Dietary intervention for Mental Illness - Metabolic Psychiatry

[Norbert Somogyi]

A rather promising, natural alternative to psychiatric medications -  paleolithic diet, or in stronger cases the ketogenic diet. My theory (or at least one I resonate with, can stem from multiple sources) of the apparent efficacy for these diets (especially for the ketogenic diet) is that as hunters & gatherers we have historically had frequent and long periods of our lives when carbs were scarce. This triggered a state of ketosis, which induced heightened cognitive ability - required to hunt and just survive. Someone with cognitive issues just wouldn't survive in the woods.

Ketogenic Diet was coined in 1921 (more like branded and reintroduced) as an alternative therapy for epilepsy patients. Used in 1920s and 1930s until epilepsy medications came around (with less efficacy and side effects - that required more pills with their own side effects - I'm looking at you, Big Pharma.). 

Another person I recommend is Dr. Chris Palmer - Also working in the growing field of Metabolic Psychiatry with promising results.

Metabolic Mind - A related youtube channel with many people's stories of overcoming the mental illnesses with such dietary changes.

It is reasonable for me to believe that at least trying out these dietary interventions (with supervision for keto, without supervision for paleo) won't harm anyone (I've had such experiences with cleaner diets - hard to maintain the diet though), and can potentially experience a heightened health and corresponding cognitive ability. With or without diagnosed mental illnesses. There are naturally niche cases where due to metabolic or other issues you will experience adverse effects (the potential long-term effects of especially the keto diet require a more careful approach) on either of these diets (perhaps carnivore could work there), due to some autoimmune conditions. Some can be kept at bay, some can be improved with these. Another intervention that can be used is vitamin D, as at least some if not all auto-immune diseases are shown to facilitate and maintain vitamin D resistance, which can potentially be mitigated with high dose Vitamin D procotols.

P:S I recommed Dr. Josef's other videos as well, showcasing the nuances and methodological problems with the psychiatric field.

Edited Friday at 03:47 PM by Norbert Somogyi