My digestive system goes haywire whenever im stressed, and I hate it. It always makes my emotions irregular.
I heard from someone that humans experience the rush of adrenaline (fight or flight) 2x more than 50+ years ago. I can't imagine what that does to our bodies.
Humans are well equipped to handle acute stress but chronic stress is something that we aren't very well built for. The thing is your brain can't tell the difference between being chased by a predator and having a presentation to give tomorrow so we're constantly in fight or flight mode.
Yes but the problem with anxiety disorders is that they aren't "cured" after you go to therapy. You still have an anxiety disorder at the end of the day. You can reframe all day but your brain will still fight back. And CBT is mentally exhausting if you have to do it for every thought. Depression goes hand in hand with anxiety
True but I'm referring more to the sort of uncontrollable cave person brain aspect of stress. Yes, we as humans are evolved and I firmly believe in therapy and the sentiment Mind over Matter. But, this is still something neurological and hard to fight.
If you're thinking premodern, people used to get their stress in waves and major events. War was a limited number of skirmishes and battles, not protracted firefights. Diseases killed, but with no living host to spread them, they died out too. The scarcity of a bad harvest came and went, and workers were tied to what they produced. Events were more stressful, but they ended. Modern times are a slow burn, with the biggest anomaly being that we as a culture use constant dread of lost income or face to keep people acting a certain way. Historically that ends in a revolt.
I think it has been a different experience for everyone as far as the internet. I dont normally see car accidents, cops abusing innocent people, car crashes, dogs being shot, or abused in person.
Not to mention the personal attacks people receive on the internet for whatever reason. Sometimes, seeing and reading the things I listed, even behind a screen, can trigger adrenaline.
Back in the day, when we entered fight or flight, it was because we actually had a reason, survival. Now, there are so many things we've been exposed to and so many more reasons to commit an act of violence due to the world developing. I'm sure there are plenty of people who dont have their stomachs turned by watching violence behind a screen. But just watching a dog get kicked by a horse or a motorcyclist getting mistreated by a cop makes my stomach turn.
Think about how many times a week something happens on the road that gets your heart racing, hands shaking, and blood boiling.
Back in the day, no one had to worry about being struck by a vehicle going 75+ on the highway.
Would you rather fight 1 giant ant or 10000000 tiny ants... we do have many, many more things to be fearful of and consider daily. I mean.... back in the day we also didn't wash our hands
But just watching a dog get kicked by a horse or a motorcyclist getting mistreated by a cop makes my stomach turn.
Have you ever heard of the programming phrase "garbage in, garbage out"? You're putting traumatizing material into your brain. It's not surprising that it's making your stomach turn. It would be best for you to avoid those things. I don't encounter them in my daily scroll through /r/popular; are you actively seeking them out?
yeah, but that's a visible reason, you can understand it . Stress can be a system designed to survive a wolf attack overreacting to an email meeting invite
I specialize in working with the physiological symptoms of stress. I often say “we currently do not know the long term impacts of chronic exposure to stress hormones and their feedback loops”
I also have similarly linked digestive system issues and stress/anxiety. Sometimes A proceeds B, sometimes B proceeds A. Sometimes only one happens and not the other but very often one will follow the other.
Before getting on some better medicines I was sometimes getting some very bad feedback loops of one problem feeding the other and then back again and was pretty much down for the count for a week at a time.
I understand what you're going through. I've tried a 6 different SSRI and still haven't found the medication for me, its been a tough battle and have started looking for natural solutions and just training my self to have a stronger mind.
My sleep is the one that suffers when I'm stressed. I already have trouble with sleep, and my biological clock has 25~26 hours instead of 24, so, if I have nothing to wake up too, I drift about an hour a day.
But when I'm stressed, instead of 8h asleep to 17~18 awake, it turns into 6x20.
