Does Meditation Really Help With Depression And Anxiety

“For us to be my physically healthy, we must focus on our mental health. ”

— Dr. Dale

From Does Meditation Really Help With Depression And Anxiety?

The Question: I experience depression and anxiety. Will meditation really help me? 

The Answer: Depression and anxiety can make everyday life very challenging. And research suggests that healthy lifestyle habits like meditation may help with some of its symptoms. 

Case in point: A small study published earlier this year in the journal Psychiatry Research. Researchers randomized 70 adult participants with generalized anxiety disorder into two groups. One group received mindfulness-based stress reduction as a technique to cope. The other group, acting as the control, did not receive any sort of meditation training.

The scientists found that participants who learned the mindfulness techniques showed much lower levels of a specific biomarker for stress in the body. This could suggest meditation can not only help how someone feels over time, but also may leave an impression on a cellular level. 

This potentially corroborates a large body of meditation research that suggests the practice is a wunderkind for mental health issues. But it’s important to note that previous research outcomes also had its flaws. Some early studies lacked a control group. Other research potentially fell victim to “expectancy bias,” which is when participants expected meditation to work and thus reported feeling better after the experiment. 

The recent Psychiatry Research study took all of this into account, which is why it seems promising. To solve for bias, the researchers said the study was simply about stress reduction without mentioning a meditation component. Mindfulness was introduced later on, and only to some of the participants. This is so researchers could separate out meditation as an active component, according to Elizabeth Hoge, the study’s lead author and associate professor of psychiatry at Georgetown University. 

So, recent research shows it works. But how do you do it?

It all comes down to your thoughts, according to Hoge. Start by sitting in a quiet room and try to focus on your breath. Thoughts will inevitably pop up but the key is to not push them away or give up.

For example, if you are meditating and start to ruminate on a major work mistake or an unfounded fear, notice what’s happening but don’t get frustrated. The thoughts won’t disappear but you will learn to create distance from them, Hoge said.

“Mindfulness meditation is based on the idea of paying attention one’s own inner experience, whether that’s thoughts or sensations or emotions,” she told HuffPost. “Anything that passes through the mind is the internal stimuli that you’re paying attention to.”

Ideally, with enough practice, you’ll learn to create space between negative thoughts and your reactions. 

“See them as distinct objects from yourself,” Hoge said. “As in, ‘My thoughts are not myself.’ That allows a layer of separation so that the person has a little bit more freedom in how to respond to the thoughts or how to cope with them.” 

There is a slight catch

The practice does have some really great mental health perks. But if you truly suffer from anxiety and depression, meditation is likely something you should consider as part of a larger form of treatment like therapy, according to Chloe Carmichael, a clinical psychologist based in New York City.

Carmichael, who specializes in treating anxiety and depression, was a yoga instructor before she became a mental health professional. She uses a blend of mindfulness meditation and psychology tools to treat her clients.

“When you just sit there and follow your breath, that is a mindfulness meditation. It’s one of the early steps of learning how to follow our thoughts,” Carmichael said. “Once you have mindful awareness of what your thoughts are, you’re able to observe them without reacting to them.”

Depression has a tendency to make people think they’re worthless and then they tend to ruminate on that negative idea. People who have anxiety are prone to excessive worrying. Meditation can be a tool to help observe those thoughts, but medical support can provide the methods that help replace those thoughts altogether, according to Carmichael. 

“That’s one of the cornerstones of cognitive behavioral therapy: To analyze someone’s automatic thoughts,” she said. “So they work together really well ― psychology and mindfulness meditation.” 

Ultimately, implementing mindfulness into anxiety or depression treatment can have a very positive impact, according to Sharon Salzburg, a meditation teacher and author of Real Happiness: The Power of Meditation: A 28 Day Program. 

“You try different things to relieve suffering,” she said. “You can celebrate whatever method, or combo of methods, [that] help.” 

Just a little something to meditate on.

7 steps to making your health your No. 1 priority

“Here’s to becoming a healthier version of yourself.”

