CoronaVirus Tips: How to Deal with Your Anxiety

These are frightening times we are living in! We are all in the midst of a worldwide pandemic that has led to entire countries and cities shutting down. We are living in fear of contracting coronavirus or losing those we love to it. While we are all trying to brace ourselves for what may come, watching news headlines and reading updates only seems to trigger our anxiety. 

If you are uncertain about this novel virus and you're finding it hard to handle everything, you're not alone! We all have no idea how bad things will get; they just keep to be getting worse. This makes it easy for you catastrophize and drown in overwhelming panic and dread. To ease your anxiety during this time, here are helpful tips you can use:

Be Grateful

If you haven’t contracted this virus, if your entire family is safe, and if you have the virus but still alive, be grateful every morning before your feet hit the floor. Make gratitude a focus of the time like now and teach your children to do the same and witness how it impacts your emotional health.

The heaviness surrounding this pandemic can quickly weigh you down. If you allow yourself to start your day with gloom and doom, you will set yourself up for the negative feeling pendulum. Just writing about things you are grateful for will improve your outlook and emotional well-being. Gratitude tends to change your brain activity positively.

Eat Healthy

Now more than ever, you need to be mindful of what you eat. What you put in your body tends to affect how you feel and think. The positive impact of nutrition on mood has been well documented by researchers. This goes to show that what you eat could help lower your levels of anxiety and stress.

Consume a diet that is high in fruits, vegetables, unprocessed food and grains, modest amounts of lean meat and dairy, and fish. Now more than ever, we recommend ditching the traditional Western diet that is mainly characterized by lots of red meat, processed foods, and a high intake of unhealthy carbs and fats.

Get Enough Sleep

The amount of sleep you get also has a huge impact on your mental health. Anxiety and other mental health conditions like depression have been linked to an increased risk of insomnia. Not getting adequate rest time like now will only leave you more anxious and depressed.

Sleep is of the utmost importance during this pandemic. We recommend that you create a nighttime routine that will help you get a healthy night’s rest. You can ensure this, for your kids, by making sure the entire family remains active during the day.

Create a Routine and a Daily Schedule

Anxiety makes one feel like they have no control over their life. You can counteract this feeling by setting up a regular schedule and sticking to it. It is easier to know what to expect when you structure and organize your life.

While creating a routine, remember to include your kids as well. The entire family will thrive in having consistency during this pandemic because it will help them feel like they are in control. This will help you remain centered and focused.

This will help you get through this challenging time because it will also help with your emotional, mental, and physical health.

Go Outdoors

Being outdoors has been linked with lower risks of developing specific psychiatric disorders. Even with the lockdown results, we recommend that you spend about 20 minutes outside. If you don't want to risk going to the park, step outside your household, maintain 6 feet distance and get some fresh air.

Consider CBD Oil

If your anxiety keeps resurfacing even when you try out everything, you should add CBD oil to your daily routine. While CBD doesn’t cure anxiety, it has been found to be an effective form of treatment and has been linked to significantly improving the symptoms.

It works binding to the cannabinoids produced in our bodies known as endocannabinoids. Endocannabinoids help regulate bodily functions like mood, sleep, appetite, and pain sensation. When CBD binds to receptors in your brain cells, the mood is improved, and stress levels reduced. Read this article to learn more about CBD and anxiety.