Anxiety can Affect Appetite and Eating

Anxiety can Affect Appetite and Eating

Changes in appetite and eating behavior are generally associated with depression, but lesser known is the fact that anxiety can also cause an eating disorder.

Anxiety and depression affect the appetite and eating behavior quite differently. Depression tends to suppress most biological functions and drives related to hunger: thirst, sex, movement or exploration of the environment. Anxiety seems to over stimulate and overcharge the same systems. Therefore, when anxious, we become "hyper," "fidgety," over focused or super vigilant.

For sake of simplicity, let's say that in depression a person becomes "under reactive" and in anxiety, "over reactive." Pursuing this line of thinking, we can see that, by and large, in depression the appetite and eating should be reduced, while in anxiety, the same should be increased. Sounds simple. Right?

But, real life is far more complicated. We know that depression can both increase or decrease the appetite. Some depressed individuals develop a hyper appetite and crave for food all the time. Likewise, anxiety can either kill appetite or turn a person into a voracious eater. How is that possible? How come the anxiety and depression both can take us to the opposite extreme?

To answer these questions, we have to look at anxiety and depression a little more closely. Many times, depression is mixed with anxiety. Studies show that depression and anxiety go hand in hand in about sixty percent of cases. Some depressed individuals feel restless and agitated. Restlessness and agitation, which are really signs of heightened activity and excitement, might in fact be caused by anxiety accompanying the depression.

It's possible that the increase in appetite and craving for food seen in depression is really caused by anxiety. I am not offering this as just "food for thought," but it can be important for the treatment of eating disorders associated with anxiety and depression.

Therefore, a depressed individual who also exhibits hyper appetite and craving for food should be evaluated for presence of anxiety. If there is a significant level of anxiety, then therapy should obviously include techniques for anxiety reduction.

As mentioned earlier, life throws a few curves now and then, here and there. Here is one such curve: some anxious individuals report severe loss of appetite. They can become emaciated. They should, of course, be evaluated for depression, but, keep in mind that anxiety can also cause the same symptoms.

Here is one explanation regarding how anxiety can kill the appetite and suppress eating behavior: anxiety causes excessive secretion of acids in the stomach causing low-grade nausea and giving the feeling of fullness in the stomach. Furthermore, a feeling of fullness in the throat and difficulty in swallowing experienced in anxiety can also suppress the desire to eat.

Other associations between anxiety and eating disturbance are not yet clearly understood. For instance, social fears and the thoughts of being negatively judged or evaluated by others are sometimes associated with loss of appetite or food refusal.

Relationship conflicts, or "tangles," are also associated with both under eating and over eating. Perhaps, anger and anxiety are responsible for this. The reverse is also true. Anxiety and eating problems improve as relationships improve.

Interestingly, in some cases during pregnancy and breastfeeding, anxiety and eating problems are spontaneously modified. However, personal and family conditions do play an important role. If conflict and tension already exists in a family, pregnancy or childbirth is likely to increase anxiety or depression and, consequently, disturbed eating and appetite.

If anxiety alone is causing overeating or under eating, calming the over reactivity of the nervous system can be helpful. And, you should calm the mind as well. Obviously, if there is a situation that is keeping you tensed up, it needs to be modified.

Learn relaxation techniques to calm the body and the mind. Gentle music can enhance the effect. Use breathing techniques to relax the whole torso.

After a round or two of relaxing the whole body, lightly stretch the abdominal and pelvic area. Relax the abdomen externally and internally. Breathe softly and gently in and out from the diaphragm.

This article was originally published on http://www.mindpub.com/

 

Tips to Increase Your Family’s Happiness and Health

13 Tips to Increase Your Family’s Happiness and Health

1. Create cuddle time. You can’t overdose on hugs. It’s important for families to spend time snuggling in bed together, reading, or talking or playing games. This kind of positive touch helps kids feel loved and secure, plus it’s fun for parents!

2. Sing together, stay together. The Von Trapp family had it right—singing together is a terrific way to bond as a family. Make up your own words to your favorite tunes; dance around the living room with your children; and use music to motivate room cleaning.

3. Make room for fun. While it’s good to encourage your children’s schoolwork and extracurricular activities, too much emphasis on them can create tension and anxiety. Make time for activities that have no purpose other than to allow family members to enjoy spending time together. Play games, plot surprise parties, take long walks, explore a cave, plant a garden, or cook.

4. Exercise together. Take a run or a bike ride to a local park with your child. At the park, you can take time to relax while your child plays in the sandbox or on the seesaw. This kind of outing allows parents to model healthy behavior, get exercise, and spend time with their kids.

