Your Brain On Water: How Hydration Helps With Anxiety.
Can drinking water help alleviate anxiety and mood?
Well, you’ve heard it time and time again, "you need to drink more water," but what may surprise you is that staying hydrated can help decrease anxiety and depression.
We can do lots of things to manage anxiety, but for this blog, I will share one easy remedy that is right at your fingertips. Yep, it's water!
Water helps with anxiety and mood by staying adequately hydrated throughout the day. All the systems in our human body depend on water to function, and the brain is no exception. The brain is made up of 75% of water. Even a 1% decrease can cause the brain not to function properly.
Research has linked dehydration to depression and anxiety because mental health is driven primarily by your brain’s activity. Dehydration causes brain functioning to slow down and not function properly. It is crucial to think of water as a nutrient your brain needs. Hydration helps the body to manufacture serotonin, which is a neurotransmitter that helps with mood regulation. Serotonin is a critical neurotransmitter that heavily affects your mood. Serotonin is created from the amino acid tryptophan, but sufficient water is needed. Dehydration can also negatively impact other amino acids, resulting in feelings of dejection, inadequacy, anxiety, and irritability. It helps with the manufacturing of melatonin, which helps us sleep, too.
Dehydration and anxiety
Drinking inadequate amounts of water put you at risk for increased anxiety symptoms. Dehydration causes stress, and when your body is stressed, you experience anxiety and depression as a result. Therefore, you want to ensure you are adequately hydrated daily, especially if you are naturally anxiety-prone.
Did you know that water has shown to have natural calming properties? This is because dehydration affects the body and brain. Drinking enough water is an essential step in managing your anxiety and overall health. Even if you’re not experiencing anxiety, drinking sufficient water can create feelings of relaxation. That’s pretty darn amazing!
Dehydration is the number one cause of stress in your body. It’s a self-perpetuating cycle: dehydration can cause stress, and stress can cause dehydration. When you’re stressed, your adrenal glands produce extra cortisol, the stress hormone, and your adrenal glands can become exhausted under chronic stress, resulting in lower electrolyte levels.
Symptoms That Come From Dehydration
Dehydration can trigger many sensations that can make you feel more anxious or experience a full-blown anxiety attack. How do you ask? Below is a list of things that can happen when you don't drink enough water and become hydrated.
Emotional and Mental Health Benefits of Drinking Water
Drinking water decreases the risk of depression and anxiety in adults. Research conducted by the World Journal of Psychiatry of more than 3300 individuals showed that participants who drink more water daily have reduced the risk of depression and anxiety. Participants with the lowest level of water consumption were reported to have doubled the risk of depression and anxiety.
Did You Know Dehydration Can Trigger A Panic Attack? Hydration reduces panic attack. Panic attacks are a result of high anxiety, Solara Mental Health mentioned how panic attacks usually have physical triggers, one of which is dehydration. “When dehydration occurs, if you’re prone to panic attacks,” Solara Mental Health describes, “you can easily begin to panic, even to the point of feeling like you’re dying.” Dehydration could expose you to many symptoms that trigger panic attacks, such as Increased heart rate. Headaches. Muscle fatigue and weakness. Feeling faint/lightheaded.
While keeping yourself hydrated may not stop the panic attacks, they may become less frequent.
Dehydration can cause difficulty in concentrating. A study from The Journal of Nutrition mentioned how mild dehydration can cause headaches, fatigue, and concentration difficulties.
How much water should I be drinking every day?
Your intake depends on your stress levels, weight, climate, exercise levels, etc. But a rule of thumb is to drink half your body weight in ounces of purified water daily, i.e., 140 pounds equals 70 ounces of water. Add 12 to 16 ounces of water for every caffeinated beverage.
Also, drink filtered water. Water should be filtered and not contain impurities. If consumed over the long-term, chlorine in drinking water depletes vitamin E, causing a deficiency. It also kills beneficial microbiota in the gut.
Here are some simple ways to drink water and start implementing it right away.
Set a daily goal. Setting a daily water intake goal can help you drink more water. Simply the act of setting a goal can be motivating and make you more likely to make positive changes that last.
Keep a reusable water bottle with you to refill regularly. Implementing this can help you drink more water. When you have a reusable water bottle, you can easily drink water in any setting, and serve as a visual reminder to drink more water. If you see the bottle on your desk or table, you will constantly be reminded to drink more.
Set reminders. You can also set reminders to drink more water using an app or the alarm on your smartphone or smartwatch. For example, try setting a reminder to take a few sips of water every 30 minutes, or set a reminder to finish drinking your current glass of water and refill it every hour.
Flavor your water. If you dislike the flavor of water or need a bit of flavor to help you drink more, you have many choices. Using an inexpensive fruit-infuser water bottle is one healthy option. Some favorable fruit combinations to use in an infuser bottle are cucumber-lime, lemon, and strawberry-kiwi. You can use any variety of fruits that suits your taste.
Increase consumption of foods high in water. One simple way to get more water is to eat more foods that are high in water. Fruits and vegetables are particularly high in water.
Sip throughout the day. Sipping on water consistently throughout the day is another easy way to help you meet your fluid goals.
Decrease your intake of alcohol, sugary, and caffeinated beverages. These are dehydrating.
Drink a glass of water before each meal. Get in the habit of drinking water half an hour before meals.
In Conclusion
Water is vital to life, and it is often overlooked as a stress reliever. Consuming water is such a simple wellness strategy that is often not considered when developing a personal health/mental health plan.
When you’re hydrated, your neurons “fire” easier: they communicate faster with the rest of your body. Hydration helps mood and improves feelings of high energy. When properly hydrated, your cognition may actually work faster. When you’re dehydrated, you’re more likely to get a headache and feel moody and tired. Dehydration can negatively impact short-term memory, anxiety, depression, and mental tasks, which may seem harder and require more effort.
Although keeping yourself hydrated is not a cure for anxiety, getting in the habit of drinking enough water daily will help alleviate some causes and symptoms of anxiety and mood. Look at it as a viable piece to your mental health healing plan.