Your anxiety may be physical

<p>Experiencing occasional anxiety is a normal part of life, but you are not alone if you have experienced a mental health challenge over the past few years.</p> <p>We were already in an epidemic of anxiety before the pandemic, and those rates have continued to climb. The international prevalence of anxiety and depression increased by 25 per cent in the first year of the pandemic, according to the World Health Organization.</p> <p>Faced with this crisis, the mental health field offers a few suggestions. The presiding agreement is that our mental health struggles are the result of a chemical imbalance written in our DNA. </p> <p>The implication is that our anxiety is chemical, and our serotonin level, the feel-good hormone, is determined by our genetic destiny. Mental healthcare professionals offer medications and therapy to change our cognitive rituals to lift our suspected serotonin deficiency.</p> <p>But what if these options don’t work for you?</p> <p>While our current offerings help some people, the inaccessibility of therapy is at an all-time high. Far too many people were struggling with their mental health and experiencing disappointing results with medication.</p> <p>Focusing on brain chemistry has led us to overlook what impacts our mood and behaviour; the body plays a critical and often overlooked function in mental health. This can come as good news for those who have not found satisfactory relief from medication and therapy.</p> <p>The determinants of our mental well-being go beyond our genes and brain chemistry to include inflammation, gut health, sleep, nutrition, hormones, chronic limbic hyperarousal because of unresolved trauma, and even having our fundamental human needs for community, nature, meaning, and purpose go unmet. </p> <p>If we do have what is known as a chemical imbalance, it is probably a downstream<i> </i>consequence of these other states of imbalance.</p> <p>In other words, anxiety is not all in your head; it’s based mainly on the body, where it should first be address