By Leaf Staff Writer Naomi Dunford https://xxnaomi.com
Mental health is a complex field, and every diagnosis has its own set of “best practices” for the treatment and management of symptoms. What works for someone with chronic anxiety may not be the best approach for someone with a generalized eating disorder, and vice versa.
However, there are a number of strategies that you can put into practice that can have positive effects on your mental health that have nothing to do with therapy, medication, or even the disorder itself.
All mental health issues have certain things at their core which create the problems that a sufferer is dealing with – some of them neurological, others physical, and still others psychological. But outside of those issues, there are a number of factors that affect how strongly those issues will affect you.
Regardless of what mental health issues you might be facing right now, there are things you can do that can make those issues easier to manage, and less impactful on your life. Here are 5 of them.
- Drink more water.
You may not know this, but dehydration can make a significant impact on your day-to-day mental health. Water does more than just hydrate your body – it’s critical to proper brain function. (This isn’t too surprising when you consider that the human brain is made up of almost 75% water.)
Studies conducted at the University of Connecticut’s Human Performance Laboratory have identified a number of side effects from dehydration that can make dealing with mental issues more difficult. According to their findings, too little water in your system can lead to “degraded mood, increased perception of task difficulty, lower concentration, and headache symptoms.”
This means that in addition to whatever else you might be doing to manage your mental health, staying sufficiently hydrated is something to watch for. More water in your days may make dealing with “everything” just a little bit easier.
- Get enough sleep.
Unlike drinking water, which is relatively easy to do, getting enough sleep can be a challenging thing for anyone to do, regardless of whether or not they have mental health issues to contend with.
But it’s particularly important for people who do, because sleep plays a vital role in maintaining mental health. If you’re not getting enough sleep, then your body and mind won’t be as prepared as they need to be to regulate your emotions and neurological functioning.
Sleep deprivation and sleep disruption can affect the levels of stress hormones and neurotransmitters in your body, which can negatively affect both your emotional regulation and your ability to maintain critical thinking skills. In other words, whatever issues you have can be magnified by a lack of sleep – and in some cases, may even be part of the cause.
While there’s not a firmly established “perfect amount” of sleep to get, if you already know you’re not getting enough, then consider ways you can change that situation. Small changes in lifestyle, or even intentional steps like meditation or relaxation techniques used before bed can help you get more sleep so that you brain get more of what it needs.
- Get more physical activity in.
While exercise and physical activity are obviously good for our body, they can play an even more critical role in brain function, making them essential tools in your mental well-being toolkit.
Regular physical activity has been shown in studies to have positive effects for mental health issues of all kinds, including depression, anxiety, ADHD, and more. Physical activity can increase natural serotonin (which is the neurotransmitter that antidepressants target) and have meaningful lifting effects on moods and emotional regulation.
Increased physical activity can also make it easier to get to sleep at night, which makes it particularly valuable for people who suffer from insomnia, another condition which can exacerbate the effects of existing mental health issues. Even short walks during the day can make it easier to get the sleep you need at night.
To help support your mental health, physical activity of any kind can be helpful – whether it’s something strenuous like running or hiking, or even a more relaxed form of movement like yoga. So whether you’re indoors or outdoors, you have options to choose from that can help your brain be at its best.
- Build healthy routines.
While no one wants to be a slave to an overly rigid life of routines, there are mental health benefits to incorporating a healthy level of routines, rituals and rhythms into your days.
Established routines can give a sense of certainty and purpose that can be very grounding from a mental health perspective. They can also reduce our need to make daily, on-the-fly decisions that can put strain on our willpower and cognitive function. They can also help us avoid making impulsive, reactive decisions on how we spend our time and energy that we might regret later.
And of course, there’s a certain level of comfort that can occur when moving through a familiar routine that can lower stress hormones that make managing mental health issues more difficult. That comfort can add to a sense of grounding and make the more unpredictable parts of life easier to manage.
Routines are also helpful for ensuring that we consistently get what we need to maintain our mental health in general. Including sleep, hydration and physical activity into our set of routines can help guarantee that the things that will help us don’t fall by the wayside.
- Take baby steps.
For those of us with mental health issues, it can sometimes feel daunting or overwhelming to do the things we need to do in order to manage them. If our issues are significant, there can be a lot of lifestyle adjustments, skill-building and therapy “homework” to deal with.
However, Rome wasn’t built in a day, and mental health isn’t either. Breaking down the things you need to do into smaller steps or more narrowly-defined projects can be a powerful way to keep moving forward without getting dizzied by all the things we’re working towards.
Small things to focus on can also help us accomplish them more easily, too. Whether it’s a single DBT worksheet, or getting better at taking medication on time, or learning how to respond to the first signs of an anxiety attack, keeping a focused eye on succeeding at a small thing can speed our way towards mastering it.
And fortunately, each “baby step” has the potential to make a measurable, meaningful difference in our daily lives. Stacking one small win on another can make the journey towards better mental health more satisfying and meaningful, which will increase our motivation to continue to keep working on what we need to.