Lizard Brain Treats Help You Feel Better Quickly!

A Lizard Brain Treat is a key intervention to help you feel better now.

When you’re feeling on the edge and having a hard time with acute anxiety and worry, it’s hard to remember what you can do in the moment to help yourself.

If you are experiencing any of the below, try a Lizard Brain Treat! Even though you may not feel hungry, fueling your brain will help you reduce your anxiety and symptoms.

1. Are you having a panic attack?

2. Are you uncomfortably anxious or irritated?

3. Are you waking at 3am in the morning, with your mind racing?

4. Are you overly or underly emotional for the situation?

5. Have you not eaten for more than 3 hours?

6. Do you want to feel better in 10-15 minutes?

Lizard Brain Treats

A Lizard Brain Treat is a snack of sugar (a quick fuel) and protein (a longer lasting fuel). You want the quick fuel to get to your brain almost immediately, which will start to reduce the adrenalin causing you to be in your reactive lizard brain. Following this with protein extends the amount of time you’re in your responsive cortex brain, before needing to re-fuel. Choose one quick fuel and one protein from the lists below – or from your favorite foods.

Ideas for Quick Fuels:

• ¼ cup of juice

• 1 piece of hard candy

• ¼ cup of soda

• Honey stick

• 1 tbl of jelly

Ideas for Protein:

• ¼ cup of nuts

• ¼ cup of nuts

• A stick of jerky

• ¼ cup of cottage cheese

• 2 tbl of peanut (or other nut) butter

Combined sources work too (as long as they aren’t sugar-free)!

• ½ cup of a protein shake

• Protein bar

• ½ a PB&J sandwich

Generally speaking, your anxiety will drop by 10-20% within 10-15 minutes.

Download this information as a handout and post it on your fridge or keep it near your desk.

Juice for Anxiety?

A participant in a recent training sent me a follow up email with a question about the Lizard Brain Treat. She gave me permission to share it here.

Hey Kristen, 

 Hope you had a safe travel home.

Thanks again for a great conference!  I have been getting more protein into myself this weekend and am feeling less irritable with my 4 yo daughter, so already showing benefits for the every 3 hour protein plan!  I also walked the half mile to work today vs driving! You have inspired me so much!

I was sharing some the info with my Mental Health colleagues today and they said “juice”? That has way too much sugar, what about fruit and nuts?  I said “Hmmmm, I’m not sure”, and had to look it up. I saw that you recommended just a ¼ cup juice, not a whole bottle…for lizard brain symptoms.  I also have a colleague who has diabetes, and he said, “I can’t have juice, no diabetic should have any juice.”  What words of wisdom do you have for that question?

Sincerely, Molly

Molly -

Thanks for doing the experiments. 

If people object to juice, they don’t have to use juice. I just find it effective in shifting a person’s mood immediately when they have lizard brain symptoms, such as anxiety, irritation, agitation, or early morning waking for 2 hours.

A ¼ cup of juice is not a lot of sugar. Remember, it is not just juice. We are also adding nuts or a protein source, since the juice will be burned quickly. 

I did a quick search:

·      Apple juice has 28 total carbohydrates in one cup, so ¼ cup has 7 grams of total carbohydrates

·      Granulated white sugar for 1 teaspoon is 4.2 grams of total carbohydrates. 

·      Dried cranberries have 26 grams of total carbohydrates in 1/3 cup. 

Note that dried fruit takes longer for the glucose to get to the brain since the sugar has to be released from the fiber.

Some people don’t have the control to drink only a ¼ cup of juice and will drink a full cup or more. This can be a problem. Additionally, sometimes when people are watching their carbohydrates, as with diabetes, it’s easier to eliminate this food category altogether.

I tell people who are opposed to juice and are anxious/irritable/early morning waking to try the juice to see if it works. If it works and helps them regain emotional balance or go back to sleep, then we work to find a food that will have an equivalent response. It is different for each person. Here are some of the solutions that have worked: dried cranberries, carrots, honey sticks, 1-2 large smarties.

The Smarties candy is an interesting one. It’s made of dextrose which converts quickly into glucose. The large ones are about the size of a penny.

My goal for the juice is to quickly get some glucose to the brain to turn off the adrenalin that is firing up the lizard brain. Here are some common scenarios where I find ¼ cup of juice (or equivalent) effective.

• Slowing down anxiety and panic attacks

• Irritable teenager who is frustrated

• Waking in the early morning with thoughts racing

• Not hungry in the morning at waking

• Really groggy in the morning at waking

Hopefully that is helpful. Kristen

Not Hungry in the Morning?

You or someone you know may not be eating breakfast. "I’m just not hungry." Or you have breakfast when you get to work – 2 hours later. Just to be clear, breakfast is the meal that breaks the sleep fast, and your body expects to receive food within one hour of waking. 

Why would someone not be hungry in the morning? It’s not because you ate a big meal in the evening. I know when I have my Thanksgiving meal at noon; I am hungry again before bed. 

So why don’t you feel hungry when you wake up? If your glucose (brain fuel) level dropped too low while you were sleeping, your liver would have already received the signal to deliver a cocktail of hormones that tells the body to make fuel for the brain – and part of the cocktail is adrenaline. When adrenaline is in the system, we tend not to feel hungry. Historically, adrenaline signaled that someone or something was trying to hurt us and we should run; running and eating are not tightly wired together. 

Clinically, the short-term consequences of skipping breakfast happen about 8 hours later. You might be fatigued, and your lizard brain takes charge. This increases the likelihood that you will overeat, have more alcohol before or at dinner than planned, and have passive evenings.

What are the long-term consequences of skipping breakfast?  When we skip breakfast, we set up a cascade of stress hormones that are working to maintain our fuel supply. The most recent studies suggest that not eating breakfast causes:

• increased calorie intake during the day,

• Increased stress/inflammatory hormones, such as cortisol and insulin,

• increased weight gain and adipose tissue/body fat,

• increased cholesterol and blood pressure, and

• increased cardiovascular disease.

What to do about the fact that you just don’t feel hungry? Typically, a quarter cup of fruit juice or some other quick-acting sugar, such as a teaspoon of honey, will get your body to send the hunger signal within 20 minutes. Then, you can have breakfast. For the people who are not eating because they are jumping out of bed to go to work, try putting a protein shake in the refrigerator the night before so you can grab it on your way out in the morning. If you do this for about a week, you might find that your hunger signal kicks in more easily in the mornings. 

Do you skip breakfast? Try the experiment of starting your day with food that has protein (14-20 grams) + carbs + fiber + fat. This Shortcuts post has some ideas for breakfast. Observe the following changes:

• less anxiety, irritation, and agitation in the mornings

• more energy and mental clarity in the day

• less overdoing intake of sugar, alcohol, or snacking 8 hours after waking

• better sleep

• increased ability to participate in after-work activities that are important to you.

Tell us about your experience on the Dynamic Paths Facebook page or add a comment to our blog.