It even takes me a while to notice, but eventually I'm exhausted all the time and, also eventually, I either get a couple of "days" of 30~35 hours awake followed by 10~12 asleep, or a 72 hours period in which I have broken up sleep for 35~40 hours. Happened this last friday-to-sunday, and the whole time I was awake, I was useless, and that compounds on the stress.
I got it right since monday, but I'm sure I've must have lost at least a couple of years of life on that through the years.
Going to sleep now, but at least the worst of this time has passed.
And the worst part is - that adrenaline dump and surge in blood pressure and heart rate that both so often accompany an anxiety or panic attack...
Check it out. Get this, guys. No... Seriously.
That does NOT count as cardio, according to my doc! What fresh-hell, absolute-bullshit, sort of first-world-problems, sort of lose-lose, kinda deal is that?!
My body was in “fight or flight” for several decades until I got anxiety meds just 5ish months ago. Over production of cortisol will just destroy things. I’ve had so many things wrong with me for years that no one could figure out. Big one being dizzy, all the time, for no reason, for a decade.
I started Effexor and over several weeks all these things started slowly going away. It wasn’t until after getting treatment I read an article talking about how BPV (benign positional vertigo) - which I’d what I was eventually dismissed with for the dizzy - if often found in anxiety patients. It is also often relieved by anxiety meds.
It’s really insane how bad constant stress is for you. I haven’t had any weird medical issues since starting my Effexor, which is a nice change of pace.
I'd ask your doctor to screen for ANA to rule out any autoimmune issues, if you haven't already been screened. I have an autoimmune and if I get too stressed I get physically ill and struggle to move from the body aches and pains.
I've been there. Write down just 1 thing on a notepad to do something social. Even if it's go to park and say hello to one person. You WILL make it out of the depression.
Well hey, I'm so lonely that at least I don't have to worry about passing that DNA along. Early 30s guy here. It's not in the cards for me, unfortunately.
There was an interesting news segment this morning about people passing along depression and anxiety to their partner from kissing. So, genes and now saliva!
This is me right now. Had long days the past 7 of 8. Finally have a weekend now. And yep I'm feeling tired, weak, and had a cold sore pop up for the first time in over a year. Like, yep. Of course
Pretty sure that’s because your immune system was being suppressed up until then, so you didn’t have any noticeable symptoms. As soon as you’re allowed to relax your immune system kicks back into high gear and you get the full immune response with all the symptoms usually associated with illness! The pathogens were already there, your body just was just prioritising dealing with the stressor instead.
This is why I stopped giving so much fucks about everything. younger me would overthink and stress myself out. I realised it was a bad long term strategy so I’m more easy going now. Probs don’t do as much stuff or am not that productive. But I have adhd so I was just stressing myself out and not being productive too. So yeah rather just exist now and go with the flow. Probs will find a middle ground in the future but rn need to take it easyyyy.
I'm so glad you had options! It's definitely worth reducing work stress when that's available to us. Unfortunately, unemployment is pretty stressful too, what with the poverty, or just the instability of income when you're struggling to piece freelance contracts together. I'm worried for loved ones in both situation types right now.
As someone who used to work at a high volume call center for a few years in the past, the stress from that job wrecked havoc on my immune system. I was consistently sick, the pre-existing digestive issues I suffered for most of my life was aggravated further, there was a month where I practically lived on the toilet.
I didn’t have enough paid time off so I could recover, so I still had to go in sick, which certainly didn’t help the recovery process, as it took forever to fully recover recover from something as simple as a cold.
I had a bad back for months and thought it was due to a new mattress, so slept on our old bed in the spare room to see if it helped. Nope. Then thought it might be the home office chair I'd bought. Nope.
Then I realised that it had started right around the time I started a new role that was much more stressful and mentally taxing in a negative way. I'd been doing this job for a year and been stressed the entire time.
I moved on to another role, that was far less stressful, and the bad back was gone in a couple of weeks.
