Boost Energy

As a Naturopath, one of the top reasons people come to see me is for tiredness and advice on how to boost energy.

• Are you always tired?





• Feel like you’re running on empty?





• Lost your spark for life?




You may know the reasons for your tiredness and need support:  you’re not sleeping well, you’ve been worried, stressed or you’ve been burning the candle at both ends.  
If you don’t know why you’re always tired, you may have been to the Doctor, had tests that showed nothing and still have no idea why you’re so tired. You’re not alone! I’d say 50% of my patients come to see me to boost their energy levels!

When people come to me saying they’re tired, I like to make this a priority because it’s affects quality of life and is a sign that something is out of balance. One of the first things I do to help my patients is teach them how to boost their energy levels. As your energy improves, you become more inspired to do all the right things to live your healthiest life. You feel like exercising again, you’re more inspired to eat well and you’re just nicer to be around, your personality is more like your old self!

Pathology tests for tiredness requested by GPs have a low pick up rate for serious disease. Tiredness is reported by 21% of patients seeing a doctor in Australia.(1)

Although it’s reassuring to confirm that you don’t have a serious disease causing your tiredness, it still affects your life in a serious way! You don’t feel yourself, you don’t have the energy to do your favourite things and life seems like a struggle.

Top 10 reasons for tiredness

1. Diet

Many of my patients tell me that they have a pretty good diet. The thing is, what is a “good diet?”

We’ve had many fads over the years, low fat, low carb, high protein, low gi…. what’s the best diet for your body?

Have you ever written down what you eat for a whole week? You’d be surprised how doing this helps you realise the things you could do to improve your eating habits.  Try doing this by keeping a diet diary for a week and see what you notice. Many smart phones have diet diary apps to make this easier for you. Instead of just writing down what you eat (food diary) also be sure to write down how you feel (food and symptom diary.) Write down all the sensations you notice in your body and rate them out of 10. 10/10 = the worst it gets. Some of these symptoms may include:

• Bloating
• Wind
• Tiredness
• Fuzzy thinking
• Mood Swings, Anxiety
• Fluctuating energy levels
• Constipation / Diarrhoea
• Skin problems
2. Skipping Meals or Meal Timing



The timing of when you eat often dramatically affects your energy levels. For example if you eat breakfast at 7.30am, have a busy day and eat lunch at 1.30/ 2pm that’s a huge 6 hour gap between meals.

Our blood sugar levels fluctuate up and down throughout the day. Not eating regularly enough to sustain good blood sugar control will quickly lead to low energy levels or low blood sugar. Your energy levels feel like they’re on a roller coaster – they’re up and down all day. Now I’m not talking about diabetes here, just low blood sugar from not eating regularly enough. If you’re busy/ stressed and having caffeinated drinks in between meals, this will speed up the rate at which your blood sugar drops, leading to you running out of energy quickly.



3. Meal Composition

Getting the right combination of  protein, carb and fats in your meals will make a huge difference to your energy levels. Try having a palm sized portion of protein rich foods with each meal to slow down the GI of your meal and fuel your brain with essential amino acids for good mood and concentration.


Some people seem to get a “carb coma.” Especially after lunch. A carb coma is when you eat a lunch with a big amount of carbohydrate – eg a big fluffy bread roll, a large noodle or white rice dish or a meal with lots of potato. If you haven’t eaten for a while, then you have a lunch high in refined carbs, your body just wants to go to sleep to deal with all the sugars released from those carbs, hence the sleepy, carb coma feeling.

Try some low gi carbs, in smaller amounts with your lunch, or have a lunch free from carbs and see how you feel.

Seeing a Naturopath / Nutritionist will help you get the balance right if you’re unsure.





4. Getting Breakfast Right

Getting breakfast right is essential for good energy levels. If you’re running out the door in a hurry and not eating a proper breakfast, then grabbing a coffee when you get going for the day, you’re setting yourself up for disastrous energy levels! As a rule, I say to my clients, never have a coffee without some food. This is because some people are caffeine sensitive and find that coffee without food makes them more anxious and they become hungrier faster, worsening the old blood sugar roller coaster. Have protein and some low gi carbs are a great way to prolong energy in the morning. Eg: brown grainy toast with eggs or whole oat porridge with nuts. A bad breakfast choice would be white bread and vegemite – this just burns up too quickly and you’ll run out of steam by mid morning.



5. Sleep Quality

How many hours sleep do you get per night? The average amount needed for adults is 7.5-8 hours.
Getting a couple of hours in before midnight is also more beneficial than sleeping for 8 hours if you go to bed at 2am.
The best way to know if you’re getting good quality sleep is to to ask yourself “do I feel well rested when I get out of bed in the morning?” If you’re waking up tired, then you’re either not getting enough sleep – quantity, or you’re sleeping for 8 hours but still feel terrible – your sleep may be interrupted or of poor quality. There are many ways that I help clients to sleep better. Learning about sleep hygiene (what you do before sleep, your sleep environment, getting away from electronic devices before bed etc) is helpful, as are herbal medicines to relax the nervous system. If you’ve tried herbal medicines from your pharmacy eg Valerian and they didn’t help, don’t despair, you just need to find the right herb for you. I give my clients a little take home pack with 2-3 things to sample and usually one of those works a treat for sleep.



