Stress: Pathway to Chronic Disease

When was the last time you experienced stress? Chances are you are under stress right now. Are you worried about what time it is right now? Where are the kids? Trying to meet an upcoming deadline? Need to get dinner on the table? Our society continually feels the effects of chronic stress; it rarely slows down. Stress is present to greet one around every corner.

Stress is mandatory and inevitable; it is a great motivator to help one accomplish various tasks. Although important, stress has a profound effect upon the well-being and vitality of one's body. In a society rampant with diseases such as obesity, fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue, high blood pressure, and depression, the time has arrived to examine the effects stress takes upon the body.

An immediate danger or an upcoming deadline places one's body in the mode of fight or flight, or the stress response. Fight or flight deals with hormones being released from the adrenal glands - epinephrine, norepinephrine, and cortisol. The release of such hormones results in dilated pupils, decreased digestion, increase in heart and breathing rates, and the shunting of blood to muscles for increased activity.

If an individual experiences a continual amount of stress, their body will remain in a destructive state of fight or flight; the body never regenerates with the opposite response of resting and digesting which is vital for healing and repair. Similar to walking on a balance beam, it is essential that one's body maintains a continual balance undergoing stress and then healing in preparation for the next stressor. This balance of stress levels is essential to avoid the "fall off the balance beam" of stress left unchecked.

As previously mentioned, the adrenal glands produce and release the hormones associated with the fight or flight response. The adrenal glands are one of the most important organs of the human body - if they failed to work in times of stress, an individual would actually die! The adrenal glands are factories that work around the clock; they never rest and rarely take a break. In fact, the adrenal glands are so vital to human survival that raw materials are stolen from elsewhere in the body (i.e. the thyroid, thymus, and ligaments) to support their continual function. This robbing of raw materials from other vital organs of the body results in gradual health decay and chronic disease.

Therefore, remaining in a stressful state for prolonged periods of time is highly destructive to one's body. Long-term stress can result in changes in body temperature, weight gain, high blood pressure, hypoglycemia, increased sweating, decreased ability to think and reason, hyperactivity, digestion disturbance, and decreased immunity.

Thus, by small and almost unnoticeable processes, stress has a profound effect on the health of individuals worldwide. Stress is an epidemic manifesting itself in the form of debilitating diseases such as diabetes, obesity, depression, high blood pressure, ADD, fibromyalgia, and chronic fatigue.

What can be done to decrease the effect stress has upon the body? What can be done to prevent debilitating, chronic diseases and treating the ones that are currently affecting you? Give yourself a much needed break!

Begin by allotting twenty to thirty minutes each day dedicated to meditation and relaxation. Enhance your nutritional content; eat fresh, raw, whole, ripe vegetables and fruits that provide the body with essential vitamins and minerals and the materials necessary to maintain a healthy body. Start walking! Bodies were made to move and also function better when allowed the opportunity to be active - motion is life! Get adequate amounts of sleep; your body needs time to repair and regenerate. Supplement your nutrition with specific products to assist the repair and proper function of the adrenal glands. These products must also be designed to decrease cortisol levels within the body.

Above all else, simplify your life; rid your lifestyle of any unnecessary stress. The worldwide epidemic of stress can be reversed by properly caring for the body and monitoring stress levels. An enhanced state of well-being and health is waiting for you and the world.