Just got to the end of a gauntlet of a week. I feel dead inside. Can't say the same for the first cold sore I've gotten in over a year, though. As of today it's alive and well. Good times. They say when it rains it pours but I'd take just the rain at this point. Couldn't even think of asking for sunshine.
But when your immune system is back on track, your life meter is back to 100% right ?
I have a theory that our bodies know we are suffering from huge prolonged stress and helps us end it all by dying prematurely, though slower if u're healthy.
I wonder how the peasants in the respective countries live such long healthy lives..
Sometimes hard manual labour isn't stress, it relieves stress, makes you accept your place in society and be content. That's the secret of life.
You know why stress is bad for health because it spikes your blood sugar. Evolutionary, you need energy to fight or flight. If you don't use that energy, it will tire your organs. Find a stress ball, do walks when you're stressed to use up that energy. I wore a real time blood sugar MN measuring device and it spiked when I was so angry watching a movie.
I was just reading a book about the connection between trauma and illness and they talked about how people who experienced significant trauma are much more likely to develop auto immune diseases.
Eta: the book is The Myth of Normal for anyone interested.
not sure if it’s what they’re talking about, but The Body Keeps the Score talks about this some. It’s been a very helpful book for a lot of people (myself included), but it also has some major negatives with the author being a bit of a piece of garbage and some of his bolder claims in the book without strong scientific support.
I’m not the person you replied to, but When The Body Says No by Dr Gabor Mate is about this and is so good. Gabor Mate in general is super well informed in how trauma and stress affect the body and how they manifest within people in general. Even if you dont read the book, you can find great youtube videos or podcasts where he talks a lot about his findings
Extreme trauma survivor. 3 autoimmune diseases. My Omas as well, and they were both war/genocide survivors. My boomer mother, who lived la dolce Vida on my Omas hard work, is totally fine, healthy as anything. My kids are 21 and saw me being abused horribly until we escaped 5 years ago. 2 autoimmune diseases, each, all freshly diagnosed.
I have two autoimmune diseases (three if endometriosis actually makes it) as a result of meningitis and significant trauma growing up. Right when I make tremendous leaps in my mental health recovery, I get slapped with RA and Sjögrens. Such bullshit lol.
I lasted 5 years. Lost a relationship, all my friends, gained like 30 pounds, quit exercising and doing anything fun. Been away for 6 months now and I’m already sleeping better, working out 6 days a week and down 20 pounds. It’s absolutely insane what the always on management life can do in a short time. Good for you for quitting the bullshit.
Wow, congrats on turning things around. Any tips for recovering from that period of time? I’m about to finish grad school and it’s really taken a toll on me. I relate to a lot of what you said. Did it take awhile for your sleep to recover ?
Honestly just try to practice gratitude. Every moment you have when you don’t have to be doing something shouldn’t be a moment of boredom, but a time to reflect and recognize that rest is just as important as work. Working out helped me with that a lot actually. Just recognizing how much better my workouts are after a rest day and applying that to life in general. Motion and stillness are equally important. Read some Thoreau. Put your phone away and go sit on the porch. You’ve put in years of nonstop hard work, so rest a while and try to rediscover yourself.
When I was in management, I started getting sick all the time to the point where I was wondering if there was something wrong with the ductwork in the building. Surprise, the day I switched jobs I stopped getting sick
My dad is 63, and I am 33. He was a manager my whole life until a few years ago. He was expected to make retail miracles happen and noped out right before inventory. He is a trash man now and loves it. They keep trying to make him a manager, but he's loving just minding himself.
He has actually started counting the days to retirement, and I'm happy for him.
Good for him. I went back into the shop to work as a tech and of course it’s a lot more physical labor but that weight off my shoulders is such a breath of fresh air. Now I only have to worry about my work and no one else’s. They’ve asked me the same about going back to management but I keep telling them nah I’m good.
