Fighting fatigue, caffeine vs exercises, acupuncture can help

Many people drink coffee to help them keep their energy level up. A cup of coffee improves attention, alertness, reaction time, and mood, especially when you are tired. Why does coffee have such effect? That is because of the caffeine contained in the coffee. Caffeine can stimulate the brain to make you feel more energetic and more awake; caffeine increases urination, increases release of acid in the stomach and increases blood pressure. There are many side effects of caffeine, such as insomnia, headaches, dizziness, restless, shakiness, anxiety, dehydration, abnormal heart rate. If you stop taking caffeine, you could experience withdrawal symptoms including headaches, drowsiness, fatigue, irritability, difficulty of concentrating, nausea etc. Other risks of taking caffeine include lower risk of type 2 diabetes, high blood pressure, and obesity, but may increase cholesterol bone loss and rheumatoid arthritis.

A brief cardiovascular exercise wakes you up, speeds mental processes, and enhances memory storage and retrieval. Exercise has multiple long-lasting positive effects on physical fitness and function, cognition, mood, and behavior. All of these effect helps reduce fatigue and no side effects.

Life style, fatigue and acupuncture

Apart from physical and psychological causes of fatigue, certain life style can make you feel tired, for instance, drinking too much alcohol, having bad diet, less of sleep, stress. You can help yourself with life style change to gain more energy.

Drink less alcohol, Although a few glasses of wine in the evening helps you fall asleep, you sleep less deeply after drinking alcohol. The next day you’ll be tired, even if you sleep a full eight hours.

Eat healthy diet, eat more fruits and vegetables to intake enough minerals and vitamins which are essential for biochemical reaction in the body. Eat regularly. Five essential group of food: Fruits and vegetable; starchy foods like potatos, bread, rice, or pasta; proteins foods like fish, eggs, meat, beans milk; unsaturated fat, unsaturated oils, omega3 etc; high fiber food like fruits,vegetables, beans, brown rice, whole meal etc.

Sugar and fatigue

There are two types of sugar: simple sugar and complex sugar. Simple sugar is digested quickly and release sugars rapidly into the bloodstream. It gives you a rush of energy which wears off quickly. Fluctuation of blood sugar too much can make you feel tired. Simple sugars are found in foods such as sweets, cakes, biscuits, chocolate, and some fizzy drinks and juice drinks. These are the sugary foods you should cut down on. Sugars also occur naturally in foods such as fruit, vegetables and milk, but you don't need to cut down on these types of sugars. Complex sugars are present in starchy foods such as potatoes, bread, cereals and pasta. They're a good source of energy and the main source of a range of nutrients. They release energy gradually. Starchy foods should make up just over a third of everything you eat.

Drink more water, cut out caffeine, caffeine may make you not sleep well. Cut down caffeine can help you sleep. Dehydration can make you tired. Drinking more water to keep the body hydrated.

Sleep well, go to bed regularly and take some time relax before sleep. These can help sleep quantity and quality.

Lose weight, if you are overweight and you feel tired, you need to lose weight.

Exercises, You might feel too tired to exercise, however in the long run exercise will help with fatigue and make you feel less tired.

Reduce stress, acupuncture is an efficient way to reduce stress.