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While all of your neurotransmitters are important, serotonin is the star when it comes to your mood. It is just a myth to say “The Jolly Fat Man or Woman” because stress equals fat and if stress is laughing it is to cover up misery on the inside.

When your serotonin levels are normal, you feel good, you handle stressful situations better, you sleep and eat well, and you awake refreshed, your more likely to exercise and your energized; you even handle a work environment better.

Mood changes can be a good indicator as to something being wrong, such as irritability, unclear thinking, weight gain and anxiety.  A vicious up-and-downward cycle is created by the use of stimulants such as coffee, caffeine drinks and drugs, resulting in chronic low-serotonin levels that inhibit short-term memory. If use is continued, more permanent memory loss and further anxiety can occur.

These chronic low-serotonin levels can also lead to hormone imbalance creating a host of illnesses manifesting and putting on fat is an indicator."

A low-serotonin level is the state in which you suffer all the symptoms of depression. Serotonin is synthesized in the brain and the digestive tract. This is why, what you eat, when you eat it and in what combinations you eat it, influence how well you digest and utilize the nutrients and is crucial to how you feel.  If you eat foods that are high on the satiety index for example, you feel good longer. Typically these are the foods high in fiber.

L-Tryptophan, an essential amino acid found in food like potatoes and turkey, that converts in your body into 5-Hydroxytryptophan (5-HTP) and that is an important building block of serotonin; and should be taken in capsule form in the evenings.  Serotonin is the "parent" for the hormone melatonin, which regulates our “sleep cycles” (Circadian rhythm). Low serotonin causes your melatonin levels to become imbalanced and your sleep gets disrupted, which sets a patter for physiological difficulties to occur. This can become a downward spiral, leading to even lower serotonin production.

Adding L-Tryptophan n Essential Amino Acid to your daily regimen naturally converts to Serotonin along with taking Tyrosine (also an amino acid) can be helpful.  Since both these amino acids compete for uptake in the brain and because tryptophan induces sleep, it is recommended that tryptophan be taken before the evening meal and again prior to bedtime.  Tyrosine should be taken prior to breakfast and mid morning, in contrast. Exercise and eat regularly along with consuming 50% of your weight in ounces of water daily.