Fatigue Fix

Nutrition

Between sugar-laden cereals and white flour bagels, breakfast too often becomes a nutrient-free zone. But an inadequate breakfast can affect your whole day. Our mitochondria depend on the nutrients in whole, healthy foods -- they burn the carbs, fats, and protein and turn them into energy.

The Fix
Eating a wholesome breakfast that contains some protein is crucial. It helps normalize blood sugar levels and provides your body with the fuel it needs early in the day. Noshing on healthy snacks -- like fruit, nuts, or yogurt, not candy or chips -- throughout the day can also help boost energy levels. Skip processed foods, which tend to contain refined carbohydrates that set your body on an energy roller coaster. Instead, choose whole foods like fruit, vegetables, whole grains, beans, eggs, and lean fish and poultry. Foods that are rich in antioxidants and other phytonutrients, such as berries, green tea, and cocoa, can also boost energy.

Supplements

Even if you're eating a balanced diet, you may be missing out on crucial vitamins and minerals -- and it may be causing low energy levels. That's because your body depends on certain vitamins, minerals, and other compounds to create the chemical reactions responsible for energy metabolism. In particular, deficiencies of magnesium, vitamin B12, and vitamin D -- nutrients that can be hard to obtain from food alone -- may contribute to a lack of energy. Digestive problems such as irritable bowel syndrome and celiac disease, alcohol overuse, and even stomach-acid-blocking medications can also affect nutrient absorption.

The Fix

The first step in resolving a nutrient deficiency is to address underlying medical or lifestyle issues that may be causing it. That said, some supplements can complement a healthy diet. To help normalize energy and prevent deficiencies, take a good multivitamin-multimineral supplement that contains all the B vitamins as well as a calcium/magnesium/vitamin D supplement with at least 400 mg of magnesium and 1,000 IU of vitamin D.

Manage Stress

When you're juggling the multiple responsibilities of work and home, being frazzled can start to feel normal. Many people have never learned healthy ways of dealing with stress, instead turning to alcohol or nicotine. And although stress starts in the mind -- you might be worried about a parent's health or dealing with a demanding boss -- its results can be decidedly physical. The result: Your adrenal glands keep releasing stress hormones like cortisol and adrenaline, which impair mitochondrial function. So you eat more, sleep less, and burn less fat, setting yourself up for low energy.

The Fix

It's nearly impossible to eliminate stress, so your goal should be to manage it. Yet for most of us, following the recommendation to "stress less" isn't as simple as it sounds. There's no shortage of relaxation techniques to choose from: Stress-soothing options include breathing exercises, meditation, yoga, qigong or other physical activities, guided imagery or visualization, creative approaches like drawing or journaling, frequent saunas or massages, and even sex. The key is discovering what works for you and doing it regularly. Diet can also have surprisingly powerful effects on your stress levels. Fluctuations in blood-sugar levels caused by refined sugars and carbohydrates can actually create stress in your body, while the nutrients in fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and nuts help reduce it.

Reduce Caffeine

Most Americans in need of a jolt of energy reach for a stimulant. Whether we're getting our fix from an espresso maker, a teapot, or a vending machine, caffeine is the drug of choice for people who need to feel fired up fast. Caffeine boosts energy by stimulating the central nervous system and increasing the heart rate and blood pressure. But this pick-me-up can also let you down. Sensitive people tend to feel jittery and anxious, not jazzed, after a cup of coffee or a can of soda. Caffeine can also sabotage your sleep, setting up a bad pattern: use caffeine, sleep poorly, need more caffeine the next day to compensate. For some people, caffeine is addictive; the slump you feel when its effects wear off compels you to consume more -- turning it into a crutch.

The Fix

The obvious solution to a dependency on caffeine is to consume less of it. But as anyone who has tried to go cold turkey knows, withdrawal symptoms like throbbing headaches, nervousness, irritability, and fatigue are no picnic. A better way to cut back? Gradually decrease the amount you consume -- drink one fewer cup of coffee every day, for example. It also helps to know how much caffeine is in common foods and beverages: A cup of coffee contains 135 mg, a cup of black tea has up to 70 mg, a Red Bull has 80 mg. If you still savor a steaming beverage once or twice a day, try green tea. It has less caffeine than coffee (25 to 40 mg total) and is rich in antioxidants.

Breathing

When you're stressed or anxious, you breathe more shallowly. This can set up a downward energy spiral: If you're not breathing properly, you're not ferrying enough oxygen to your tissues, and that oxygen deficiency impairs energy metabolism. Shallow breathing also allows toxic metabolic waste to build up in your cells, he explains, making you feel sluggish and ill.

The Fix

Take a deep breath -- or several. The best way to get more oxygen is to breathe slowly and deeply from your diaphragm, not your chest. Plus, take your mother's advice and sit up straight: Poor posture tires out your muscles and compresses your organs, so your body doesn't work as well as it should. Practicing yoga can help you cover both bases. Basic breathing exercises also help. A couple of times a day, sit with your spine straight, your eyes closed, and your abdomen relaxed. Take a breath in, imagining that you're filling the bottom of your torso -- let your belly expand -- then the middle, and finally the top. Exhale in reverse: top, middle, bottom. Repeat for 10 breaths.

Exercise

We're bipedal creatures, designed to walk, run, and dance, yet we spend much of our lives sitting still, whether at our desks or in front of the television. You might think this lack of motion helps shore up energy, but the opposite is true. Being sedentary makes you lose muscle mass, which decreases the efficiency of your mitochondria, causing energy levels to plummet. When you're tired, you don't feel like moving. But inactivity exacerbates fatigue, setting up a vicious cycle.

The Fix

When you're feeling drained, hopping on a treadmill, picking up a pair of dumbbells, or stretching your limbs into Downward Dog may be the last thing you want to do. Yet you need to expend energy to get more of it. That's because regular physical activity not only improves your mood and helps you sleep better, it can increase both the number of your mitochondria and how efficiently they work. For the best results, aim for a half hour of aerobic activity most days of the week -- swimming, cycling, or a daily speed walk on your lunch break -- plus strength training and stretching a couple of times weekly. Try interval training, which combines short bursts of high-intensity exercise (such as sprinting) with longer periods of lighter exercise (like brisk walking or jogging). This can help you burn more calories while you sleep, boosting your metabolism and your energy levels.