Change Your Brain Every Day - Can Having a Mental Disorder Affect Your Memory?

Episode Date: October 19, 2017

Roughly half of the population will be affected by a mental disorder at some point in their lives. In Part 8 of a series on Memory Rescue, Dr. Daniel Amen and Tana Amen take a look at how mental health affects your memory, and the importance nutrition plays in maintaining optimal health.

Welcome to the Brain Warriors Way podcast. I'm Dr. Daniel Amen. And I'm Tana Amen. Here we teach you how to win the fight for your brain to defeat anxiety, depression, memory loss, ADHD, and addictions. The Brain Warriors Way podcast is brought to you by Amen Clinics, where we've transformed lives for three decades using brain spec imaging to better target treatment and natural ways to heal the brain. For more information, visit amenclinics.com.

The Brain Warriors Way podcast is also brought to you by BrainMD, where we produce the highest quality nutraceutical products to support the health of your brain and body. For more information, visit brainmdhealth.com. Welcome to the Brain Warriors Way podcast. Welcome back. We are still talking about memory rescue, and as part of memory rescue, we're talking about bright minds. How do you have a bright mind? Well, and just to review, the way you rescue your brain or keep it healthy is you eliminate all of the risk factors that steal your mind. And the mnemonic for that is bright minds. And I love what you came up with, with bright

minds. So we went all through bright, B-R-I-G-H-T. Blood flow, retirement and aging, inflammation, genetics, head trauma. We just finished toxins. So, and now we are on M in MINDs. So, the M in MINDs is mental health. And I wanted to start off today because as I looked at the list here of risk factors, I realized this list has touched, like every one of these risk factors has touched my entire family. Like it's, it's really deeply woven into my history. So chronic stress, depression, ADD, PTSD, bipolar, and schizophrenia. And I just, it was like a big wake-up call to me

because this is, I never really thought of my family, like I don't think of my family as being like this family that suffers from mental health issues. I really don't think of us that way, but we have suffered from all of these. And I really want people to think about this because the reason this is important to me, we've got to do a better job of decreasing stigma around this. Families suffer from these issues. And if you were suffering from heart disease, if you were suffering from diabetes, it wouldn't be a judgment. It would be like something we help you deal with.

And this is life. This is what we have. There's many reasons these issues come up. And we need to do a better job. Well, and as a psychiatrist, what I realized, if I'm going to help you with your addiction or I'm going to help you with your depression or with your PTSD or ADHD, it's I have to help your brain be better. And what we just, you know, in doing memory rescue, and I've known this for a long time, is having a mental health issue

increases your risk of a cognitive health issue or of dementia. And I'm just not okay with that. That if you want to rescue your memory, you also have to rescue your mood. You have to rescue and stop the addictions. You have to get these things optimally treated. And I agree with you. We definitely have to do a better job of decreasing stigma. That's why I fell in love with imaging. We have to do a better job of treating these illnesses. Oh, no.

I have to tell you. And this bright minds approach is a smart way to do it. I mean, I think everybody who listens to us now knows that I thought psychiatrists, when I first met you, I'm like, I don't want to date a psychiatrist. I think they're idiots. Pardon me for if you're a psychiatrist and you're listening to this, but the whole industry, because my family had been hurt by this, by psychiatrists. So I love what you do and I fell in love with your story and what you did. And I'm like, God, it's so different. It's such a different approach. And I really liked that. But in a million years, I would never have realized that the chronic stress I grew up in and the fact that I suffered from pretty severe depression for, even though it was not a long time, it was pretty severe.

That would affect my, like that's a risk factor for Alzheimer's disease. Yeah. Depression in women doubles the risk of Alzheimer's disease. Isn't that crazy? Depression in men quadruples the risk. Like, who would have known? And so how do you know if you had this risk factor? In the book, there's actually questionnaires to help people know if they have things like

PTSD, depression, bipolar disorder, ADHD, and so on. So let's say that again. There's a questionnaire in the book. In the book to help them know if they have any of these disorders. And there are so many things you can do. So they're not really lab tests for them. We still make diagnoses based on questionnaires at Amen Clinics. We use imaging to help us understand and treat our patients.

I like the omega-3 index because if your omega-3 fatty acid levels are low, you have high inflammation. You're more likely to get depressed. The interventions, there's so many things that we do, but I'm just going to give them some of the highlights from the books. And we talked about this in Brain Warriors way. Start every day with today is going to be a great day. Today is going to be a great day. Because then your mind will help you find it. Write down three things you're grateful for. Learn to meditate, especially a loving kindness meditation that we talk about in Brain Warrior's Way.

Take a walk in nature. It's been shown to help your mood. Learn to kill the ants ants the automatic negative thoughts that steal your happiness i have a new children's book out i'm so excited about called captain snout superpower questions uh so i mean just get your kids started early with the right brain healthy do you remember when we were cleaning out books and we were like donating books and and i was getting all chloe's books out from when was a kid. I used to read to her every single night and I'm like, oh my gosh, I never realized like the types of books we were reading to her when she was little, you know, about the four questions

and about the seven habits of highly effective children and who moved my cheese and like, but the kids' versions of these, but it's so important because you plant those seeds early. Because mindset matters. Mindset matters. Brain health matters. Mindset matters. And if you have mental health issues in your family, like you do, and I do too, it's important to take brain health even more seriously. Because I actually believe optimizing someone's brain really helps them to break their addictions or depression. I just was saying that because I really love the New Children's book.

Thank you. So let's talk about supplements and food. So if you're a worrier and have mood issues, I really like 5-HTP and saffron. We put them together in serotonin mood support, one of the most popular supplements that we have you have a fun story of someone you've been dealing with and this is actually pulling your hair out so it's a it's a it's a family issue we've been helping someone in our family to to get a lot better like the the story's been miraculous the turnaround in the family dynamics

have been great but we had one person in the family that just two people in the family couldn't get along. But one of the people, little OCD, a little bit OCD and a little over-focused to say the least. And so she knew it. She was acknowledging that she couldn't let things go at all, even the smallest things. And so she went online, took the quiz for her brain type, and then you talk to her and we sent her some serotonin mood support and a couple of other basic supplements. And it's so funny. I get a call from the other person in the family who couldn't get along with her to the point where we were going to have to move them separately. They were not going to be able to live together. I mean, it was that bad. And so we were like trying to make arrangements, living arrangements. And I get

a call and she's like, I don't want to do that. I'm actually like, I love her. And it was, you know, they're family members. And I'm like banging the phone on the counter. And I'm like, what? Say that again. She's like, no, I don't know what it is. She goes, I've actually never had this kind of relationship with this person. Um, in my family, I've never been able to get to know her even the way that I'm getting to know her now. And she's like, I go, so what do you think the difference is? She goes, I don't know, except that the only thing I can think of is it started about a month ago when you sent, you know, shortly after you sent the serotonin mood support. And then I get an email and she goes,

please, please, please overnight me serotonin mood support. I didn't realize she's almost out. She was doing this for the other person in the family. She's like, I've got to have more of this stuff. I cannot run out of it. So it was just hilarious. It made a huge difference for them. I love that. For people who struggle with focus, we make something called Focus and Energy, rhodiola, green tea, ashwagandha, ginseng. For people who are anxious, gaba calming can be really helpful. But there's also- I want to add something here before you move on. I cannot tell you how many people that I've worked with that get better by adding probiotics. So the brain probiotics, because we deal with so many people who have been eating so poorly or who have been on antibiotics

and their guts are so messed up. And if, you know, 80% of the serotonin, 80 to 90% of the serotonin in your body is made in your gut. You will be anxious and depressed if your gut is messed up. So, or you are likely to be. So probiotics make a massive difference for people who are struggling in many cases had to throw that in all right it's one of my go-to well so then let's talk about foods and let's talk about the foods that increase your risk of mental health issues so that would be processed foods sugar the standard american diet. Cheap oils. Cheap oils. And the foods that support mental health. But let me, really quick, because people always write in and ask, what are cheap oils?

Vegetable oils like safflower, corn oil, soybean oil, those types of oils are highly inflammatory. Canola oil so foods foods to use spices especially saffron turmeric peppermint and cinnamon cinnamon has been known to help attention why are you looking at me with that look? I know what you're about to say, because you think it's an aphrodisiac. That's why you make it for me every day. I don't think I need to, but... Dopamine-rich foods to help with focus and motivation. Turmeric, again, green tea, lentils, fish, lamb, chicken, turkey, beef, eggs, nuts, seeds, especially sesame seeds and pumpkin seeds. High protein veggies like broccoli, spinach, protein powers. So protein actually helps to increase focus. Right.

So that's why we often tell parents, their children, if they're struggling with attention, getting in trouble in school, stop giving them these crazy simple carbohydrate breakfasts like cereal and pancakes for breakfast. Give them a, or if you're going to give them pancakes, do Tanana pancakes, which are in the Brain Warriors way cookbook, but give them protein rich breakfast if they're struggling with attention. If they are struggling with anxiety, it's different. Go on. Okay. I was just thinking about the Tanana River. I learned about it today in Alaska.

Okay, sidebar. The Tanana pancakes are phenomenal. And they're called Tanana pancakes because your grandchildren call you Tanana. But they're flour-free. Serotonin-rich foods to help your mood. Combine tryptophan-containing foods. So tryptophan is the amino acid building block for eggs, chickpeas, nuts, and seeds with healthy carbohydrates such as sweet potatoes and quinoa. They elicit a short-term insulin response that actually

drives tryptophan into the brain. It's really interesting. So there's an interesting book called Potatoes, Not Prozac. And they really weren't thinking about long-term health, which is why they were thinking about serotonin. Which is why women crave things like chocolate and wine when they have PMS. Correct. It's that instant boost. And then GABA-rich foods to help with anxiety, such as broccoli, almonds, walnuts, lentils, whole grain, gluten-free whole oats, oranges, spinach. So the point of all of this in memory rescue is there are so many things you can do. There is no suffering in getting well. Our podcast is called The Brain Warrior's Way because we know you're in a war for the health of your brain. Everywhere you go, someone is trying to shove bad food down your throat that

will kill you early. But you can live a vibrant, healthy, focused, motivated life, and the food tastes awesome. I mean, that's been one of the biggest blessings I've had in my life, is have a wife who knows how to take super healthy food and make it taste awesome. So I get to live within the mission and purpose of my life and I never suffer. Right. We just want you to be prepared. Except when you're mad at me and I suffer. We just want you to be prepared, aware, armed, and empowered. And that's what we're doing. Armed, prepared, and aware. I love it.

Stay with us. We're going to talk about immunity and infections next. Thank you for listening to the Brain Warriors Way podcast. Go to iTunes and leave a review, and you'll automatically be entered into a drawing to get a free signed copy of the Brain Warriors Way and the Brain Warriors Way Cookbook we give away every month.