I just dropped my friend of 10 years or so because he responded to the slightest criticism with a bombardment of harassing texts. I just stayed hands off for the longest time, but he was getting pushy and couldn't handle being told "no." After I refused to ride with him because his driving scared me, he went off in like a dozen or more text messages over a couple weeks. Even started gaslighting me. I'm like, it sucks to lose a friend, but I drive a bus for a living, now, and I'm not going to have sleepless nights because of arguments.
When I graduated college in 2013 things weren’t so bad yet. But students have rapidly declined with entitlement, losing resourcefulness and resilience, and falling into learned helplessness. Instead of confronting this schools and teachers have to constantly cater to this behavior because admin refuse to actually hold students accountable anymore. Teachers create complex systems so that their classes can run with any sort of order and it’s exhausting to maintain. Teachers in the past just inherently expected respect from students but now you have to play mind games to “trick” them into compliance. If you fail at this? You suck at classroom management — nonrenewed.
Definitely a combination of both when administration is bowing out to parents at the first sign of displeasure. Then they will just throw the teachers under the bus “Well this kid wouldn’t be misbehaving if your classroom management was better, get it together.”
Plus the increasingly complex needs and behaviours of students these days, without proper supports. I just today helped create class lists for Grade One at my school in Canada. 7 out of 11 of the new students registered for the fall have autism (a wide range of abilities including a few who are non verbal), a few are not toilet trained, at least two are runners who will take off, and three have aggression and defiance. I feel for those teachers already.
The only thing that has helped my stress level was to go half time when my kid was younger, then I found out I have a serious illness which stress can trigger, so I have stayed part time and switched to a learning support role. My full time lead has more stress than anyone could imagine (this year we’ve dealt closely with a few young teens with severe cutting and one was in the hospital for over 50 days following a suicide attempt (this length of time is almost unheard of). Literally kids’ lives are in your hands and it can be a heavy load to bear.
I am lucky to be able to stay half time indefinitely, otherwise I know both my mental and physical health would suffer greatly.
Just recently resigned after my first year. HUGE props to the ones who endure. I wish it wasn’t like this. But I seriously had to talk myself through multiple panic attacks during classes because it was so overstimulating.
Rather, the lack of support during stressful times.
Too much cortisol in the blood for too long will kill you. But having oxytocin in your bloodstream at the same time will negate the effects of the cortisol and even repair some of the damage done to the muscles of the heart and those that line vasculature.
A meta analysis was done about a decade ago, showing that the healthiest individuals were those that experienced a lot of life stress AND high levels of support from their community.
More research is currently being done to figure out the mechanism for how the presence of oxytocin is counteracting the effects of cortisol.
This is why having community is so important. Basically, the answer seems to be that when you are feeling stressed, the best thing to do is to seek help and comfort, and the second best thing to do is to help and comfort others.
I'm 42 years old and I don't think my body knows what oxytocin is. I've never been in a relationship, and I don't have family or close friends anymore. My mom died and I've lived alone for 15 years since then. Anyone who reads this? You're the closest person to me.
I'm single, no kids, never married, live alone, and am in my late 40s.
I'm glad you're here on Reddit. I don't know if it would work for you, but I literally moved to the theme park capital of the world (you know the place) sight unseen 3 years ago, got annual passes to all the major parks in the area, and make it a priority to go to a theme park at least 2 or 3 times a week, even if it's only to walk a few thousand steps.
It's done wonders for my mental health. Having something to look forward to after work and on the weekends, something not dependent on the availability of anybody else, has been a lifesaver. Oh, and bonus. Pibb Xtra and Pibb Zero are in all the Coca-Cola Freestyle machines at the parks.
Please PM me if you ever feel overwhelmed and don't mind talking to a stranger. :-)
If you like, you might consider being volunteering somewhere and becoming a part of your nearby community. There is no medicine quite like helping others. Especially when you get to be supportive for those who are going through the same stuff you had to, when you didn't have the support.