5. Create healthy habits. Junk food high in salt and sugar may taste appealing, but it will play havoc with your family’s health and moods. Create healthy snacking habits by leaving out bowls of fruit, cut-up vegetables, nuts, or dried fruit.

6. Cook together. This is another way to get kids interested in healthy foods. While you’re whipping up dinner with your children you are encouraging healthy eating habits as well as teaching cooking, measurement, teamwork, and improvisational skills. Also, kids who help makes meals are more likely to eat them.

7. Reward good behavior. It’s important to reinforce your child’s good behavior. But there’s no need to be extravagant. A trip to the humane shelter, a visit to the zoo, a movie and popcorn, or a slightly later bedtime can be good motivators.

8. Read and write together. Make time every day for reading. Read aloud to the kids, or have the whole family spend time with their own books, or listen to an audiobook. Cuddling up on the couch can make it even cozier. It’s also important for children to spend some time writing each day.

9. Go one-on-one. Parents with more than one child should try to spend a little time interacting just with one child each day, even if it’s just for ten minutes. That special time with a parent helps the child feel special and to bond with you.

10. Have routines. Kids thrive when they know what to expect. So bedtime routines that involve bath, stories, and songs before sleep can minimize nighttime misbehavior. A morning routine can also help you get out the door faster with little fuss.

11. Appreciate each other. Find little ways to show how much you value each other. One idea is to do a little happy dance every time a child returns from school or a parent from work.

12. Remember sorry isn’t enough. When one of your children hurts the feelings of a sibling, it’s not enough to apologize. That child must also find a way to help heal the hurt she has caused, by helping with a chore or sharing a toy.

13. Prioritize your marriage. The most important thing you can do for your child is to love your spouse and to demonstrate that love. This models a good relationship for your child and helps to keep your marriage intact.

Sources: Parents.com, WebMD.com, Redbookmag.com

 

How to Believe in Yourself

There was a long time when the lack of belief in myself was a major factor in my life.

I didn’t pursue an ideal career, or start my own business, because I didn’t think I could. I didn’t stick to habits because I didn’t really believe I had the discipline. I was shy with girls, I had a hard time making new friends, I didn’t assert myself in the workplace. I didn’t push past my comfort zone.

All because I didn’t really believe I could.

While I’m not free of self-doubt these days, I can honestly say I believe in myself like never before. That doesn’t mean I think I’ll never fail or quit: I will. Probably often.

And that’s OK.

The trick is that I learned it’s completely fine to try and fail, to put yourself out there and not be perfect, to say hello to someone and have them not instantly love you, to create something and have people judge you.

Failure, not being perfect, mistakes, not having people agree with me, not being completely accepted: these are not negative things. They’re positive.

How is failure positive? It’s the only way we truly learn. For example: you can read a book on math, but until you try it and fail, you’ll never see where your lack of understanding is. The best way to learn something is to study it a bit, then try it, take practice tests, make mistakes, then learn some more.

How are mistakes positive? They’re little pieces of feedback necessary to grow and learn.

How is being rejected positive? It means I’m growing beyond the absolutely socially acceptable realm. The best people in history were not socially acceptable: truth-tellers like Socrates, Jesus, Gandhi, Proudhon and Bakunin, Martin Luther King Jr., animal rights philosopher Peter Singer, unschooling pioneer John Holt, women’s rights activists, abolitionists, and many more.

These things we’re afraid of — they’re actually desirable. We need to learn to see them that way, and embrace them, letting go of the fear.

When we can get better at this — which takes a lot of practice — we can start to remove the things that hold us back.

So practice:

• Push past your discomfort, growing your discomfort method.
• Put yourself out there, and be OK with not knowing if people will accept you.
• Stick to a habit, not listening to the negative self-talk that normally holds you back.
• Stick to it some more, and learn to trust yourself.
• Go into situations not knowing, and learn to be OK with that.
• Learn through repeated attempts that it’s OK to fail, that you can be OK in failure.
• Learn through repeated experiments that you are stronger than you think, that you are more capable and more tolerant of discomfort than you think.

And in this practice, you will find yourself. And realize that you were great all along.

This article was originally published on www.zenhabits.net

31 Perfect Things

As we see more and more holiday gift guides, articles espousing the perfectness of glitzy products, I’d like to offer an alternative perspective.

We don’t need to buy things to make our lives beautiful or joyous. We don’t need more glamorous items in our lives to find happiness and contentment. We can find these wonderful qualities in what’s already in front of us.

