5 Natural Anti-Stress Drinks to Help You Fight Anxiety

Always thinking the worst, feeling like your brain never stops, getting stressed out quickly, losing your composure when faced with an emergency... The symptoms of chronic stress and anxiety are numerous and can largely contribute to making your life miserable. Among the solutions that can help you reduce your stress and fight anxiety, anti-stress drinks are interesting: they can easily be integrated into your routine and contribute to your well-being. Specializing in the manufacture of French drinks inspired by Japan and in issues of well-being and slow life, Maison Aimi has taken an interest in anti-stress drinks and their effects. Discover in this article 5 natural anti-stress drinks to help you fight anxiety.

Summary

Stress in a few words

Before explaining why and especially how anti-stress drinks can be interesting to combat anxiety, let's briefly recall what stress is and the difference between occasional stress and chronic anxiety. We will take the opportunity to break a preconceived idea that has a hard life: stress makes you sick.

What is stress?

In its first definition, stress refers to the forced reaction of our body (paralysis, sweating, blushing, difficulty breathing, etc.) when faced with a threat, a dreaded situation (sudden event, trauma, strong sensation, noise, overwork). In other words, stress can be understood as the physiological response of our body when faced with an event.

However, more than physical sensations when approaching or facing a particular event, stress can also be understood as the feeling of not being able to cope with that event .

The difference between occasional stress and chronic anxiety

We regularly distinguish between “good” stress, the kind that allows us to wake up and tackle all our tasks quickly, and “bad” stress, the kind that, on the contrary, blocks us. We can distinguish these two stresses as follows:

• Acute and punctual stress, linked to a particular event. It is normal, for example, to be stressed when approaching an exam, a job interview or a sports competition. The hormones secreted by the body when approaching such an event allow a dynamic reaction that helps us to overcome the situation – for example by increasing our ability to concentrate. We then speak of “adaptive stress” or “good stress”.
• Chronic and long-term stress is most often considered "bad stress" because it can be disabling. People who experience it do not see their performance improve before the stress, quite the contrary: the peak of stress paralyzes and exhausts them. They secrete stress hormones continuously, exhausting the body and leading them to enter a process of mental ruminations, chronic anxiety and even exhausting panic attacks . Exacerbated stress hormones, mental ruminations and panic attacks can lead to various health complications such as sleep disorders, loss or increase in appetite (weight gain or loss), loss of menstruation / amenorrhea, depression ...

Anti-stress drinks can act on both occasional stress and chronic stress. This, in different ways that we will present to you here. However, if stress is a major handicap for you, to the point of affecting your daily life and your life, we can only invite you to consult your doctor . He will be able to offer you medication to limit stress or to treat its effects or refer you to a psychologist if he deems it necessary. Anti-stress drinks can relieve your symptoms and bring you physical and mental comfort but they are not an anti-stress treatment .

By calming your body

Anti-stress drinks can contain molecules and active ingredients that have immediate soothing and relaxing properties. Simply consuming them will help you relax and feel better.

By supplementing your body

Because drinks, especially when they are good and low/no calories, can easily fit into your daily diet, they can also be interesting to supplement your body in the long term. A deficit of certain hormones, such as melatonin (sleep hormone), can lead to difficulty falling asleep and chronic stress. Supplementing yourself daily through anti-stress drinks is interesting and can be more natural than other methods.

By participating in a comforting ritual

Taking the time to set up a pleasant and comforting ritual is often recommended advice before a big event. We think in particular of taking a hot bath, reading a book, listening to music... and why not, adding a hot and delicious drink, for total relaxation. Relaxation is then not only linked to the properties of the drink but to the whole moment that you have created

Before we introduce you to our list of anti-stress drinks to discover, here is what, for us, makes a good anti-stress drink.

Rich in relaxing and soothing active ingredients

An effective anti-stress drink is a drink that contains active ingredients and molecules with soothing and relaxing powers. We are thinking of:

• Cannabidiol (molecule better known as CBD): derived from hemp, this molecule has no psychotropic effect (unlike cannabis) but has calming and anxiolytic properties;
• GABA: Gamma-aminobutyric acid, also called GABA, is an amino acid and the main inhibitory neurotransmitter of the central nervous system. Its main role is to participate in the inhibitory regulation of brain activity–allowing us to “disconnect” when necessary. This would help in particular to control “dark thoughts” and negative thoughts, especially when falling asleep. GABA would thus be particularly interesting for combating chronic anxiety;
• Melatonin: Often referred to as the sleep hormone, melatonin is a hormone that helps control circadian rhythms and regulate the day-night rhythm. Produced naturally by the body, it can be taken as a supplement to naturally combat sleep disorders;
• Plants with soothing properties: Verbena, chamomile, lavender… there are many plants known for their soothing properties. Most often consumed as an infusion, they help you fall asleep.

Natural and organic

The naturalness and even more the organic character of anti-stress drinks is essential for us. If you are led to drink a drink regularly to help you fight against your stress, we believe that it should not be dangerous for your health in addition!

Greedy

This may seem secondary to you, but the deliciousness of a drink is, in our opinion, another important criterion! The more delicious a drink is, the more tempted you will be to drink it regularly and integrate it into your wellness routine!

