Easy ways to avoid your carb cravings

Many people have significant lifelong struggles with overeating sugary and carbheavy foods — the combination of sugar and fat has powerful effects on our brain chemistry, leading to ‘addiction’.

That’s because when we eat sugar or carbs, insulin is released — insulin allows an amino acid from protein, tryptophan, to cross more easily into the brain, where it plays a role in making serotonin, the ‘feelgood’ hormone that helps stabilise mood ( some antidepressant medication works by increasing the amount of serotonin available in the brain).

although highsugar and highcarb foods lead to a shortterm boost in serotonin, the downside is that, repeated over time, tryptophan (and therefore serotonin) is depleted.

So, although you get a shortterm boost from your chocolate bar, it’s a poor longterm strategy because you’ll feel the need for increased consumption to get the same results.

Here are some of my tips to boost the levels of the feelgood compound, serotonin, naturally:

eaT foods rich in tryptophan (and low in carbohydrate). These include: chicken, turkey, eggs, cheese, milk, fish, pumpkin and sesame seeds.

although hightryptophan foods don’t immediately raise brain serotonin levels, you need to consume enough foods rich in tryptophan so that your body has it available.

Take regular exercise. In particular, aerobic exercise — such as brisk walking, running or cycling — has been shown to increase serotonin levels. It’s important to find an activity you enjoy and do it regularly.

GeT into the daylight: you can further boost the beneficial effects of exercise on serotonin levels by doing it outdoors, especially in bright light.

Light levels during the day are related to serotonin. However, bright light at night does not work, because it can disrupt your body clock and sleep cycle, so make sure you turn off screens and bright lights before bedtime.

Sunlight is also important because the body needs it in order to produce vitamin D, which promotes the production of serotonin.

LaSTLy, happy memories and pleasant thoughts directly lead to serotonin release. How about keeping a special file of photos on your phone with your happiest moments? you could even set it to your favourite music and play it a couple of times a day to give yourself a natural boost.