Cortisol: Your Stress Alarm
Welcome to a new week fiends! This issue is going out today to help you get past that hump in the week.
I am not sure about you, but I have been busy busy over here. This last week I spent some quality time with friends and family. I focused my energy on enjoying their presence. I made an effort to just REEEELLLAX. This week’s topic is centered around stress: the good, the bad, and ways to be more aware of your stress response. SO let’s dig in…Sometimes we all need that reminder that all will be okay in our lives if we take some time out for ourselves. Actually, things are likely to improve in your life if you remember to do this once in a while.
This week’s topic is centered around stress: the good, the bad, and ways to be more aware of your stress response. SO let’s dig in.
Cortisol is a hormone released by your body in response to different types of stress (mental and physical). Cortisol helps regulate blood pressure, energy levels, and your body’s natural sleep-wake cycle also called your circadian rhythm. It also plays a role in reducing inflammation, promoting tissue repair, and increasing blood sugar. Cortisol can save your life when it comes to ‘fight or flight’ scenarios, but it can also cause some serious damage if your body is constantly producing it.
For most, cortisol is naturally released in the morning at around 6:00 AM to help the body and mind wake up with energy and drive. Levels are supposed to decline throughout the day so that you can have a restful night’s sleep. However, physical and mental factors can interfere with this and cause consistent high cortisol levels throughout the day. These mental and physical factors can include: prolonged exercise, eating too few calories, lack of sleep, and any event that brings stressful thoughts.
High cortisol can lead to decreased muscle growth/repair, increased inflammation, and interrupted digestion and sleep. Over time, chronically high cortisol can slow the body’s metabolism and negatively affect athletic performance. However, there are some simple lifestyle and nutrition changes that you can make to manage stress and normalize cortisol levels.
4 Steps To Manage Cortisol:
1.Include Whole Grains and High Fiber Fruits and Vegetables:
Cortisol is made from cholesterol, which is also used to make other hormones in the body. You might be thinking, “what, I thought cholesterol is bad?” Too much of a good thing is not a good thing, but our body needs cholesterol in the right amounts. Since all of the hormones work together it’s important for them to be in balance. One way to help balance hormones is to consume high fiber foods. Fiber pick up excess cholesterol and hormones and escorts them out of the body through the intestines. Aim for around 28 - 35 grams of fiber a day. Fruits and vegetables with the highest amount of fiber per serving include artichokes (~10g) raspberries (~8g/cup), avocado (~10g/cup), and chia seeds (~10g/ounce). However, all whole grains, legumes, fruits, and vegetables contain beneficial fiber. If you are looking for a recipe to include more fiber in your diet, check out this grain bowl here.
2. Exercise Regularly:
Exercise increases cortisol levels in the short term but also helps lower cortisol levels at night, which in turn helps increase your sleep quality. Exercise can be a great way to maintain healthy cortisol levels but if you are experiencing high amounts of stress in your life then you may benefit more from a gentler exercise such as walking, yoga, or pilates versus high intensity or endurance training. An extended amount of endurance exercise (2+ hours) can cause more harm than good and can increase cortisol levels for several days. If you sense your cortisol levels are high, try to limit exercise to 1 hour. Since cortisol is released during physical exercise, it may be beneficial to exercise in the morning, when cortisol is already at its peak in order to synchronize with the body’s natural rhythm. Try to fit in time to exercise a few times a week with forms of exercise you enjoy.
3. A Solid 8 Hours (Zzzz’s):
Good quality sleep is necessary when it comes to hormone regulation and stress management. But let’s be honest, good quality sleep is beneficial for a lot of reasons, and can become more difficult when your cortisol levels are high or you are thinking about all the items on tomorrow’s to-do list. Sleep and stress are like the chicken and the egg. When cortisol levels are high it can be hard to sleep and, when you get little sleep cortisol levels tend to rise.
Some things you can do to increase your sleep quality and improve stress levels:
Winding down before bed with activities like stretching, reading a book, taking a bath, or writing in a journal. This could even be a great time to implement a gratitude practice, which can shift your whole perspective to more optimism.
Exercise regularly (see #2).
Get natural light throughout the day to help regulate melatonin levels (a hormone that regulates your sleep-wake cycle). Avoiding bright lights and technology before bed will also help to keep this cycle normalized.
Limit caffeine intake to 2 cups of coffee a day and try to drink them before 1 - 2 PM to avoid high amounts of caffeine in your body close to bedtime.
4. Meditation and Mindfulness
Meditation and mindfulness activities can help to reduce cortisol levels and decrease negative thoughts. Keep in mind, mindfulness is not the same for everyone. For you, this may be writing or painting and for someone else, this may be listening to some soft music or praying.
If you’re feeling lost on where to start, here are a few ideas:
The Name Game: similar to eye spy, you simply look around you and name three things you can hear, then two things you can see, and finally one sensation that you feel. This can help increase your awareness and curb spiraling thoughts.
The Sigh: Sighing can bring more relief than you think. A breathing exercise to bring a sense of calm is to take 2 consecutive breaths in through the nose and then 1 large sigh out the mouth. Make it quite audible. (Maybe try this out alone before practicing this in public).
The Candle Study: Light a candle, take a seat and gaze at the flame for 5-10 minutes (from a safe distance to protect your brows). During this time you can let your mind wander and just observe your thoughts. Without holding judgment, let them pass.
Gratitude Practice: Before going to bed each night, write down three things for which you are thankful. This can be things that happened today or maybe things/people in your life you especially noticed today.
Choosing to focus on these strategies one at a time may be less stressful and less overwhelming; however, once mastering one, try to maintain balance in your life by incorporating each one of these lifestyle changes.