Most moments, I forget this. In my best moments, I remember, and my heart expands with love for life and everyone around me.

In my mind, these things are perfect, and are proof that we don’t need to buy anything to be happy, cool, excited, contented:

1. A quiet morning.
2. A walk outdoors.
3. Reading one of those books sitting on your shelves.
4. A cup of tea, drunk slowly.
5. Family.
6. A hug.
7. Meditation.
8. An avocado.
9. Berries, savored.
10. A good workout.
11. Time to practice sketching.
12. A song that gets you dancing.
13. Creating something.
14. This current moment.
15. A connection with someone else.
16. The light of the dying day.
17. Fallen leaves.
18. Warmth.
19. Love.
20. Learning something new.
21. Someone wanting your attention.
22. A friend.
23. Coconut.
24. Reflecting on life, in a journal.
25. People laughing around you.
26. Imagining future possibilities.
27. A bite of mango, lingered over.
28. Writing a love note to someone you miss.
29. Solitude.
30. Knowing that you love yourself.
31. You.

This article was originally published on www.zenhabits.net

Failure A misunderstood word

“You are a failure!”

How often have you heard this? In my life, I have heard it many times – from friends, parents & sometimes from within. The most dangerous is when we hear it from our inner voice. You are compared to a benchmark and then measured against it. Parents & teachers do it more often than anyone else.

When I was a kid, I read a quote in The READERS DIGEST which is instilled in my mind forever. I don’t remember writer but it went like this - “No No No No No…, the more number of No’s you hear, the closer you are to a Yes!”.It is so simple but so deeply powerful! It changed my life forever.

Why is failure so misunderstood.

People take failure as a point where they feel no good for themselves and their loved ones. This is where your own voice can come to your rescue. If you believe that failure is a point to stop then you have lost your path but if you think that you have learnt something worthwhile from this failure then it serves as a catalyst for your growth.

Remember it never ends until you stop!

The famous scientist of our time – Stephen Hawkins was diagnosed with ALS (Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis) when he was doing his PhD from Cambridge University. (Remember the Ice Bucket Challenge)? He was only given 2 years to live at the time. He is now 71. In the initial years he was scared that he will not be able to complete his PhD. But he struggled and fought his life battle and published something astonishing – A Brief History of time.

He failed many times and to add up his pain, his body was against it but he fought and he gave the world something to ponder for the rest of time. He uses his cheek muscle to interact with the world. Think about the perseverance and determination with which he has survived. Has he failed?

If you don’t know his story, watch the 2014 movie based on the true events of his life.

“The Theory of Everything” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EsrhiHij_Zg

There are numerous examples of such failure stories that rose above it and achieved some impossible feats. People with strong mind and patience achieve super human results.

Did you know?

Gone With the Wind was rejected by 38 publishers. Legend has it that Walt Disney was turned down 302 times before finally getting financing for his dream of creating Walt Disney World. It’s also been said that KFC founder Colonel Sanders was rejected 1009 times before finding a taker for his chicken recipe. Imagine what the world would be like if they had given up after 1 or 2 or 3 failures?

Failure sounds cruel but it can be a life-changing event. If the Failure is accepted with grace & humanity and reworked using the correct path and pattern, nothing is impossible!

Failure can be devastating but it can be inspirational and it is the way we perceive it. As a kid we failed to understand our parents, mathematics, Science; as a youngster we failed to get good marks, get good girl friends / boyfriends, etc.; as a man we failed to understand our duty to our nation, parents, spouse, brothers/sisters, etc. So we can see that we keep on failing in life in different forms, at different levels, at different scenarios. But we always overcame it, for some we had to fight hard and for some we just sailed through.

Today, as I write this, I am able to recollect all my major failures in life and I am trying to do a retrospective analysis. Now I think if I would have done that in a different way then perhaps the result would have been different. I am only trying to help myself and in process others to understand the importance of FAILURE and get the desired result!

As the saying goes “Failure is stepping stone to success”, so be a champ and achieve the impossible!

“FAILURE is getting you an INCH closer to success and your next step might be your success”

This article was originally published on www.maltibhojwani.com

Weight Loss Tips: Why your workout isn't working

1. You Sit All Day

Sure, you hit the gym five days a week, but it may still not be enough to offset the benefits of exercise if you’re chained to your desk all day, then lounge in a recliner watching TV at night.

Numerous studies say too much sitting can be bad for our health and our waistlines — even if you put in a solid 60 minute session at the gym.

