Is Stress Affecting Your Health?
What happens to your body when you are overly stressed?
Stress is the body’s natural response to environmental stimuli. It is an emotional and physical response to a perceived threat, either from inside or outside the body. When a threat is perceived there is an increase in your heart rate, blood pressure, breathing rate, and glucose levels. These changes are designed to ensure you are physically ready to respond to stress. After the stressful event or emotion is over, the body returns back to balance. If this stress is short-term, no detrimental effects are caused.
Although this is a natural response, when stress is experienced consistently and/or at a high level it can increase the risk of health issues such as cardiovascular disease and high blood pressure. Chronic stress is now known to detrimentally affect behaviour, mental health and physical wellbeing.
Too much stress can be damaging to your health, putting you at a higher risk of illness and disease.
Not everyone responds to stressful situations the same way. Some of these differences are genetic, some are due to upbringing, and some are due to differences in biology.
Strategies for stress reduction
Given the negative effect chronic stress can have on your health, it makes sense to get some support if you are feeling particularly stressed. Strategies to reduce stress can include lifestyle strategies, specific dietary changes, and nutritional and herbal medicines aimed at reducing symptoms and improving the body’s resistance to stress.
TALK TO YOUR PRACTITIONER FOR MORE INFORMATION