Optimizing Pitta Nutrition to Combat Anxiety | Ep. 90

This conversation is for the entrepreneurs. This is for the overachievers. This is for those really driven people, the kind of ones who instead of live, laugh, love, they have can't stop, won't stop, hung up all over their house. Like, this conversation is for my pitch of friends and today we're going to be talking about the eight types of anxiety. And I want to put a slash after this and it's anxiety, slash nervousness, slash overwhelm, slash agitation, slash, amplification. Like anything that is the synonym for nervous system arousal. So any of my, all of those friends, this is going to be the conversation for you. I am Dr. Nicole Cain and I am here with my dear friend and podcast host.

I'm happy, healthy Hadley, and we're super pumped you're here.

And so today we're going to be talking about pitta and we're going to be getting into diet and lifestyle. And so before you listen to this episode, definitely check out the links in the bio. You can also find them on our socials. To take the number one is you're going to take the are you beta quiz and then write down the result that you get. Number two is you're going to take the eight types of anxiety quiz and then write down that result. Because as you're listening to these podcasts, we want to make sure that it is as relevant and useful for you so that when you finish listening to this episode that you have a plan of attack ready to go.

Yeah, it's just, it's so cool how we can bring in the. You've broken down your eight types of anxiety so well. And then we can bring in the different doshas. Because a lot of times we, in our modern wellness world, we have this one size fits all approach, which is because of the way the scientific method works. It's like, well, if the majority of people respond to this thing, then that's what works. That's what the protocol is going to be. But that's not how Ayurveda works. And so Ayurveda is like, actually there are different remedies, different things for different people and different constitutions and the actual symptoms that are coming up in the mind and body. We can actually tailor those things. That's what we're trying to help you do is really tailor the way that you are approaching your symptoms based on how those symptoms come up. You're basically becoming a detective, which is so cool. And hopefully we can help you become a very skilled detective for yourself in a way that makes it as easy and easeful as possible for you.

I love this. So let's be a detective about pitta. And so I was curious if you could tell us a little bit about what pitta is.

Yeah. So pitta. Oh man. So I am going to say all this very lovingly because I am mostly pitta. That's my. But pitta is, is intense. Pitta is, you know, like Dr. Kane was saying, the, it's the, the activated one. It's the, the fight response. It's the, it's the really. It can be aggressive, it can be intense. Even if you feel like I'm not an aggressive person. Like, I didn't think that pitta was highest in my. I was like, I feel like I'm a pretty nice person. I don't, I don't know, but I'm very intense. And so I, one of my teachers, one of my mentors back in the day was like, oh, no, you're not a kafa. You are definitely a pizza. You're just a sweet pizza. I was like, oh, okay. So you know, you don't have to like be like angry to be a pizza, but you might have more of the like perfectionism tendencies, the type A tendencies, the, the just high achievement in general, you tend. Tends to be more pitta. Or even if that's not your like primary dosha, it might, it just might be higher in your kind of your pie of the doshas that you're born with. So essentially we're all born with all three of the doshas, but you might have more of one or you likely will have like the highest amount of one and then there's like a secondary one and then there's less of the third one. There are the very rare people who are tridosic, but that's like super, super rare where it's like the, the pie pieces are the even amount for each, for each dosha. But, but so how it might show up in the body as a pit imbalance is inflammation. Inflammation is like, it's always got some pitta in there. So if you think of any sort of redness, heat, pain, all of that stuff, that's going to all be pitta. Pitta is the fire element. And so anything fiery is going to be, is going to have at least some element of pitta. You know, some symptoms are a mix of different doshas, but they're going to have some pitta in there. So, so that's kind of how it shows up in the body more. It also can show up in the body not even out of balance. But like, just if you have more pitts in your constitution, you might just experience more. You just might have more muscle on your body. You might have, you might have like a medium short stature, that kind of thing. Thinking like, if you were to work out a ton, you would have more of that like bodybuilder type body rather than like a like model, like lanky body or like a, an endurance athlete, like bigger, broader shoulders, that kind of thing. That's going to be more kapha, whereas the lanky model type body is going to be more like vata.

