Magnesium, dubbed “nature’s chill pill,” is a mineral involved in over 300 crucial biological processes. But there are a ton of different types of magnesium. So, choosing one isn’t as easy as you think! But don’t worry. In this article, we’ll go over five different types of magnesium and explain the upsides (and downsides) of each one.
How to Increase Athletic Performance and Recovery at Any Age
We all know the importance of becoming more athletic and how it can improve heart health, reduce brain fog, and keep our bodies strong throughout the course of our lives. But have you ever felt like you’re not completely recovering from exercise? The culprit may be oxidative stress--learn what to do about that here!
The Best Essential Oils for Mood and Sleep Support
Have you ever used aromatherapy or experienced a boost in your mood after you’ve encountered a familiar smell that triggered a fond memory? If so, then you know how smell can directly affect how you feel. In fact, it’s smell that often triggers memories and emotions. And it’s smell–more so than the other senses–that can best influence brain activity and help us calm down.
So when it comes to feelings of overwhelm and anxiousness, it makes sense that aromatherapy can help.
Science backs this up, too. In a study conducted at Ruhr University in Germany, Professor Hanns Hatt suggested that, “Essential oils may affect a number of biological factors, including heart rate, stress levels, blood pressure, breathing, and immune function.”
And in a 2014 study conducted by the American College of Healthcare Sciences, “58 hospice patients were given hand massages once a day for one week with an essential oil blend in 1.5 percent dilution with sweet almond oil. The essential oil blend consisted of equal ratios of bergamot, frankincense and lavender. All patients who received the aromatherapy hand massage reported less pain and depression, concluding that aromatherapy massage with this essential oil blend is more effective for pain and depression management than massage alone.” [1]
When it comes to calming your mind and de-stressing, here are 7 essential oils I recommend:
Bergamot:
With both calming and uplifting abilities, Bergamot can dissipate anxious feelings while simultaneously providing cleansing and purifying benefits.
Cedarwood:
With properties that help to soothe the mind and body, the warm, woody scent of Cedarwood promotes a relaxing environment.
Frankincense:
Often called the “king of oils, ” Frankincense promotes feelings of peace and overall wellness when used aromatically.
Lavender:
Lavender is often considered a must-have oil to keep on hand at all times due to its versatile uses, including calming and relaxing properties that promote peaceful sleep and ease feelings of tension.
Roman Chamomile:
While providing a sweet, floral aroma, Roman Chamomile can soothe body systems as it supports calming effects for the skin, mind and body.
Vetiver:
With a unique, exotic aroma, Vetiver is known to provide a calming, grounding effect on emotions, promoting restful sleep.
Ylang Ylang:
Derived from unique star-shaped flowers, Ylang Ylang is often used to support healthy skin and hair, while simultaneously providing a calming effect and promoting a positive outlook.
I suggest diffusing these oils during the day, and applying a couple of drops to your wrist, chest, and back of neck while you’re out and about.
You might be wondering, if essential oils help calm your mood, then can they help for sleep? The answer is ABSOLUTELY!!!
Quality sleep is essential. If you’re not sleeping well or sleeping enough, you simply can’t be your best self. Your energy tanks, your mood is off, you get sick easier, you crave unhealthy food, and you just don’t feel well.
Experts recommend that adults get at least 7–8 hours of sleep every night. Unfortunately, about 33 percent of Americans are not getting the recommended amount of sleep per night, and approximately 1 in every 5 adults in the United States experiences occasional sleeplessness or difficulty sleeping.
Depriving your body of sleep has been linked to many health risks and places a tremendous burden on virtually every organ system in your body. Lack of adequate sleep affects our ability to lose weight or to maintain a healthy weight; influences how we feel, learn, and behave; negatively impacts our cardiovascular health and overall wellbeing; and can reduce reaction time and interfere with our ability to drive.
