Brain Fitness Tip of the Week: Anxiety

With all the uncertainty in the economy, more and more people are asking about how to manage anxiety. Although several types of medications can be helpful in coping with anxiety, some of them (drugs in the group of benzodiazepines, such as Valium, Xanax, and Ativan) can actually have a negative impact on your memory. Other patients whom I see simply don’t want to take medicines for their anxiety. Since anxiety and stress can make your memory worse, managing your anxiety should be near the top of your brain fitness list.

Top ways to manage anxiety without medications:

Find out what you’re anxious about, and do something about it. Many patients have vague anxiety and aren’t quite sure what it’s about. See if you can figure it out. Talk to a friend about how you feel. Sometimes just talking about a problem can help make it clear. Another person’s viewpoint may help you to see a problem in another light.

Exercise. Both aerobic (walking, running, bicycling, swimming) and nonaerobic (weight training) can help you manage anxiety. People usually feel less anxious after exercising. If you aren’t exercising now, check with your doctor to make sure it’s OK to start. Even 10-15 minutes a day of walking can make a difference.

Relax and breathe. Researchers long ago noticed that it’s almost impossible to breathe deeply and feel anxious at the same time. Take 10 minutes twice a day to sit quietly, relax the muscles in your neck and back, and breathe fully. If you do this for a week you’ll feel better.

Meditate. Researchers have shown that almost any kind of meditation improves anxiety. I believe that meditation that helps you develop attentional focus will not only relieve stress and anxiety but also improve your memory. Mindfulness meditation is one form of meditation that is very helpful.

Distract yourself. Sometimes you can’t solve a problem but just have to live with it. Even after you exercise and meditate, you may still have to confront a problem over which you have little control. Try to find things that you enjoy doing that can help give you a break from feelilng anxious. Hobbies can often help people distract themselves. Doing something that is intellectually challenging is also good for your brain health.

Brain Fitness Tip of the Week: Stress

Focus on stress. Our own, and many other researchers’ work, has shown that stress has a negative relation to memory. Stress may affect how well you can pay attention, and the chemicals it increases in our body (sometimes called stress hormones) may have a negative impact on your body. Whatever the cause, stress has a negative effect on your ability to remember what you want to remember.

What to do? First, check out your stress level. Do you often feel tense, worried, and jumpy? Stress might be the reason. How often do you feel out of control, or as though events have gotten away from you? Those are the sorts of experiences that make for increased stress. People sometimes forget that we adapt to stressors, so that after some time we may not even notice how stressed we are.

Simple ways to control stress include mental “time outs,” relaxation, and exercise. Mental “time outs” mean simply taking a few minutes once or twice a day to shift gears. Stop the headlong rush through the day for just a few minutes. Do something else for 10 minutes, but be sure that you take a few seconds to breathe and mentally shift gears. Still better, practice relaxation for 15 minutes twice a day. Simply sit in a comfortable chair, close your eyes, and focus on relaxing the muscles of your body from your head to your feet. Finally, exercise five times a week. It doesn’t mean that you have to go to a gym and lift weights or train for a marathon. Just walking 30 minutes can make a difference

The most important things are to notice your stress level and make a plan for dealing with it. Your memory will thank you.