E7: Can Food Really Fix My Mood? (Anti-Inflammatory Lifestyle Tips for Menopause & Midlife Wellness)

Forget fad diets — this isn’t about kale or calorie counts. It’s about how simple, anti-inflammatory food shifts can literally clear your brain fog and steady your mood.

In this episode, I’ll break down how your gut, hormones, and nervous system talk to each other (and how your lunch might be sabotaging your serotonin). You’ll learn my nurse-backed “Food as Mood Medicine” blueprint — the exact steps to stabilize energy, calm the mood swings, and feel like yourself again.

💡 You’ll walk away knowing:

• Why your mood isn’t just “in your head” — it’s in your metabolism
• The foods that mess with your midlife mindset
• How to reset your energy and focus with one plate at a time

👉 Grab my $1 Energy Rescue Pack to start your reset today — no supplements, no guilt, just small shifts to fuel your fire.

Get your own copy of Joyce's daily supplement list here. (The one she mentions in this episode).

If you need help mapping a plan to stop chasing an old version of yourself and start creating a new version, schedule a free call here and get some clarity on what your body truly needs.

Follow me on Instagram or visit my website.
Watch full episodes on YouTube.

To sign up for the free 7-day Midlife Reset, click HERE,

Transcript

This is episode seven. Can food really fix my mood? I want you to forget about fad
diets. Today, I'm going to talk about simple anti -inflammatory shifts that can
literally clear rain fog and help calm the mood swings. 

Welcome to the unmute your midlife podcast, where we take you from foggy and forgotten to focus and lit up. I'm Joyce, your nurse turned midlife resurrection strategist and the cheerleader in your pocket. And I'm here to remind you that your next season in life is your power era.

So first of all, it is not all in your head. It's in your gut. It's in your
blood sugar. It's in your hormones. They're all connected. What they forgot to tell
us before we got to our 40s is that the mood swings, the irritability, the brain
fog. They're not always just emotional. We don't just have PMS on steroids.
It's biochemical. What you eat literally affects your neurotransmitters,
especially serotonin, dopamine, GABA, or G-A-B-A, those are all made or influenced by your gut health. Did you know 90 % of your serotonin is reduced in your gut. So if you've got inflammation in the gut, you've got inflammation in the brain because they are sharing the signaling pathways. When you expose your body to high sugar and high ultra processed foods, you spike your cortisol levels and then you crash your dopamine. And then that brings on the anxiety, the fatigue, and the irritability. So it's not just that you're moody, your cellular mitochondria are miserable, but we're going to break that. We're going to talk about how you can counteract that, how you can pick a healthier habit, and thus have better moods, less mood swings, less anxiety. Anybody curious? Want to hear more? 

So that is something that can happen, no matter what stage of life you're in, from a little kid on up to elderly person that that I just described can happen to you. But then when you hit perimenopause, there's some things that happen that make the gut brain connection even stronger. First off, estrogen affects our serotonin and our dopamine levels, which influence our mood stability. Having lower estrogen levels also affects our insulin sensitivity. So that can make trigger crash is more common or insulin resistance can start to show up. And then you combine that with the other things. We get to experience in perimenopause like poor sleep, skipped meals, or the emotional roller coaster that life changes brings. I mean, think about it. When I was going through perimenopause, that was when both of my kids left the house. We moved to a different house. We brought my mother -in -law in to live with us because of her dementia. Those are a lot of life changes to happen in that period of time when I was also having my hormones look like a little roller coaster. So, no wonder I was having trouble stabilizing my mood, regulating my reactions to things. I mean, I used to think I was just, you know, "I'm cranky when three o 'clock rolls around." But it turns out that I was probably hungry, dehydrated, and running on way too much cortisol.

Fortunately, one of the first things I did to reverse these trends in myself was
I got control of my gut health and my eating patterns. That was my number one
thing that I did to start to feel better. And then once I did that, and I could
start thinking a little bit more clearly, I made other changes. But that first
change, using food as mood medicine, was like day and night how different life felt for me. The good news is you don't need a 30 -day detox. You don't have to become obsessed with kale, which is good because I don't like kale. You just need fuel that stabilizes your chemistry. So here's what that's going to look like. Coming from a nurse who researches perimenopause and menopause quite frequently, the first thing that I'm going to recommend is protein. Protein is going to build your dopamine is going to stabilize your blood sugar. How much protein you need? The formula is one to 1 .3 grams per kilogram of weight. But a rule of thumb you can use is you want: if you look at your dinner plate, a quarter of your plate should be your protein. A serving size is going to be the palm of your hand and you should have a one to two of those serving sizes on your plate each meal. 

