Kerry Katona is famous for her struggles with bipolar disorder and fluctuating weight, but is this surprising considering her history?
Bipolar disorder, also known as manic-depressive disorder, causes cycles of depression and mania in sufferers. Kerry has clearly shown us dramatic mood swings from ‘high’ feelings of extreme euphoria to depressed ‘lows’ with some periods of normal functioning inbetween.
Her use of food, cigarettes, alcohol and drugs have all been headline-grabbing entertaining news, but they are also ways of self-regulating her brain chemistry. For a sufferer of bipolar disorder they may feel like a way out of their mental fog, but in reality all they do is create greater imbalance.
Research shows us that bipolar sufferers are born with a genetic disposition for their disorder, but this requires nurturing by their environment in the form of stressful life events that lower the threshold at which mood swings occur.
Kerry was placed in care as a young girl, and was brought up by 4 sets of foster parents and attended 9 different schools. The trauma Kerry experienced at an early age was clearly stressful and would have triggered her mood swings and heavily dented her self-esteem and self-worth.
The thoughts we build about ourselves, other people and the world when we are children become our most deeply held beliefs. They become entrenched in our psyche and lead us to act out in behaviours that justify the way we see ourselves.
Snorting cocaine, binge eating, violent episodes are all familiar self-denigrating performances for Kerry. Before she hit the charts with Atomic Kitten there was the lap dancing, nude dance troupe and the glamour modeling. This is all easily understood considering her traumatic upbringing combined and her bipolar tendencies.
Now with Peter Andre’s management company Can Associates, Kerry is banned from using drugs and reuniting with her volatile ex-husband Mark Croft. With cameras watching her every move on ITV2 in ‘Kerry Katona, The Next Chapter’ and currently on Dancing on Ice, how will she find balance in her life again?
Emotional eating is something we all do to some extent. Compulsive eaters abuse the their use of food to help them deal with their fluctuating and often overwhelming emotions. Kerry ticks the box big time here, with her bipolar medication just making things worse. It will help to balance her brain chemistry, but leave her more numb and unattached from her true feelings. It will also make her gain weight.
Kerry’s weight gain and weight loss cycles just as much as her mood swings from elation to depression, and now with medication managing her weight just becomes a whole lot harder. So what can she, and other sufferers of bipolar disorder, do to lose weight and promote a positive mood?
Kerry’s bankruptcy was extremely stressful, and eating magnesium rich foods and B vitamins will help support the adrenal glands that produce the stress hormones. Eating a healthy diet of nuts, vegetables, meat, bread and dairy products is the way to go.
Irritability and tiredness come from poor blood sugar management, so Kerry needs to eat low GI carbs, which tend to be brown and fibrous, throughout the day. Daily consumption of chromium-rich meat, wholegrains, lentils and spices wil further help to balance her insulin levels.
Easing off the caffeine will help to reduce anxiety levels and help to reduce the bipolar anxiety-induced insomnia. Combine that with regular exercise to produce a healthy flow of calming endorphins and Kerry will be transformed.
James Lamper
Founder and Managing Director
Weight Matters
http://www.weightmatters.co.uk/
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