What Is Brain Fog?
A First Field Note
Has this happened to you? Imagine driving on the highway to work and suddenly you realize that this stretch of road doesn’t look familiar. “Did I miss my exit?” Panic sets in. “Where am I? What happened?”
It happened to me when I had a newer job demonstrating products at a warehouse store that was perhaps 15 miles from my house. I’d driven to the warehouse a dozen times without incident. Today, though, my mind felt fragmented and I was having trouble focusing. I struggled to remain mindful in the moment.
Suddenly, I realized that there were trees and grassy slopes at the side of the freeway instead of strip malls. I could see a farm house and cows grazing in a field on the other side of the highway. I had no idea where I was. My body tensed, my mind froze. I pulled off at the next exit and started weeping.
This pattern has been part of my bipolar physiology for many years. I cycled through a wide range of medications and found only temporary relief from depression, with no sustained relief from intermittent brain fog. Therapeutic ketamine treatments alleviated depressive symptoms for a time, but the cognitive crashes returned.
Sustained improvement in both mood stability and cognitive clarity occurred only after a marked reduction in dietary carbohydrates. My current intake consists primarily of beef and eggs, small portions of Greek yogurt with a few raspberries or strawberries, and saturated fats such as butter, coconut oil, and rendered beef fat.
Under this pattern, episodes of brain fog now appear only under two conditions: several consecutive nights of insufficient sleep, or repeated carbohydrate intake exceeding approximately 50 grams per day over two to three days.
The metabolic framework that clarified this pattern was first introduced to me through a lecture by Dr. Chris Palmer. His book is listed on the Odyssey80 Books page.
Dietary intake is tracked using Cronometer, which allows continuous monitoring of macronutrients and micronutrients. Sleep, heart rate, and activity data are captured via Fitbit, which is linked to the same tracking stream.