6. Happiness & Inspiration

Every day when we greet people we typically say “Hello, how are you?” and we pretty much always say “good thanks,” even if we feel like crap! When’s the last time you really told someone how you feel and how you are? Have you asked yourself, how am I feeling? Am I happy? Am I inspired by what’s going on in my life right now? Do I have goals/ hobbies/ plans that excited me? Do I love my job or daily activities?

Or is it all just a bit of a daily grind? Lack of happiness or inspiration can be a huge energy zapper. When we’re happy and inspired, things just seems to flow and we have so much energy for our daily activities. If there’s something in your life that you aren’t happy with, then naturally you may be low in energy as there’s nothing that’s stoking the fire in your belly.
Meditation and mindfulness are excellent ways to help you find your inner happiness and put stressful thoughts into perspective. Many of my clients aren’t happy in their jobs or are working long, unsustainable hours, which zaps their energy. Ask yourself “is it worth it?” Perhaps a change of scene or a workplace with a more balanced culture would improve your day to day happiness.



7. Nutrient Deficiencies

I used to firmly believe that if you ate well you didn’t need vitamin supplements and wouldn’t get nutrient deficiencies. Well the last few years of my practice have proven this wrong.
Many of my clients, (including myself) that eat well have shown up with blood tests that reveal some deficiencies in vital nutrients. Now there’s many reasons for this, which is another blog post in itself.
Take Vitamin D for example:

Vitamin D is synthesized in our skin after exposure to sunlight. Many of my clients with energy and hormone problems are testing low in the range for vitamin D. Why? Slip Slop Slap is why! We’ve been so diligent in avoiding skin cancer that we don’t get enough sun exposure to give us adequate vitamin D synthesis. After winter, my Vitamin D was in the toilet. I was working long hours and hardly saw any sun. When I do, I wear a big hat as I burn in 10 minutes. So I’ve been taking vitamin D and I feel a lot better.


Magnesium :

Magnesium is essential for hundreds of cellular reactions, including energy production and how we respond to stress. Stress burns up lots of magnesium. Unless you’re eating organic food, you are at risk of not getting enough in your food. Studies have shown that organic produce is much higher in essential minerals such as magnesium, possibly due to soil cultivation methods.
One of the things I do when clients come to see me for tiredness is get them on a great multi mineral supplement and run a blood test panel for common nutrient deficiencies.


The picture below, while a little complicated, illustrates how energy (ATP) is produced by our cells. Now without needing to be a chemistry nerd, take a little look at the amount of nutrients (co-factors) needed to reach the final product of energy. Each blue circle contains a vital nutrient needed to produce the next phase of energy production. There’s things like B vitamins, minerals and amino acids. Now imagine if you’re not getting enough of one or more of these vital nutrients? The whole energy production system breaks down! As a Nutritionist, this is what I’m addressing when you come to see me, all the vital nutrients needed to keep you firing on all cylinders.







8. Stress, Hormone Imbalance including adrenal fatigue

If you’ve been under long term stress, or burning the candle at both ends for too long, you run the risk of hormone imbalance or adrenal fatigue.

The adrenal glands regulate the production of our stress hormones adrenalin and cortisol. These hormones make us feel pumped up and ready for action. They’re designed to be used for short term energy boosts or in emergencies when our lives are threatened – fight or flight response.

If you’re stressed out for months at a time, you many run on these hormones for longer than they are designed to run and essentially you burn yourself out, or “run out of gas.” Cortisol and DHEA (our feel good, stamina hormone) get depleted and you feel tired, you have mood or energy swings and may have trouble sleeping well and maintaining a good level of stamina for daily activities.


Nature has provided us with some wonderful herbal remedies for fatigue. They’re called adaptogens, which means that they help the body adapt to stress. They work by assisting the adrenal glands to regulate hormone production and become more resilient to stress. I use these with great results every day in my practice, because most of my clients are leading busy lives with some degree of stress.



9. Stimulants & Sugar

Relying on stimulants such as caffeine and sugar for energy creates a viscious cycle of dependency. You have a hit, you feel great for an hour or two then you crash and crave some more.

It’s normal to crave these things when you’re tired, but relying on them for energy doesn’t nourish your body, it actually puts more stress on it by depleting it further. Why? Because we need a huge amount of minerals and B vitamins to metabolize the sugars that we eat. When we’re stressed, we burn huge amounts of B vitamins. Then we eat lots of sugar, which uses more B vitamins, worsening the deficiency. Its a catch 22, but one that must be broken.


Having trouble quitting sugar? Check out Sarah Wilsons I quit sugar blog to help you with recipes and ideas.

Or come and see me for treatment to stop your cravings and replenish your energy levels naturally.

Would you like an appointment to boost your energy?

The Naturopaths at Vibe Natural Health offer appointments at our clinic at 210 Days Rd, Grange in Brisbane, or via skype or phone to those who can’t make it into our clinic.

Visit our appointment diary on the top right of screen to book now.

If you have questions, please email us rather than commenting on the blog at info@vibenaturalhealth.com.au

Or phone us on (07) 3366 7970. We would love to help you!

 




References : 1. Australian Family Physician Magazine, CEO of S&N Pathology laboratory Michael Harrison.