Low calorie

A drink that is too fatty (especially because it contains whole milk) could be harmful when consumed to help you fight stress. Indeed, because of stress, your feelings of hunger and satiety can be destabilized, increasing or decreasing your appetite. Not to mention your stomach which can be painful because of stress. So it is not necessarily the time to drink drinks that are very high in calories and fat that risk upsetting your stomach even more!

No sugar

While we might be tempted to believe that indulging in a sweet treat boosts our mood and reduces stress, recent studies seem to show the opposite: eating too much sugar tends to disrupt the level of cortisol (the stress hormone) released during stressful periods. We therefore recommend that you opt for sugar-free anti-stress drinks instead.

No caffeine

Caffeine is the molecule to avoid par excellence if you are in a period of intense stress or if you suffer from chronic anxiety. Indeed, as we explained in the harmful effects of caffeine, one of its effects can be the increase in stress. This is why we recommend that you avoid consuming caffeine and all drinks that contain it in case of stress: coffee, tea, matcha, mate or even energy drinks. Prefer the drinks listed in this list and find a list of alternative drinks to coffee and alternatives to tea.

Anti-stress drinks are effective in combating anxiety when they are rich in molecules and soothing and relaxing active ingredients. Here are our 5 favorite anti-stress drinks, selected based on the criteria listed above.

Anti-stress drink rich in GABA: mugicha

The first anti-stress drink on our list is mugicha, or barley tea.

This drink, consumed in Japan, but also in Korea (under the name of bori-cha (보리차)) and in Italy ( caffé d'orzo ), is a cereal infusion that has the particularity of containing GABA, a molecule whose role is to regulate brain activity by allowing in particular to “turn off your brain”. Although it has a slight taste of roasted cereals that is similar to coffee, it does not contain caffeine, which makes it our favorite anti-stress drink.

At Maison Aimi, we have developed a 100% French and organic mugicha , made from barley from organic farming (AB certified). Our goal? To introduce you to this Japanese drink while limiting the impact on our environment! In addition, we pay attention to packaging and transport, in particular by offering you the possibility of buying our mugicha in bulk. Discover our French mugicha without delay.

CBD-based drink: CBD herbal tea

It's hard to have missed it: CBD (or cannabidiol) is THE trendy anti-stress and anti-pain molecule. Since 2020, it has been highly acclaimed because it can relieve stress and chronic anxiety thanks to its action on neurotransmitters.

While everyone is different in their reception of CBD, with varied effects (increased concentration, reduced stress, anti-pain), you might be tempted to discover it to fight against your anxiety. For this purpose, we invite you to consume it in CBD herbal tea.

💡Did you know? Hemp is a plant that has the specificity of “cleaning the soil” of heavy metals by absorbing them. If it is too good for the environment, it is less so for those who consume it. This is why it will be interesting to consume CBD from tested soils.

Relaxing herbal drink: Verbena, chamomile

Phytotherapy (or plant-based care) is a discipline that has existed for several millennia and from which our medicine is partly inspired today. The benefits of plants are no longer in doubt and many plants prove to be interesting in their relaxing and soothing functions.

We therefore think of:

• Lemon Verbena: Lemon verbena is great for relieving tension and aiding digestion. It also has a mild calming effect that helps you relax at the end of the day.
• Chamomile: Chamomile is well known for its calming and relaxing properties. It helps soothe nervous tension, promotes sleep and relieves stress-related stomach aches.
• Linden: Linden is another plant known to calm the nervous system. It helps fight mild anxiety, insomnia and promotes muscle relaxation.
• Valerian: Valerian is often used to treat anxiety and sleep disorders. It has mild sedative properties that promote relaxation.
• Lavender: Lavender is known for its calming effects, both in its scent and its sedative properties. It helps reduce stress, anxiety and promotes peaceful sleep.

To consume them, opt for organic herbal teas or make your own infusions from plants selected in herbalists. Respect the recommended infusion times and temperatures, otherwise the properties of the selected plants will be limited.

Melatonin-based drink: Melatonin herbal tea

More and more brands are developing herbal teas that contain melatonin. Known as the sleep hormone, this hormone naturally present in our body helps regulate circadian cycles and helps you fall asleep. Drinking beverages containing it can help combat stress by helping you get back to sleep.

Comforting drink without sugar or caffeine

Generally speaking, any drink that you particularly enjoy can become your anti-stress drink as part of a wellness moment that you set aside for yourself. As mentioned above, we recommend that you preferably opt for a drink without sugar, caffeine or fat to avoid stressing your body out too much–but remember that it is also important to enjoy yourself!

❤️ Our current favorite is the sobacha latte. Sobacha is an infusion of cereals (like mugicha) and more precisely buckwheat. Widely consumed in Japan, it contains neither caffeine nor theine and is rich in soluble fibers which gives it a strong satiety. Its taste of roasted hazelnuts is particularly evident when consumed in sobacha latte, with cow's milk or vegetable milk (almond milk, rice milk or oat milk).

At Maison Aimi, we have just released sobacha powder, a powder that can be used as a drink powder or as a baking powder, to flavor your shortbread and other pie doughs.

Although they are in no way a substitute for consulting a specialist doctor, anti-stress drinks are an interesting way to combat stress, whether occasional or chronic. Rich in active ingredients that promote calm and sleep, they can help you relax while offering you a moment of well-being.