Did you know your grocery store holds one of the most powerful mood adjusting agents of all time?
You probably ate a few of them in the past few weeks.
And in two seconds you’ll see how one of the world’s most popular nuts could replace Prozac and may even help prevent diabetes.
However, before you know what this nut is, it’s important you understand something.
Both diabetes, as well as mental disorders that supposedly require the use of pharmaceuticals like Prozac, are most often caused by poor diet in the first place.
As a growing body of research indicates, what you eat and what you don’t eat has a major effect on what diseases you develop.
Which is why even though you’re going to see how this nut could help keep you off of dangerous mood-altering drugs and free from relying on insulin injections for the rest of your life… if you don’t use the information you’re about to be given it won’t help you much.
Fortunately, while you’re going to be shown how this nut can improve your health, the best news is unlike a pill or a drug, this food tastes great, is affordable, and doesn’t require a prescription.
Why Cashews Are One of the Best Nuts for Brain Health
Stable and normal mental health is mainly dependent on chemicals in your brain known as neurotransmitters continuing to function as designed.
Unfortunately, owing to a variety of factors (like stress, diet, exposure to toxins) and more, many people find their neurotransmitter levels become unbalanced.
This is why people turn to psychotropics like Prozac, as these drugs help to restore normal neurotransmitter function.
Prozac is a kind of drug known as a selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI). While we’re unclear on exactly how SSRIs work, we believe they prevent your presynaptic brain cells from absorbing too much of a neurotransmitter called serotonin.
So instead of your brain absorbing the serotonin, the serotonin is distributed throughout your body which helps to ameliorate symptoms associated with depression and anxiety… conditions which Prozac is meant to treat.
Interestingly enough, and where cashews come into play, is an amino acid called L-tryptophan can also help prevent too much serotonin from absorbing in the brain.
You’re probably familiar with L-tryptophan already as it’s the amino acid found in turkey everyone claims is responsible for post-Thanksgiving sleepiness.
L-tryptophan has powerful effects on neurotransmitter levels and would appear to be a great addition to your diet if you want to avoid Prozac.
Dr. Andrew Saul, who’s a therapeutic nutritionist and editor-in-chief of Orthomolecular Medicine News Service, says: “Several handfuls of cashews provide 1,000-2,000 milligrams of L-tryptophan, which will work as well as prescription antidepressants.”
Here’s How Cashews Can Help Prevent Type 2 Diabetes
Type 2 diabetes is one of the leading, preventable diseases in the world.
If it weren’t, then Harvard Health wouldn’t have an entire article dedicated to showing you how to prevent it.
One of the leading causes of type 2 diabetes is being overweight.
The reason being overweight may cause type 2 diabetes has to do with how obesity affects hormone levels, particularly insulin.
When a person is overweight it generally means their insulin levels go up and down rapidly based on their eating patterns.
This yo-yo effect on insulin levels eventually leads to something known as insulin resistance which is one of the primary contributing factors for developing type 2 diabetes.
Fortunately adding cashews into your diet may help keep you from gaining weight, which could keep you from developing insulin resistance, possibly keeping type 2 diabetes at bay.
A study published in the journal “Obesity” proved this.
The 28-month study involving 8,865 adult men and women in Spain found that participants who ate nuts at least two times per week were 31% less likely to gain weight than were participants who never or almost never ate nuts.
And, among the study of participants who gained weight, those who never or almost never ate nuts gained more (an average of 424 g more) than those who ate nuts at least twice weekly.
Study authors concluded, “Frequent nut consumption was associated with a reduced risk of weight gain (5 kg or more). These results support the recommendation of nut consumption as an important component of a cardioprotective diet and also allay fears of possible weight gain.”
Thus, if you start to eat more cashews you may help prevent future weight gain and help prevent type 2 diabetes.
A caveat to all of this?
Whenever possible, get organic cashews.
Conventionally harvested cashews tend to have high amounts of pesticides on them which can cause other health concerns that affect weight management and mental health.
Adding cashews to your diet may prevent your need for insulin or Prozac, or reduce your dependency on these drugs if you are already taking them.
