Uma Naidoo MD - The Food Mood Connection

DISCLAIMER

This book is intended to supplement, not replace, the advice of a trained health professional. If you know or suspect that you have a health problem, you should consult a health professional. The author and publisher specifically disclaim any liability, loss, or risk, personal or otherwise, that is incurred as a consequence, directly or indirectly, of the use and application of any of the contents of this book.

A NOTE ON THE RECIPES

These have been reproduced from the original American edition and, in order to make them user-friendly for a UK audience, all weights and amounts have been converted from imperial measures to metric and certain ingredients substituted. Any discrepancies or issues that arise from this conversion are the sole responsibility of the publisher: in the case of any queries, please contact .

This book is dedicated to my beloved late father and Pinetown Granny, to my mom (who gave me the most important piece of advice in my life), and to my husband, without whom this book would never have materialized.

Contents

How To Use This Ebook

Select one of the chapters from the and you will be taken straight to that chapter.

Look out for linked text (which is in blue) throughout the ebook that you can select to help you navigate between related sections.

You can double tap images to increase their size. To return to the original view, just tap the cross in the top left-hand corner of the screen.

Introduction

Nutrition and psychiatry may not seem like the most natural fit. When you picture Dr. Freud with his pipe and his leather couch, hes probably not scribbling a recipe for baked salmon on his prescription pad. Indeed, in my experience psychiatrists send their patients home with prescription drugs or referrals to other types of therapy, but no guidance on how food can help them with the challenges that brought them to the analysts couch. And though many conscientious modern eaters think constantly about the food were eating how it will affect our hearts, the environment and most of all our waistlines we dont think about its influence on our brains.

While this relationship between nutrition and mental health may not feel intuitive at first glance, its key to understanding twin epidemics in modern health care. Though medical knowledge and technology are better than they have ever been, both mental health disorders and bad health outcomes caused by poor dietary choices are disturbingly common. One in five American adults will have a diagnosable mental health condition in any given year, and 46 per cent of Americans will meet the criteria for a diagnosable mental health condition sometime in their life. Thirty-seven per cent of Americans are considered obese, with an additional 32.5 per cent considered overweight, making a total of roughly 70 per cent of the population above an optimal weight. An estimated 23.1 million Americans have a diabetes diagnosis, with another 7.2 million estimated to be undiagnosed. Thats a total of 30.3 million people, almost 10 per cent of the population.

Much like the intricate relationship between the gut and brain that forms the basis of this book, diet and mental health are inextricably linked, and the connection between them goes both ways: a dearth of good dietary choices leads to an increase in mental health issues, and mental health issues in turn lead to poor eating habits. Until we solve nutritional problems, no amount of medication and psychotherapy is going to be able to stem the tide of mental issues in our society.

While fixing the broken relationship between diet and mental health is certainly important on a societal level, it can also make a crucial difference on an individual level and not just for those who suffer from diagnosed mental conditions. Whether or not you have ever visited a mental health professional for depression or anxiety, every one of us has felt sad and nervous. We all have experienced obsession and trauma, large or small. We all want to keep our attention and memories sharp. We all need to sleep and have a satisfying sex life.

In this book, I want to show you ways in which you can use diet to achieve well-being in every aspect of your mental health.

When people learn that I am a psychiatrist, a nutritionist and a trained chef, they often assume that I have been cooking since I was young and that my medical interests came later. But I actually learned to cook relatively late in life. I grew up in a large South Asian family surrounded by grandmothers, aunts, a mother and a mother-in-law who were all exceptional cooks. I didnt need to cook! My mom, a specialist in two fields of medicine and excellent cook and baker, did get me interested in baking, and it was through the exact measuring of ingredients that the roots of my love for science took hold. Otherwise, I was happy to let others handle things in the kitchen.

When I moved to Boston to train in psychiatry at Harvard, I felt ripped from the love and warmth of my extended family and the delicious food that signified home. I knew I had to learn how to cook in order to carve out a home in this new place. My husband, being the brilliant person he is, already knew how to cook, but I banished him from the kitchen (at least so he likes to joke in reality he was an invaluable guide and brutally honest taste tester) and began to try out a few recipes that Id been taught.

For inspiration, I channelled memories of Pinetown Granny, as we called my maternal grandma. While my mom attended medical school during the day, I hung out with her and watched her cook. At three years old Id peer into the kitchen, not allowed to step anywhere near the hot stove and oven, and observe her closely. Wed start the day by picking fresh vegetables from the garden, then prepped fresh vegetables for lunch, set the table, told stories and took an afternoon nap.

Since cable was an unaffordable luxury as we were getting on our feet in Boston, I also watched public television and met the magnificent Julia Child, dropping omelettes and teaching me about French cuisine. She inspired great confidence in my cooking and kept me company during many lonely hours when my husband was completing his fellowship. Slowly and steadily, cooking became a part of me and a space in which I could decompress once I began residency.

Even after I began to work as a practising psychiatrist, my passion for cooking stayed strong, and my husband suggested I spend some time at the Culinary Institute of America. I loved taking classes at the CIA but couldnt sustain the commute while actively working as a doctor in Boston. So I enrolled in an amazing local school, Cambridge School of Culinary Arts, and pledged to keep myself committed to both psychiatry and cooking.

I quickly learned that unlike the sexy medical dramas on TV, which are a far cry from the real-life medical world, professional-level cooking as it is depicted onscreen is really how it is a lot of screaming and yelling from the head chef, although theyre not usually as foul-mouthed as Gordon Ramsay. Though it is stressful, nothing beats the gratifying feeling when your meringue comes together perfectly, or when you appreciate the depth and flavour of a perfectly executed consomm, or when your pt is the texture of buttercream before it sets.

All the while, I was still actively practicing at the hospital. Thinking back, I am not sure how I managed it. There were many times when I took my books to dinner to study for my written culinary exams. There were also long hours catching up with work, emails, prescriptions and telephone calls after school. Somehow I got through. I see now that my passion for both worlds drove me, for I truly love psychiatry as much as I do cooking.