How To Eat To Prevent Cognitive Decline

DISCLOSURE: THIS POST MAY CONTAIN AFFILIATE LINKS, MEANING I GET A COMMISSION IF YOU DECIDE TO MAKE A PURCHASE THROUGH MY LINKS, AT NO COST TO YOU. THIS HELPS ME TO CONTINUE WORKING WITH PEOPLE LIKE YOU AND PROVIDING AWESOME INFORMATION ON THIS WEBSITE. PLEASE READ MY TERMS OF USE POLICY FOR MORE INFO.

When I first started my health journey, I ran across a new diet claiming to keep you young forever just about every week. I was constantly changing what and how much I ate, but I never felt any different. At that point, I was just trying to get slim and healthy, and maybe prevent some of the metabolic issues that run in my family (such as heart disease and diabetes). My true fear though, going through the slow decline of Alzheimer’s disease, was still in the back of my mind with no solution. As far as I knew, I could do everything right and still develop Alzheimer’s. It felt defeating.

Then, I came across the work and research of Dr. Dale Bredesen. He and his team have found 36 contributors to Alzheimer’s disease and cognitive decline and many of them can be optimized through nutrition! 

Finding this research was so relieving.

Finally, there was hope that I may not have to go through what my grandma and great-grandmother have gone through. The fear, frustration, embarrassment, and feelings of being lost and alone did NOT have to be my future. And I could start preventing Alzheimer’s disease right now.

Let me reiterate. 

Alzheimer’s is preventable and reversible. If your doctor or anyone else tells you otherwise, they are just not up to date on their research. 

However, there is no magic pill that will prevent Alzheimer’s because there are 36 known factors that can contribute to the biological processes that lead to the tissue damage and symptoms we call Alzheimer’s disease. No drug can target 36 things all at once. I would know. I’m a pharmacist.

If you haven’t read my post on How To Give Yourself Alzheimer’s yet, I encourage you to read that before you continue with this post. Then, come back here because this post will cover the very first thing you can begin to do to prevent and reverse Alzheimer’s disease.

Since beginning to eat the way I’m going to go over today, I have experienced renewed vigor. I have more energy, can concentrate way better, can recall conversations and names better than ever, and overall feel happier. I no longer crave sugar all the time, nor do I experience large swings in my emotions.

If you’re struggling to feel good or are living in fear of the “inevitable,” you are in the right place. Let’s jump in to how you can actually take charge of your health.

Don’t live in fear. You have the power and capability of making big impacts on your health. Let’s get started! 

And be sure to stay to the end for a free gift.

How Food Can Cause Alzheimer’s and Cognitive Decline

Inflammatory Foods

One of the main three contributing categories to cognitive decline and Alzheimer’s disease is inflammation. And, perhaps one of the top sources of inflammation can be from your food. 

You likely eat numerous foods several times throughout the day, which, over time, adds up to a significant number of times that your body could be introduced to potentially inflammatory compounds.

Some food substances are naturally inflammatory to most people because of how they break down in the body. These include gluten, dairy, sugar, and pretty much anything processed. We see these all the time in the Standard American Diet – cheeseburgers, French fries, ice cream, pasta, bread, cereal, cakes, candy, soft drinks, and on and on.

Other inflammatory foods may be specifically inflammatory to a particular person because of their genetics, which may prevent them from digesting and tolerating those foods or food chemicals.

Still other people may develop sensitivities to certain foods because they have a leaky gut barrier that allows larger food particles than normal to enter the blood stream and be seen by the immune system as a foreign invader. This was me, by the way.

All of the situations I just mentioned will trigger the immune system to launch an inflammatory response because your immune system thinks these things are harming you. While some of them do actually cause damage (such as the gluten, dairy, sugar, and processed foods), many don’t unless one of the other factors is in play.

A side note on processed foods. If your grandma or great-grandma wouldn’t recognize an ingredient as a food, it’s probably not something you should be putting into your body. Let’s eat food, not food-like substances.

Blood Sugar Imbalances

In addition to specific foods being a problem, imbalances in your blood sugar cause peaks and valleys of energy supply for the brain and contributes to inflammation itself as well as insulin resistance (when your body doesn’t listen to insulin signals anymore, your blood sugar starts to increase, and you move one step closer to a diagnosis of diabetes). Blood sugar imbalances are seen most often when a person mostly eats carbohydrates (both simple and complex) in comparison to healthy fats and proteins. This is characteristic of the Standard American Diet. That’s because the energy provided by carbs is much shorter lived than that of protein and healthy fats. Basically, when this happens your body is on a roller coaster going between well fed and starvation mode many times a day. If that’s not exhausting I don’t know what is.

Overall, when reversing and preventing Alzheimer’s disease, it’s best to avoid gluten, most dairy, starchy foods that are turned quickly into sugar (like white potatoes, rice, and grains), as well as processed foods, because they contribute so much to inflammation.

How Food Can Prevent and Reverse Alzheimer’s Disease and Cognitive Decline

Anti-Inflammatory Foods

If certain foods cause inflammation, wouldn’t it make sense that to decrease inflammation you’d try to avoid the foods you know cause it?

It makes sense to me too.

And what’s even better is that there are lots of foods out there that actually help your body resolve inflammation! These you may have seen referred to as anti-inflammatory foods. Most come from plants, but good sources of animal products can be anti-inflammatory as well. Some of my favorites are:

• Grass-fed beef
• Free-range chicken & eggs
• Wild caught salmon
• Venison and other game meat
• Avocados
• Olives & olive oil
• Green tea
• Bone broth
• Berries (any kind)
• Any non-starchy vegetable
  • Some of my favorites are onions, cabbage, Brussels sprouts, broccoli, cauliflower, carrots, radishes, mushrooms, and all kinds of lettuce
• Nuts & seeds (but not seed oils)
• Garlic
• Turmeric
• Ginger

There are many more foods and spices that can help lower inflammation, but these are the staples in my diet. 

Please be aware that to optimize cognitive function and have the lowest risk for developing Alzheimer’s, the majority of what you eat should come from plants, especially non-starchy vegetables. If you are like me and still enjoy eating meat and fish, you still can! Simply make the amount of veggies you eat outweigh the amount of meat. 

On top of that, eat as many colors as you can! Each color means the food has different phytochemicals that help your body function properly. The more colors you eat, the more likely you are to get a wide array of these healthy molecules.

Detoxifying Foods

Many plants have also been shown to help bind and eliminate toxins from the body. Since toxins are a potential contributor to cognitive decline, eating more of these plants is really beneficial. Detoxifying plants, as we’ll call them, include cilantro, cruciferous vegetables (like cabbage, kale, and broccoli), avocados, beets, garlic, ginger, grapefruit, lemons, and olive oil.

A word of caution from the pharmacist in me – double check with your doctor or pharmacist whether grapefruit is safe for you because it can interact with many medications.

Gut Healthy Foods

Something I’m also working on is developing a taste for fermented foods such as sauerkraut and kimchi as well as learning to cook with miso. These foods naturally have probiotics (good gut bugs) and are fabulous for the gut and cutting inflammation.

However, if you have symptoms of a leaky gut, please address this first before pumping your gut with probiotics. While they are meant to do great things in the body, they can also get across that leaky barrier and cause inflammation since they’re not supposed to be in your body (just in your gut). Heal the gut first! Then, introduce probiotics and prebiotic foods.

By the way, 70% of your immune system is located in your gut so keeping it healthy with probiotic and prebiotic foods is a must. If you’ve never heard the term prebiotic before, it’s basically food for your probiotics. You can get some in supplement form, but foods like bananas, onions, and garlic are fantastic food sources as well. Make food be your medicine!

In general, eating the way I’ve outlined so far lowers inflammation in the body and brain, helps heal leaky gut and prevent it from occurring in the future, and helps optimize your gut bugs, or microbiome.

Mild Ketosis

Additionally, the brain actually functions better and is more efficient at self-repair and self-cleaning when you are in a state of mild ketosis. This means that your body is using ketones (breakdown products of fats) as fuel instead of glucose (the simplest form of carbohydrate). 

You may have noticed that I haven’t mentioned any kind of starchy carbohydrate or ancient grain in this section yet. That’s because in order to be in mild ketosis for the brain to function optimally, you’ll want to eat way more of the things I mentioned above than things like white potatoes (sweet potatoes are an exception), white rice, and even amaranth (an ancient grain). These things convert to sugar in your body pretty darn fast and cause your blood sugar to rise and insulin to increase, meaning you’re no longer in any state of ketosis. Things like sugars, breads, soft drinks, alcohol, candy, cake, and processed foods are also converted to sugar really fast, so this is yet another reason you’ll want to stay away from these bad boys.

Lentils and other legumes are fine to have on occasion, but they are still higher in carbs than other plant foods and shouldn’t be the bulk of your diet.

Since being in ketosis means you’re running on fat fuel, it makes sense that eating good fats would also help you get there. Good fats are things like olive oil, avocados and avocado oil, coconut oil, MCT oil (usually from coconuts), and nuts.

Other ways to promote mild ketosis are through fasting and exercise. I’ll write entire posts on each of these so you can be confident in why and how to try them for yourself. Be on the lookout for those!

Fun fact. Being in ketosis also helps with that thing called insulin resistance that I mentioned earlier. Teaching your body to run on fat instead of carbs allows your body to be able to listen to insulin again, reversing insulin resistance and preventing diabetes. Yay!

Please be aware that when you’re switching from carbohydrate-burning mode to fat-burning mode, you may experience some carb cravings, be a little cranky, or even feel lethargic. This should only happen for the first week or two while your body learns how to run on fats, but in the meantime you can eat a little extra fat, such as a tablespoon of MCT oil, to help. If you’re having an intense carb craving, try putting a little salt on your tongue and set a timer for 5 minutes. If you still have the craving, try reaching for some berries or nuts.

Remember that your brain is actually rather resilient and can function at near optimal levels even if what you’re eating isn’t 100% perfect. So while it’s important to try your best to stick to the eating plan I’ve outlined above, please give yourself some grace if you eat something less than ideal. We are human after all. 

Plus, the goal is to be able to eat this way long-term. It’ll take some time to get used to it and for your tastebuds to change. 

I’ll caveat that with my own testimony. Every time I stray away more than just one meal or snack, I feel my old brain fog, concentration issues, and general lack of energy come surging back. Re-experiencing my old symptoms is definitely a great motivator to move back towards this way of eating as fast as I can! 

Don’t worry though! The more you eat this way, the less appealing the foods that contribute to cognitive decline become. This has certainly been true for me! There are now foods I don’t ever crave anymore and more still that I crave, but then stop eating after a couple bites because it doesn’t taste as good as I remember.

The bottom line is, if I can do it you can do it too.

And to make getting started even easier, I’ve put together a free guide all about exactly how to eat for your brain. Simply fill out the form below and I’ll send it your way.

If you’d like to read more about Dr. Dale Bredesen’s work, click here to get a copy of his book, The End of Alzheimer’s.

Click the image below to pin it for later!