All of the oils recommended above have powerful calming properties and are perfect to diffuse in your bedroom to support restful sleep. You can also consider adding a few drops to an epsom salt bath before bed or applying a couple of drops to the bottom of your feet before bed.
All of these practices will help calm and relax your mind, so you can easily drift off to restful sleep.
Whether you are overwhelmed with grief or sadness, need to be energized and motivated, or need calming and peaceful feelings throughout your day, essential oils can be helpful in supporting your mood and your sleep.
I would love to hear from you! Do you use essential oils for mood and sleep support? Please share your favorite oils and how you use them!
Found this Interesting?
Jen Broyles is a Certified Holistic Health Coach and essential oils educator who helps people regain their health and vitality naturally through nutrition, stress-management, essential oils, and natural solutions.
Jen has a special interest in gut health, detox, mood, and hormone imbalances. You can visit her website for healthy living advice, practical essential oils tips, and delicious recipes at www.jenbroyles.com.
Ease Anxiety and Support Immunity in a Disaster with Mira Dessy
Mira Dessy is the Ingredient Guru and a Houston area resident whose home was flooded in Hurricane Harvey. She is a practicing holistic nutritionist and meditation expert.
She’ll share both how she remediated her home and some of the emotional and physical health challenges she handled with nutrition, supplements and mindfulness.
We cover:
The DIY actions she is taking to restore her home
How a community can come together in a crisis
The symptoms she’s noticing right after the hurricane
The emotional toll of losing your possessions and your home
How even junky food, given with love, can be nourishing!
How to kick a sugar habit if you’ve relied on it through a disaster
The supplements Mira uses to stay healthy
How quick and simple meditations can help for sleep and stress
Resources
Download notes from this interview HERE.
Get Mira Dessy's free ebook: Eating Out Healthy
Moisture Meter - to make sure all surfaces are dry enough before beginning the rebuilding process.
To learn more about Mira Dessy, visit her website here and follow her on social media:
You can listen to this and all other episodes on the podcast or watch directly on our YouTube channel here.
Please enjoy these articles from our friends Trudy Scott from Every Woman Over 29 and Jodi Cohen of Vibrant Blue Oils:
Nutrition Solutions for Psychological Stress After a Natural Disaster
3 Steps to Combating Mold with Essential Oils
Essential Oils to Modulate the Toxic Effects of Mold
Tomorrow we’ll have our final day of Mold Week with Ryan James, teaching you how to get the most out of an insurance claim. Home remediation can be quite costly; let Ryan keep you from getting the short end of the stick from your insurance company.
Audio-Only Version
If you are on-the-go or have a poor internet connection, it will be more reliable to play the following audio-only version.
Free Guide: Healing from Toxic Mold
You want help for your mold symptoms ASAP! Cut to the chase with this straight-forward guide, outlining my favorite supplements for detoxing mold. As a person who has been healing from mold toxicity, I can personally say these supplements support my daily self-care effectively.
Let me help you start healing!
Bridgit Danner, LAc, FDNP
Founder of Hormone Detox Shop
Sleep Science with Brodie Welch & Dr. Michael Breus
Brodie Welch is an acupuncturist in the state of Oregon and host of the podcast ‘A Healthy Curiosity’. In this episode she's hosting Dr. Michael Breus who is a sleep expert to talk about all things sleep.
Click here to download an mp3 of "Sleep science with Brodie Welch & Michael Breus"
Here's what you'll hear:
Min 02:10 Introduction to Dr. Michael Breus
Min 03:30 Effects of sleep on the metabolic process
Min 05:40 The sleep & weight loss connection
Min 07:00 How much sleep do you need?
