Bipolar and food choices? What do you eat?

Does it help you or hurt you?

I just stumbled upon an article on ketosis and low carb paleo type stuff maybe helping Bipolar because ketosis acts on the sodium calcium channels like lithium and lamotrigine etc.

I'm not interested in going whole hog ketosis but was wondering if anyone has had any success with various diet methods.

I know we all have different brains and what works for some may work for others.

I have always just tried to eat unprocessed whole foods and not a lot of extra sugar as much as possible. I have also not eaten meat or dairy or fish for a few years now though I am adding it back in. And I am noticing that I feel calmer on days when I start out with eggs or meat than with oatmeal. I should probably chart to see if I'm making it up

So tell me if you don't mind...

What do you eat?

What don't you eat?

What helps?

What hurts?

Have you seen any real science about it?

For breakfast I'll have oatmeal and fruit, or hard boiled eggs. Try to eat as little of red meat as possible. Don't drink soda. Dinners usually chicken or pasta, maybe sushi. Eat ice cream occasionally. Lots of water. Tea. Coffee in the morning. No fast food. Still give into pizza or wings once or twice a week.

I feel that on days I eat less and more greens and fruits I have more energy.

Diet is very important aspect of bipolar disorder. Always trying to get healthier/

I don't eat meat, which includes fish, or dairy (it's an ethics thing). My husband is the same, and he's really passionate about it, so he cooks healthy meals for us and has researched how we can get all the nutrients we need. I'm just saying that so no one thinks I'm a junk food vegan (like eating fake meat and **** like that). So I eat a lot of vegetables and fruit and whatever my husband makes for dinner.

I'm back to the way I was eating pre-seroquel now, which is nice.

I don't know. I really don't think I'm very healthy. I don't eat enough, so I'm going to start taking vitamins. I smoke too much. I haven't lost my eleven pound seroquel weight gain despite going back to the way I was eating before and being very physically active. Of course, I've only been off my nemesis for two weeks. Lol.

Carbs, carbs, and more carbs...everything my doctor doesn't want me to eat. But I can't help it and don't care anymore.

Yeah I have been a whole foods vegan for a long time.

I'm glad you lost you weight I hope you feel better

Good question. The brain can only use the resources we provided it. The best line I have heard is that 'what's good for the heart is good for the brain'. And there is a ton of literature and research on heart disease and I mean like a ton. Just don't believe everything you read fats are good for you um kay. And triggering the insulin response does seem to be implicated in heart disease. Not to mention that being bipolar means you have about a 30% increase in the rate of type II diabetes anyways. Some of it due to meds (antipsychotics), but also have been found to correlate in drug naive patients as well. I don't know too much about it but ketogenic diets (or a diet that induces ketosis) is when the brain is using ketone bodies as fuel instead of sugar? Which to me makes sense as sugars are pretty hard to find in nature year round, but protein and fats are abundant any time of year (I mean if we don't ship **** from Argentina so we can eat apples all year long). Sorry if I got excited love the topic!

Oh I forgot to say that our vegan choices are because of ethics and environment and health too. That is why it is kind of tricky for me because I'm not really happy about eating animals. I just also think it may just be true that I feel better when I do. Sigh.

I am very much a "know your farmer " kind of a girl so I try

I too eat whatever junk i want. I just have no self discipline. I feel better with the carbs.

Oh please do get excited! I like it. Food stuff gets me excited too.

I wasn't sure if you were saying you do think fats are good for you or you do not think fats are good for you.

I have been way on either side of the spectrum in my life. Ha! I just realized how Bipolar that sounds

I do think probably somewhere in the middle is best. And real unprocessed foods and lots of vegetables seem to always be the winner.

I have just been eating extremely grain and bean heavy for a long time and am just wondering....

The 18 months of my life when my Bipolar was the best (NO depression low to no anxiety and probably a few mild hypos maybe) was the time that I was into the traditional foods stuff. But there are way too many variables to conclude anything....
I'm just wondering

When I'm depressed I crave doughnuts.

When I'm depressed I don't eat anything.

I'm primarily vegan, and when I'm not in a depression I can manage to prepare healthy meals. I find it takes a lot of work and time to prepare healthy fresh foods. I have to decide what to get, go to the grocery store and get it, and then there's all of that prep. I never feel like I get enough protein, and when I'm in my routine, I make sure I have a shake every day for breakfast.

When I am depressed I start disliking food. I find there's absolutely nothing I want to eat. I also find it overwhelming to go to the grocery store and I end up sending my husband out to grab quick things.

Then I usually end up living on junk food and it's a Catch-22, because I feel too depressed to make healthy food, and I'm eating junk so I feel more depressed.

Sometimes in a depression I'll fixate on one food and that's the only thing I want to eat for weeks at a time. I know this is terrible but I've gone through phases where I've had chips and dip for breakfast lunch and supper for weeks back when I ate dairy.

So I go from one extreme to the other. I go from eating a vegan diet with mostly fresh vegetables and very few preservatives to living on absolute garbage. As soon as I start to come out of my depression I start to make healthy food again.

