Five Brain-Drainers (Part 1)
Optimizing your brain function is not only about getting the right nutrients. It’s also important to minimize the nutrients that can pollute the brain and potentially damage and age it.
Here are five 'anti-nutrients' for the memory that you should avoid.
Oxidants
The dry matter of the brain is made up of 60 per cent fat, and therefore the kind of fat you eat alters the kind of fat in your brain. The worst fats you can eat are called 'trans' fats, which are damaged fats found in deep fried food and foods containing hydrogenated vegetable oils. Therefore avoid these fats by limiting your intake of fried food, and don't buy foods containing hydrogenated fats.
Why are Trans fats so bad for you?
Trans fats are one of the main factors that introduce oxidants into the body, other factors are smoking and pollution. These fats are taken directly into the brain after being eaten, and cause a chain reaction of damage to the essential fats attached to phospholipids in nerve cell membranes. They also block the conversion of essential fats into vital brain fats. As the brain is more than half made up of fat, there is a danger of these fats becoming oxidized or going rancid.
The good news is that Vitamin E can protect your brain from these damaging effects. Vitamin E is a fat-based antioxidant and many studies have shown that it is consistently associated with better memory performance. Vitamin E is properly called 'd-alpha tocopherol', and is present in foods like seeds, cold-pressed seed oils and fish.
Sugar
Eating lots of sugary foods and refined carbohydrates makes it difficult to maintain even blood sugar levels.
Another reason sugar is bad for you is that it uses up your body's stores of vitamins and minerals and provides next to none in return.
Conclusive evidence has shown that high sugar consumption is linked to poor mental health. Researchers have found that the higher the intake of refined carbohydrates, the lower the IQ.
Sugar has also been implicated in depression, learning difficulties, aggressive behavior and anxiety.
So the message is clear, if you want to optimize your mental performance, cut back on sugar and refined carbohydrates.
Source: islamstory.com
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