When I began my private practice over 20 years ago, it used to surprise me. Since then, I guess I’ve grown accustomed to the amount of otherwise “healthy” people that are on psychotropic medications. Of course, if I knew then what I know now, it would have been no surprise at all.

What was really interesting was that almost none of them thought that having to be on Prozac was a health problem. Life simply got too stressful or depressing.

Did you know that the level of one’s health will determine their response to life stresses and traumas?

“Oh but it’s a brain chemistry thing”, said as if it was a sentence handed down from God.

Yes. It is a brain chemistry thing. But what does that actually mean?

Let’s start with this; the brain is an organ. Like all the other organs in the body there are certain things that are going to affect how it functions.

For instance, toxic chemicals or heavy metals can negatively affect how a brain functions by destroying the brain tissue and changing the brain chemistry. If you eat processed or even non-organic foods, you are ingesting toxic chemicals. If you use conventional hair and skin products, perfumes, detergents or household cleaners, your brain is being exposed to toxins. There is a long list of toxins we and our brains are exposed to every day.

Brain Cells Need Adequate Nutrition

Toxicity isn’t the only problem a brain has to deal with these days. Like every other cell in the body, brain cells need adequate nutrition to function optimally. Not only does the typical American diet of processed food products have little if any nutritional value, it contains a number of other undesirable attributes including preservatives, food dyes, sodium, artificial vitamins and sweeteners, genetically engineered foods and sugar, all of which negatively alter brain function.

Speaking of sugar; it wasn’t until after I gave it up that I realized what a huge impact it had on my own mental emotional state. I used to think it was normal to have down feeling days, for no particular reason. Not anymore.

There are no doubt instances in which the structures of the brain have been too badly compromised to recover. More often than not, this is not the case and a holistic approach to anxiety and depression is the most logical first step.

First, determine if there are toxicities present that may damage the brain and body and remove. Next make sure the brain and body have adequate nutrition so that the body can rebuild. Finally, stop eating sugar for a while and see what happens.