— Dr. Dale

From 7 steps to making your health your No. 1 priority

If you’re like many of us, you make well-intentioned health and fitness resolutions — perhaps on Jan. 1 — only to break them days or weeks later. We asked Betsy Mendel, a Los Angeles personal trainer and author of “Move a Muscle. Change a Mood,” for tips to help get back on track when we lose our way. Here’s what she had to say:

Instead of resolutions, let’s talk about commitments. Commitment involves an actual action plan. Really making a commitment and holding yourself accountable is critical. Personally I don’t make resolutions. I am committed to being my best, feeling and looking my best, all year round.

Here are six simple steps for accomplishing this:

1. Don’t try to change everything at once. Pick one thing and stick to it.

It seems like we try to change everything at once — our weight, our relationship, our career, our family and our finances — rather than prioritize. But it is completely unrealistic. In fact, sometimes the more we try to do, the less able we are to make any of these changes, and everything suffers.

So the first step is to prioritize. Make a list of everything you want to change. Then take time to really look at your list. Think about how each item on the list affects the other, and which makes the most sense to start with. Arrange them in order of importance. Now look at the first thing on your list and set a tangible and achievable goal you know you can attain. For instance, you could say “I want to lose 10 pounds by summer.” Look at this commitment each and every day. You are now on the pathway to success, taking one small step at a time.

2. Aim to create a positive new habit, not just a result. 

Focus on the new behavior you want to achieve, not the outcome. Let’s go back to that goal of losing 10 pounds by summer. There are two ways to obtain this goal: Cleaning up your diet, and exercise, just getting up and moving. That’s more effective that just focusing on the scale.

3. Change your environment.

This will change depending upon your goal. But if you want to lose weight and get healthier, you know that you need to stock your kitchen and pantry with healthy, wholesome foods that you will actually eat. Go through your kitchen, pantry and cabinet. Look at each item, one by one and put them into three groups: Foods that are healthy, foods that you’re not sure about, and foods that are unhealthy. The first group contains fruits, vegetables, lean meats and so on. Use your smart phone or computer to look up foods you’re not sure about, and decide whether they go into the healthy or unhealthy category. And you know what do to with the third group of food: Take unopened, non-perishables to the food pantry, and the rest goes in the garbage.

4. Recognize that small changes add up. 

Park your car so you have to walk a little farther rather than wasting time hunting for “the perfect spot.” Take the stairs instead of the elevator. Think of each step as a calorie burned. Ditch the diet drinks and drink water instead. (There have been so many studies and reports that show that diet drinks actually make us hungrier.) Create an exercise plan you can commit to four days a week.

5. When you slip, get back on track quickly.

There are times when we will make choices that we know are not good for us. We grab that super sugary dessert or skip a few days of our workout. One of the hardest things to do is to forgive ourselves and move back into our best behaviors as soon as possible. You don’t need to overcompensate to try to undo the damage that was done. This only makes getting back on track harder. Just get back into your healthy routine. Get back to your small changes, back to your positive behaviors and right back to achieving that outcome.

6. Schedule your new habits into your life.

Now, how do we make sure we follow through? First, we need to remember we are talking about a commitment. A commitment to ourselves. Commitments are not meant to be taken lightly. They are how we can truly judge ourselves. Are we strong enough to make a commitment and follow through? Of course we are, if we make and use the realistic plan we’ve outlined. But it’s not automatic. We are trying to changing behaviors that we’ve had possibly for decades. I suggest you use daily reminders to stay on track. Take your calendar or your smart phone and note all the positive behaviors you are committing to for the day. Maybe it’s wake up earlier to work out, or make a healthy smoothie, or walk a mile during your lunch break. Do this every day.

Your thoughts become your words, your words become your actions, your actions become your habits, your habits become your character. Add some positive thinking in this entire process, and your character becomes your destiny. And your destiny is plain and simple: Lose those 10 pounds, or whatever your goal was. If you follow through, you’ll find that achieving your goal was one of the easiest things you ever did because you did it through small, achievable steps.