Taking notes as you're describing this and I'm hearing like inflammation, redness, heat, pain, fire, intense muscular, strong, driven. And I'm also thinking about, there's this big conversation right now about histamine and how signs of histamine overload or histamine intolerance can really look like what you're describing. Where there can be like anaphylaxis, which can be really sudden and intense and gripping and squeezing and there could be red hives. And it's like hot and burning and intense. And so. And some of the things that we do to combat histamine is to avoid some of these more inflammatory and more heating, high histamine foods like nightshades, tomatoes. And so I'm going to be, I'm really curious, as this conversation goes on today about what you're going to teach us about pitta and nutrition so that we can start to see if and how some of these overlap the way that Western medicine is describing it on maybe an immune system immunological basis versus what traditional Ayurvedic practitioners have said for over 2,000 years. I'm curious, just as a caveat to that, do you have any thoughts? Because I know you've personally studied histamine.

Yeah. So. And when you say personally, it's because I literally have had the like eczema rashes. I had mold exposure a couple years ago. And so I had, I was, you know, avoiding histamines and stuff to, to try to, to heal that because I had all of the, the rashes and the just inflammation like my. Lots of puffiness everywhere, all of that, all of that kind of thing. And so yeah, so I studied histamines literally personally just so that I could, you know, have some relief with that. And histamines pretty, like pretty evenly across the board are exactly what ayurvedic practitioners from 4000s of years have said are the things that are pitta. Aggravating. So it's really cool and it's not every. I can't think of a counterexample, but I feel like there were a couple of examples where I was like, oh, that's actually supposed to be helpful for pitta, but I. I can't think of any of them. There are a couple of spices. Just because spices, and they sit too long, they can develop histamines. I keep my spices in the fridge so that they don't. So that it stops the histamine production a little bit faster. But so that can cause more like, of a histamine imbalance. But things like. It's really interesting because, like we talked about in the vata episode, the vata nutrition episode, Pitta, there are a few things that we think of as, like, oh, this is super healthy for everyone, and we need to be eating more of this, or we need to be eating less of this or whatever in our modern wellness culture. And really commonly, everyone is obsessed right now with probiotics, right. And so things like sauerkraut. Oh, my gosh. Kombucha. Oh, the amount of times that I see, like, people who have, like, you know, rashes, lots of acne, just feeling like those. Those pitta symptoms, and they're eating. They're. They're drinking, like, an entire bottle of kombucha, which, you know, those come in kind of a big bottle. They're, like, drinking those every day.

And I'm like, the big bottle. I love that you're commenting on how it's such a huge bottle, because it is. You're not just drinking like a little guy. It's like a giant, huge vat of it. Yeah.

And they're like, oh, I'm doing this, like, really good thing for myself. And then, oh, my gosh. And it's wreaking havoc. And so that's where I, like, get so frustrated with the modern, like, not medical model. But, like, though just like wellness culture right now is like, we don't take into account the. Is in. In our constitutions and in our imbalances and that kind of thing. Although I don't know that an entire bottle of kombucha every day would be helpful for any of the doshas. But especially pittas are the ones who tend to do it, because pittas tend to be like, oh, this is good for me. I need to do so much of this thing. I need to have, like. Like all the sauerkraut. I need to have, like, all of the komuja. I need to do all of the things. And it's like, Actually, if you just had like a normal amount of those things, that would be fine. But because you have a lot of pits in your constitution, you're like, let me do it all. So, so that's one thing that I'll say that is like, you know, high histamine fermented things obviously, like alcohol causes inflammation. We know this. Things other things that are fermented, even things like soy sauce and like other. I'm trying to think of other miso is also fermented. And it's not to say that like you should not. I'm not, I'm not a big fan of shoulds. It's not to say that you shouldn't eat these things. Like we do need probiotics and we can get it from these things. But really minimizing the amount can be really helpful, especially if you're expensive, experiencing a major pitta imbalance.

