Dietary changes and health supplements may help avoid or relieve symptoms of anxiety and depression. Anxiety, often resulting from stress, can bring about feelings of worry and apprehension. Depression causes persistent feelings of sadness, hopelessness, lack of energy or insomnia. Both anxiety and depression can occur from time to time for many people. Prolonged conditions require therapy and medication. Diet and vitamins help for acute conditions or during treatment.
Pyridoxine or Vitamin B-6
Vitamin B-6, known as pyridoxine, helps provide relaxation effects to calm anxiety. The vitamin plays an essential role in the functioning of the nervous system and helps avoid depression. Depression patients have been found to lack sufficient levels of the vitamin, and treatment often includes supplementation with B-6. The vitamin helps manufacture serotonin, a neurotransmitter that provides a sense of calm to help relieve symptoms of anxiety and depression. Spinach, onions, broccoli, squash, kale, Brussels sprouts, peas, radishes, bananas, fish, cereal and liver contain vitamin B-6.
Vitamin B-3
Foods high in vitamin B-3 include meat, fish, milk, eggs, cereal grains, green vegetables and beans, MedlinePlus notes. Insufficient amounts of the vitamin can contribute to anxiety, depression, agitation and mental lethargy. Niacin and niacinamide, vitamin B-3 compounds, help treat conditions associated with B-3 deficiencies. The compounds have been approved by the FDA for use in treatment of such disorders as pellagra, a nutritional disease that can affect the central nervous system and lead to depression.
Folic Acid
Folic acid, also known as vitamin B-9, helps relieve anxiety by increasing levels of serotonin in the brain. Lack of the vitamin has been found to produce mood changes by lowering serotonin levels and increasing symptoms of anxiety. Folic acid deficiencies have been linked to patients suffering from depression, according to Middle Tennessee State University. Fruit, green vegetables, dairy products, fish and liver contain high amounts of folic acid.
Vitamin D
Low levels of vitamin D may contribute to depression. A study of 531 women and 423 men ages 65 and older indicates that older people with lower levels of the vitamin become depressed over time, Reuters reports. Women with low levels of vitamin D were twice as likely to become depressed during a six-year period than women who had sufficient levels of the vitamin, according to the National Institute on Aging. The association was not as strong for men, but similar patterns of depression were seen with low levels of vitamin D. You can get vitamin D through exposure to the sunlight and from oily fish.
