I have written in several places about certain supplements that I think help your brain function better or that can help you relieve stress, low moods, and help you sleep.
In addition to the supplements I have already written about, like fish oil, you should make sure you are getting sufficient vitamins and minerals while you study for the bar exam. This is especially important if your diet has deteriorated during your bar exam studies.
Multivitamin
It is extremely important to take a good multivitamin throughout your life, but especially when you are under stress. Vitamin and mineral deficiencies have been linked with mood and depressive disorders. Obviously, you want to avoid creating conditions for such disorders to emerge at any time, but especially when you are studying for the bar exam.
The good news is that taking sufficient vitamin and mineral supplements has been linked with preventing and even correcting these same mood and depressive disorders.
In her book, The Mood Cure, Julia Ross talks about a peer-reviewed study showing that people who took a multivitamin everyday for eight weeks became less nervous and depressed, had greater self-confidence and concentration, were more active and social, and had a markedly improved mood. Sounds good to me!
B-Complex
This complex of vitamins is important to the functioning of the nervous system and neurotransmitters in the brain that affect mood and thinking. Therefore it is important to ensure that you have proper intake of B vitamins in stressful and anxiety-inducing situations, such as preparation for the bar exam.
Vitamin B6 is necessary for proper nervous system and brain function. Low levels of vitamin B12 can result in confusion and depression. B12 is also needed to help control inflammation in the brain. Therefore is recommended that he take a be complex vitamin each day containing at least 50 mg of B6 and 500 mcg of B12.
Be careful about taking a big dose of B vitamins in the afternoon or evening as it can cause agitation and interfere with sleep.
Antioxidants
Antioxidants are necessary to prevent free radicals from damaging your brain. A free radical is any atom or molecule that has a single unpaired electron in an outer shell. This means that free radicals are highly reactive and cause oxidative damage to your cells.
The best way to get antioxidants into your diet is to eat at least six servings of vegetables and two servings of fruit every day. A serving is half a cup of cooked vegetables, 1 cup of raw vegetables, or one medium-sized fruit. Most of the antioxidants in fruits and vegetables are in the pigments of the plants. Therefore, different colored fruits and vegetables have different types of antioxidants, so be sure to eat a colorful diet.
If you don’t like to eat vegetables or don’t want to eat so many of them, then you should be sure to take an antioxidant supplement.
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