And so I'm thinking as you're saying this, I love this and this is such good data where if you have a tendency towards high pitta and then you eat pitta aggravating things, that this can then set you up to have histamine issues or at least be more sensitive to a histamine accumulation. Or let's say that genetically that you have a mutation and you're not able to effectively detox histamine. That that can then set the stage for you to accumulate histamine and then up in a pitta imbalance. And so if we go to the gut, I love what you're saying is maybe start thinking about probiotics that are low histamine probiotics. And there's actual clinical research on this. I'm writing about it in my book. And so we could do, we could do a whole episode on, on histamine and mental health and histamine and physical health. But you might actually benefit like if you want to like Pittas who are listening and you're like currently swigging back a giant kombucha is maybe trade that for a low histamine probiotic. So you're getting those good bacteria that can actually decrease histamine and nourish your gut at the same time. And we can teach you all about that. If you have a specific question about products, then just send us a comment on the chat and we'll definitely get you a link.

Yeah, totally. It's also, it's interesting the one, the one type of like fermented food that is actually beneficial for pitta. Pitta pacifying is what we call it in Ayurveda. It pacifies the, the overwhelmed dosha or the dosha that's. Well, in Pitta's case, inflamed is dairy based probiotics. So things like yogurt, kefir even, even if you can't handle dairy, coconut yogurt, that kind of thing can be an option as well. So. So if you want to get it in your actual foods too, I find that I do really well with, with that, especially coconut yogurt. Although, you know, normal yogurt is fine for me too. But yeah, depending on if you're sensitive to dairy or not. Coconut is cooling. Dairy is cooling. Unless it's like a fermented cheese, then it's heating. But most dairy is cooling. And same with coconut. And so that can be really helpful for pitta for cooling down the fire.

So you have pitta fire and how can that show up in the eight types of anxiety? So pitta fire can show up in the gut with burning ulcers, reflux. We talked about this. This is a question that I had in the VATA podcast about vata nutrition. And you were teaching us that VATA tends to be like more of a burst out of chaos and that Pitta tends to be like burning and rising. So you described that upward movement and then that kind of forward intense movement, right?

Yes, exactly. Yeah, so, so yeah, the directionality of the doshas is like, yeah, the vata is, is up and out. Pitta is like up and forward and, and, and focused. So like, like an arrow. Whereas, yeah, VATA is more chaotic. And then kapha is the, is downward, downward and not direction directional.

That heavy downward directional. Yeah, yeah. And then if you're in a state of thought anxiety in your Pitta, then you were describing kind of earlier in this episode, like those people that are really overworked, very type A, really intense. And so you might find that you have thoughts that are like really intense and focused and persistent and, and it.

Might, it might be hard for you to get out of your like mental set too. So like in, in psychology that's, that's basically just means like you're in this specific perception of something and you can't really think outside, outside of the box. You can't think outside of that specific perception that you currently have. So a lot of times Pittas will think I'm right about this and then we'll realize that, oh yeah, we actually weren't right about that. And so we need to us Pittas need to have a really good sense of humor in order to really balance out our intensity and a good sense of humor, like self deprecation that is like, okay, you know, check yourself kind of thing. So. So, yeah, so. So creativity is sometimes a little bit harder to access for if you have a lot of pitta in your constitution because it's like, oh, it's like logic based, very focused. And so we need more of that, like, expansiveness that Vata has, but that pitta has a little bit of a harder time expressing.

Which, by the way, I think is what is part of makes you and I a dream team is because I can come up with like all sorts of ideas and you have this like forward drive and you make things happen. And then I feel like you have the execution and then we both have kind of some kapha in us, which helps us see so it doesn't actually like fizzle out. So it's like they all have their assets. It's just about balance.

Yeah, I love it. I love it. That is why we are team. I love that.

