Depression? Anxiety? Consider Barbell Therapy
Lift your moods by lifting weights
Physical exercise has been an integral part of my mental health program.
Running was the catalyst for my triumph over social anxiety, and I have been interested in the role of exercise on mental health ever since.
Five years ago, I started a weight lifting routine and fell in love with the process.
While endurance exercise receives high praise for its mood-enhancing capabilities, strength training is still mainly touted for its positive effect on the body.
While the physical benefits are well known, much less has been written about the mental health benefits of resistance exercise.
But, there is some research suggesting that strength training can exert equally positive effects on the brain.
Both depressive and anxiety symptoms can be reduced through lifting weights.
Battle Depression
An article published by Gordon et al. (2018) describes the mood-lifting effects of strength training in young and adult alike, irrespective of their health status or training frequency and intensity.
The researchers analyzed data from 33 studies, including 1877 participants. Not all of them were diagnosed with clinical depression.
However, for all of them, the likelihood of being depressed was reduced by the end of the intervention.
What’s interesting is that the improvements in mood were not correlated with physical changes from strength training.
That means even if people didn’t improve their strength or muscle mass significantly, their mood improved.
People reported a general improvement in mood but also feeling immediately better after a workout.
What is not clear, however, is why strength training seems to have this effect. One explanation could be that weight lifting changes the brain’s chemistry, similar to what has been reported for endurance exercise. Pumpin iron affects certain neurotransmitters in the brain, including dopamine and serotonin, which both help regulate mood.
Due to the high prevalence of depression and the problems associated with medication or psychotherapy, the authors suggest that resistance exercise is a promising alternative treatment. One argument is that as opposed to standard therapies, lifting weights has no high costs associated with it.
Fight Anxiety
Before taking a look at depression, Gordon et al. (2017) showed that strength training can significantly reduce anxiety symptoms. They analyzed 16 articles, including 922 participants.
The anxiety-reducing effects were more pronounced in participants without diagnosed mental illness than in those with a physical or mental illness.
According to the authors, there is no significant difference in results between sexes, program setup, or lifting frequency.
The workout frequency varied from 2 to 5 days a week and intensities ranged from moderate to high.
Sleep is often a problem for people dealing with anxiety. Chronic worry about the many things that can go wrong keeps an anxious person awake.
Turns out strength training can improve sleep as well.
A study from Herring et al. (2015) compared the effects of endurance exercise, strength training, and no exercise on sleep patterns in women with generalized anxiety disorder (GAD).
They showed that strength training was particularly conducive to sound slumber, especially on weekends.
However, the researchers did not clearly point out whether improved sleep led to less anxiety or vice versa.
My Experience
Exercise seems to be a natural and effective treatment for mental health disorders. Personally, I can confirm the observations from research studies.
While a lifting session doesn’t give me that “high” I feel after a long run, it has noticeable effects on my anxiety levels.
The boost in confidence from lifting heavy might be one factor, the intense focus needed during a challenging set of cleans or squats another.
It is exciting to see research confirming just how much the body and mind are interconnected.