I know I need to eat better and it would help me get out of this depression but I just can't go to the grocery store right now. The other day I almost cried because I became overwhelmed at the idea of having a bath. It just seemed like so much work to wash and condition my hair and then get out and get dressed and brush my hair.

And you'd think that when I hate all food I wouldn't eat it, but I do feel this weird gnawing hunger all the time when I'm depressed so I end up stuffing myself full of junk food that I don't want and don't enjoy.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I'm a vegetarian, but that's just because I have weird taste buds... meat just tastes gross to me, and that includes poultry and seafood too. I stopped eating meat 12 years ago and haven't had any desire to start again. Other than that, I don't have any restrictions and probably eat a little too much junk food...

So I will be honest I am a senior in chemistry at my local university and I just completed a course on metabolic regulation and we were asked to read this book 'Good calorie, bad calorie' for extra credit (I got it on audiotape because honestly when I am stressed **** reading). Anyway the main premises of the book was that there is insufficient data to demonizes fat as bad and just as much insufficient data to glorify carbs. Currently I think the direction of nutritional sciences is in the way of what is called a paleolithic diet that is the diet on which we evolved on prior to agricultural. We never had fruits and vegetables, or grains year round which is basically saying we were hunter/gathers. There have been several studies on cultures that only eat meat and they are not malnourished or obese (like americans are. and as a quick aside I have never seen a malnourished lion or tiger unless you accout for lack of food). We hear a lot about fish oils lately and how they are good for the heart. The two main omega-3 fatty acids that are recommended for heart health are DHA and EPA. DHA makes up about 80% of brain matter (or is that 80% of the fats in the brain matter). Whatever the main point is that DHA is not only good for the heart but is obviously a major component of the brain and has been shown to be a somewhat affective mood stabilizer. The link between carbs, diabetes and heart diseases is a constantly growing field of research in health and human nutrition and I think it begs the question what is the "correct diet" for humans

Fascinating thank you. I'm going to read that book. Do you have anything else to say? It's very interesting to me.

I have been a vegetarian for 25 years. Right now I am drinking an Odwalla soy dairy protein shake. 32 g of protein.

I am not into paleo diets or low carb diets or anything else. Anything that restrictive for me would be a recipe to fail.

I lose my appetite a lot and eat a lot of protein bars.

Today I ate green grapes, strawberries and a small Greek salad. I eat fish and poultry occasionally. I try to avoid super sugary or fattening things. I do not eat many calories and very low fat.

That said, I struggle with anorexia so what I eat and don't eat revolves around my ED, not bipolar.

I eat everything. Nothing stops me from getting my grub on.

I crave doughnuts when I am depressed and also when I am not depressed. Mmmm

Is there a relationship between vegetarianism and bipolar disorder? Seems like the majority of posters here don't eat meat...

There is a correlation between mental illness/mood disorders and vegetarianism. It's important to remember that correlation does not imply causation.

Since I was a child, I've had a strong adversion to meat. I go long periods without being able to stomach it. However I'm not a vegetarian. Sometimes I will eat it. Nothing with bones or off a carcass.

My eating habits are all over the place. I go long periods eating very healthy and well. I also go long periods overeating and eating terrible foods. And often I enter phases where the thought of food makes me sick and I have to force myself to eat, even though everything tastes and feels like the equivalent of sawdust.

Carbs are the real enemy for bipolar. I have written a post on leaky gut and the mind/gut link due to this. I drink a lot of Kefir, used to eat probiotic. There are articles on this if you google, leaky gut...

The problem is we eat lots of food that was treated with antibiotics(chicken, for example) or we take that as a drug (lesser), so this eventually kills of the good bacteria we MUST have. I take probiotics and I have noticed a world of difference...processed food does the same! I avoid that too! I still have ups and downs but the severity is not what it was before. Check out this website book. http://www.breakingtheviciouscycle.info/legal/listing/

The diet itself is impossible (for me, at least to follow), but you may wish to try. Go for it!

Paleo. Totally works. No alcohol or caffeine (but I have to drink the caffeine cuz I self medicate for the ADHD)... But seriously that diet is a life saver! I don't do it all the time, but when I need to center I do and it always works.

Sent from my SM-G900V using Tapatalk

I really don't eat many vegetables, I am mainly a meat eater. However, I find it helps to follow my cravings. Sometimes I will crave beef and I eat steak and hamburgers for 3 days straight, other times it may be lettuce and I will I eat a whole head of lettuce for dinner, and other times it may even be licorice, rice, potatoes, etc. The cravings rarely hit me though. But as a whole I am generally satisfied within nothing but beef and potatoes.
I even love beef so much as to have a steak for dinner and a hamburger for desert.

I always feel good with my diet and am only 10 lbs overweight, which I have been for the last 6 years.

I have never heard that there is a link between vegetarianism and mood disorders. I quit after college and was into PETA and activism. And I just don't like meat or seafood.