So when you're creating your dream team, you know, you pitch entrepreneurs. Giving us a listen is you want to find somebody like people on your team that can like, really help you be balanced. And you know, we talk about that with the disc assessment, the disc and how you want to have a really balanced team, but, like, have all of your teammates, like, take the dosha quiz on our website and see how you guys can like lean into each other's assets based on their dosha and that could really help you, like, really move things forward and sustain that. Totally.

Yeah. And I feel like you do such a great job of coming up with the. With like all sorts of ideas and you're really good at being like, well, let's just do it right now. Whereas, like, I will tend to be like, oh, like, we need to make a. Like, we need to make it perfect. We need. We need to do all these things because I have that, that pitta. And so it's really helpful. I always try to surround myself with vatas who are like, let's do it right now. Let's just make it happen. So good.

What is Todd? So Hadley's husband's Todd. We always talk about my husband Paul, and how Paul is like, vata, vata, vata. What is Todd?

So the reason we don't talk about Todd as much with the Doshas is because he has a pretty, like, he's pretty balanced, pretty well balanced. But I would say his. From what I. From what I've gathered of the eight years that we've been together usually. I can tell pretty. Pretty quickly, like, people's constitution, But I think he's mostly pitta. Vata is his constitution, but he does have a decent amount of kapha that keeps him really steady. If you saw him, you would be like, oh, okay. Pitta and vata for sure. Like, he's, like, tall and very lanky. His. His beard is reddish, so a lot of times that'll be a pitta thing. If you. If you have, like, undertones of red in your hair or if you have red hair, that's more. More of a pitta thing. So you would be like, oh, yeah, definitely pitta and vata in his, like, body. But he definitely does have some of the kapha that keeps him really balanced, which is. Which is nice for me.

So amazing. Yay, Todd. We love Todd.

Yeah, he's great.

So eight types of anxiety and pitta. So cardiac anxiety. So that can show up with pounding, throbbing, pulsing of the heart. And it's very different than what we talked about with vata last time, which is more like fluttering and racing. It's like a bubbly light kind of chaotic. Versus. This sounds really intense. I remember once I was in medical school, and we were doing constitutional hydrotherapy, which is. We could do a whole podcast on that, but we were doing these treatments on ourselves, and we had to listen to our hearts and take our vitals and all that just to assess how the body was reacting. And so I listened to my heart. Hadley, and I had three heartbeats. Oh, it was dull up, dull up. Dub da love dub. And I was like, what the hell is that? And so I started freaking out and getting incredibly anxious. I have, like, cardiac anxiety, and then my heart is like, bam, bam, bam. And it's beating so hard, so fast. And my teacher's like, you need to go to the medical center. Which then, of course, makes me more anxious. So I get to the med center, they lay me down on the table. They're like, we want to do an ekg, but your heart is so fast, we don't know if we'll be able to read it. Can we give you a beta blocker and slow your heart down? And I was like, so I said, no, and then I left. That's sort of the end of that story, but it feels very much like a pito response where it just went into total fight flight. And, like, really hard, really heavy, really intense. Like, all the adrenaline is going, all the cortisol is going. And I was, like, in sheer terror. Does that sound like a Pitch of cardiac anxiety to you?

Yeah, it sounds like it started as vata. And then because you got so activated and scared about that, it sounds like it became like a fight.

Yeah.

Oh, man. And then like that intensity more and harder and harder.

Yeah, it was, it was not fun. But you know, as you guys are listening to this, like, I want you to remember that your heart is designed to beat hard and fast. And so if your heart is beating hard and fast, it's doing what it's supposed to do. Your heart likes to be kind of like airplanes like to fly. You know, your heart is good at it. It's overachieving, perhaps. And so your job is such the.

Most pitta thing ever.

