things”, “I’m all over the place”.

Let’s be honest, this isn’t entirely the fault of social media, constant notifications, constant interruptions from phones or the fast pace life that we live.

How we feed our brain is super, super important too.

Health at Midlife

My Friend’s Case

I have a friend who, amongst other things, struggled with holding her train of thought. She appeared dumb sometimes to me. Harsh, I know, but I always found it strange because I knew she was clever, she just couldn’t hold a thought for long enough to finish a sentence!

When I learned of her diet, I wasn’t surprised. The more I learn about food’s effect on brain chemistry, the more it makes sense that we are dumbing ourselves down.

Hops for Beer

Starchy carbs have always been known as an opiate of sorts. Carbs calm us down and help us sleep.

In addition some natural compounds in grains dumb us down. It is well documented in history that hops were chosen as the grain of choice for beer because they made the masses docile (hops contain estrogenic compounds, and estrogen is the hormone of compliance) and prevented any uprisings!

My Friend’s Carb-Filled Diet

Here is what she was typically eating:

Breakfast:

Muesli with soy milk and banana, cappuccino with soy milk

  • here we have carbs in abundance – in the oats, banana and dried fruit, sugar in soy milk, (and caffeine in the coffee will increase blood sugars too) – all of these stimulate blood sugars which we know affects the brain’s chemistry. Note: None of these are inherently bad but there are 2 issues – a trend towards high carb, and they are all hard to digest, probably contributing to gut inflammation.
Lunch:

Chicken schnitty wrap

  • here we have carbs in the wrap, carbs in the coating of the schnitzel, sugar in the sweet chilli sauce, bad fats (industrialised seed oils AKA vegetable oils) in the mayo, bad fats the chicken was fried in and bad fats in the wrap. All of which affect blood sugars and insulin levels which in turn affect our gut, brain and endocrine system. Not to mention our weight!
Dinner:

Glass of wine, spinach pasta, bottle of pasta sauce, sweet potato, veggies and tofu stir fry

  • here we have sugars in the wine, white flour carbs in the pasta, sugar in the pasta sauce (guaranteed) and a carb oriented stir fry mix, especially the sweet potato. Once again, these are not terrible choices but overall they add up to a very carb heavy day.

But I thought I was being healthy!! What do I do now?

…she cried!

I used to think this diet was healthy too and indeed, this reflects a lot of what I was taught 30 years ago at naturopathic college. Healthy = vegetarian = high grains, high fibre, high vegetable, high fruit, high carb, low fat & low protein.

Since then I discovered The Wise Traditions diet from the pioneering research of Dr Weston A Price. And I’ve been hooked ever since.

Lately I’ve added the GAPS diet to my research and I’m finding it incredibly powerful for anyone with chronic disease.

I have become a passionate advocate of The Wise Traditions diet as it seems to benefit women and their families in dozens of different ways. But I’ll share more about that another time.

For now, I recommend you give me a quick call to arrange a complimentary conversation where we can discuss what your biggest problem is and what’s holding you back from achieving good health and good brain function. I’ll give you a resource for you to take away and we’ll see if we’re a good fit for working together.

Call 0409 774 790 or book online

Coming soon

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Brenda Rogers

With over 25 years experience as a corporate trainer, naturopath, yoga teacher and wise woman educator, Brenda is the head clinician and coach at Quintessence Health.

"A healthy mind and body simply ensures you have the time and energy to fully express and manifest your life’s purpose – it facilitates the unfolding of joy."

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