Why you get fat and depressed, and what to do about it

Over the years, many clinical studies have shown that obesity and depression tend to be comorbid. That means they tend to occur together without necessarily having a cause and effect relationship. When conditions tend to occur together, scientists naturally want to explore exactly how they are connected. Does obesity cause depression? Does depression cause obesity? Could there be a third factor that is driving both conditions? These are important questions, because once we know the answers, we can better direct our research and treatment efforts.

I happen to believe that both obesity and depression are often driven by a third factor: our modern Western diet. It is now clear that excess fructose, primarily from sugar and high fructose corn syrup, is the driving force behind insulin resistance and central obesity. When you have insulin resistance, more insulin is needed to get glucose into the cells, and high insulin levels tend to trap fat inside cells, where it can’t be used for energy. Recent evidence suggests that excess fructose may alter the intestinal bacterial flora, further contributing to metabolic syndrome and obesity.

When you have insulin resistance and consume fast-absorbing carbohydrates, especially from grains, you end up with magnified glucose spikes. Over time, these glucose spikes can damage nerve cells because, unlike most cells in your body, neurons don’t have an insulin gate. That’s why diabetics tend to lose their nerve function and develop neuropathy long before other organs in their body are damaged.

Over time, these toxic glucose spikes can trigger a form of diffuse brain dysfunction in which your brain no longer works as intended. The first symptom you experience when this happens is a craving for sweet and starchy foods, which pushes you to consume more of the same food that is burning your brain. You may also develop mild symptoms of brain dysfunction such as fatigue, anxiety, mood swings, and lack of sleep. At this stage of brain dysfunction you don’t yet have a disease because the symptoms are mild and variable. I refer to this pre-disease condition as “sugar brain.”

As time passes, sugary brain can become a true disease characterized by as many as 22 distinct symptoms of brain dysfunction that interfere with your ability to function in multiple environments. I now call this disease carbohydrate-associated reversible brain syndrome or CARB syndrome. Because the brain plays a key role in autoregulating fat stores, people with brain sugar and CARB syndrome will begin to store extra fat even while dieting and losing weight and lean body mass.

The symptoms of sugary brain and CARB syndrome develop because people with these conditions have low levels of monoamine neurotransmitters like dopamine, norepinephrine, and serotonin in the brain. When these neurotransmitters are low, regardless of the reason they’re low, you end up with predictable symptoms. Some of these symptoms would easily qualify you for a diagnosis of depression.

It’s important to remember what true hereditary depression looked like 100 years ago. At that time, all the patients with major depression felt depressed, lost their appetite, and lost weight. There was no such thing as a “weight gain” type of depression. This situation has radically changed in the last 30-40 years. Today, most patients diagnosed with depression feel depressed, have increased appetite and cravings for carbohydrates, and gain weight. In my opinion, this form of depression is CARB syndrome, not true major depression. Unfortunately, the medical and scientific communities lump both types of depression into one category, when in reality they are two separate illnesses. Suffice it to say that the vast majority of people diagnosed with depression today actually have a form of food-induced brain dysfunction called CARB syndrome.

A recent study published in the journal Molecular Psychiatry by Dr. Mark Hamer titled

“Risk of future depression in obese but metabolically healthy people: the English longitudinal study of aging” supports the view that obesity and depression are connected through metabolic parameters, not obesity per se.

Remember that there are actually two types of obesity. The most common type is associated with insulin resistance, metabolic syndrome, and type II diabetes. This is the form of obesity that we tend to see with CARB syndrome. The second type of obesity is when a person has excess body fat without any of these adverse metabolic markers. This type of obesity is seen when a person or laboratory animal is overfed with healthy foods. If you give enough healthy food to any animal, it will eventually develop this type of obesity.

The type of obesity associated with sugar, HFCS, and grain-based carbohydrates does not depend on calories or overeating. Although people with this form of obesity always have excess body fat, especially in the abdominal region, they may not be overweight and can sometimes even be thin. It is important to remember that obesity is definite as excess body fat, so don’t be fooled by someone’s size or weight.

In this particular study, they looked at the correlation between both types of obesity and depression. They wanted to know about the connection between depression and people with “metabolic obesity” and those who were obese but metabolically healthy. It turns out that people with metabolic problems were at higher risk of developing depression later, while obese people without metabolic problems were not at increased risk of developing depression. This is exactly what we would predict from the CARB syndrome disease model.

How does this information apply to you? I assume most of you would rather not be obese or depressed. If insulin resistance and metabolic syndrome are the gateway to most cases of obesity and many cases of depression, the best strategy would be to prevent metabolic problems or aggressively treat them if you already have them. The best way to do this is to limit your intake of the dietary triggers of insulin resistance and metabolic syndrome: sugar, HFCS, and high-glycemic carbohydrates, especially from grains.

This of course describes most of the processed foods that form the core of the modern American diet. Learn to eat real foods, such as meat, poultry, fish, shellfish, vegetables, and fruits. I’m not a big fan of milk due to its sugar content, but a reasonable amount of cheese is acceptable. I would also limit your consumption of vegetables due to their anti-nutrient content. Some would recognize this as a Paleo-style diet. I just call it a healthy diet.

If you learn to eat this way, you will go a long way toward preventing the metabolic problems that seem to lead to many cases of obesity and depression. There are also many other common conditions that fall under the umbrella of CARB syndrome. As with depression, we now believe that the illnesses listed below can be triggered by eating these toxic dietary items.

ADHD

PTSD

anxiety disorders

Autism

Eating disorders

fibromyalgia

irritable bowel syndrome

restless leg syndrome

Premenstrual syndrome

Bipolar II

I think it’s really exciting that we’ve now made a connection between food and these common disorders. Think about it. What would you rather do, take handfuls of pills for the rest of your life living in a daze, or just change your diet? This important study clearly shows the relationship between the consumption of certain foods and depression. In the years to come, I hope we’ll see more studies looking at the impact of diet on common chronic diseases. Gary Taubes, author of the excellent books “Good Calories, Bad Calories” and “Why We Get Fat” has started a non-profit organization called NuSi that is dedicated to funding this type of research. I plan to support Gary in his efforts and encourage you to do the same. I don’t think we can count on the agricultural or food industries to fund this type of research, so we’re on our own. If we are going to stay healthy, we must stick together.

If you want to learn more about the role excess fructose plays in causing metabolic problems, I highly recommend reading Richard Johnson’s book “The Sugar Fix” or his excellent new book “The Fat Switch.” It’s never too late to learn and it’s never too late to change. For the sake of your mental health and well-being, I suggest you start today.