Such an overachieving heart. So your job is to just simply take the data and say, oh, okay, I'm noticing I have this pounding, throbbing pulse and heart. This could mean that maybe I'm tipping into pitta. And so then Hadley is now going to teach us about how we can use lifestyle and nutrition to pacify or calm or nourish or soothe your heart. And really the other places that this pitta anxiety can show up, like your nerves, your muscles with that throbbing pain, burning anger, short fuse, irritability. Right. And so it's all about like, okay, what is the symptom I'm presenting with? And then how can I soothe that or pacify that? And so Hadley, tell us what you got, girl.

Yes. Okay, so like we talked about in the vata episode, how we eat is just as important as what we're eating, which sometimes people have a hard time wrapping their brains around that. But it's, it is actually true. Just like, just like we now know that stress is just as important as the foods that we're eating. And like the, and exercise and all that, like mitigating stress in our bodies is just as important as all of the other stuff to live a healthy life. How we eat is just as important as what we eat. And it's because of stress. And also it's because of how we digest our food when we are in stress or when we're in, you know, more of that parasympathetic nervous system that rest and digest state. So it's really, really common for pittas to eat at their desk. Right? So like, that is, you know, they're just, they're so focused on work, they're just eating, you know, while they're working. That's super common for, for pitta. Whereas we talked about last time, vata is like on the go, standing up, you Know, that also might be the case for Pitta, just because if you're like rushing around because you have stuff that you're like really focused on doing, you might, you might be doing that too. And so that's going to cause a pitta imbalance. That's going to cause the like acid reflux or the indigestion burn, just burning sensations, that kind of thing. And of course, if you are really stressed out while you're eating it, that's. That can cause ulcers too, like down the road. Right. And so we know that stress can cause ulcers. That's. We've known that since like the 60s now. And so. So pitta, the way that we eat, we want to eat in a, in a calm environment. Even if. So a lot of times people with a lot of pizza like to be like hyper stimulated at all times. Same. I like listening to podcasts all the time and they're like personal development podcasts. So I can feel productive at all times. But giving myself a little bit of a break, especially when we're eating, it can be really helpful to give ourselves a break. Maybe you're eating while watching TV or maybe you're eating while you're working. Maybe you just take out one of the. If you're like, oh my God, that sounds terrible. To just like eat and silence, like, no, I'm not going to do that. Even if you just take out one of the. One of the senses. So maybe you just listen to something or maybe you just read something just to make it a little bit more of a calm environment that can be really, really helpful for pitta. And then the other thing is we want to make sure that pitta has enough fats. So we talked about how vata needs enough fat, but Pitta actually needs more of the cooling fats. So we talked about how a lot of times vatas think they need more like avocado or coconut oil or that kind of thing. And really they need more of the heating fats like sesame oil and ghee and. Well, ghee is great for all of the. The doshas. But more of those heating oils. PETA needs more of the cooling oil. So that is the coconut oil. Avocado. Although I think avocado can have histamine. I think that's the thing. I think that was the one thing that I was.

It does have histamine.

Yeah, so I think that was the. That was the one thing I was thinking of earlier. But. So you can use coconut oil or whatever, and then olive oil is Actually really great for pitta as well. It can be helpful for vata too. But olive oil is, is also really helpful. And then ghee, ghee is helpful for all of the doshas. So you want to make sure that you're getting enough of that because if you don't get enough fats, you will probably become hangry. And a lot of times people with a lot of pizza will just will become hangry and then they'll be like, I, I need to be eating all day long. Like I need to be eating lots of meals all day long. But what can happen is that is like really exhausting our digestive system and making it harder to digest. That might also cause more of the reflux and the, the indigestion, all of that kind of thing. So just adding more fats to our meals is going to satiate pizza for longer and we won't get hangry. And also not eating too much sugar, sugar will cause the hangriness for, for pizza. It's really funny actually speaking of Todd, my husband, who has mostly pitta but is pretty balanced in the doshas. If we are on vacation and he's not in his normal eating schedule eating routine and if we're usually when we're on vacation, we're, we're like eating things that are more like have more sugar or you know, we might not be eating as much fat as we normally do on a day to day basis. That's, that's when he'll get hangry. And it's like always shocking because he's never like angry. He's like the most calm, cool, collected person. But he'll get that hangriness if he has too much sugar and not enough fat.

