Have you ever felt stressed, sad or grieved? Nobody will be surprised if the majority says ‘Yes’. In such a frenetic world it is becoming highly complicated to avoid negative emotions. It’s quite normal to have those unpleasant feelings once in a while. However, it’s better to stay away from so-called overwhelming sadness that can become a cause of major depression when you lose interest in the things that used to please and cheer you up.
According to the National Institute of Mental Health, anxiety disorders are the most common mental illness in the USA: 40 million people of age suffer from depression, making up 18% of the whole US population. The World Health Organization (WHO), in turn, admits that on a global scale the number of sufferers is 350 million (more women than men).
Among typical symptoms are the following:
– emotional: irritability, bustling and anxiety, anger, loss of interest;
– physical: insomnia or excessive sleep, fatigue, random aches, loss of concentration, increased or decreased appetite, weight gain/loss.
Aggravated depression often leads to chronic pains, alcohol/drug abuse, panic disorders, family/relationship problems, isolation or even suicide.
To avoid those dangerous stages, it’s a must to put aside negative feelings and thoughts, to have more rest, relax, and socialize.
Fortunately, specialists in custom healthcare applications development grant us a chance to enjoy a wide range of mobile apps that help to stay positive and control emotions.
Here are some of them:
1) Breathe2Relax is a wonderful tool for managing stress. This app delivers valuable and detailed information on stress’ negative effects on the human body and gives an outline of really useful breathing exercises to counter negative emotions and anxiety.
Experts are sure that such practical exercises as diaphragmatic breathing allow decreasing body’s stress responses and help stabilize mood, control anger, and get rid of worries and fears. You can use Breathe2Relax solely or as part of clinical treatment provided by physicians.
2) Twilight Pro Unlock will release you from the trouble of falling asleep. As a rule, sleep problems appear when you use your mobile phone for hours before going to bed (let it be for work or entertainment).
While using your device you expose your eyes to blue light that reduces melatonin production (this hormone is responsible for healthy sleep-wake phases). Thus, your sleep cycle is badly affected.
The beauty of Twilight Pro Unlock is that it lets your device screen adapt to the time of the day and protect user’s eyes with a soft red filter, the intensity of which is also adjusted (depending on local sunset/sunrise times). With such an app you are guaranteed a comfortable sleep.
3) SAM is a Self-help Anxiety Management app that proposes an array of methods to manage anxiety.
The app can boast an anxiety tracking tool, anxiety treatment guidance, relaxation instruction, and a network thanks to which you can ask for help, find handy tips and valuable opinions. You will also get fun from learning how to better manage emotions thanks to the app’s interactive relaxation features and various media formats in which the content is presented.
SAM has high standards of usability and may be used with or without health practitioners’ support.
4) Talkspace is an optimal option for those who can’t cope with their depression by themselves and need therapist’s advice. This app represents a community of over 1,000 licensed and verified doctors who are ready to provide immediate anonymous help without asking a patient to make an appointment.
Thanks to Talkspace you are granted a chance to be consulted anytime and anywhere on stress, anxiety, depression, relationship problems, posttraumatic stress disorders (PTSD), fears, eating disorders, etc.
Get confidential therapy at the touch of a button and let your dedicated specialist make a difference in your life.
5) Equanimity is a faithful companion for anyone who maintains a daily meditation practice to get rid of stress. The app times your sittings, displays graphical tracking, and offers a nice journal for your sitting notes.
This timer provides a vast meditation history and allows exporting the recorded data in a form of a printable email, a detailed table, or an entry for your personal blog.
With nicely created graphics you can track your short-term results (meditation regularity and time) and overall progress within a given year.
Equanimity is also a reminder, so, you won’t miss another sitting. You can set chimes in case your meditation session consists of different stages, and pleasant gongs will continue sounding even with a turned off ringer (to avoid calls/SMS interruptions).
6) MindShift, created by Anxiety Disorders Association of British Columbia, will become a great assistant in your fight against anxiety and fear, changing your way of thinking about the problem.
With MindShift you will learn to relax, find new active steps and strategies to control sleep and emotions, manage worries, panic attacks, and conflicts.
The app is useful for teens and grown-ups who are ready to face challenges and take over the responsibility for their lives.
7) Sleep Better by Runtastic will help you to improve bedtime habits. The app comprises two functions: it’s a sleep tracker and an alarm clock, so, you can use it not only to track your sleep phases, but also to control your wake-ups.
Sleep Better offers an array of pleasant alarm clock sounds and snooze functionality. Install it on your device and wake up at the perfect time and, monitoring your sleep quality. The app will also allow you to understand your light/deep sleep and the time spent awake while falling asleep or waking up in the morning.
Make use of the moon phases monitoring function to understand whether they affect you; browse through your sleep history, keep a diary, make notes about your moods, enter your habits and variables (caffeine/alcohol consumption, stress level, exercise info) to identify their influence on your sleep cycles.
Beyond that, you have an opportunity to share your sleep sessions via social networks and email.
8) Daylio is a mini-diary app to better understand your habits. You don’t have to type a lot to track your emotions – just choose your mood and add your activities, done within a single day. Daylio will create vital and reliable statistics for you and a calendar to allow tracking activities and building up certain patterns.
Furthermore, with this app you can set reminders, customize moods names, backup your entries (via Google Drive), and relish an extensive icons database for your personalized affairs.
Conclusion:
It’s just a narrow list of mobile apps, designed to track daily habits and control your emotions. But among them you will certainly find your loyal friend in combating negative experiences and will learn to stay positive and sound, avoiding deep depression.
About the Author:
Yana Yelina is a website design and development expert at EffectiveSoft, a custom software development company with 250+ specialists who boast expertise in different business domains (healthcare, trading and finance, logistics, e-commerce, etc.). You can reach the author at: [email protected]; [email protected] or connect with her via LinkedIn or Twitter.
