6 Foods to Reduce Stress and Nourish Your Body

In this blog, we’ll be suggesting foods to reduce stress and ways to nourish your body.

Getting away from stress is almost impossible in such a fast paced world with many different problems emerging on a daily basis on an individual as well as collective level. No matter where you live, what work you do, people you’re surrounded with, or any other factor, stress gets you and brings you down to your lowest being the most inevitable discourse.

Although stress is unavoidable, it results in many deadly issues with our health, adversely impacting most of our routine elements from diet to mood, hormones to productivity, and even sleep. If you want to be healthy then managing your stress and molding it for your own good can help you in many ways. Yes, it’s easier said than done but getting on to the basics and moving forward isn’t as hard as it seems. The primary aspect that can work in stress management is to bring stress relievers into your diet.

What Causes Stress?

Before getting into advanced applications, let’s figure out why we feel stressed. No, we aren’t going for your daily problems but just giving you the root cause. There are many hormones in your body that work differently. One of those hormones is Cortisol is responsible for managing your fight-or-flight instinct, which releases when stress takes over your body from the adrenal gland, mainly called the stress hormone. With the activity of this particular hormone, you can either deal with your stress or run away and isolate yourself.

However, if you have a higher cortisol level, different types of issues may trigger within your body and can also cause inability of using the nutrients you fed into your body properly. This results in increased craving for sugar, sleep disorders, dermatosis, etc.

6 Foods to Reduce Stress for a Healthy Body

To keep cortisol balance you’ll have to learn about managing your stress effectively. The primary factor in which you can bring change is in your diet and the addition of the following stress-reducing food can help significantly:

Dark Chocolate

For those who randomly get immense sweet cravings or are genetically sweet tooth, instead of other sugary items like gummies, candies, or other dessert, dark chocolate should be your ultimate sweetness satisfier. It happens with 90% of the people that whenever they feel stressed, they have this urge to eat something sweet or just straight up junk food.

Most of them consume a tremendous amount of candies and jumpies, which simply results in increased weight and unhealthy calorie intake. To reduce stress, you must consume dark chocolate as it has significantly higher antioxidants. Since during stressful scenarios, your blood level fluctuates, dark chocolate also helps to control your anxiety, increases blood flow to keep blood pressure balanced and sharpens your memory to think straight during such times. Even normally, when you don’t have any change in mood, you can snack on some dark chocolate around 50-60 grams to keep your stress level maintained.

Calcium Rich Food

Did you know that a glass of warm milk can instantly elevate your mood? Calcium-rich food sources are a fundamental piece of a sound eating regimen for bone wellbeing, however this supplement may likewise assist with decreasing gloom, as per a review distributed in December 2012 in the diary Nutrition Research and Practice. Milk and other dairy food varieties with calcium and added vitamin D can help muscles unwind and balance out state of mind. One review, distributed in January 2017 in the diary Obstetrics and Gynecology, even found that it can likewise ease side effects of premenstrual conditions.

It is often suggested to drink a glass full of warm milk before going to bed for an effective sleep. Warm milk has a relaxing and soothing effect that can ease your stress on physical as well psychological level as well. In our childhood, almost every one of us went to bed after drinking milk. It’s time to repeat that habit as it can give your body a signal to relax. Moreover, drinking any warm beverage all curled up in your bed is soothing in every way.

The primary pressure minimizer here is calcium. However, for our lactose intolerant folks, milk isn’t the right food to try, so they can go for green and leafy veggies, canned salmon, sunflower seeds, almonds, and many more.

Omega-3

Another necessary nutrient that can help in managing as well as reducing your stress level along with many heart related diseases is Omega-3. It is an anti-inflammatory nutrient that balances your blood pressure and brings your heart rate back to normal. Most experts suggest eating Omega-3 enriched food when having panic episodes.

You will also observe your stress being reduced prominently and you feel less depressed. Omega-3 is predominantly found in fish, however for vegans and vegetarians, there are other alternatives as well including flax seeds, walnuts, avocados, olive oil, chia seeds, and soybean.

Blueberries

Who doesn’t love berries? But do you know blueberries can balance your cortisol hormones quite easily? So, if you get stressed very often then to reduce its effects, you can keep a stash of blueberries in your fridge. Being rich in antioxidants as well as phytonutrients, you feel immediately light and fresh after consuming them.

The best thing about blueberries is that they help in battling with unnecessary cholesterol within your body which merges within our body after a while and damages our organs. It also keeps your blood level maintained and adds a secured layer on your cardiovascular system for the stability of your health. It is much recommended for elderlies and can satisfy your sweet cravings quite effectively, while decreasing the chances of diabetes.

Nuts

Eating nuts can relieve your stress in just a matter of minutes. Since nuts are rich in essential nutrients, you can also find stress relieving vitamins like vitamin B that is the base of every balanced diet and can also help in decreasing your stress level.  Almonds, pistachios, and pecans might try and assist with bringing down pulse levels. As per a previous report, pistachios specifically can play a part in diminishing feelings of anxiety. Simply make sure to restrict servings to a modest bunch a day to stay away from overabundance calories.

Nuts and seeds are likewise high in magnesium, and since magnesium has been connected to better uneasiness within your mind and memory, it helps in stabilizing your mood as well. Discoveries from a survey distributed in April 2017 proposed that magnesium benefits people with gentle to direct degrees of uneasiness, yet more preliminaries are required prior to making this treatment suggestion no matter how you look at it.

Chamomile Tea

Lastly, the most effective, frequently used, and frequently recommended method for reducing your stress level is Chamomile tea. There are many different stories and instant effects of this tea which can visibly reduce your stress level and help you get better and deep sleep without any resistance. Just one soothing cup of this tea gives a relieving impact that loosens up your nerves and untightens the pressure hitches in your body.

Chamomile tea significantly affects period spasms and throbs, and deals with a few stomach related issues like queasiness and bulging. It has mitigating impacts that can assist you with stomach throbs and the runs.

Conclusion

Choosing a healthy, balanced and consistent diet is the ideal way of managing your stress and stress managing hormones. You must ensure that every bit of your diet is rich in vegetables, fruits, nuts, whole grain, essential vitamins, minerals, fats, and meat as well including fish and poultry.

Such foods have anti-inflammatory essence which can loosen up your nerves and relax your muscles to decrease the cortisol level. It also helps in stabilizing your mental capacity so that you can prioritize the events the way they’re happening or going to happen in your life.