Sugar and Refined Carbohydrates Sugary treats such as candy, baked goods, desserts, pastries, and soda may feel like a haven for anxious nerves but consuming them will only make anxiety worse. The same goes for refined carbohydrates—that is white flour, white bread, white rice, snacks, pasta, and breakfast cereals.
You can take a vitamin B supplement or eat foods that are rich in B vitamins to ward off anxiety. These foods that help with anxiety include beef, pork, chicken, leafy greens, legumes, oranges and other citrus fruits, rice, nuts, and eggs.
Observational evidence suggests high glycemic index foods, like white rice and french fries, may increase symptoms of anxiety. Hypoglycemia. Low blood sugar, known as hypoglycemia, can occur after eating.
Carbohydrates are thought to increase the amount of serotonin in your brain, which has a calming effect. Eat foods rich in complex carbohydrates, such as whole grains — for example, oatmeal, quinoa, whole-grain breads and whole-grain cereals.
Magnesium reduces stress hormones in the brain to lessen anxiety, restlessness, mood swings, memory loss, depression, insomnia, and a host of other mental health issues. Magnesium limits the release of cortisol, which is the primary stress hormone, and prevents it from reaching the brain.
Too much protein in the diet can also exacerbate existing mental health/nervous system issues such as post-traumatic stress disorder. This is due to a lack of serotonin in the brain which regulates mood.
Do you feel quite bloated after eating rice dishes? Similar to gluten intolerances, a rice intolerance stems from a reaction to certain proteins found in grains. You may also find that if you have a sensitivity to other ingredients like oats, you may also experience symptoms when eating rice.
Highly refined carbohydrates such as white bread/pasta, white rice, crackers, cookies and soda increase blood sugar and trigger a hormonal response in the body to reduce blood sugar levels. This response also may result in mood changes, fatigue and other symptoms of depression.
White rice
Your body needs lots of carbohydrates to keep up with serotonin synthesis, so snacking on healthy, complex carbs in white rice can give you an instantaneous stress release.
Unlike the simple carbs we talked about earlier, complex carbs are a great group of foods you can eat to stay healthy, keeping those anxiety symptoms at bay. Complex carbs include oatmeal, brown rice, sweet potatoes and 100% whole wheat bread.
Eating healthy complex carbohydrates, such as brown rice, whole wheat bread and legumes every day helps to keep your mood stable and increases the serotonin levels in your brain. Serotonin helps your brain to feel calm and reduces anxiety.
While searching for foods that counter depression, look for the healthy, high-fiber carbohydrates present in whole grains. Complex carbohydrates help to improve mood rapidly. This includes Whole grains like brown rice, barley, sweet potatoes, and amaranth are all good choices. They assist the body release serotonin.
Magnesium also modulates activity of the hypothalamic pituitary adrenal axis (HPAA) which is a central substrate of the stress response system. Activation of the HPAA instigates adaptive autonomic, neuroendocrine, and behavioral responses to cope with the demands of the stressor; including increasing anxiety.
Magnesium deficiency can have a spiraling effect.
If we don't get enough magnesium from our food, we are more vulnerable to high levels of stress and anxiety. More stress can lead us to lose even more magnesium through the kidneys in a process of urinary extraction.
The B-vitamins in bananas, like folate and vitamin B6, are key to the production of serotonin, which can help improve your mood and reduce anxiety. For an extra stress-busting boost, top bananas with almond, peanut, or cashew butter.
Yogurt. You might be surprised to learn that fermented food—including yogurt, one you might not ordinarily think of as falling into this category—can help reduce anxiety! A link has been found between the consumption of fermented, probiotic foods and a reduction in social anxiety.
Matcha and green tea
Both have L-theanine with calming properties. Green tea is often in the form of crushed leaves and is steeped like traditional tea. Matcha is the entire tea leaf ground into a fine powder. It has a rich, buttery flavor when mixed as a drink.
By going low-carb, you can change the rate of glucose metabolism in the brain so there's a more active conversion of glutamate to GABA, the neurotransmitter linked to relaxation. "Because GABA is a mood stabilizer, the idea is that the ketogenic diet acts as a mood stabilizer," Feller said.
Abstract. Serotonin-releasing brain neurons are unique in that the amount of neurotransmitter they release is normally controlled by food intake: Carbohydrate consumption--acting via insulin secretion and the "plasma tryptophan ratio"--increases serotonin release; protein intake lacks this effect.
Consuming dairy when you don't break it down well can cause inflammation and irritation in the gut. Any inflammation in the body triggers the immune system and the nervous system to kick into high gear. If you are dealing with anxiety it's best to reduce dairy until you know how you are affected by it.