7. Repeat.

Use this process over and over again to achieve all the goals you laid out at the very beginning. Step-by-step, day-by-day, you will live your commitments and see the strength of your true character.

The bottom line is there’s no secret sauce, no quick fix.

Commitment to good habits is the “magic bullet.”

Learning to Live With Ulcerative Colitis

“An interesting read about living with Ulcerative Colitis.”

— Dr. Dale

From Learning to Live With Ulcerative Colitis 

When I first wrote about living with ulcerative colitis (UC), I was very optimistic, as I typically am. I had just been released from the hospital and was on a heavy dose of steroids to control my symptoms and inflammation. I was a rookie. I didn’t know what was to come, but I was just so happy to get back to my normal life and be free.

What I didn’t know was that three years later, I still won’t have found freedom from my disease. Three years. Three years of pain, various medications, steroids, colonoscopies, blood labs, tests, trips to Mass General, desperate calls to my doctor.

One of the worst parts about UC, IMO, is the uncertainty of it. No one knows the cause, how your body will react to certain medications, when or why a flare will occur, a cure. Not being able to understand why this is happening makes things more difficult for one reason: on top of all the physical symptoms, it makes me feel guilty. Am I doing something wrong? Should I be taking different vitamins? Spending my money on acupuncture? Should I stop eating gluten? Should I stop drinking alcohol? Should I stop having a life?

I don’t know. No one knows. So, I just keep living, day after day, unsure of when I’m going to be bedridden in the fetal position again.

Despite my struggle with UC, I consider myself truly blessed. I know that God would not put so hard a burden on me that He knew I could not handle. I count the positives in my life, and understand I could have been dealt far greater problems. I am strong, in every sense of the word. My parents instilled that strength and confidence in me, yet they worry about my health more than I do. I accept things as they are. I accept that I have UC, and that I have to wake up and take several pills every day, even though I hate medication. I accept that despite being in my mid-20s I have annual colonoscopies. I accept that I have to get bi-monthly blood labs to be sure my medicine isn’t affecting my liver. I accept that I often have to pretend I am okay because I can’t continuously cancel plans, or miss big-moments. But what I forget sometimes is that this isn’t normal. I forget that other people, besides me, care about me and I need to manage that. UC has become such a part of who I am, that when people ask me if I’m feeling okay, it takes me by surprise to remember that I’m very sick.

Since my rookie year, I’ve learned a few things:

· People react differently to different medications – one person’s side effects may be completely different than yours

· Don’t consider what you read online as fact

· Sometimes you’re going to cry and it’s okay

· People LOVE to complain. Keep counting your blessings rather than joining their pity  parties

· Vegetables aren’t always good for you. Eat them sparingly

· Cinnamon is an anti-inflammatory. Add it to your coffee

· Baby wipes are not just for babies

· Tylenol is okay, not ibuprofen

· Invest in a heating pad, it is magical

· Drink more water than you want to

· Going for a short, slow walk can help pain. If you’re too sick for a short walk, go to the ER

The past three years I have been on and off steroids, which is terrible to be on and off of for that long. I consider steroids the devil’s drug. They work immediately, but have terrible side effects. Along with steroids, I started with a Level One medication, an aminosalicylate, which stopped working for me after a year. I moved onto a Level Two medication, an immunosuppressant, which has also now stopped working. I’m moving up and onto the final Level of medications: biologics. This medication is not a pill, it is an infusion, I am out of pill-options.

My goal going into this new medication is to find the freedom that three years ago I thought would come as soon as I was released from the hospital: remission. If I don’t find myself in remission, the last step for me is surgery. I’m not afraid of my UC, nor am I afraid of what it may bring. A friend of mine who had the surgery explained it well, she told me that you lose one year, but get the rest of your life back.

Like everything else around my disease, I’m unsure. I’m unsure about what the future will hold for me, but I do know that it will be nothing less than great. The rest of my life is a blank slate, and I intend to overfill it with love, family, friends, and uber-happy moments. I don’t have much space allotted in my future for sitting on the couch with my heating pad. So, we shall see where this next year takes me, I’m aiming for freedom.