How to reduce the stress linked to the start of the school year?

Summary: How to reduce the stress related to the start of the school year?

Lynn Goneau, naturopath with the grain box, shares advice to help children relax before bedtime, especially during the school year. She recommends soothing activities like talking about their day, reading, making soft stretching, drawing or listening to audio books.

It underlines the importance of a diet rich in magnesium, tryptophan and fibers, with foods such as brown rice, turkey, quinoa, and to avoid sweet or fried food before bedtime. For snacks, choices such as nuts, cottage cheese and fruit yogurt are recommended, while avoiding chocolate.

Lynn Goneau also talks about Stress Relax natural supplements from Natural Factors to promote calm and sleep, available at the grain box where it offers consultations.

Manage children's stress and anxiety during the start of the school year

Lynn Goneau, naturopath with the grain box, underlines the importance of creating a moment so that children can talk about their day and express their concerns. This can be done with parents or even with a loved one like a grandmother.

Solving activities before bedtime

To help children relax in the evening, Lynn offers activities like reading a book, making soft stretching, drawing, or making puzzles, avoiding screens so as not to disturb the production of melatonin. Audio books are also a great option to promote relaxation.

Importance of food for better sleep

Lynn recommends foods rich in magnesium, tryptophan, and fibers, such as brown rice with turkey, spinach, salmon with quinoa, avoiding meals rich in fat and sugar in the evening. For snacks, choices such as almonds, cashew nuts, cottage cheese or yogurt with fruits are preferable, while avoiding chocolate that contains caffeine.

Natural supplements to promote calm and sleep

Lynn suggests products from the Natural Factors Stress Relax range, such as quiet sleep and mental calm, to help reduce anxiety and promote better sleep. These supplements are designed to be taken in the evening or during the day as needed.

Consultation with the Naturopath Lynn Goneau

Lynn is available for consultations with the Greber Grain Box, where she offers personalized advice every Tuesday from 12 p.m. to 5 p.m., with the possibility of private appointments for tailor-made support.

About the author

Lynn Goneau, a graduate naturopath

Specialized in:

• Digestive health
• Hormonal health
• Stress and fatigue
• Memory and concentration
• Weight management

Frédéric Bisson, radio host at 104.7 FM

Animator at the 104.7 FM radio station from the Cogeco network. Frédéric Bisson hosts the Outaouais program now from 3 p.m. to 5 p.m. every day of the week since February 27, 2023.

Transcription

Frédéric Bisson - Host 104.7FM:

Back to school continues and it is with great pleasure that we find Lynn Goneau in the studio in the grain box. Good morning. You start with a subject where you think of parents and their children.

Lynn Goneau - Naturopath of La Boite à Grains:

Effectively.

Frédéric Bisson - Animator 104.7FM:

They may have lived in the past few days at the start of the school year for a little moment of anxiety and stress. So five activities to calm our children before bedtime.

Lynn Goneau - Naturopath of La Boite à Grains:

Yes, because we get along that it is there when they accumulate a lot of stress during the day that in the evening, they have difficulty sleeping, then with the start of the school year it is not obvious.

Yes, because as they live a lot of concern before the start of the school year and even during, now that the start of the school year is made during school days, when it happens in the evening, just before bedtime, I always say to myself, it is A good thing to talk about what concerns them. Let your child tell his day to have a place really to drop off his ideas. Well, if ultimately mom or dad is not available, they can always call granny. Then, I'm sure she will want to listen. It is a way for them to unpack their day. It can be read a book or make soft stretching that, it really helps for relaxation. It can be puzzles, especially for the little ones. It can also be drawn. That, it will really allow children to come back in the present moment that when you draw, it's at the time you don't think about everything that happened during the day or what is coming.

Frédéric Bisson - Animator 104.7FM:

Mandalas, we don't draw them on the iPad, that's another thing.

Lynn Goneau - Naturopath of La Boite à Grains:

Indeed, if we want to get rid precisely because cellular, tablets in the evening, as we know, that when we play on it before going to bed, the famous blue light prevents us from producing our melatonin. And at that time, it's very difficult to sleep. There are audio books, it is that we hear that we listen to that. It's excellent. We can listen to that by that will allow us to really promote relaxation. We can afford to listen to that, then obviously, but that relaxes that.

Frédéric Bisson - Animator 104.7FM:

There is also food that can help our young people in supper, among others. What do you offer?

Lynn Goneau - Naturopath of La Boite à Grains:

Yes, in fact, I like to promote foods that have magnesium, tryptophan and fibers. So you can go there with brown rice, because it is very high in fiber. It can be accompanied that with turkey because turkey, we know, there are a lot of tryptophan. Then that will help produce your melatonin. Well, you can marry that with spinach or a piece of salmon with quinoa. Because we get along that quinoa has a lot of magnesium in it., Ok you avoid a supper meal which is too rich, basically the famous fried potatoes or everything that is fried or that there is sugar In too large quantities or preferable not to take it at all or especially in supper, we keep that for the time of dinner. A meal like that is ideal to take it three hours before sleep.

Frédéric Bisson - Animator 104.7FM:

For snacks?

Lynn Goneau - Naturopath of La Boite à Grains:

Yes, because there are children who claim a snack before going to bed. It's not mean either, but you have to have a good choice. So we can talk about almonds, cashew nuts with a banana, because that, it's rich in magnesium, then potassium, it can be a little cottage cheese. If we have problems with lactose, there is lactose -free cottage cheese. You can marry that with a little fruit, then pumpkin seeds or you can have a little yogurt with fruit. It is small choices that are easily made. But you really have to avoid chocolate. So everything that is chocolate.

Frédéric Bisson - Animator 104.7FM:

Yes because it stimulates.

Lynn Goneau - Naturopath of La Boite à Grains:

That's it. Because there is caffeine in everything we take, a chocolate milk in the evening or things like that. Chocolate pies, cookies, chocolates, things like that. There is a lot, a lot of caffeine in there means that obviously it will disturb your sleep. You always want to favor foods that are rich in magnesium like a good bowl of complete grain cereals. Ok,

Frédéric Bisson - Animator 104.7FM:

It specifies us because some people do not understand the concept of full grain.

Lynn Goneau - Naturopath of La Boite à Grains:

Exact. The complete grain, we will find it in oats, buckwheat, brown rice, quinoa, that is always grains that contain all three parts of the grain. So the envelope, the flesh and the nucleus. Ok, then that is rich in magnesium, in nutrients.

Frédéric Bisson - Animator 104.7FM:

If we want to use a supplement to help our children precisely calm down as in this back -to -school period.

Lynn Goneau - Naturopath of La Boite à Grains:

I really like the Natural Factors Stress Relax range. They have a very, very beautiful range. They have a lot of products but two in particular that I would like to speak, it is quiet sleep, it is a chewable tablet. It really has a good fruit taste. You take it in the evening. It will really help you with your sleep, contains L-theanine, melatonin, gaba, magnesium, everything you need to really decrease anxiety. Second product is mental calm. Yet another bunched tablet, will really help him with mental clarity, have better clarity, then relaxation, but he, you take it because there is no drowsiness. A little thing when you arrive from school or for an adult when it happens to work because it is also good for adults. You take a tablet or two, it will already help you calm down, arriving from work or when you arrive from school, it's excellent.

Frédéric Bisson - Animator 104.7FM:

So I remind you that we can see you this season too. You can go to the grain box. Yes,

Lynn Goneau - Naturopath of La Boite à Grains:

Yes I am here Tuesday from 12 p.m. to 5 p.m. where you can take a private consultation. We phone La Boite à Grains On Gréber to make an appointment.