Question: Can your diet and what you eat affect your mental health?

Elizabeth Treadwell answered on 16 Jun 2020:

This is a really good question. Often people struggling with their mental wellbeing are told by medical professionals to make sure they are eating properly and healthy.

The food we eat, and the nutrients and minerals within it help our body to work normally. When it’s not working normally, we might feel ill, or we might just feel “not quite right” and this in itself can affect your mood. So in a general sense, yes, diet can affect mental health.

More specifically, one of the neurotransmitters (the little messenger chemicals in our brain) that is thought to affect mood, called serotonin is made from another chemical called tryptophan. Tryptophan can’t be made inside the body, so we have to make sure we eat enough of it! One of the foods that has it in, is bananas.

There is also some evidence that omega (oil found in fish and other food) improves mood. There are two parts of omega, and one of those parts EHA, on its own is thought to have all the benefit.