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Stress and Health Part 1 - Impacts of Stress on Physical Health
By admin | January 20, 2010
- Image by Getty Images via Daylife
Are you stressed out, overwhelmed, and frustrated? Do you feel like you are trying to make traction in different parts of your life (health, relationships, career, money) and not making much headway? Is this stress now impacting your health?
Statistics say that 75% of all diseases are stress or lifestyle related. Many common ailments these days, such as heart disease, diabetes, and obesity, are preventable through changes in lifestyle and stress levels.
So what causes stress? Although stress can result in physical ailments it often starts from an emotional place. Stress is caused by the following factors:
o Not having enough of –feeling like you don’t have enough of something such as love, time, money, connection, or feedback can leave people feeling lack in their lives.
o Expectations not being met – expecting one thing, such as a specific outcome or result, and something else happening. With the economy in a downward cycle in 2009 people’s expectations of financial security, job security, and being able to buy what they desired were put on hold and therefore expectations around finances were not met causing much stress around the world.
o Break in connection – often when we don’t feel connected to ourselves, our source, or to others and we feel discombobulated, which can lead to stress.
Even though stress can start on an emotional level it can result in physical discomforts. So how does stress impact your physical health?
o Feeling of a shock to the system – this starts in the brain and impacts the nervous system, causing a release of cortisol and adrenalin. This can be positive if the adrenaline is used for positive action, but can be negative if it causes a feeling of stuck-ness or inactivity.
o Creating of a flight or fight response – often the body will display such responses as increased heart rate or higher blood pressure which can often cause people to flee or get angry, of which neither response is very healthy. If you don’t release the adrenaline in a positive way or through fight or flight then it can build up in the body and lead to longer term diseases, such as heart disease and diabetes.
So what can you do to alleviate stress? Stress can be alleviated through a series of different tools and techniques. Look for answers in the series Stress and Health Parts 2-11.
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Topics: Uncategorized |
Technorati Tags: Blood pressure, Diabetes mellitus, Disease, Fight-or-flight response, Health, Heart disease, Obesity, physical health, Stress, stress management
