Eat for happiness

Eating a healthy diet is great for your overall wellbeing as food can affect our emotions. Eating releases happiness hormones that make us feel good, and eating specific healthy foods can give you even more of a mood boost.

Healthy food supports mental health. While healthy food on its own cannot cure or manage depression, a healthy diet can help as part of the overall treatment for depression. Serotonin is a brain chemical that boosts your mood. If your body doesn’t produce enough serotonin or can’t process it properly, it can lead to depression.

Smart carbs calm you down

When you eat carbohydrates, your brain produces serotonin. How do you boost your body’s serotonin production without blowing your eating plan? Choose smart carbs like whole grains (oats, brown rice, barley, quinoa, bulgur wheat, and buckwheat) and eat plenty of fresh fruit and veggies, and legumes like lentils and beans. Smart carbs also help you to get enough fibre in, which is good for your digestive health.

Protein clears the mind

Eating protein can help clear your mind and boost your energy. When you eat turkey, chicken or tuna, it boosts your body’s serotonin production. This doesn’t mean that you have to overload on protein to get a serotonin boost – moderate amounts do the job just fine. Healthy sources of protein are beans and peas, fish and seafood, chicken, turkey, eggs, and milk, soy and yogurt.

Omega-3 fats boost happiness hormones

Omega-3 fats (a type of polyunsaturated fat) support overall brain health and reduce depression symptoms. Great sources of protein and omega-3 fats are walnuts, and fatty fish like mackerel, salmon, herring, and trout. There’s also evidence that shows that omega-3 fish oils, certain amino acids (the building blocks of protein), folate and vitamin D can help antidepressants work better.

Vitamin D

In 2010 a study found that people with low vitamin D levels are more likely to be depressed. In South Africa we’re lucky since we can all head out into the sun - the main source of our vitamin D as sunlight stimulates Vitamin D production in the body. However, too much sun can damage your skin and even lead to skin cancer. Another way of getting your vitamin D boost is upping your intake of fatty fish, vitamin-enriched cereals, eggs and fortified milk.

Should you eat that?

You may notice that you have less energy after eating certain foods. The signs of a food intolerance include feeling tired and bloated, and having stomach cramps after eating a specific food. Since a food intolerance can cause discomfort, but is not as serious as a food allergy, you could try cutting out the particular food to see if that improves your mood. But remember that a balanced diet including all food groups is healthiest, so make sure that you really are intolerant to a food before cutting it out and, if so, replace the food with a healthy alternative.