Most articles will tell you which foods would boost brain health and function, but there is very little light shed on the foods that can actually deteriorate the brain over time. Science has seen the rampant rise of Alzheimer Disease and other degenerative mental illnesses since the last century, and researchers are predicting an increase of people affected with brain deterioration by 2050.
In addiction to this projection, researchers are also blaming a significant aspect of a person’s life – diet. This article aims to focus on the foods that kill the brain and deteriorate its functions and hopefully, inspire people to make better and healthier diet choices.
Fast Food
Do you know fried chicken is bad for your brain?
A research done by feeding mice a diet of fast-food like components showed a significant decrease in the brain functions of the mice. The diet was composed of high levels of sugar, cholesterol and fat. The experiment showed the brain containing increased levels of proteins associated with Alzheimer Disease. Scientists then concluded that a diet consisting of fats, cholesterol, sugar and nothing to neutralize their effects will soon contribute to a degenerative brain.
Hydrogenated Fats
Simply put, hydrogenated fats are the kind of fats that creep into your arteries and cause blockage and damage to your heart. Consuming foods rich in hydrogenated fats, such as baked goodies – cookies and cakes and fried food – French fries and chicken, for instance, will not give you an instant heart disease, but it will slowly block your arteries, making it hard for oxygenated blood to reach and provide nourishment to the brain.
Choosing a diet, sugar-free soda over natural fruit juice is like drinking sweet poison.
Artificial Sweeteners
Artificial sweeteners, like Aspartame, have long been linked to brain seizures and tumors. Artificial sweeteners are popularly used by people trying to watch their blood glucose levels. Little do they know it, but choosing a diet, sugar-free soda over natural fruit juice is like drinking sweet poison. If it has been associated with something drastic as brain tumors, then brain cell deterioration is not a far-fetched possibility.
Soft Drinks
They are loaded with artificial coloring and sweeteners. A general mechanism of soda pops is that they give you a feeling of euphoria and mental alertness, something you would call “sugar rush”, but this gets out of your body as fast as it got in, so after a frenzy, you are left disoriented, depressed and with very low energy. The sugars and coloring in sodas have been associated with attention deficit disorders in children, and even in adults.
Alcohol
Finally, those late night parties thrown to help people get a load off their shoulders will eventually take a toll on them after a few years. The simplest analogy is this: Drizzle alcohol onto some fatty tissue and watch the tissue literally disintegrate. Although the physiology of alcohol and the brain is clearly not that morbid, your brain can only take so much of this stuff.
Alcohol, especially when coupled with nicotine, affects your blood vessels. They constrict more, preventing adequate blood flow that carries oxygen and nourishment to the brain. When there isn’t enough nutrition up there, your neurons become confused and will fail to function optimally.
Photo by thebittenword.com
