Category: Mental health

Mental health

Sleep To Feel Good

How have you been feeling lately? Do you feel so stressed? Hormonal? With a foggy head? Battling your weight?
 
 
How have you been sleeping in the past 6 months?
 
 
Let’s talk about sleep.
 
 
Sleep Deprivation Symptoms
 
 
😦 brain fog
😦 lack of energy
😦 changes in mood
😦 irritability
😦 increased hunger and appetite
😦 processed foods and sugary food preference
😦 poor decision making
 
 
Long term sleep deprivation effect on your health
 
 
😓 obesity
😓 cardiovascular disease
😓 diabetes
😓 immunodeficiency
 
 
You might have some other agenda around sleep such as
 
 
💻 working all hours of the day
📱 scrolling social media in the bed at night
🛋 chilling on the sofa, watching Neflix and your favourite program
🍷 having some adult time – time out of life
🍾 catching up with friends few times a week
🎮 playing games at night
🍫 stress eating at night
 
 
It is important to acknowledge it and recognise how you have been feeling lately.
 
 
With just one better night sleep you will see the benefits of it.
 
 
How to create a routine in the evening that serves you to feel your best:
 
😴 set a time to go in bed, so you can get 7-9 h sleep every night
😴 don’t bring phone, laptop or TV in the room with you. Leave it in the other room.
😴 have a warm shower or bath before you go to bed to feel calm and relaxed
😴 if you struggle to fall asleep – brain dump, journal or listen bedtime stories or meditation
😴 allow yourself to experience a different day after you had a good night sleep
 
 
I can tell you from my personal experience, since I have been going in the similar time to bed as kids, I have no longer energy dips at 4pm, craving sugar, going into a strop with mood, struggling with mood swings etc. I am simply feeling amazing every single day. But I do sleep well almost every night and I look forward to go to bed! At least it is my intention to get the best night sleep every night.
 
 
How do you sleep at night?
 
 
Is this something you have been paying attention to or you have pushed it aside?
 
it is ok no matter what choices you have been making until now, but it important for you to ask yourself – have this been helping me to feel my best or not and what can I do about it to change it?
 
 
If you would like to share with me your experience, please do just reply to this email as I would love to read it 🙂
 
 
Sleep well this eve,
 
Adrijana
Mental health, Nutrition, Wellbeing, Women's Health and Wellbeing

8 Reasons Why You Think About Food All The Time

Why do we obsess so much about food? Why we can’t stop thinking about it? 

As we are all so different, we have different thoughts about food, we treat food differently and also some of us have different emotions about what food represents or mean to us. 

Here are few potential reasons why you really struggle with food and food is the main topic your mind is processing daily: 

1. You are unhappy with your body.
2. You are constantly on the diet trying to restrict foods you love.
3. Every time when you feel out of control, any negative or positive emotions, you seem to dive into food. This cycle in your life probably happens more often than you want it to, so there is a lot of thought how to stop it. 
4. You have anxiety around food, because you believe what you are eating is wrong, unhealthy. 
5. You are trying to eat a perfect diet, but whatever that is, you never seem to be happy.
6. You know what you need to do, but all you think about is “junk” & “unhealthy” foods. 
7. You feel ashamed of your eating habits & you are constantly trying to do your best without success.
8. Fear that eating certain foods will damage your health or weight and you spend a lot of time thinking and preparing your food. 

Our opinion about food/nutrition is normally very far from what nutrition actually is. Eating balanced diet is just one part of our daily habits that contributes to our wellbeing and health, but it is definitely not the most important one. 

What do I mean by that? 

Our health, wellbeing, weight, quality of life is directly related to how we feel on a daily basis. I am just going to summarise here few things that impact our life every single day and looking only one part of our life as an exception, such as nutrition and if we change only that one part is not going to improve our life, if other things are not involved as well.

How much daily habits affect how we feel every day?
Good Quality Sleep
Daily movement
Healthy relationships
How you treat yourself
Regular physical activity
Screen time (social media scrolling WILL affect how you feel - reduce it)
How you manage your mental health and wellbeing
Gratitude
Daily experiences of joy and happiness

As you can see our nutrition/eating habits play just a small part of our life on how we feel. But unfortunately if we don’t address it on time, it can become our main focus, main frustration and the main reason of our unhappiness. 

How you can overcome this issue, so that food isn’t in the main focus of your life that controls how you feel every single day: 

1. First you need to have an understanding/knowledge of how nutrition, food, eating behaviours affect us on a physical, mental and emotional level. You have to be willing to open your mind to learn a new way how to see food in your life. 

2. Increased self awareness – become an observer of your own thoughts, emotions, habits and behaviours around food and how much food affects you and learn new skills how to manage those thoughts, emotions, change habits and behaviors to serve your wellbeing and health goals. Be willing to stop judging yourself, as you are doing the best you can, with the information you have. 

3. Have clarity to what is exactly you want your physical and emotional health to be like. Know exactly what you want to work towards. 

4. You have to be willing to let go of past beliefs and opinions about food, to create a space for new experiences, to explore tastes and food without criticism, judgment, shame and guilt.

5. Have trust in yourself that you can overcome this challenge. It is possible to let go of old, to embrace new and live life freely where food becomes just food to enjoy, rather than the enemy to destroy your life. 

Please watch this video below to gain a proper understanding of energy balance and how we can impact it with our behaviours to serve us long term. 

If you are looking for support, accountability and coaching, please feel free to message me for more information or email me on adrijana@adrijana.co.uk 

I hope you have enjoyed reading this blog. Please feel free to leave any questions or comments in the section below. 

Wishing you a wonderful day! 

Adrijana x