Nourishing Resilience: How Diet and Nutrition Influence the Stress Response

Written by: Claudia Haller NBC-HWC

In my last blog, we explored how health and wellness coaches can guide clients through stress using tools like mindfulness, meditation, journaling, and Havening. These are essential practices in a coach’s toolbox, and they work beautifully in tandem with another foundational, but often overlooked, aspect of well-being: nutrition.

When our clients navigate high-stress periods, what they eat (and how they eat) can either support their resilience or amplify their struggle. As coaches, understanding the relationship between diet and stress equips us to offer more comprehensive support while still staying firmly within the scope of our practice.

Let’s take a deeper look at how food affects the body’s stress response, and how we can help our clients make informed, sustainable shifts toward nourishment that supports both their brains and bodies.

The Stress-Nutrition Connection
Stress isn’t just a psychological experience, it’s deeply physiological. When the body perceives stress, it activates the HPA axis (hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal), releasing hormones like cortisol and adrenaline. In short bursts, this response can be protective. But when stress becomes chronic, it begins to deplete essential nutrients, alter digestion, and disrupt blood sugar balance.

One of the most common patterns we see in stressed clients is a shift toward quick, hyper-palatable foods: high in sugar, salt, and unhealthy fats. These foods provide a short-term dopamine hit, but they can increase inflammation, disrupt sleep, and worsen emotional regulation over time. It's a cycle that many clients feel stuck in, especially when stress hijacks their usual routines.

It’s especially important to highlight this connection for your clients who are working women! A study published in The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition found that women experiencing occupational burnout are more vulnerable to emotional or uncontrollable eating. Subjects of this study who were overweight or obese noted their own failure to make changes to their diet due to burnout and reduced resources. In the end, this negatively affected their self-esteem and self-efficacy, which prevented them from making weight loss progress.

As coaches, we’re not here to diagnose or prescribe, but we can help clients explore how their current eating habits may be contributing to, or relieving, their stress load.

Nutrients That Support a Calmer Nervous System
Certain nutrients are particularly supportive during periods of stress. When depleted, clients may feel more irritable, fatigued, anxious, or mentally foggy. Encouraging a food-first approach to restoring these nutrients can make a meaningful difference in how clients feel and function. Some key nutrients to focus on include:

• Magnesium: Supports muscle relaxation, sleep, and nervous system regulation. Found in leafy greens, pumpkin seeds, almonds, and avocado.
• B Vitamins (especially B6, B12, and folate): Essential for neurotransmitter production and energy metabolism. Found in legumes, eggs, whole grains, and leafy vegetables.
• Omega-3 Fatty Acids: Reduce inflammation and support brain health. Found in fatty fish (salmon, sardines), flaxseeds, walnuts, and chia seeds.
• Vitamin C and Zinc: Both support adrenal function and immunity. Found in bell peppers, citrus fruits, berries, pumpkin seeds, and shellfish.
• Complex Carbohydrates: Stabilize blood sugar and support serotonin production. Found in sweet potatoes, oats, quinoa, and brown rice.

In addition to these key nutrients, you can also encourage your client to increase probiotic-rich and fermented foods in their diets to improve their mood and digestive function. Gut health plays a vital role in emotional and cognitive regulation! As such, introducing foods such as yogurt, kefir, sauerkraut, and kimchi, can help support our gut and in turn our brain.

Foods and Habits That Can Amplify Stress
While it’s important to focus on nourishment, it's equally helpful for clients to be aware of habits that may be unintentionally increasing their stress load. Some common pitfalls to gently explore with your clients include:

• Skipping meals or irregular eating: Can lead to blood sugar crashes, irritability, and fatigue.
• Over-reliance on caffeine: May elevate cortisol levels and disrupt sleep, especially when consumed on an empty stomach.
• Highly processed foods: Often lacking in fiber and essential nutrients, these can contribute to inflammation and mood instability.
• Emotional eating patterns: Using food to self-soothe is common during high-stress periods. It’s not about judgment, it’s about helping clients build greater awareness and gentler coping strategies.

​
What we eat is important, but how we eat is just as impactful. Stress often leads to distracted, rushed, or mindless eating. Helping clients slow down and bring more awareness to mealtime can shift their entire experience with food. Techniques that can support stress resilience in your clients include:

• Create a calm eating environment: Encourage clients to set aside time for meals without screens or distractions.
• Use breath to shift into rest-and-digest mode: Even one minute of deep breathing before eating can activate the parasympathetic nervous system.
• Balance blood sugar with every meal: Encourage a combination of protein, healthy fats, and fiber-rich carbs to maintain steady energy and mood.
• Introduce gentle meal planning: Support clients in preparing nourishing, stress-friendly meals in advance to reduce decision fatigue.

To learn more about how and why I encourage my clients to eat mindfully, check out my personal blog from last year at this link.

Stress-Supportive Coaching Conversations
Within the coaching relationship, food often becomes a gateway for deeper exploration. It can open up conversations around boundaries, self-worth, time management, and emotional regulation.

We can support clients in developing a more mindful, informed relationship with food by asking questions like:

• How do your eating habits shift when you’re under pressure?
• What patterns have you noticed between what you eat and how you feel?
• What small changes feel realistic and supportive right now?

When necessary, partnering with or referring to a registered dietitian or functional nutritionist can provide additional support, especially in cases involving disordered eating, chronic health conditions, or advanced supplementation needs.

Food as a Foundation for Resilience
Stress management isn’t about eliminating stress, it’s about building the internal capacity to respond to life’s challenges with greater clarity and stability. Nutrition plays a key role in that foundation.

By helping clients make intentional food choices that support their nervous system, cognitive function, and emotional well-being, we’re not just addressing surface-level symptoms. We’re helping them create a more sustainable, supportive way of living, especially during times when their system feels under siege.

As coaches, we don’t need to overhaul a client’s entire diet to make a meaningful impact. Sometimes the most powerful shifts come from the smallest changes: adding a handful of leafy greens to breakfast, drinking water before reaching for a second coffee, or journaling after an emotionally charged snack.

When those small shifts are met with consistency and curiosity, clients begin to feel more grounded and more capable. And that’s a beautiful step forward on the path to healing.

Claudia is an NBC-HWC Board Certified Health and Wellness Coach, the owner of Vibrant Health by Claudia LLC  and Virtual Health Coaches LLC. She studied Health and Wellness Coaching at the Institute for Integrative Nutrition where she also completed courses in Gut Health, Hormone Health, and Advanced Coaching. She is a Havening TechniquesⓇ Certified Practitioner and certified 21-Day Sugar Detox Coach as well as a co-author of three Amazon Bestsellers “The Ultimate Guide to Creating Your Soul Aligned Business”,  “The Ultimate Guide to Becoming a Successful Soul Professional” and “The Ultimate Guide To Leaving Your Legacy.”

To schedule a time for a free information call click here or join her Vibrant Health Power Community - a free Facebook Group - here.