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The Role of Diet on the Gut Microbiome, Mood and Happiness

pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

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Re: The Role of Diet on the Gut Microbiome, Mood and Happiness

#71

Post by algoatecorn »

Last year, I started an experiment with my diet.

It started with the idea of eating as cheaply as possible with nutrient dense foods, but I started off with an elimination diet.

I chose 2-3 "meals" that I could easily prep and only cost $2-4 each. Mostly eggs, ground beef, white rice, potatoes. I quickly added bell peppers and onions.

I tracked macros, and filled in the micros with new additions. Calories as well of course.

The result was fantastic.

1. I got really fast at cooking, and even now that I cook more complex meals, I'm much faster than before. Probably because I introduced new ingredients gradually and maintained efficiency in the kitchen.

2. My ability to eyeball macros on a plate is pretty good now. It's much easier to regulate my energy levels because of this. I can also guess my bodyweight within ~5lbs before checking the scale.

3. I figured out what I digest most easily. As an athlete, I can't really afford to have days where I'm "bathroom dependent".

The consistency in all these aspects has greatly improved my life.

If you want to get better at cooking, understand your body better, save time, and eat a healthier diet, this method might work well for you.

Disclaimer: after the first 2-3 weeks, I switched from 100% compliance to ~80% compliance. That way I get the benefits of regimented eating without going crazy. Even if you eat healthy, it's not good to obsess over calories and food options.

Re: The Role of Diet on the Gut Microbiome, Mood and Happiness

#73

Post by amanaplanacanal »

hombre_fatal wrote: post #57
runlaszlorun wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think most of us would agree that makes sense? Eat like crap, feel like crap? I’m just an average joe trying to figure out how to improve a diet, but I haven’t found much of a consensus regarding fats vs proteins vs carbohydrates.

Minimize saturated fat (by replacing it with unsaturated fat). Get enough protein. Eat healthy carbs*. * On HN and other social media, "carbs" is a euphemism for sugar and cake rather than beans and vegetables, so people will talk about how carbs made them fat when you know they're not talking about slamming back-to-back cans of garbanzos. And don't take any nutrition advice seriously that doesn't break fat apart int…

As far as I can tell the best research is that saturated fat is pretty neutral. Earlier research blaming saturated fat was flawed.

Re: The Role of Diet on the Gut Microbiome, Mood and Happiness

#74

Post by DrThunder »

mfer wrote: post #41
blakesterz wrote: post #13

"After the diet change, we observed significant changes in measures of anxiety, well-being and happiness, and without changes in gut microbiome diversity. We found strong correlations between greater consumption of fat and protein to lower anxiety and depression, while consuming higher percentages of carbohydrates was associated with increased stress, anxiety, and depression." I think most of us would agree that make…

I wish it detailed the types of carbs. Carbs from whole grains and things like fruit are different from processed carbs where the supporting parts of the food are removed. That's why Keto bread will look at fiber compared to total carbs. It depends on the form of carb. I wish the overview touched on the different types of carbs and their impact. Not all carbs are alike.

Better, but still carbs. It's just harder to eat a lot of those. I would challenge "whole grains" actually being any better at all.

Honestly, I think the whole fiber intake stuff is bs. Anecdotally, I feel much better on a low fiber high protein diet than anything else. So does the rest of my family.

My opinion on carbs is that you should only eat them when you're going to burn them quickly. That's what they're for, to give you a big energy boost. They're not for consuming and then sitting on your ass.

Re: The Role of Diet on the Gut Microbiome, Mood and Happiness

#75

Post by amanaplanacanal »

hombre_fatal wrote: post #61
adriand wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think "healthy carbs" might be a bit too vague. There are simple and complex carbohydrates, and the latter can be further broken down between starchy carbohydrates like grains and fibrous carbohydrates like vegetables. There is nothing inherently unhealthy about any of these types of carbohydrates: simple carbs (e.g. fructose) are in fruit, complex carbs in whole grains, etc. I think it is probably more helpful to…

I don't think it's vague considering my second paragraph. Eat whole foods. Avoid the Coca-Cola and cake and packaged goods that most people are referring to when they demonize carbs. Fruit and vegetables, go ahead. I just lightly pan fried some potato cubes and tossed in random veg for breakfast. I don't want to do a whole diet breakdown every time I scrawl something about nutrition on HN. But more HNers should subsc…

Whole fruit is probably fine. Fruit juices are more similar to that can of coke and should probably be avoided.