So for pitta especially is more fat, less sugar and then emphasize cooling oils you said.

And it's interesting because the sweet taste can be pacifying for pitta. But if we go overboard on sugar then it's not going to be helpful. So like any like refined sugar is not going to be as helpful. But things that are more like, like sweet like tropical fruits, especially when they're in season is really helpful for pitta. Things that are more like mango, coconut, all of that kind of thing is really helpful. And even if it's not tropical like summer fruits are helpful for pizza because literally the earth is creating the thing that we need to balance in our bodies based on the seasons. Like pitta, Pitta season is the summer because it's the fire, it's the heat and the earth is literally creating fruits and vegetables. For us that are cooling like cucumbers and all of the summer vegetables and summer fruits or most of them are going to be really helpful for Pitta.

Just makes so much sense, right. Humans have evolved with the planet and that the planet, either it was the chicken or the egg, right. Like the planet's like this is what you get. And then the humans evolve around that. Or it was a process of co evolution. I just think it's so neat when you can think through the body and how the body can be nourished if we just simply look at what the planet is naturally producing in that moment.

Yeah, it's so interesting. And that's a big piece of what I do with my clients in my program too is like, okay, it's mind body connection, but it's also like mind ecosystem connection because we are totally connected to what's actually happening in on the Earth. And once we actually start to get more of an, like more of an understanding of what's happening in the seasons and all of that, then our bodies like regulate. It's really cool. Like our nervous system regulates the types of foods that we're eating. Our digestion regulates. It's. It's also interesting, like indigenous. Most indigenous cultures did not have a word in their languages that meant nature. Because what would, what would be nature? Like we are nature. Like that's like an incomprehensible thing because like it's just all interconnected. It doesn't make any sense that that would be separate from us. And so yeah, when we come into that right relationship with our ecosystem, our external environment, then our internal environment regulates. And that's what Ayurveda is all about. It's like what's happening internally is a reflection of what's going on in your, in your ecosystem. And so if you actually like come into partnership with your ecosystem, then you can, then you can actually balance it all out.

So it's helping your body, but it's also helping the planet.

Yeah, right, exactly. And usually not always, but usually that's the case.

That's amazing. That's, that's really inspirational. I feel like that's a really good place to end is on that thought of, you know, the implications. Sometimes it's not enough for us to say like I'm gonna do this for me. The goal would be that you believe that you are worthy enough to do it for you. But sometimes that little extra nudge can be helpful. And to think about that connection that you were talking about, Hadley, that connection between our planet and the ecosystem our health. And how can making small changes in my nutrition make a huge impact and change the planet and my health? I think that's really powerful. So thank you for sharing that.

Yeah, absolutely. Maybe we should do a whole podcast episode on that, I think maybe for Earth Day.

For Earth Day. If y' all are interested, give us a comment. Let us know if you want to hear it.

Let's do it. Yeah. Awesome.

Awesome. We have one more podcast in the series coming up. It's going to be a similar vibe, but it's going to be top of vibe.

Yes. So definitely check out our Ayurveda mini course, too, because obviously we didn't get into, like, actual specific. I mean, we got into some specifics, but we get way deeper into that in the mini course. We've got, like, handouts that actually tell you, okay, here are some of the. The actual foods that you can kind of incorporate a little bit more to balance things out. And so that'll. That'll be really helpful to be able to go in. In there and do that. And it's. It's an awesome mini course. It's really, really fun. We had so much fun.

We had so much fun making it. Totally. Well, thanks for listening for the pitches in your life. Share this podcast if you like it, we would love a review. And so please definitely leave us some kind words and we'd be ever so grateful. And then we will see you next time.

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Thanks for being here. See you later. Bye.