Here are the 11 Natural Remedies to Calm Anxiety

 

Click HERE to Discover these 80 Keto-Friendly and Healthy Slow Cooker Recipes

Anxiety – Symptoms, Causes & Natural Remedies

The pace of life seems to have accelerated over the past decade. Today, the constant stream of emails, never-ending social media updates, and blurring of the lines between work and home life are increasingly stressful on your body and brain.

In fact, our increasingly hectic schedules have paralleled a similarly alarming increase in the rates of anxiety in the general population over that time.

It’s becoming more and more common for people to experience anxiety in the workplace; a recent study found that up to 40% of workers today have reported high levels of anxiety in their jobs.

Today’s constant connectivity is terrific for driving productivity and innovation, but if you’re not mindful, it can start to negatively impact your health.

Anxiety disorders affect about 1 out of 5 adults in America, and 40% of people take some sort of mood altering medication from their doctor. The World Health Organization (WHO) predicts that by the year 2050, one-third of the global population will suffer from either anxiety or depression.

Let’s take a look at some typical signs of anxiety, after which we can look at some simple strategies to help curb these symptoms.

Anxiety Symptoms

When I see patients in clinic, many people are surprised to see that some (or many) of the symptoms of anxiety apply to them.

Common symptoms of mild to moderate anxiety can include:

• Inability to focus
• Inability to concentrate
• Feelings of uneasiness
• Quick breathing
• Increase heart rate
• Dry mouth
• Cold or sweaty hands or feet

As your symptoms become more pronounced or if your anxiety is more longstanding, you may experience some of the following symptoms:

• Insomnia (trouble falling or staying asleep)
• Excessive fear or worry
• Obsessive thinking
• Rapid heart rate
• Heart palpitations
• Numbness or tingling in hands and feet
• Avoidance of work or social situations

You can see from this list that symptoms of anxiety can be very general; it’s therefore easy for doctors to miss and many people may experience a few of these symptoms at some point in their lives.

If you notice these symptoms increasing in frequency or severity, then it’s time to think about actively incorporating strategies to address the root cause.

What Causes Anxiety?

There are number of things that can contribute to symptoms of anxiety, and one of the most common might be part of your regular morning routine. That’s right, caffeine is listed in the DSM-5 (the medical bible for mental health diagnoses used by the American Psychiatry Association) as a direct cause of anxiety, yet for many anxiety sufferers it continues to be part of their morning routine.

Food can also predispose you to bouts of anxiety. If you struggle with poor blood sugar control, when your levels bottom out you’ll be at a much greater risk of symptoms of anxiety.

The natural reaction when blood sugars are low is to look for a sugary snack, which shoots blood sugars way up and leaves you prone to constant “highs and lows”. Unstable blood sugar levels, caffeine and stress all contribute to anxiety.

Stress is another major cause of anxiety. Stress comes in many different forms: work, school, relationships, finances, alcohol and drugs, and even too much exposure to WIFI and mobile devices.

Reducing exposure to stressors under your control (caffeine, alcohol, recreational drugs, etc.) is the first place to start, thereby enabling you to improve your response to the stressors which are not in your control (i.e., your workload in school or at the office).

Your reaction to the stressors is the only thing you can truly control, and it plays a massive role in how well you cope with stress. If you struggle with anxiety, your sympathetic nervous system is likely too-ramped up in “fight or flight” mode (in which your brain and body think you’re running away from a tiger or lion), when in reality it’s simply too many emails or work deadlines to meet.

If you constantly react very strongly to stressors, you effectively program your nervous system to always “hyper-respond” to stress, which will lead to symptoms of anxiety.

The good news is you can reprogram your stress response and build better resilience, or capacity, to cope with stress. Reprogramming your nervous system with some gentle exercises or lifestyle “hacks” will help to reboot your overactive “fight or flight” nervous system.

11 Natural Remedies to Calm Anxiety

1. Remove (or Reduce) Caffeine

If you struggle with regular or severe bouts of anxiety, it’s time to kick coffee to the curb. Caffeine triggers the release of the stress hormone adrenaline, which can be beneficial for some, but disastrous in others if the caffeine dose is too much.

Moreover, if you’re genetically a “slow metabolizer” of caffeine, it will remain in your bloodstream for longer periods, which can worsen anxiety symptoms or inhibit deep sleep.

2. Lift Weights

Numerous studies have shown the clear benefit of resistance training for improving cognition, mood and anxiety. If you’re sedentary, you can start by performing bodyweight exercises at home, join a local gym or CrossFit box, or try a new class in your area.

3. Go for a Run

If lifting weight isn’t your thing, get moving and add more cardio to your daily routine.

Experts at the Anxiety and Depression Association of America have found that regular aerobic exercise can decrease overall levels of tension, balance mood, improve sleep, and increase self-esteem.

4. Turn Up the Music

When life gets busy, social outings and even listening to music often go by the wayside. Attending a live music concert, or even listening to relaxing music at home, have been shown to reduce anxiety levels. Turn off your TV and turn up your stereo to help decompress.

5. Get a Massage

Physical touch is an important and calming influence on the brain, yet when we get busy we often distance ourselves from friends and loved ones. Something as simple as going for a massage and receiving some therapeutic touch has been shown to be effective for decreasing an overactive sympathetic nervous system.

6. Do Yoga

If you can’t carve out time for a massage, relax your nervous system at home with some gentle stretching or yoga. Performing some basic poses for 10-15 minutes is a great way to turn off your “thinking” brain so your body can begin to relax, possibly helping to relieve symptoms of anxiety in some people.

7. Try Acupuncture

Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) has used acupuncture for millennia for treating anxiety and research, and there is support for its use as an effective anxiety aid.

Acupuncture helps to relax tight muscles, dampen a hyperactive nervous system, and provide an environment to disconnect from your work and life stressors.

8. Talk It Out

Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) is a proven scientific talk therapy approach that uses problem solving techniques to reprogram your reaction to stressors. CBT is a great technique for getting to the root cause of your anxiety.

9. Take a Nature Walk

If you live a city, constant exposure to concrete, noise and pollution takes its toll on your body and mind.

A recent study found that rediscovering nature and going for a walk outdoors is naturally calming to the nervous system and can improve symptoms of anxiety. Find a local park or take a trip to the countryside near you.

10. Deep Breathing

Your breath is the connection between your body and mind. When life gets busy, you likely breathe up in your chest, and this “pump handle” type breathing is a sympathetic nervous system stimulator.

Carving out 5-10 minutes to take deep, belly breaths (using your diaphragm) activates the vagus nerve in your brain to tell your body “ahh, relax”. It’s a wonderful tonic for mild or severe anxiety.

11. Sing

There are many other ways to help calm your overactive sympathetic nervous system, and singing is at the top of the list. A recent study in choir members found a positive impact on psychological indicators of mood and anxiety. Try singing in the shower, in your car, or during your outdoor walks!

Our environment today is a major driver of symptoms of anxiety like restlessness, poor focus, insomnia and general feelings of uneasiness.

Help offset the stimulatory effects of today’s fast paced world on your nervous system by adding some of these simple strategies to your routine. Your health, productivity and happiness will all be rewarded.

Watch this video – 10 natural remedies for helping anxiety and stress

Written by Dr. Marc Bubbs

Author Bio:

Dr. Marc Bubbs, ND is a Naturopathic Doctor, Strength Coach, Author, Speaker, and Blogger practicing in Toronto, Canada. He believes that diet, exercise, and lifestyle factors have the most profound impact on your overall health and performance. Marc is the author of The Paleo Project – A 21st Guide to Looking Leaner, Getting Stronger, & Living Longer and currently serves as the Sports Nutrition Lead for Canadian Men’s Olympic Basketball Team.

A lot of people have gotten results from the Keto diet, and enjoyed the foods that it has to offer. However, many of the people who are following this diet have a hard time finding the recipes that they need, especially ones that are quick and easy to complete.

Fortunately, Kelsey Ale, noticed this problem, and decided to do something about it. She’s found that making recipes in a slow cooker gives you meals which are not only delicious, but also take very little time to make. Mostly you just put a few simple ingredients in the slow cooker, and let it do the rest.

To find out more, click on – Keto Slow Cooker Cookbook

How Anxiety Can Cause Inflammation and What Foods to Avoid

 

Click HERE to Discover these 80 Keto-Friendly and Healthy Slow Cooker Recipes

How Anxiety Can Trigger Your Inflammation (Plus: What Foods to Avoid)

Anxiety is the most common mental disorder in the United States, impacting more than 40 million adults.

While some cases can be mild and short-lived, others can be debilitating, lasting for years, or transitioning into a chronic problem.

Anxiety is connected to a number of lifestyle, health, and dietary factors, but understanding the triggers and root causes can lead to more effective treatment.

What Is Anxiety?

Many people refer to situational stress or momentary tenseness as anxiety, and often the term “panic attack” can be loosely thrown around.

But for people living with generalized anxiety disorder or one of the other recognized anxiety diagnoses – like social anxiety disorder, specific phobias, or separation anxiety disorder – these terms have meaning that delves into a feeling that can be all-consuming, debilitating, and hard to comprehend by someone on the outside.

