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Many of the clinicians who attend my CE seminars ask ”How do I introduce nutrition into the psychotherapeutic setting?” My first suggestion is to begin with the method we engage in already: Psychoeducation. While we are not always trained in ergonomics, we still advise against slouching in a chair all day, and while we are not trained as experts in liver disease, we know enough to advise our clients of the dangers of excessive alcohol use. As mental health clinicians, we do not require a degree in nutrition to psycho educate our clients about the effects of excess caffeine on anxiety and insomnia and many other nutritional and dietary behaviors that contribute to poor mental health. There are many simple approaches to helping clients enhance their nutritional choices that are absolutely proven to improve mental health, and yet our clients are not often aware of these methods. We can safely and within scope, educate them and we are the best trained to help motivate them and to understand their obstacles to change. Below I list just a few places to start with your client:
The SAD Diet
I educate my clients about the benefits of changing their SAD diet (Standard American Diet) of refined flours, sugar, soda and toxic fats and how it is indeed making them sad. I coach them to withdraw, step by step from these foods, just as I would help them to withdraw from any addictive substance.
Mood Follows Food
In my book, written for mental health clinicians I describe how diet can be used to help people regulate their moods which may labile due to poor diet and not due to bipolar disorder or ADHD. Sugar and refined flours along with artificial sweeteners can cause blood sugar to rise and fall and exacerbate mood disorders. These clients benefit from increasing their quality proteins and fats(which helps to reduce cravings for sugar) and then to reduce and eliminate refined carbs and artificial "mood changers". Only then can we accurately assess exactly what is contributing to mood lability.
Vegetarian? Carnivore? Vegan Or Paleo? OH MY!
Laura was a long term client who was very anxious and verging on panic, symptoms she had never experienced before. When I assessed her,I found that she had started a strict vegetarian diet several months earlier, but what she did not know was that her particular biochemistry required animal-based proteins along with plants. Once she changed her diet, her anxiety disappeared. People may be biological carnivores or vegetarians but if they don’t align with their body’s needs, they can experience significant mental distress. Understanding biochemical individuality is an essential, yet advanced nutritional concept. Clinicians can begin to psycho educate by asking their clients to identify what types of foods make them feel best, mood stable, vital and energetic and what foods depress them and cause fatigue. This provides us with practical information to build on and also begins the process of client self-awareness of how mood follows food. Following this discussion, a consultation with a nutritional therapist may help to define their more complex biochemical individuality.
Vitamin D Deficiency
Over 98% of the population in the USA are Vitamin D deficient. Low levels of Vitamin D are associated with depression, pain, and poor immune function. Jill, a long time client in Seattle reported that she couldn't stop crying and felt depressed and didn't know why. I asked her when she had last checked her Vitamin D levels. Blood tests revealed significantly below normal levels. She took high doses of micronized emulsified Vitamin D for a month and her blood levels rose and her crying and depression lifted.
Probiotics + Prebiotics
The gut creates relaxing Neurotransmitters like GABA. I explain to my clients that their gut is their “second brain” and they need to tend to their “gut garden” with healthy bacteria planted in a prebiotic fertilizer. I provide my clients with recipes about how to make inexpensive sauerkraut or kim chi as they cannot always afford expensive store-bought probiotics.
Depression is a Dis-ease of Inflammation
Depression is a disease of inflammation that occurs in part, as a result of poor diet. By adding certain foods into the diet that are rich in anthocyanins (like blueberries) and eliminating the ones that cause inflammation (sugar and margarine, and gluten and casein for many) people can achieve remarkable results and often eliminate psychotropic medications.
My Mantra
If you want to see a major improvement in the mental health of your clients then psycho-educate about the role of nutrition in mental well-being.
