Mental attitude and emotional state matter in both healing and illness, more than most treatment plans allow for. Naturopathic physicians train in a range of psychological techniques, including counseling, nutritional balancing, stress management and biofeedback.
There are plenty of good reasons to stay physically active. Near the top of the list is lowering your risk of stroke, heart disease and diabetes. Maybe your reasons are simpler: getting in shape, holding off depression, bringing your blood pressure down, or just feeling better in your own body. And when the “brain fog” of getting older starts to show up, exercise changes the brain in ways that protect memory and thinking.
Exercise does two jobs at once, and holding off depression is part of it. It brings inflammation down through the body, and it works directly on brain health. The diagram below shows how much difference regular movement makes to the brain.
At Natural Medical Solutions we work to reach the underlying cause of whatever someone is dealing with. To keep the brain running well, Dr. Ravello reviews diet and nutrition alongside the other things that support cognitive health. Call (770) 674-6311 to book an appointment.
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Natural Medical Solutions marks the start of a new school year with a look at integrative options that can sharpen mental performance.
Caffeine
Caffeine is probably the most widely used psychoactive substance on earth. It stimulates the central nervous system, heart rate and respiration, and it occurs naturally in the leaves, seeds or fruits of more than 60 plants, coffee beans, cacao beans, kola nuts, guarana berries and tea leaves among them. Its use for lifting mood and mental function goes back a long way. Taken before a task that demands concentration, caffeine appears to help working memory and reaction time, though the effect on long-term memory is much weaker.
Ginseng
Ginseng covers several species in the genus Panax, part of the Araliaceae family. A number of studies report that Panax ginseng improves mental performance in healthy people. Reviews have linked it with faster attentiveness, better accuracy and reaction time, improved overall mental efficiency and better psychomotor performance. What longer studies still need to establish is whether those results hold for particular subgroups, and whether taking it for longer adds anything.
Rosemary
Rosemary is an aromatic evergreen shrub grown in many parts of the world. Fresh and dried, the leaves work as a food preservative and turn up throughout traditional Mediterranean cooking. One earlier study found that aromatherapy using rosemary essential oil may improve cognitive performance.
Boron
Boron is a micronutrient found in plants, and it appears to matter for growth and development in animals. One early human study reported better performance on tasks involving eye-hand coordination, attention, perception, short-term memory and long-term memory when boron was supplemented.
Bacopa
Bacopa monnieri is a creeping herb that grows in marshy ground and is often planted in freshwater areas. Native to India and Australia, it has since spread across the tropics. Ayurvedic practice has long used Bacopa to support memory and cognition.
Fall arrives, the leaves turn, and the temperatures stay warm a while longer. That should feel good. It often does not. Even with sunlight on your skin and the vitamin D that comes with it, you can find yourself sluggish and low, carrying the kind of heaviness that tips into depression, like sitting in a dark room with the door shut.
Depression shows up as sadness, crying, fatigue, lethargy, aches and pains, irritability, losing interest in things you used to enjoy, and pulling away from friends and family. It does not wait for a convenient moment. These symptoms can arrive at any time.
In any given year about 8.2 percent of U.S. adults have a major depressive episode, and around 21 percent will experience major depressive disorder at some point in their lives, according to the National Institute of Mental Health. Research suggests depression arises from several genes acting together with environmental and other factors. Even so, there is a great deal a naturopathic physician can do about depression.
If you are in crisis right now, call or text 988 to reach the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline, free and available 24 hours a day. If someone is in immediate danger, call 911. Naturopathic care supports your mental health alongside, not instead of, urgent help and the care of your other providers.
Depression is bound up with the hormonal imbalances we carry through daily life. What is missing from your diet can shift your mood as much as anything else. Keeping blood sugar steady is one of the most reliable levers you have, which is why people so often notice more anxiety on days they skip meals. Eating regularly is an unglamorous but effective way to steady your mood. Individual food reactions play a part too.
There are a few straightforward ways to identify problem foods, and the elimination diet is the most useful. You remove the most commonly reactive foods for 2 to 4 weeks and pay attention to what happens to your mood and your depression symptoms:
Blood testing for immunoglobulin G (IgG antibodies) is another route to finding food problems. IgG is part of how the body fights bacterial and viral infections. It makes up as much as 80% of these essential proteins, and it is the smallest and by far the most abundant human antibody. It can appear up to 3 days after you eat a problem food. Several naturopathic labs run these panels, and the results give a far more personal picture of which foods to avoid. Other testing includes:
Amino Acid Testing
Amino acid assessment is useful across a range of conditions, among them depression, anxiety, chronic fatigue, digestion and absorption problems and catabolic processes.
Mineral Testing
Macro and micro mineral elements are needed throughout the body's metabolic pathways. Imbalances there can feed into cancer, disordered immune regulation, chronic degenerative disease, aging and mood.
IGG4 Allergen Testing
Food sensitivities set off a surprising spread of symptoms: inflammatory bowel disease, gas and bloating, fatigue, mood swings, anxiety, ADD/ADHD, headaches and migraines, skin problems, RA, sinusitis and recurrent ear infections.
GI Effect Testing
Gastrointestinal health governs digestion, nutrient absorption and clearing waste and pathogens out of the body. When digestion is poor and absorption fails, what follows is immune dysfunction, nutritional shortfalls, food allergies, toxicity and a range of disease states.
Toxicity Testing
Elemental exposure (mercury, lead and the like) and environmental exposure (xenobiotics, chemicals) are far more common than people assume, and both feed a long list of chronic illness: allergies, asthma, autoimmune disease, brain fog, certain cancers, cognitive difficulty, diabetes, fatigue, fibromyalgia, hormonal imbalance, infertility, obesity and tremors.
Fatty Acid Testing
Getting the fatty acid balance right matters in autoimmune conditions, cardiovascular health, depression, allergies and skin conditions.
Testing
Organic acids are the metabolic intermediates produced in central energy production, detoxification, neurotransmitter breakdown and intestinal microbial activity.
Depression reaches everyone, whatever their background and whatever their age. What still surrounds it is stigma and fear, and there are people who read a condition like depression as weakness. Knowing the current numbers helps, because seeing how widespread it really is chips away at that stigma. The more the stigma falls, the more people go looking for treatment.
The most common forms are Major Depression, Persistent Depressive Disorder (once called dysthymia) and Seasonal Affective Disorder.
Major Depression is when low mood takes over everything and interest drains out of activities that would normally be a pleasure. It brings trouble sleeping, changes in appetite or weight, no energy, and a sense of being worthless. Thoughts of death or suicide can come with it.
Persistent Depressive Disorder means low mood lasting at least two years without necessarily reaching the intensity of Major Depression. Plenty of people living with it get through each day and hold down their responsibilities, while feeling flat or bleak for much of that time. It can also bring appetite and sleep changes, low drive, low confidence and sadness.
Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) sets in as the days shorten through fall and winter. The mood change appears to come from shifts in the body's daily rhythms, in how sensitive the eyes are to light, or in the way chemical messengers such as serotonin and melatonin behave.
Mental attitude and emotional state matter in healing and in illness. Dr. Ravello trains in a range of psychological techniques, counseling, nutritional balancing, stress management and biofeedback, and uses them to help patients get back to good health. If you are dealing with depression, call us today at (770) 674-6311 to schedule an appointment.
Book Appointment Today
Natural Medical Solutions Wellness Center
1130 Upper Hembree Rd
Roswell, GA 30076
Phone:
(770) 674-6311
Educational resources from trusted medical organizations. This information does not replace personalized medical advice.
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