Anxiety can refer to numerous symptoms that can include:

• Nervousness
• Fear
• Apprehension
• Worrying
• Paranoia
• Feelings of being unsettled
• Trembling
• Upset stomach or nausea
• Diarrhea
• Headache
• Heart palpitations (which can increase anxiety over worries of heart attack)
• Numbness or pins and needle sensations in extremities
• Sweating or hot flashes
• Restlessness or restless legs
• Fatigue
• Poor concentration
• Irritability or mood swings
• Muscular aches and pains from tension
• Have trouble falling/staying asleep
• Being easily startled

While almost anyone can experience temporary feelings of anxiety before impactful events, important moments, tests, or the like, anxiety is considered to be problematic when it presents for numerous events within a person’s life, and when it begins to interfere in some way with normal function, including sleep disturbances, social anxiety, or self-care.

Bottom line: Anxiety is a legitimate disorder that can range from short-term to chronic, and can have wide-ranging symptoms that can be attributed to a number of other conditions.

What Causes Anxiety?

Anxiety can be caused by a number of different factors. Some of the more common triggers include:

• Chronic stress, including depression from stress
• Excessive serotonin production or activity
• Early life stress or pressure
• 24/7 connectivity online
• Genetic mutations
• Traumatic life events
• Financial problems
• Chronic pain

While the specific triggers for anxiety may differ from case to case, there seem to be some common groupings of anxiety triggers. But what actually takes these triggers and turns them into anxiety for some people and not others?

Beyond the potential causes for anxiety, there has to be a triggering event that is significant enough to spark a chronic problem. Even in cases of genetic tendency, something still has to cause the initial episode. Anxiety and inflammation feed into each other, making anxiety triggers worsen.

What many of the causative factors listed above have in common is inflammation.

Stress can increase inflammation within the body, and one of the common factors linking each condition together is stress. Stress can also take its toll on the body in other ways that don’t lead to anxiety, and certainly people can experience stress regularly without having chronic problems as a result.

Bottom line: Anxiety is caused by numerous factors, and many of the causes have underlying issues in common with chronic inflammation and stress. Anxiety is, however, an issue in and of itself and not simply a side effect of other problems.

Inflammation and Anxiety

The link between inflammation, anxiety, and even depression is well-documented.

Inflammation is the body’s response to injury, and it’s becoming increasingly understood that this injury doesn’t have to be purely physical. Mental and emotional stress or injury can spark inflammatory responses, too.

When inflammatory processes happen within the body, one of the first things to be affected is the gut and the microbiome. Stress produces inflammatory cytokines that can actually alter the way that the gut, brain, and nervous system respond. This can include the development of depression, anxiety, and leaky gut.

Once leaky gut is present, it can perpetuate cycles of anxiety due to disrupted microbial balances in the gut, toxins in the bloodstream, and poor absorption of nutrients.

Nutrient deficiency can have a significant role in the health of the nervous system, and deficiencies in nutrients like B vitamins or vitamin D can worsen anxiety issues. Leaky gut can perpetuate the cycles of anxiety.

While anxiety isn’t necessarily best addressed in only one specific way, a thorough healing approach will take gut health and inflammatory levels into account.

Following an anti-inflammatory diet protocol and reversing leaky gut could, at the very least, prevent anxiety conditions from continuing to worsen.

In some cases, gut health could be the primary trigger of anxiety, and a gut healing protocol could actually resolve anxiety in its own right.

While testing specifically for anxiety is difficult, if anxiety is present, there are a number of tests that can be done to determine the state of gut health. Specifically, tests that look at zonulin and lactulose levels, like the ELISA test, can help to determine the severity of leaky gut by looking at factors that actually control the level of gut permeability.

Inflammatory markers can also shed some light on the state of gut health that might be contributing to anxiety. Tests such as hs-CRP, or C-reactive protein, measure cytokines in the blood that are released by damaged or inflamed tissues, presenting a decent snapshot of the body’s inflammation levels.

Homocysteine is another test that measures the levels of this amino acid in the blood. When it’s elevated, it can indicate nutrient deficiencies that can be associated with chronic inflammation (like B12) as well as general inflammation.

Bottom line: Anxiety isn’t likely caused by inflammation alone, but measuring inflammatory levels can certainly help to spell out a more direct path to resolving the issue, especially when inflammatory and gut health issues are present.

Foods and Inflammation

An anti-inflammatory diet can look different in many cases, and there isn’t necessarily a one-size-fits all approach. While some common themes will emerge, like eating plenty of leafy greens and healthy fats, others will need to take an individualized approach to get to the root of their problem.

