Wednesday, March 2, 2011

Your Brain is a Gas Guzzling SUV


Your brain is constantly in action and exerting energy. Your brain weighs about three pounds; yet, it consumes about 20-30% of your total calories burned in a day.  Just like our cars need gas, our brains also need fuel to operate. To get that fuel, our bodies break down the foods we eat into glucose. Glucose is the fuel used by our brains when our neurons fire and when our neurotransmitters are released. We get our glucose from carbohydrates. In fact, 40% of our carbohydrate intake is devoted to fueling our brains. It is better for our bodies to ingest glucose from complex carbohydrates, fruits, and vegetables. Even though glucose is a type of sugar, if we feed our brains simple carbohydrates like white sugar (sucrose) or white flour, we are actually only giving our brains a short supply of energy that will then cause us to crash. I am sure you are familiar with a sugar crash.  Our brains do it, too.  Sucrose (white sugar) may temporarily raise certain neurotransmitter levels, like serotonin. For many people when they crave sugar they are actually low in serotonin. Serotonin is associated with moods and most antidepressant medications work by stimulating serotonin levels. However, when we give our bodies sugar, it will temporarily increase serotonin, but cause a crash, too. This is why when people are sad, they might turn to chocolate cake, yet, after about a half hour feel worse and more depressed than they did prior to consuming the cake. In order to improve your mood and fuel your brain, give your brain a consistent source of energy like complex carbohydrates. Avoid simple carbohydrates because they will only make you feel worse in the long run.

2 comments:

  1. Hey Dixie, coll think and i am the first person wriding on you page. Yay and peace!

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  2. oh my gosh...this post pretty much defines my life. thanks for the info, dr. meyer!

    ReplyDelete