Your nervous system is vital for your body—whether in fight or flight mode during an emergency, allowing your body to relax on vacation, or operating your body’s daily functions. But a dysregulated nervous system can leave you feeling stressed, anxious, and fatigued. Read on to understand how to recognize the signs of a dysregulated nervous system and how to naturally restore regulation. What Is the Nervous System and What Does It Do? The nervous system is your body’s communication network made up of the brain, spinal cord, and nerves carrying messages from the brain throughout your body. Messages sent through the nervous system regulate virtually everything we do, including movement, thoughts, feelings, and our response to stressful situations—and things we do without even thinking about it, like breathing, digesting food, healing wounds, and keeping our hearts beating. The nervous system is divided into two parts: the central nervous system (CNS) and the peripheral ...
You’ve probably heard that you should be incorporating more antioxidants into your diet, but what exactly are antioxidants and where can you find them? Antioxidant basics Antioxidants are substances that help protect our bodies from “free radicals” or unstable molecules capable of doing damage to our cells. Free radicals are formed during normal bodily processes like eating and exercising, or when we’re exposed to toxins like pollution or cigarette smoke. Antioxidants can help neutralize free radicals and decrease the potential damage they might cause to our cells (also known as oxidative stress). To put it another way, free radicals are the “bad” guys, and antioxidants are the “good” guys, swooping in to keep these culprits from destroying the place. Where do antioxidants come from? The best source of antioxidants is food, especially richly colored fruits, vegetables, and whole grains. A well-balanced diet with lots of different colors wi...