A basic anti-inflammatory diet will include plenty of:

• Bone broth
• Leafy greens
• Cruciferous vegetables
• Berries
• Salmon
• Chicken, especially thigh meat
• Beef
• Avocado
• Sweet potatoes
• Squash

Foods to avoid on an anti-inflammatory plan will include:

• Gluten and grains
• Dairy
• Beans and legumes
• Processed or refined foods
• Sugar, even in Paleo form
• Artificial sweeteners
• Preservatives
• Caffeine
• Alcohol

Food sensitivity and allergy play a huge role in inflammation and gut health. When foods that produce an immune response are consumed, they further perpetuate leaky gut, inflammation, and digestive upset or malabsorption.

In addition to foods that are specifically aggravating to an individual’s gut, there are also certain groups of foods that can be difficult to digest or which can exacerbate issues with leaky gut. These include grains, beans, legumes, and dairy products – food groups which are already excluded on a Paleo diet.

The Paleo diet has become a popular remedy for gut health woes, but even within the confines of a Paleo diet lies plenty of room for individualization.

Some individuals do best following an AIP diet, or the autoimmune Paleo protocol. This further eliminates known inflammatory foods like eggs, nuts, seeds, and nightshades (tomatoes, peppers, potatoes, and eggplants). Paleo is enough to fix gut health for some; others need a more strict AIP diet.

Others may do better eating super low carb Paleo, or ketogenic Paleo, while still others may thrive on a high vegetable Paleo diet that limits meat intake and promotes large quantities of the full rainbow of vegetables.

Addressing anxiety and gut health issues with diet is best done with the help of a qualified professional who understands both gut health and the underlying causes of anxiety and other mood disorders. In some cases, nutrient replacement with a supplement program can further decrease symptoms and speed gut health.

Please note that while diet can be very effective, if medical prescription therapy is needed, it’s important not to quit medication protocols that are managing anxiety or depression without the assistance of someone who is qualified to do so.

Watch this video – The Anxiety/Depression Diet: This Will Help

Bottom line: Nutrition can play a key role in reducing inflammation and combating anxiety, especially when you increase high-nutrient foods like leafy greens, berries, and salmon and reduce highly processed and sweetened foods.

3 Alternative Therapies to Address Anxiety

Many who suffer from anxiety turn to medication and diet to deal with their unpleasant symptoms, but there is also another category of support than can work together with other protocols or on its own: alternative therapy.

Acupuncture

Anxiety responds well to acupuncture and other Traditional Chinese Medicine protocols.  Acupuncture works to remove energy blockages, or “chi,” within the body.

There are specific anxiety points in the ear, wrist, and feet that acupuncturists will work with. While acupuncture may seem off-putting to anyone who has never tried it or who has a fear of needles, it is well worth the effort to give it a try.

Acupuncture needles are so tiny that they are barely felt, and if they are, it feels more like a tickle than a pricking of the skin. Sessions tend to last anywhere from 30-60 minutes, and I personally find them so relaxing that I often fall asleep and wake to find I am in a much calmer state of mind.

Yoga

Yoga, too, can be effective for the management of anxiety, either on its own or in addition to other methodologies. Even if you’re not a yoga pro, or you’re not flexible at all, working with an online program, a class, or even an app can start to produce positive results.

Yoga doesn’t have to look perfect. You just need to approach it with the mindset of doing the best that you can, and focusing on breathing well and achieving the positions as correctly as possible.

Exercise

Exercise other than yoga, such as aerobic or cardio exercise, can be beneficial as well, since it reduces overall inflammation within the body. Whatever the form of exercise you begin, regularity is what will produce positive results.

Walking a few miles after work, joining a fitness class three times per week, swimming in the mornings before work, or any other possible combination can all bring you closer to your health goals, and that can definitely include reducing anxiety and inflammation.

Summary

Ultimately, the protocol that is going to address anxiety best for someone is going to be specifically targeted at their individual needs. The original trigger or reason for developing chronic anxiety needs to be considered along with other existing health conditions, lifestyle factors, and genetic health.

Exploring different healing modalities like diet, lifestyle, exercise, and alternative therapies will often have a much more significant impact on anxiety than simply waiting for it to dissipate on its own.

Written by Aimee McNew

Author Bio:

Aimee McNew is a Certified Nutritionist who specializes in women’s health, thyroid problems, infertility, and digestive wellness. She ate her way back to health using a Paleo diet, lost 80 pounds, and had a healthy baby after numerous miscarriages. She focuses on simple nutrition practices that promote long-lasting results.

A lot of people have gotten results from the Keto diet, and enjoyed the foods that it has to offer. However, many of the people who are following this diet have a hard time finding the recipes that they need, especially ones that are quick and easy to complete.

Fortunately, Kelsey Ale, noticed this problem, and decided to do something about it. She’s found that making recipes in a slow cooker gives you meals which are not only delicious, but also take very little time to make. Mostly you just put a few simple ingredients in the slow cooker, and let it do the rest.

To find out more, click on – Keto Slow Cooker Cookbook