Why Anxiety and Depression Start in Your Gut

You've tried therapy. You've tried medications. Maybe they help for a while, but something still feels off. Your anxiety keeps creeping back. Your depression won't fully lift.

And nobody can tell you why.

Your gut and brain are in constant conversation. And when that conversation breaks down, anxiety and depression follow.

This isn't a metaphor. It's physiology. Your gut produces 95% of your body's serotonin, the neurotransmitter that regulates mood, sleep, and emotional stability. It also makes dopamine, GABA, and norepinephrine.

When your gut microbiome is inflamed, imbalanced, or starved of real nutrients, those mood-regulating chemicals don't get made properly. Your brain gets the message: something's wrong. That shows up as anxiety, depression, brain fog, and emotional instability- even when your bloodwork looks "normal."

This episode of the Medical Disruptor breaks down the gut-brain axis: the physical nerve highway (your vagus nerve) and the chemical postal system (your microbiome) that connect your digestive system to your mental health.

We cover how chronic stress, ultra-processed foods, antibiotics, and poor sleep disrupt this axis, how gut inflammation sends danger signals to your brain, and why people with depression have measurably different gut bacteria than people without it.

If you've been told your symptoms are "just stress" or "all in your head," this episode is your permission slip to look deeper. Because when your gut is balanced, your brain finally gets the message.

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All citations for this episode are included in the link below.https://docs.google.com/document/d/1Y...

Chapters
00:00 – How Gut Health Affects Mental Health
01:10 – What Is the Gut–Brain Axis?
02:45 – The Vagus Nerve and Anxiety Explained
04:30 – Chronic Stress, Inflammation & the Gut
06:05 – The Gut Microbiome and Mental Health
07:50 – Inflammation, Cytokines & Brain Fog
09:35 – Gut Health and Cortisol (Stress Hormones)
11:05 – Serotonin, Dopamine & the Gut
13:20 – Why Anxiety and Depression Aren’t “Just Stress”
15:15 – Gut Health and Depression: What Studies Show
17:30 – How Diet Changes Mood Through the Gut
19:05 – Probiotics, Fiber & Mental Health
21:30 – Sleep, Exercise & the Gut–Brain Axis
23:45 – Gut Health Is Mental Health (Final Takeaway)