If you are deficient in B vitamins or magnesium, this can leave your nervous system more hyped up. As a result, you can overreact to stress and find it harder to relax and to sleep. The easiest way to test this is to take a B complex supplement and 300mg of magnesium every day.

Another possible factor is your blood sugar. If you crave sweet foods or stimulants such as tea, coffee, chocolate or cigarettes, you may have poor sugar control. Again, this can lead to overreactions to stressful situations. The solution here is to eat wholefoods and enough protein to balance out your carbohydrates, which will have a stabilizing effect on your blood sugar levels. This means ensuring you have a handful of seeds with fruit, hummus with oatcakes, tofu or chicken with rice or potatoes and so on. Supplementing 200mg of chromium can help too.

Used by the ancient Greeks as a sedative, valerian is the most popular natural remedy for insomnia. It’s no mystery: it really does work. Many studies have shown that valerian root makes you go to sleep faster and keeps you there longer. Valerian is also useful as a sedative at times of stress and anxiety, and as a painkiller. It appears to blind to the same brain receptors as valium and other tranquillizer drugs. In trails comparing valerian with such drugs, it appears to have similar sedative effect but not the same side effects, such as daytime drowsiness.

It comes either as a dried root or as a standardized powered extract. For a standardized extract (usually 0.8 per cent valaric acid) you need 300mg half an hour before bed, as compared to 1,000mg or 2,000mg of the dried root.

Remember that depression or anxiety attacks can have various causes, so for some people, St John’s wort does not work. It may be a case of dealing with an issue, say with a therapist, or sorting out other slight chemical imbalances such as blood sugar levels or nutrient deficiencies that can be done with the help of a nutritionist.

Keywords: depression, anxiety, mental health, stress, social anxiety, psychology, panic, fear

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