The next thing is you need to add some color to your plate. You know how your mom always told you growing up, eat your vegetables. It's true. The vegetables are full of antioxidants, which have lower brain inflammation. So if you want to help with your mood regulation, not just now, but in the future, preventing dementia and Alzheimer's, eat your vegetables. And yes, I know they have the powdered greens. Arbonne has a great greens supplement. There's the A1, A1, AG, I don't know. There's a lot of different brands out there. If you absolutely cannot eat enough vegetables, then you can supplement with the greens. But I wouldn't make the greens your sole source of vegetables. So, a serving size of veggies is if you make a fist, and you want one to two fists at each meal. Now that's just vegetables, especially the green leafy ones or the ones that have lots of bright colors. That does not include iceberg lettuce. I'm sorry, iceberg lettuce has no nutritional value. (Okay, maybe five calories worth, but that's not worth counting.) You want the vegetables that are full of good, healthy nutrients. And fruit doesn't count. Fruit counts as carbs. 

Okay, number three is going to be your omega -3 fats. Did
you know your brain operates off of fat? Fat is a great mood stabilizer.
Even butter has some health benefits for you. Check this out. It's rich in fat
soluble vitamins, A, D, E, and K. It contains conjugated linoleic acid, which we just call CLA, which is an anti -inflammatory compound. It has vitamin K and calcium, which helps with your strong bones. There are some studies that show that the CLA in butter can help reduce your heart risk. But of course, anything in excess is going to turn around and bite you in the butt. So remember your serving sizes. Another thing that's good about butter is that high fat content, it promotes satiety. So if you try, I don't know if you've ever tried to do like a fat -free diet before. I remember doing this probably in the early 2000s. I was so proud of myself. I got down to like 20 grams of fat per day and I was miserable. Like I could not think straight. Nothing like my brain cells were not firing. I had no idea that it was because you need fat. Think. Your brain needs it. But also I was hungry. Like I was doing like six mini meals a day. I have no time to do six meals a day. I'm lucky to get in my three meals a day. But when you add some healthy fats in, it helps your food satisfy you longer, so then you can go longer between meals. And if you're trying to do the intermittent fasting, where you go 14 to 16 hours without eating, you're definitely going to want to have had some fat in that final meal to help carry you through to the end of your fasting window. So hopefully, that just made someone's day finding out that yes, you can have a little bit of butter and not feel guilty about it. But, again, it needs to be good butter, not margarine, obviously. 

Number four is going to be hydration and minerals. When you have your electrolytes balanced, you have better mood regulation. If you're up, running around, if you're exerting yourself, if it's a hot day outside and you're sweating, if you're having hot flashes or night sweats, then you're sweating, you're not going to harm yourself having an electrolyte replacement drink. There's plenty of good ones out there. I use the Arbonne sports drink and I also use the
LM &T, but now there's a new one that just came out that, was it liquid IV or
liquid hydration? Every day I feel like there's some new product coming out. My
point is there are plenty of electrolytes out there. You want to find one that is
sugar -free but does not have aspartame or sucralose as the sweetener.
Stivia is okay unless you have issues with stevia, but stevia is not going to,
it's not like a cancer -causing or oxidative chemical. It's a naturally occurring
herb. If you don't want to add anything to your water, you can also flavor your
water by infusing it through fruit. They have like little water bottles that you put
your fruit in and you, it's almost like a filter thing that you put the fruit in
and then you pour the water in. And so some of that fruit flavor gets into the
water. If you've ever tried hint water, it's a brand. It just has a hint of fruit
flavor to it. That's what infusing your water does for you. If you want to know
how much water you need, my rule of thumb is if I weigh 150 pounds, then half of
that is 75, so I need 75 ounces. That's usually a good rule of them. If you weigh
hundred pounds, half of that is 100, so you need 100 ounces. I recommend trying to get that water over and done with early in the day so that you don't have to get
up and pee 50 times during the night. 

Okay, number five on my list is to limit your sugar and alcohol. Both of those things spike your dopamine short term and then cause it to crash later. And I've talked on here about energy drinks and what they do to you. Try not to drink those. As a nurse, when my shift would get really busy. I think my first year working in the hospital, I worked as a nurse aide while I was finishing up school. And I would have these 12 -hour shifts of go, go, go, go, go. And even though we were allowed to take a lunch break, there wasn't really time to go downstairs to the cafeteria, get food, come back and eat it. Because that alone usually took almost 30 minutes with the lines and everything. So if I didn't pack my lunch, then I would have to run to the vending machine and get a Snickers bar or we had, at the time we had the soda fountain spigot in the nutrition room so we could give the patients sodas, and I would just go in there and get like this short cup of Dr. Pepper and I would
drink this little short (like maybe three or four ounces of Dr. Pepper) probably every
two to three hours and that sugar and caffeine would be enough to keep me going
through the whole shift if I didn't get to eat. That was not healthy. Now, obviously, I was a lot younger then, and I could get away with it. That is not a smart way to take care of yourself and your energy needs. So limit your sugar, limit your alcohol. I know now in menopause, if we go out to dinner, that dessert tray may look amazing, but I've learned to say, no, thank you. I'm too full. Because if I have a sugary dessert at dinner, I am guaranteed to have hot flashes or night sweats that night. I'll wake up in the middle night, soaking wet, freezing cold, wet sheets. I can still trigger it with the food I put in my body. So I have learned to just eat what my body wants so that my body is kind to me and doesn't react negatively with things like hot flashes, nights with erratic moods, all the things. So your mood isn't just about mindset. It's also metabolic. Now, if you do still struggle with symptoms, it's okay. Let's just call these symptoms what they are. They're data. They're data that you can use to tell what's going on inside underneath this skin suit of yours and to know what you need to change, what you can adjust. Instead of asking yourself, "why I'm so moody today?" Ask yourself, "wait a minute. Did I eat the right things today? Did I skip a meal? Did I skip my vitamins? Did I ignore what my body was asking for?"

If you tracked your symptoms and your meals for a week, you would probably find your triggers. You would be able to see a correlation. Oh, look, on this day, I had a lot of hot flashes during the day. But look what I ate that day or look what I didn't eat that day. Another thing that I would recommend is adding magnesium glycinate. I have this BEEYA magnesium powder. It has the three kinds of magnesium in it. I use that one. I mix it in my water. I usually drink that in the morning. The bea powder is something you have to order and I think you have to have a monthly subscription for. But you can also look on this little supplement schedule I've got here. This Calm brand, Naturemade, Thorn, T -H -O -R -N -E. (That's a really reliable brand.) Nordic has a magnesium glycinate powder that you can mix with your water to get your magnesium in. This little flyer here has all the supplements I take. I'll add this to the show notes in case anyone wants to see it up close. But if you were to add magnesium glycinate, Get enough water every day and cut out one of your junky meals, whether it's the drive -thru that you grab on the way home from work or the over -processed food that you use out of convenience. Watch what happens in seven days because your body is not broken or sick. It's just asking for a different kind of fuel. 

Now, I have a toolkit on my website. It's a whole dollar. It's called the energy rescue pack and it has one sheet is a cheat sheet of 10 energy thieves that come in and steal your energy and what you can do to combat them right and then there's a bonus in there that's called it's not just stress and it's five worksheets on mindset renewal or something you can do to in the moment reset your mood or explore why you're reacting the way you are to something. And then the second bonus is called a movement reboot. And it's got five workouts in there that are 10 minutes or less, no equipment required. It's stuff you can do from home to get your body moving. Because my new routine that I've been doing in the morning lately is I get up 5 a .m. or 6 a .m. depending on when I have to be to work or church that day. So I get up an hour earlier than I need to so that I have this time and I do this 20, 2020. So I do 20 minutes of vigorous exercise. That helps to change your brain waves. You go from your beta waves into your alpha waves and maybe even into your theta waves because it puts that that prefrontal cortex quiets it down so that you can start to flush out the remaining cortisol levels and start stimulating the dopamine and serotonin. So 20 minutes of exercise, and then I have 20 minutes of journaling or Bible study or reading a book that I'm interested in, something for self -improvement, and then 20 minutes of prayer time. Or if you're not a prayer person, then you can do journaling. And that one hour in the morning helps me to get into this flow state for the day so that I'm ready for whatever the day is going to bring. My mood is set. You know, I might use those 20 -minute times to do some planning, like, "what am I going to eat today? What do I need to do today?" I can use that time to review my calendar. I mean, you could, you could choose how you want to use that block of time. But doing that in the morning, when the house is quiet, the dogs are still asleep, nobody needs me for anything. It gives me some uninterrupted time to myself to set myself up for a great day. And that's the kind of things that I talk about in this energy rescue pack is things you can do, simple, easy ways to feed your focus, calm your cortisol, because we don't want a big overwhelming plan. We like simple around here. 

So next time you want to say, "I'm in a mood." Check your plate before you check your personality. 

All right, my friends, that's today's dose of midlife truth. Thank you so much for listening. Remember, You're not foggy or forgotten or finished. You are just getting lit up for your next season. And if today's episode hit home, don't keep it to yourself. Share it with a sister who needs some help unmuting her own midlife. Until next time, keep unmuting, keep rising, and remember your midlife resurrection starts right now.