Kourtney Kardashian Opens Up about Her Anxiety—And How She Copes

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The Kardashian family is famous for putting their lives way out there. Keeping Up with the Kardashians regularly airs scenes in which the siblings discuss bad wax jobs, weird sexual encounters, and myraid bodily issues. Of all the sisters, though, Kourtney is typically the most guarded and hard to read. She's likely to keep the jokes coming, without revealing too much about the harder times.

The last year or so brought a lot of those, though. She welcomed her third child, Reign, but then broke up with his father, Scott Disick, after nearly a decade of dating. Disick's problems with addiction are well known to any viewer of the show (or reader of tabloids). Of course Kardahian suffers, and now she's finally talking about her struggles with anxiety. (We've got Anxiety-Reducing Solutions for Common Worry Traps.)

"Everyone deals with hard times in their lives differently," she wrote in a post that appeared exclusively on her app. "I'm generally not a nervous person but I get anxious." She confessed that her stress most often manifests as nausea, making it tough to eat. "Still, when my anxiety is extreme, it feels like my body is constantly burning calories all day long."

Kardashian forces herself to eat on those days, but she does make some modifications to her already-healthy diet. She avoids caffeine, alcohol, or excessive sugar, or as she said, "basically anything that could make it worse." So much for diving into a big ol' sugary margarita after a tough day. (FYI: These foods reduce stress.)

She also said she relies on exercise to power through anxiety. Kardashian admits that the mental issues themselves make it tough to lace up the sneakers, but she always feels better once she does. She aims to work out five days a week, focusing on running, jumping rope, or "anything fast" to distract from the thoughts racing through her brain. Just last month, her sister Khloe released a book about her own diet/exercise regiment, in which she also explored how the benefits of exercise are, for her, primarily mental.

Kourtney's message of self-love is particularly useful during these first few weeks of January, when many find themselves setting impossible New Year's resolutions. Instead of punishing yourself for those extra pounds or that jiggle, consider following the Kardashian example (yes, really!), and move your body because it feels good-mentally and physically.