Food Choices Effect Memory
Eating Wrong Can Cause Memory Loss
Gretchen Heuring | ElderThink | 03.01.11
Eating wrong is the same as "not eating right." Older people can be quite suddenly become exhausted caregivers, suffer from 
energy-depleting illness, or live alone for the first time. Preparing and consuming nutritious meals falls by the wayside under such stressful conditions. Once can become twice, can become a week, then a month, then longer.
The body and brain need certain foods to be healthy. Most of our lives, it's relatively easy to shop for and prepare good meals. Older people often fail to manage their nutrition properly when life deals them a blow.
The term we use is "malnourished" because the body isn't getting the right foods in the right combinations to maintain health. The result is loss of energy, a depleted immune system, confusion and memory loss.
Downward Spiral of Malnutrition
Low energy and confusion lead to poor choices but there is more going on in a person who doesn't eat right for an extended period. The body loses the resources to heal and repair itself. At the very lowest level the cells of the body begin to break down and are not replaced.
Foods We Must Have to Live Long and Well
The Tufts Modified Food Pyramid for Older Adults divides the foods we need into several categories.
Follow the links below to learn more about these foods and what the older body needs from them, shopping tips, recipes and storage ideas.
grains and cereals
vegetables
fruits
dairy
beans and nuts
meat, fish and eggs
oil and spreads
water