Min 09:00 Sleep deprivation & its effects on the body
Min 12:30 The 4 chronotypes & the optimal time to go to bed
Min 15:50 Chronic sleep problems
Min 18:20 5 Tips to improve sleep quality
Min 24:20 Blue-light screens and melatonin
Min 28:40 Myths about sleep
To learn more about Dr. Michael Breus, you can find him on his website here or follow him on social media:
Brodie Welch is the host of the podcast ‘A Healthy Curiosity’. You can find her on her website here or follow her on social media:
Resources:
The Power of When Quiz - to find out your chronotype
Sign Up For Our Newsletter
If you have not yet joined our community, be sure to grab our hidden Hormone stressors quiz here, and come on board!
This episode was originally featured on Brodie Welch's podcast "A Healthy Curiosity" here.
Thanks for listening,
Bridgit Danner, Founder of Women's Wellness Collaborative
Five Fun Ways to Fix Your Adrenal Glands
Many people mistake the picture of health for a picture of deprivation. In fact, it’s quite the opposite. We can enjoy good food, good friends, and lots of fun and pleasure while we enjoy good health as well!
Today we’re going to cover five fun ways to heal your adrenal glands. The adrenal glands produce hormones for energy and stress-handling, and they take a beating in our culture of chronic stress.
Adrenal function can go awry in three phases:
Hyperfunction- You are producing a lot of cortisol and may feel like you have a lot of of energy. However you may have trouble relaxing, may be gaining mid-section weight, and may have lost interest/focus for sex.
Dysregulation- Your adrenals are fatiguing, and your energy is varied. You may be tired in the mid-afternoon, and relaying on caffeine and sugar for a lift. You might be getting sick too often. You may feel like you only have energy late at night.
Exhaustion- Your adrenals don’t have a lot to give. You may get diagnosed with chronic fatigue syndrome or hypothyroidism. You may just feel like a shadow of your once energetic self.
There are causes of stress beyond the obvious ones (traffic jams, deadlines, fights), that include things like environmental toxicants, internal parasites and food sensitivities.
But today we are going to focus on ways to calm and restore your body, that you’ll also enjoy! These tips support you, whichever phase of adrenal dysregulation you may be experiencing.
1. Have unstructured time.
Is your day planned out and packed from morning to bedtime? This is very tiring on your system! Give yourself some time to just wander, relax and do whatever you choose. If your day is really packed, you may have to actually schedule this time.
2. Get out in nature.
Getting outdoors can shift your perspective away from your worries, and help you see the bigger picture. This can be a true camping trip, sunbathing in a park, or just walking around your neighborhood. The fresh air, vitamin D and phytochemicals emitted from plants will all help balance your cortisol. (1) (2)
3. Vacation.
With smartphones, laptops and ever-present wifi, many people are working seven days and week. Taking a long weekend or, better yet, a whole week or month to really unplug and explore is super restorative. When is your next vacation?!
4. Read.
Reading, preferably on an old-fashioned paper book without the blue light of a screen, has been studied to be very effective for relaxation. I also encourage reading fiction, or whatever subjects really ‘takes you away.’ Your body will appreciate this break! (3)
5. Sleep.
Sleep is the most restorative thing we do. It’s so important that it takes up a third of our day! There is an old saying that every hour of sleep before midnight is worth two hours. This may be because we produce more human growth hormone when we sleep when it turns dark, instead of staying up. (4) So, especially while you are healing adrenal dysregulation, it’s important to get to bed before 10 PM.
You may find that you ramp up if you stay up after 10. This does not mean that you are a nocturnal creature. It means your circadian rhythm and cortisol rhythm is off. So you really need to try to get it back on track. That may mean working with a practitioner, but for starters, avoid sugar and alcohol at night, and end screen time by 8 PM.
You will find that you feel much better the next day when you are asleep by 10. The human growth hormone we produce when we sleep repairs our bodies and gives us energy. (5) Human growth hormone is what we produce more of when we are young, so getting good sleep is like a little fountain of youth every night.
Please incorporate these five fun cures for your adrenals, and you just might find you want to keep these habits around!
For more information on healthy lifestyle for women, take our free Hidden Hormone Health Stressors quiz!
Contributed by Bridgit Danner, LAc, FDNP
Sources: