66. How Your Diet Affects Your Mental Health

In this episode, Sam links cravings and unhealthy eating habits to her worsening anxiety when she stumbles upon old research from episode #21: Gut Health 101. Turns out, the connection between your diet and your mental health runs wayyy deeper than just blood sugar spikes and crashes. So she explores the role of your microbiome, your vagus nerve, glutamate, GABA, and more to uncover the truth about food, anxiety, and depresion.

Listen to this episode if you've been eating like crap lately!

Key moments:

08:19 The truth about burnout

13:20 The gut-brain axis, explained

13:38 What is your enteric nervous system (ENS)?

16:12 How the gut-brain axis affects your emotional state

16:20 Which neurotransmitters are produced in your gut?

17:41 How the bacteria in your gut can cause depression, stress, and anxiety

18:25 The link between IBS and clinical depression

19:52 The vagus nerve’s role in the gut-brain axis

20:19 What does the vagus nerve actually do in your body?