Anxiety is a fearful system disorder that locks your body into a state of fear called “fight or flight.” Your mind experiences a threat or danger, leading your body to release more cortisol and adrenaline. These hormones boosts your blood pressure, hasten your heart rate, direct blood to your muscles, and change your breathing to prepare you to vanish the situation or fight the threat as a survival instinct.
Symptoms of anxiety
Symptoms of anxiety can diverse and include:
- Sleep problems
- Memory problems
- Feeling of a lump in the throat
- Nausea
- Negative mindset
- Avoidance of social situations
- If anxiety occurs for years, it can boost the risk of developing diabetes, heart disease, and other health problems as the adrenal glands begin to become weaken, causing hormonal imbalances in both women and men.
Vitamins to Reduce Anxiety
Here are the six vitamins and nutrients suggested to decrease your stress response and reduce anxiety:
Vitamin B1 (Thiamine)
Most people with anxiety are weak in thiamine (vitamin B1). Parts of your brain, such as the amygdala and hippocampus, apply your B1 stores for energy whenever you feel stressed, emotional, or threatened. Eating sugar, strained foods, or caffeinated beverages can also reduce your vitamin B1.
Therefore, put 2–3 tablespoons of unfortified nutritional yeast daily, adding it to soups, stews, or atop salad. You can also consume more B1 by eating sunflower seeds, organic pork, pasture-raised eggs, and wild-caught fish.
Probiotics
Your gut is filling with beneficial microbes that help destr0y food and keep your overall health. These microbes also create B vitamins, such as vitamin B1, B2, B12, and others, which help fix your mood and prevent prolonged anxiety.
To improve the health of your gut bacteria, consume fermented vegetables such as sauerkraut, kimchi, pickles, and kefir at least three times a week.
Vitamin D
People dealing with anxiety and sleep disturbances often have high cortisol levels. To fix this, sun exposure encourages the production of vitamin D, which helps ease cortisol.
Magnesium and potassium
Magnesium and potassium are crucial for creating energy in your cell’s mitochondria. They come primarily from leafy vegetables. Magnesium is essential for the production of neurotransmitters like serotonin and GABA, which help you feel calm and happy.
Increase your magnesium and potassium intake by regularly consuming avocados and leafy green vegetables like kale, broccoli, beet greens, collard greens, Brussels sprouts, cabbage, and radish.
Passionflower infusion
If you deal with anxiety, it’s crucial to remove caffeinated beverages like coffee and soda, which can deepen anxiety. A natural alternative is passion flower tea, which consists of plant compounds that can promote GABA in your brain, helping to calm jittery nerves and relax you.
Ashwagandha
Ashwagandha is a powerful herb that has been applied for thousands of years to naturally treat stress and anxiety. This herb is high in withanolides, which reduces cortisol, balances blood sugar, stabilizes mood, and enhances sleep.
Lifestyle Tips to Eliminate Anxiety
In addition to vitamins and nutrients, here are some lifestyle tips to ease anxiety:
- Remove stimulants and caffeine from your diet.
- Change caffeinated drinks with herbal infusions (valerian, lemon balm, passionflower, lavender, mint, rosemary).
- Participant more outdoor physical activity, such as walking in a park for 45 minutes a day.
- Create and minimize your living space to reduce mental clutter.
- Prepare calming essential oils in your home (ylang ylang, black cherry, lavender, sage, jasmine).
- Sleep least 8 hours each night. Relax before bed and visualize calming thoughts.
Practicing these strategies can reduce your nervous system and enhance a sense of well-being. Enjoy greater productivity and creativity in your daily activities by applying these useful habits.
