When Bipolar Meds Aren’t Working, Follow Your Gut

Follow Your Gut

In my opinion, people with bipolar and depression tend to have unhealthy diets due to their illness. We are constantly trying to make ourselves feel better, and food is one way to do that. Moreover, most of us have energy and motivational issues, which result in behaviors such as less exercise and less cooking of fresh food.

“All diseases begin within the gut.” Hippocrates 460-370BC

Almost all “mental illness” is simply gut illness and poor dietary intake in disguise. Do you have digestive problems like bloating, flatulence, diarrhea, and constipation?  Do you suffer from frequent headaches, fatigue, mood swings, depression or bipolar disorder? These symptoms brought on my poor eating habits are part of your overall gut health.

Bipolar disorder always involves a gut that needs to be “cleaned out” or fixed as soon as possible before malabsorption of essential nutrients becomes severe.  Excess toxicity is also a part of all mental illness, affecting your mood and overall state of wellness. A pathogenic yeast, candida albicans, is a prime agent in many emotional and physical problems.

A Little Yeast Works A Long Way

The yeast connection is a term to indicate the relationship of superficial yeast infections in your digestive tract to fatigue, headache, depression, PMS, irritability, bipolar disorder and other symptoms that can make you feel “sick all over.”

Eating certain foods poor in adequate vitamins and minerals may increase your risk of candida overgrowth.  Antibiotic use, mood stabilizers and other chemical drug cocktails could lead to candida yeast overgrowth.

Yeast can become a hardy fungus and has an aggressive appetite. Minor increases in intestinal yeast are usually not a problem, but if yeast overgrowth is left unchallenged it can cause intestinal permeability and leak toxins across the cellular membranes. This can cause a disruption in the absorption of nutrients and nutritional deficiencies that can lead to reduced immunity and weaken the body’s defense systems and contribute to mental illness problems.

Cleansing the Body

Without proper nutrition, the body can’t heal or regenerate its tissues and if you cannot digest and assimilate food, the tissues will eventually starve. Cleansing the body and taking probiotics, and other anti-candida measures is a step toward healing.

You should consult a Naturopathic Doctor, a nutritionist that has treated bipolar disorder beforehand or an orthomolecular medicine doctor to help cure candida. Here are some steps to take to cleanse your body of unwanted candida yeast: