Appetite is your willingness to eat. Whenever your body needs energy or your tummy is empty, it will give signals in the form of hunger, but sometimes it may function differently resulting into lack of appetite or unnecessary binging on food. Changes in eating pattern, whether positive or negative may reflect some kind of health issue for sure. Mostly these issues are related to anxiety and stress. Largely people tend to respond to increased stress and anxiety in their own way. Some may show appetite problems while others may come up with other issues like fatigue, heaviness of breath, headache, and related issues. If you fall amongst the group showing appetite problems in the event of anxiety and stress, then you quickly need to rectify the issue as the prolonged appetite problem due to anxiety will give rise to many other related problems.

Know if you really have appetite problem?

Before digging into the root cause of the problem, know if you actually have an appetite problem or not. Look for the below symptoms.

• There is a sudden downslide in your eating pattern. You may experience lack of interest in food. Eating food would be a big challenge even when you feel hungry.
• Sudden increase in appetite. You are binging on food all the time. You feel like eating even after having sufficient food. You feel hungry during odd hours of the day. You eat to uplift your mood.

Any unexplainable change in eating pattern may have some underlying cause and if there are other symptoms related to anxiety present then you need to see your medical practitioner to treat the underlying problem to avoid future health issues.

Why anxiety or stress reduce your appetite?

There may be many reasons for appetite reduction due to anxiety. One of the most common reasons is that you are too much engraved in your work pressure and that would not let your brain release the -signals in time. The co-ordination of mind and body gets affected due to imbalance of neurotransmitters. One of the major neurotransmitters called serotonin is responsible for sending hunger signals and also have significant role in anxiety. The imbalance of serotonin levels would not send the hunger signals effectively and hence your appetite would be affected. All your body systems face the chemical disorder in the event of stress and anxiety as your brain is receiving all wrong signals. The digestive system may have lowered efficiency and the food you consume would take longer than usual to get digested, resulting into lowered appetite.

Why anxiety or stress increase your appetite?

Surprisingly, stress also increases your appetite substantially. Eating food may release certain neurotransmitters that make you feel good. This later gets converted into hunger pattern, where you automatically crave for food when encountered with stress. Thus, your appetite increases in long run, but due to inefficient digestive system, you will have to suffer from other problems like acid reflux, heaviness of stomach, nausea, and other stomach related issues.

Related health problems

Appetite problems due to anxiety are not just related to appetite and may cause many related problems as mentioned here.

• Nutrition deficiency
• Fatigue
• Sudden weight gain or weight loss
• Hypertension
• Obesity

To avoid appetite problem and related health problems, you may now start working towards fighting anxiety and stress.

• Know the reason for anxiety and stress. If you need medical or psychiatric help then go for it as your mental stress would result into chronic physical ailment in long run.
• Introduce a hobby in your life. Take out time for meditation and make sure you spend time with yourself daily.
• Music is the best stress buster, give it a shot!
• Exercising regularly will enhance endorphin levels and bring down stress levels.

Appetite problems and stress are very much correlated, hence make it a point that you take your life, work, and relationship easy to keep stress at bay for healthy life ahead.

Author Bio:

Carol, is a professional writer, writes on different health subjects.  Nowadays she is actively writing for Nutra Pure HCG, a weight loss diet plan for weight loss seekers to shed those extra pounds effectively.