“Conclusion: Vegetarian men have more depressive symptoms after adjustment for socio-demographic factors. Nutritional deficiencies (e.g. in cobalamin or iron) are a possible explanation for these findings, however reverse causation cannot be ruled out.” (1)
There has been a lot of studies on health benefits of vegan/vegetarian diets - both pro and con. Some show improved health aspects and some do not.
Many of the health benefits are likely associated with simply choosing whole foods over processed foods and not exclusion of meat.
Things are not as simple as just cutting out meat. Otherwise there would be no case for the carnivore diet, which is currently trending. So now we have the mainly-meat carnivore diet, mainly-fat keto-diet and only-plants vegan diet going. Each claiming to be THE solution for all and sundry to optimize their health. If that doesn’t make you roll your eyes and munch down a cinnamon roll in utter rebellious disbelief of the ridiculousness of it all, I don’t now what will.
Now granted: each of the above-mentioned extremist diets does have its applicability for short-term use for certain types of issues.
The main problem is, that they are promoted as a blanket-solution long-term for everyone. This serves to disconnect us from mindful eating, and understand how our body reacts to food, based on what it needs, which varies throughout a lifetime. And that is the most accurate measure we have of what healthy eating is for us, no lab testing will ever be accurate enough to tap into our ever-changing nutrient needs. Lab testing can point us in a direction. Based on that general direction, we need to get better at decoding our body’s signals and our eating patterns. The more balanced we are, the easier this becomes. The more chronic sick we are, the more we need to follow mechanical eating guidelines for a time-period (why test don’t guess becomes ever more important the sicker we are).
Several studies have confirmed that we see a higher incidens of mental health issues, such as depression and anxiety amongst vegans/vegetarians. However, part of the explanation is, that people who are already vulnerable and a bit food-obsessed tend to choose an extremist diet to follow.
So the question is whether the diet precedes the mental health issues or vice versa.
Obviously there are ethical reasons to choose not to eat meat, especially considering how awful we treat animals at the moment. So there are many reasons to go vegan, and it is a very personal choice. Yet our diet should work FOR us, not against us. It becomes key that we understand the nutrient imbalances we often will face in time, as to avoid feeding our brain into malnourishment and depression.
Typically we see low zinc, b12, folic acid, amino acids across the board, low omega-3, low arachidonic acid and palmitoylethanolamide.
These are KEY nutrients for proper detoxification, mood, bone health, appetite control, weight mangement, skin and hair, fertility and immune health. This is nutritionally the cost of a vegan/vegetarian diet that we need to be aware of, if we want to ensure our mental health stays strong - supplementing often becomes the needed solution as our food choices are limited (test your levels, don’t guess).
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