Remedy: You’ve heard it before. Increase your incidental activity, which is the movement you get during daily activities that can be done in little bite-size chunks throughout the day. At work, choose to stand whenever possible; take frequent breaks (ideally every 30-minutes), walk over to your co-worker’s office instead of using the phone or e-mail, or walk up and down a couple of flights of stairs to go the bathroom. At home: go for a walk after dinner or do squats while you wait for the kettle to boil. In other words, think of movement as an opportunity, not a time-wasting inconvenience.

2. Post-Workout Splurge

You may have sweated off hundreds of calories during a Zumbo class, so it’s totally okay to allow yourself that extra few slices of pizza, right? Many people are under the delusion they can eat more if they are active or reward themselves with too many “cheat days”. If this sounds like you, you may be suffering post-workout compensation: eating more calories than you actually burn during your workout.

Remedy: Get the timing right. Since your muscles are carbohydrate sponges following a workout, aim to eat within 30 minutes of finishing. If you wait too long the intense hunger could trigger overeating or mean that you end up making the wrong food choices. Fluids matter, too. There are way too many calories in energy or sports drinks, especially when consumed if you’ve exercised less than 90-minutes. Water is the best thirst quencher and can also help quell hunger pangs later on.

3. You Skimp on Sleep

Many of us know that regular exercise helps us sleep better, but it’s also a two-way street: regular sleep helps us exercise better. Sleep deprivation tends to suppress our growth hormones, making it harder to repair and build lean muscle. Studies also show that sleep deprivation can alter glucose metabolism (main source of fuel for exercise), which can impact energy levels, making it harder to bring out your greatest effort to your workouts.

Remedy: Establish a consistent sleeping schedule. Remove all distractions that keep you from sleeping, like tablets, smart phones, or TV, and avoid vigorous exercise too close to bedtime as it stimulates the body and makes it more difficult to get to sleep.

4. You're Only Doing Cardio

Yes, cardio is important for weight management, heart health and muscular endurance, but that doesn’t mean it’s all you do to stay in tiptop shape. A 30-minute jog on a treadmill won’t really alter your body composition (fat vs. muscle), but incorporating strength training will. Adding resistance will help build lean muscle which will significantly help you burn more calories, increase your metabolism and burn fat faster.

Remedy: There is not one single activity that can give you everything you need. Create a weekly program that rotates through different modalities of fitness (cardio, strength training, flexibility, core) in order to keep your mind, and body engaged and challenged. For best results, aim for at least two strength training sessions a week. Even if that means lifting your own body weight. Think push ups, planks, bench dips, squats. Better still, try a circuit-training class, which is like getting a strength and cardio workout at the same time!

5. Same Old, Same Old

Many of us are creatures of habit: we eat the same food for breakfast, order familiar things off a restaurant menu, or shop at the same stores. A routine can be comforting, but when it comes to the same exercise week after week, your body will have no choice but to adapt. Pretty soon, the challenge is gone and that workout is no longer as effective.

Remedy: Our bodies only change when they are forced to adapt, so it’s time you shake things up a little. If you are using weight machines for a particular routine, try free weights instead. Only cycling for cardio? Try cross training by doing a number machines, like treadmill, stair master and rower.

Even better, try an activity you’ve never done before, like long bush walks or indoor rock climbing. The key is to challenge and shock the body with a different stimulus. To deal with this shock, the body then will need much more energy than what it’s been currently burning. A perfect solution to bust out of a weight loss plateau. Consider trying a new workout at least every 3 to 4 weeks.

This article was originally published on www.news.com.au

The Frogs

A farmer came into town and asked the owner of a restaurant if he could sell him a million frog legs.

The restaurant owner was shocked and asked the man where he could get so many frog legs! The farmer replied, “There is a pond near my house that is full of frogs – millions of them. They all croak all night long and they are about to make me crazy!”

So the restaurant owner and the farmer made an agreement that the farmer would deliver frogs to the restaurant, five hundred at a time for the next several weeks.

The first week, the farmer returned to the restaurant looking rather sheepish, with two scrawny little frogs. The restaurant owner said, “Well… where are all the frogs?”

The farmer said, “I was mistaken. There were only these two frogs in the pond. But they sure were making a lot of noise!”

Next time you hear somebody criticizing or making fun of you, remember, it’s probably just a couple of noisy frogs.

Problems always seem bigger in the dark. Have you ever laid in your bed at night worrying about things which seem almost overwhelming like a million frogs croaking? Chances are pretty good that when the morning comes, and you take a closer look, you’ll wonder what all the fuss was about