Things That Help My Anxiety and Depression

 Happy Wednesday! 

Since May is Mental Health Awareness month, I've decided for this month I'm going to be talking about mental health/mental illness on my blog! If you've been following me for any amount of time, you've seen me mention my anxiety and depression on a number of occasions, mostly during my monthly wrap ups. I've been struggling with anxiety and depression since I was sixteen.

After getting a pretty big diagnosis and having a trauma, I had panic attacks almost every night for a while. I don't really have panic attacks anymore (thank goodness), but my anxiety and depression still can get pretty bad. It's an up and down thing. Sometimes I feel really good and am doing really good and then other times its like anxiety is ruling my life. Right now, that's how I'm feeling. Like my anxiety is ruling every aspect of my life, like it's holding me back. It's hard to shut my brain off, I get overwhelmed really easily, I feel majorly stressed and tense a lot of the time and I've been struggling with a lot of physical symptoms of anxiety too. Usually when my brain won't stop and I can't stop thinking about things, I spiral into depressing thoughts too, which has been happening quite often as well. Sometimes I know what triggers this and sometimes it just happens. This time around, I don't know what caused this sudden burst of anxiety.

Anxiety makes you feel so alone in what you're feeling. It makes you feel like you're the only one who struggles with this stuff. No one else gets it. It's never going to get better. You're never going to feel better. But those are all lies. Anxiety is a real thing and there are lots of other people who struggle with it. And I'm not talking about like the whole everyone has anxiety. My anxiety isn't the normal, every day anxiety that's like an annoying fly you can brush off. My anxiety is something that is a real struggle. It's an illness and something that makes my life hard sometimes. It makes it hard to do normal things that are easy for other people. I say all that to say that if you struggle with anxiety, you aren't alone. If you've felt/experience any of those things, you're not the only one. 

I was on meds for a while, but honestly, I think they may have put a dent in it, but didn't really help as much as they might help others. There's nothing wrong with taking meds for your mental illness at all. Some people really need it and for some people they work well... For me, they don't work as great as they do for others. So, today, I want to talk about some things that have helped me with my anxiety and some things I'm going to try this month to help with my anxiety. I hope any of these things are helpful to you! :) 

Before I get into it though, I believe that our whole body is connected. It's scientifically proven that there is a strong connection between our brain and our gut. The health of our gut can effect the health of our brains. Through going to the chiropractors I've learned that the way our spines are lined up can effect our mental health too. Pinched nerves, tense muscles and more than effect anxiety and depression too. Through trial and error and getting to know my body, I've learned that different foods and plants and smells can effect mental health too. Everything we put in or on our bodies can affect your brain in different ways, sometimes negatively and sometimes positively. So that's why I like to take a more wholistic approach to treating my anxiety and depression because I know that my whole body is connected and the things I eat, the things I do and smell effect our bodies in so many different ways. 

So here are some things I do and use to help with my anxiety and depression! 

• Supplements (I take a lot of them haha): I take magnesium, L-theanine and melatonin every night along with busper (a prescribed medication to help with anxiety and racing thoughts) since I have bad anxiety about sleeping and before I go to sleep every night. Those things are the only things that help me fall asleep. Magnesium and L-theanine help with anxiety in general too. In the mornings I take vitamin D, vitamin C, vitamin B, and l-lysine (another supplement specifically for depression and anxiety). Vitamin D is supposed to help with depression (though it's not a perfect substitute for getting outside in some real sunlight) and Vitamin B is supposed to help with both anxiety and depression too. I also take these gummies called Goodbye Stress that have GABA, l-theanine and lemon balm in them. You take them whenever you start to feel anxious and stuff and they're supposed to help.

• Working out. I got 3-4 miles every day on our elliptical and during the summer I'm always going to a park and walking at least once a week. 

• Sunlight and grounding. It's scientifically proven that sunlight and being outside helps with depression. If you've never heard of grounding, it's just putting your bare feet on the grass and in the dirt. Even being surrounded by nature and trees is beneficial and is called nature bathing. It sounds hokey, but being surrounded by trees and nature and especially having your bare feet on the ground helps with anxiety and depression as well. As a side note, I don't do this, but apparently the first rays of sun in the morning are supposed to be super healthy for you. If you can get up right when the sun is rising and go outside or just be by the window, it's supposed to help with depression too. That's for all the early risers and morning people out there haha 

• Essential oils. The big one that helps with my depression is orange. It sounds crazy, but for real, whenever I have orange in my diffuser I feel happier. It's a must have for me when I'm depressed. It doesn't help 100%, but it definitely puts a dent in it for me. Lavender also helps, though I'm super sensitive to smells, so for me I can only use it at night because it makes me super chilled out and tired. I know for others lavender is an all day, every day help to them. I also got a Stress Away blend from a friend that I've been using a lot and I feel like it's been helping a little too. I use eucalypts too and it's actually really calming to me. It's probably my favorite essential oil I have haha 

•  Avoiding sugar and processed foods. This is probably the hardest one for most people and it's still hard for me a lot of the time. I cheat a lot on it even though I know I shouldn't haha But I have noticed that when I eat less to know sugar and only use monkfruit and cane sugar in my tea, I see a difference in my anxiety and brain fog. The same goes for when I go a while without eating any sort of processed or drive through food. 

• Being deliberate in what you eat. This ties into the last one. There are certain foods that are really good for helping with anxiety and depression. You can look up foods that help with anxiety and find a whole list but the ones that I've been eating consistently lately are brazil nuts every morning and eggs. Brazil nuts don't taste great, but I eat three every morning anyways... They're almost like supplements to me haha 

• Green tea. Guys! Green tea is literally one of the healthiest things you can put into your body ever. I'm not kidding. Look up the benefits of green tea and you'll find list after list of all the things it does for you. I drink one cup of caffeinated green tea in the morning and then one or two of the decaf the rest of the day. 

• Avoid caffeine. I realized that caffeine makes me super jittery and makes my anxiety ten times worse. After realizing that, I avoid all coffee and only drink the one caffeinated green tea in the morning. 

• Dark chocolate. This is my favorite one. I don't eat it often, but it's apparently supposed to help with depression. So there's your excuse to go get some super dark chocolate when you're feeling depressed haha 

• Planning out my week/day ahead of time helps me too. I have racing thoughts a lot of the time, I overthink things and I get super anxious whenever something unexpected happens or I suddenly have to do something without having time to prepare. So keeping to a schedule and being a planner helps me. I've always wanted to be one of those go with the flow sort of people who doesn't worry about anything and I don't like being rigid with my schedule... but it's what I have to do for my mental health. 

• Journaling. I prayer journal every morning and I've found that when I sit down and type or write out my thoughts when I'm feeling extra anxious or depressed does help. 

• Giving myself space in the day to just chill and do nothing. When I'm in an especially anxious season, having too much to do in the day or even think about makes it even worse and I get super overwhelmed and brain foggy. So it helps to keep days light and take time to chill and read or watch a show or something calm. 

So, yeah, those are some things that help me. There's so much more that I could go on about, but any of the other stuff I think is specific to me and how my body and brain works haha A few things I plan to try this month is some hormone balancing supplements, this stuff called PeaceJuice and MoodJuice (all natural supplements you put under your tongue) and there might be one more but I don't remember. I'm also going to try and track my anxiety and depression levels this month. I've tried this numerous times and always forget to do the actual tracking, but this month I'm determined. I made a little thing in my bullet journal and everything. I'm also trying to get back into eating less processed foods and sugar cus I've been really bad about that lately... 

At the end of the day, it comes down to a lot of trial and error. It's taken me years (and my super smart mom who researches everything so much) to come up with all this stuff and figure out what works for me. You get to a point with your mental health where you don't want to live the way you've been living anymore. Where you'll literally try anything. You get to the point you're willing to try the most obscure things, take out foods from your diet, completely change your lifestyle until you figure out what helps and what works. But I hope any of these are helpful to you. Give them a try and see if they work. I hope this post has been encouraging and a good resource for anyone out there struggling with anxiety and depression. You're not alone in this. It may not feel like it right now, but this won't last forever. You will feel better, you will find something that works. It just may take some time and a whole lot of patience.