Re: The Role of Diet on the Gut Microbiome, Mood and Happiness

#76

Post by DrThunder »

darthrupert wrote: post #18
blakesterz wrote: post #13

"After the diet change, we observed significant changes in measures of anxiety, well-being and happiness, and without changes in gut microbiome diversity. We found strong correlations between greater consumption of fat and protein to lower anxiety and depression, while consuming higher percentages of carbohydrates was associated with increased stress, anxiety, and depression." I think most of us would agree that make…

The idea that fat and protein are good while carbs are "crap" is controversial.

It's not. It's only controversial if you follow FDA recommendations. Any athlete knows this. Fat and protein are REQUIRED to build muscle and endurance. Carbs are great pre/post workout for energy and recovery.

Our society has a massive excess of carbs in our diets that don't get used for energy production and just turn into fat.

Re: The Role of Diet on the Gut Microbiome, Mood and Happiness

#77

Post by DrThunder »

r_singh wrote: post #3

Has anyone researched the opposite? Like the role of mood and happiness on the gut microbiome. I was diagnosed with Celiac 5 years ago, could never gain weight and had my share of struggles with anxiety etc. I recently found a counsellor who told me to stop overthinking, seeking knowledge and a few other things which after following I gained 5 kilos and became a happier person. I always thought my gut was to blame bu…

It does seem like I've read a couple studies that suggest it's not one or the other. Diet can influence the microbiome/mood and mood can influence the microbiome. Reducing my anxiety has definitely helped my ibs/mild crohn's.

Re: The Role of Diet on the Gut Microbiome, Mood and Happiness

#78

Post by hombre_fatal »

TylerLives wrote: post #69
hombre_fatal wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Minimize saturated fat (by replacing it with unsaturated fat). Get enough protein. Eat healthy carbs*. * On HN and other social media, "carbs" is a euphemism for sugar and cake rather than beans and vegetables, so people will talk about how carbs made them fat when you know they're not talking about slamming back-to-back cans of garbanzos. And don't take any nutrition advice seriously that doesn't break fat apart int…

A different take on PUFAs - https://raypeat.com/articles/articles/unsaturatedfats.shtml

A different take in the same way an astrologist's blog gives us a different take on the planet Saturn.

If anything Ray Peat, a quack, says is true, then why do things like PUFAs improve human health outcomes in the literature? He says PUFAs cause atherosclerosis and SFA protects against it, so why does human outcome data show the opposite? And how many animal studies is he going to bring up?

Ray Peat is a good example of how far contrarianism will take you in the nutrition celeb space. Probably because we like to decide on what we want to eat first and then shop for claims that support it which is 10000x easier than deciding on what to eat based on the greatest evidence.

Here's a good post that summarizes some PUFA literature in response to the social media "seed oil" scare: https://www.the-nutrivore.com/post/a-comprehensive-rebuttal-...

Re: The Role of Diet on the Gut Microbiome, Mood and Happiness

#79

Post by DrThunder »

coding123 wrote: post #31

My wife has to eat protein (in her case meat) with carbs. If she eats carbs with no protein she has anxiety. It's so awesome that we are finally studying things like this.

I'm the same. I assume it's spiking my glucose levels too much when I don't include protein. She may have a bit of reactive hypoglycemia going on. Wonky sugar spikes can really mess with people mentally.

Re: The Role of Diet on the Gut Microbiome, Mood and Happiness

#80

Post by mrinterweb »

> For this pilot study, we enrolled 20 adults to follow this protocol

Is that even a large enough of a sample size to draw a conclusion from? Probably a big enough sample size to get funding for a larger study, but not big enough to draw general conclusions from.

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