anyone of you changed your diet and found yourself much more socially ept?

by changing my diet quite a bit, i found myself having a better sense of being, and not self-conscious anymore. that allowed me to feel more at ease with people and just chat with them.

however it's more hit-and-miss, because i'm not sure what really caused those changes. recently i'm finding myself hitting a roadblock, and not knowing where else to proceed.

something in my diet is draining me (carbs?), making me reticent and self-conscious (protein?). but if i don't have enough protein, i don't function well, and if i dont' have enough carbs, i have less serotonin.

would love to hear if any of you became less neurotic by changing things in your diet. less OCD, less ADHD etc.

i just don't ever feel normal (except for a few sacred moments) and wish i were!

I'm not sure why you think that cutting carbs will lower your serotonin? Serotonin, like all neurotransmitters, is made of amino acids from protein. The only time that carbs will increase serotonin in your brain is for the very short period during which you experience a "sugar high," because a lot of sugar into your bloodstream at once stimulates a lot of insulin, which causes your muscles to take up a lot of the stuff in your blood making the blood-brain barrier sites less competitive for serotonin. But this is a very short-term effect.

Don't cut protein or fat! These two are needed for health and well-being. Make sure you're getting enough Omega-3 (I recommend Krill Oil) and drastically limit your intake of Omega-6s (polyunsaturated vegetable oils -- these are pro-inflammatory).

I recently discovered that I am gluten intolerant, and found that a lot of grogginess, irritability, and stuck-in-my-head type feelings that I thought were normal were actually the result of this intolerance (and now gone!).

(12-13-2011 10:44 PM)dbot Wrote:  I'm not sure why you think that cutting carbs will lower your serotonin? Serotonin, like all neurotransmitters, is made of amino acids from protein. The only time that carbs will increase serotonin in your brain is for the very short period during which you experience a "sugar high," because a lot of sugar into your bloodstream at once stimulates a lot of insulin, which causes your muscles to take up a lot of the stuff in your blood making the blood-brain barrier sites less competitive for serotonin. But this is a very short-term effect.

Don't cut protein or fat! These two are needed for health and well-being. Make sure you're getting enough Omega-3 (I recommend Krill Oil) and drastically limit your intake of Omega-6s (polyunsaturated vegetable oils -- these are pro-inflammatory).

I recently discovered that I am gluten intolerant, and found that a lot of grogginess, irritability, and stuck-in-my-head type feelings that I thought were normal were actually the result of this intolerance (and now gone!).

i usually feel better after eating some carbs, especially if i just had protein. if i don't i might feel tense, self-conscious and/or less sociable. how else do you keep your serotonin levels up? maybe there's just something wrong with gut.

i feel the best when i don't eat anything! or maybe there is food i am intolerant to that i keep eating. if i eat very little for that day, or in particular, if i don't eat protein, i become more sociable, more out of my head and more relaxed.

gluten seems to make me neurotic too, particularly when i eat bread (and i used to eat SO MUCH bread in my younger days). maybe i damaged my gut cause of all that gluten, and now have a leaky gut?

eat food, food goes into bloodstream, inflammation, feel lousy. serotonin leaks out of my gut too? lol just one of my many theories.

either way, for starters, NO MORE GLUTEN from this point. you guys keep me accountable!

dbot, did it take just a lil' bit of gluten for you to see those negative effects (for example, using a dip containing gluten)? also, reps for you - thanks for the help, i really appreciate any help.

Probably because when you stop eating carbs your brain stops regulating seratonin....

http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2004/carbs.html

(12-15-2011 1:47 PM)halo0073 Wrote:  Probably because when you stop eating carbs your brain stops regulating seratonin....

http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2004/carbs.html

fruits will be my healthy carbs. i just discovered that bananas make me feel tired though...

Why do you suspect low serotonin at all?

Managing neurotransmitter levels is really not something you need to worry about unless you're taking some funky supplements or meds that would wack them out.

well for one i have (or had) OCD. i also find if i eat protein throughout the day w/o much carbs, my mind gets noisier. some people say that is a sign of low serotonin.

i'm also a carb type, so i generally need more carbohydrates.

i was also never really centered, or chill about life. always the worrier, until i started to manage my diet.

you can also try foods that are high in dopamine. Blueberries produce a ton