I'm kinda new here but I've been reading lots of posts and I wish I had a magic wand I could wave and make everyone better. Over the past few years I have watched myself get worse and worse with anxiety, stress, mental fog, concentration problems, body aches and pains, severe miagraine headaches, two different kidney stones, three major colon surgeries and the list goes one.
One year ago I began to have severe stomach cramps and pain. I went to the ER on 4 different occassions, 3 trips to my GI doctor and 3 trips to my surgeon. Not one of them could tell me what was happening and all the time my anxiety was getting much worse. One doctor finally gave me xanax to help...which it did for a few weeks.
Just by mistake I quit eating dairy and my stomach problems seemed to lessen but I always have body aches and migraines. After countless hours on the internet searching my symptoms I decided I was allergic to wheat products so I quit eating anything containing gluten. At this time I was basically eating fruit, veggies and meat with water. Slowly I began to feel a little better. One day I woke up and felt that the anxiety was better too.
During this time I continued the xanax....anywhere from .25 to .5mgs a day, usually just before bed so I could still sleep. I noticed also that my stomach problems seemed to be getting better so I slowly began to reintroduce wheat products into my diet and found I could now tollerate them. Being a person who has to learn their lessons from the "school of hard knocks" I quickly returned to eating hamburgers, fries, Taco Bell..ya know..all the **** that is bad for you.
My anxiety began to increase and the headaches returned..I was so mad. Back to the internet I went and discovered that the root of my problems, anxiety included, was refined sugar. Going back over the past few months when I was feeling better I realized that I had also drastically reduced the amount of sugar in my diet. Since we are in the holiday season my diet as been horrible and today I feel really bad.
My point is this. If you are suffering from anxiety, like I am, I would recommend eliminating sugar from your diet...IT WORKS! This also means anything that turns into sugar after you eat it like white rice, potatoes, bread, crackers and so on. I know it worked for me in reducing my anxiety and other problems.
The bad news is...this is very difficult as almost everything in our American diet is FULL of refined sugar. But...if you are sick and tired of being sick and tired the work is not that difficult.