The Better Brain: How Nutrition Will Help You Overcome Anxiety, Depression, ADHD and Stress

I had the privilege of hearing Bonnie Kaplan speak at a medical conference her humility and no nonsense approach to her craft runs through this book. The book is thorough, well researched and supported by extensive peer reviewed evidence. When we have special diets for diabetes, cancer and heart disease it seems obvious that we should also be eating for our mental health. The consequences of not doing so have huge personal and social implications. Doctors, social policy designers and governments should read this book. The cost saving to the exchequer of a properly fed public alone should swing the argument never mind the improved quality of life. A no brainer. This book fills a much needed gap and I am sure it will become a standard text.I just wish I could have a time machine and bring it to past friends. I feel it would make a huge difference.

This book is so easy to read and so informative. There is a huge amount of information in the book, but written in a way that most lay readers can understand and use the knowledge to their own benefit. Having read this book I have re-evaluated my own diet and the vitamins I need to keep both body and brain healthy, Very well done to the authors. I recommend others buy this book, in my view a must read!

This is such an important contribution to our understanding of the causes and treatment of mental health.Kudos for the extensive research, powerful facts, and succinct ‘takeaways’.Check out the recipes the ‘black bean brownies’ are going to be a household staple!

This is such an important issue. Clearly written and packed full of research data and case studies. Even some brain-friendly recipes too! Great job by the authors 😊

The thesis is that supplementing with micronutrients run by a company the authors say they don't make money from reduced the incidence and severity of several debilitating mental illnesses. There is little empirical evidence this works, particularly when the patient is already on less emotion medication. Unfortunately the company concerned don't list their ingredients on their website so it is difficult to tell one way or another how these supplements work. You'd also need to persuade your psychiatrist that this is a good idea if medication is to be migrated while you start the supplements, which at US$60 for a 30 day supply aren't cheap.

The book is full of amazing stories of recovery by basically taking multi vitamins, but not just any multi vitamin....nope not that £14.99 multi vitamin, you need their £150 multi vitamin.The whole book is a giant advert for their friends companies.They like to tell you of their success stories but fail to tell you about the failures, convenient that!If you have anything like a sensible regular diet, don't bother with this, it's honestly terrible

I have read about 25% of the book and so far I am not a huge fan of it. I find it messy, with very few information of every topic, the author continuously talks about how they have done research about a certain topic but does not describe it or explain it on detail, only tells a story. The book feels like a semiautobiography, the author wants to tell her personal experience as a researcher instead of sharing the knowledge obtained by it. As a Nutritionist I do not feel like it has so far improved my practice in any way and does not inspire me to keep reading it. The book keeps throwing topics without any relation between each other, without any deepness, without any further going and without any real base. I really do not like the “Bonny did this” and “Bonny did that”, I believe it should give the information Bonny found instead of only telling what Bonny did constantly.

I gained very useful information from this book and it was well written and easy to understand. One of the vitamins that are discussed in this book I decided to go ahead and try and it has been a great benefit to me. If you struggle with anxiety, depression, etc. and are someone who doesn't want to end up on anti-depressants, this would be a great read for you to see more natural ways you can try to overcome the challenges you are facing.

I am a Functional Medicine consultant. I understand food, nutrition and supplementation and their impact on health, in general, and mental health in particular. Dr. Kaplan and Dr. Rucklidge explain very complex concepts in easy-to-understand language.Major takeaways for me:Page 265, the graph showing the dose of Vitamin B12 in OTC supplements versus the amount in research supplements. I knew that therapeutic doses of nutrients are much higher than RDAs, but I didn't know how BIG that difference was!Single nutrient studies versus using multiple nutrients: This problem plaques supplementation studies in heart disease, cognitive health, and not only mental health. As the authors rightly pointed out, each nutrient addresses a different pathway. (image 2 above)Both the authors are very well respected researchers! I feel very confident about recommending multi nutrients because I know that it is based on serious research and not only patient testimonials. Drs Kaplan and Rucklidge don't make money selling supplements. I was shocked to find out about the resistance (hostility?) from psychiatrists. It is akin to accusing them of research misconduct, the worst kind of academic dishonesty!I am not anti-medication. I am trained in Western medicine. But I am against using prescription drugs as the first line of therapy for every mental health challenge. I urge my psychiatrist colleagues to look outside the prescription pad. Food is medicine! Nutrients have a therapeutic dose. The bare minimum is not enough for everyone. Eating "real" food versus "food-like substances" is a good place to start. But for many people, this is not enough.I have already recommended this book to my patients and psychiatrist colleagues. This is one of the best research-supported books published on addressing mental health challenges!

An Awareness Book on Supplement and hope we as a society have from them- liked: how processes are described , how examples are captured- disliked: It can have gave little more detail on nutrition one by one, instead of always talking it as Micronutrients and Macronutrients.

I am no doctor, health practitioner or dietician, only an interested lay person. I have been using the supplement mentioned in the book for a year now. It’s hard to tell if there were any positive effects. I do feel better but also did many other things to improve my health (running, meditation, modern trauma therapy). So in my case, the jury is still out there on whether or not the supplement works for me. My children used half a stik per day for around half a year. It did not improve anything for them (aggression, whining), nor did anything slide back when they discontinued taking the stiks.I was a bit surprised that two Drs made the following mistakes: Vitamin B12 is not only cyanocobalamin. There are other forms as well. Yes, choline and inositol have been classified as vitamins in the past, but aren’t today (position 700 in the kindle book). Also, the information on omega 3 in vegan diets desperately needs an update! What they say is wrong and can be falsified within minutes of googling. At one point they mention a lot more essential amino acids than there are (there are 20-22 in total, depending on the source, but only around 9 are essential; position 2659 in the kindle book). In their jobs, they should know these basic things that everyone can verify quickly.Position 3656 in the kindle book: I was shocked to read about their suggestion of the “thank you bite” technique - Please never ever do anything like that with your child. My children eat a very good diet with tons of vegetables. People comment on that on a regular basis. I never ever forced them to eat or even try anything! A like-minded friend had the same results with her two boys. Trust your child. As a healthy mammal, they will eat what their caretaker eats anyway. If you yourself enjoy eating vegetables like I do, children will copy that over time. No need to freak out when they reject certain single foods - we all do.