How Your Diet Affects Your Stress Level

Let’s face it, we have our work cut out for us when it comes to stress management. Pandemics, politics, climate change, feeling time crunched, processed food, pollution, lack of sleep…good grief! We are dealing with chronic stress and its health implications at new all-time high levels.

And your diet is a big one!

The phrase “You are what you eat” applies to your stress levels…What you eat affects your stress hormones.

Before we talk about stress any further, I am including a cute puppy picture for you to enjoy so that all this stress talk doesn’t stress you out! 

While cortisol is the most famous stress hormone, typically released in higher amounts when you are in the fight-or-flight response, insulin is also involved in the stress response. You see, when you get stressed by something, your cortisol and some other stress hormones (i.e. adrenaline, norepinephrine, catecholamines) go up. One of the effects on your body when these hormones are released is for your blood sugar to go up (to give you energy to fight or flee)…and when blood sugar goes up, insulin goes up too.
This is a crucial point for any of you who are eating a healthy diet yet dealing with blood sugar imbalance, weight imbalance, high blood pressure, or energy imbalance. Independently from your diet, your stress response raises your blood sugar!

So it becomes even more important that your diet not become a source of stress.

Tip #1: If you are used to eating a diet that is high in sugar, it’s time to cut back on it. A high-sugar diet is associated with brain fog, low or inconsistent energy, fat storage around your organs, memory loss, and an increased risk in dementia. An increased blood sugar level increases the chance for insulin resistance, meaning, it will take a longer time before we can utilize the glucose/energy you take from the food you eat.

 Tip #2. Eat when you are actually hungry and not out of habit.

Snacking bumps up your insulin level. Remember that insulin affects all your other stress hormones. So the more you snack, the more insulin increases and too much of this pattern increases insulin resistance (a cell desensitization to the impact of insulin). High insulin and insulin resistance wreaks havoc in your entire body, affecting your mood, gut health, immune system, and stress levels.

Depending on your particular situation, you might try practicing intermittent fasting, in which you go without food for a slightly longer time period (12-16 hrs, including overnight sleep time). This gives ample time for your body to use ketones, instead of glucose, as fuel; helps restore healthy insulin levels, and increases cell repair.

Tip #3. Choose high quality food. Foods grown with artificial fertilizers and loaded with pesticides contain toxins that disrupt your hormonal balance. Meat coming from animals that have eaten toxic food also plays a role in disrupting your hormonal system. So opt for the cleanest, best quality food you can as often as possible.

 Tip #4. Make meal time pleasant and calm…and choose good company.  No matter how appetizing or healthy your food is, when you eat with people who stress you out or talk about stressful things while eating, it becomes a lot harder to keep your own stress level down. So make sure that you eat with the people you care about and try to discuss things that help you feel happy and safe.

I hope these tips are helpful to you! Want to learn even more? Join me next week for my free online class Stress & Digestion: How Stress is Wrecking Your Digestion and What You Can Do About It!  (register here).

It is my passion to work with people like you to regain your health so you can feel great and free to enjoy life fully.

If you’re ready to discover where your best health has been hiding, I’d love to connect with you!
Apply for a complimentary Unstoppable Health Discovery Session. bit.ly/schedulinghealth (subject to availability).

Until next time, I’m wishing you unstoppable health!
~Rebecca

Science-Backed Benefits of Gratitude

Did you know that practicing gratitude every day can change you and your brain?
 
It’s true. Developing the habit of gratitude has immense benefits to your physical, social, and psychological well-being. Let’s dig into them one by one.

  • According to neuroscientists, focusing on positive things activates neurotransmitters branded as “happy chemicals.” (i.e. dopamine and serotonin) This makes gratitude a natural antidepressant.
  • Robert Emmons, a scientific expert on gratitude, states that gratitude is “….an affirmation of goodness. We affirm that there are good things in the world, gifts and benefits we’ve received.” Feeling good reinforces doing more things that keep us feeling this way. Meditation, prayer, journaling, and exercise are some of these things that keep us feeling good. You don’t need to do ALL of them, and depending on your energy, you may do better to stick to 1 or 2 consistently to support your mood and energy.
  • Generally, gratitude improves your well-being. When we think of things that we are grateful for, the parasympathetic response (rest and digest) is activated, contrary to when we focus on negative thoughts. The rest and digest response is essential to relax and improve sleep quality, boost the immune system, and alleviate illness.
  • Gratitude changes your brain’s neural pathways. Constant repetition forms a habit. So the more we practice gratitude, we become better at it. Being intentionally grateful helps rewire our brain to be more positive and resilient so that stress won’t get to us.
  • According to the HeartMath Institute’s vast research on this topic, renewing feelings such as gratitude help improve the balance between cortisol and DHEA. By plugging emotional energy drains, you have more energy and attention to spend on the things that are important to you.

 There are many ways to practice mindful gratitude. Here are several suggestions you can try:

  • Keep a gratitude journal – Every day, especially right after getting out of bed in the morning or before going to bed at night (that’s peak time for neuroplasticity!), write down at least three things that you are grateful for–best if you choose different things every day. At the end of the week, read these things so that you are reminded.
  • Write thank-you notes – Send the notes to your loved ones or leave them at a place where they can easily see, like the fridge or their desk.
  • Fill a gratitude jar – Write gratitude notes on small pieces of paper and put all inside a clear jar. When you feel low, get one note from the jar to remind you to be grateful.
  • Let others know that you appreciate them – You can show people you appreciate them in many ways. One example is to call/text/tell them in person that you appreciate them and why.
  • Take a moment to appreciate your surroundings – Be aware of what’s around you by pausing for a while and appreciate every good thing such as the birds outside, the beautiful weather, the blooming flower, and more! When you are looking for blessings, you will find them (sometimes in surprising ways!). 

I hope that these suggestions are helpful to you!

It is my passion to work with people like you whose health symptoms are getting in the way of you living life fully and with a sense of freedom in your body. I can help you to regain your health so you can feel great and free to enjoy life fully.
 
If you’re ready to discover where your best health has been hiding, I’d love to connect with you!

Apply for a complimentary Unstoppable Health Discovery Session. bit.ly/schedulinghealth (subject to availability).

Until next time, I’m wishing you unstoppable health!
~Rebecca

Soothe Your Upset Stomach with Coriander

Having an upset stomach is awful–no one wants to experience queasiness, vomiting,  or diarrhea. But you’ve heard the expression “don’t kill the messenger”, right? When your body has a symptom, like an upset stomach, it’s your body telling you that something isn’t working well for you or that something is wrong.
 
Sometimes we need to develop our detective skills to be able to discover what is wrong–much as we’d like it to be, it’s not always simple or quickly fixable.
While you’re exploring the root cause of your upset tummy (or other symptoms), it’s great to have some relief.
 
Coriander oil comes from coriander, also known as cilantro seeds, or the Coriandrum sativum plant. The essential oils and the chemical compounds in coriander oil make it helpful in soothing an upset stomach and its accompanying symptoms.
 

 
Some of these compounds are:

  • Cineole (eucalyptol) – a compound that eases pain in the joints. Since stomach upset may produce pain in other areas of the body, it helps when joint pain is one of your symptoms.
  • Borneol – an upset stomach with diarrhea may be caused by harmful microbes and fungi. Borneol aids in digestion, peristalsis, and has antioxidant, antimicrobial, and antifungal properties.
  • Citronellol – this compound is both antiseptic and antimicrobial. It also promotes healing especially if you have ulcers.
  • Magnesium – an upset stomach can cause muscle spasms. Magnesium eases the spasms by relaxing the muscles.
  • Antihistamine – multiple studies have shown that coriander can help with seasonal allergies by acting as an antihistamine.

 Aside from treating an upset stomach, coriander oil also comes with many other benefits that it earned the nickname “The Wonder Herb.”
 
Coriander can be consumed as a spice in your cooking, put into a tea, or taken as a concentrated an oil that you can add into your food or just on its own to support your body’s natural healing process.
 
It is my passion to work with people like you whose health symptoms are getting in the way of you living life fully and with a sense of freedom in your body. I can help you to regain your health so you can feel great and free to enjoy life fully.
 
If you’re ready to discover where your best health has been hiding, I’d love to connect with you!
Apply for a complimentary Unstoppable Health Discovery Session. 👉 bit.ly/schedulinghealth (subject to availability).

Until next time, I’m wishing you unstoppable health!

~Rebecca