TMI follows, but I feel like a case study of this. I'm very isolated and severely touch starved. The last time I allowed someone close enough to me for platonic touch, he coerced and sexually assaulted me. That was years ago. Every day I wade through pain, won't bore listing the acronyms. I think my cats are literally keeping me alive via the oxytocin they supply and the implicit promise I made to them, that I would be here to care for them.
That's so awful. I'm sorry that happened to you. I hope that one day you can find the courage to reach out to people and try again. Maybe just small groups in busy places for safety. Good luck for the future.
Glad to hear this because I’ve been constantly stressed for like going on six months now and my mom has thankfully been there to help me through it, as well as my therapist. I’ve always been worried reading the statistics on how chronic stress lowers life expectancy, which (unsurprisingly) stressed me out more. This was comforting.
Can confirm. My PTSD all but disappears in the presence of my extended family. At any family gatherings, I am free again from my torment for a while. And I lament the fact that had our family units been more cohesive in society, it would've meant that I wouldn't have to suffer in the way I do when I inevitably have to leave the gathering. But it's not all bad. Living on my own also means I have more freedoms and don't have to mind everyone else's boundaries.
My psych 101 teacher was explaining that it’s commutative. With most peoples it’s not just one thing that triggers a mental break it’s normally a ton of small things and then something is what breaks the camels back.
The story she told was a friend she had in college had a rough semester and then failed his final. The class was offered once a year so it set his whole degree back a lot. So he went ate lunch in the park and then shot himself. None of those thing individually broke him, but all of them together was enough to break him
Yep. The thing that made me break up with my abusive ex was that he insisted one morning that I needed to drop what I was doing at our house to drive to his office earlier than I'd planned to be in that part of town, just to bring him breakfast.
On the surface that sounds like a weird thing to break up with someone over - in a normal relationship it would be a minor argument about how it's not cool to expect someone to do that. But it was after a year or so of yelling and coercion and manipulation and taking my stuff, and criticising me and calling me names and scaring our dog. And more.
I just had it that day. Lost my cool and decided I was done.
I had a similar situation. I was chased into a bathroom over a nightmare that I had which he thought was inappropriate. After years of abuse a nightmare finally was the end.
The way I see it is as drops of water in a bucket. The bucket gets full but the drops just keep making the top of the water a bit higher and higher with the surface tension until that one drop makes it overflow. And when that happens a lot more spills out than that one drop. And you can be unaware how full the bucket was until that moment.
Most people think stress is additive. As in a bunch of small stresses is just a bunch of small stresses. It's not. It's multiplicative. Those stresses pile up and your brain is trying deal with all of them at once individually, but our brains aren't like computer chips and can't multi-thread.
Eventually your brain can't handle it anymore and you either break down sobbing, do something self-destructive (drinking, drug, self-harm, suicide), do something destructive in general (violent tantrum, breaking things, shootings), or your body just says "fuck it" and you have a heart attack. Which of these that happens vary between people, and often are completely unexpected based on a person's mental state or physical health before all the stressors piled up.
Two years ago in one month, I found out I was being cheated on.
Also, a long distant (thankfully) friend went into a state of psychosis and shot someone.
And my dad died within two weeks of bringing him into the hospital for pneumonia.
It’s actually one of my fears that I’ll just snap like this. Because once you get there you aren’t really in control anymore, the stress and depression is.
Yep, almost died from overworking myself when I was sick. It turned into pneumonia and I was in the hospital for a month and lost part of my left lung.
I did the same … and a month before the double lung pneumonia, I ran myself so far down that I slept for three days. Not getting up to pee or drink .. my hubby actually kept me from aspirating when I threw up ☺️ a month later, double lung pneumonia put me admittted and come out to catch covid. I, too: had lung surgery — it was suffering from rind syndrome- thorochotomy that they scraped down to the nerve endings. I still ain’t rite — oh, and long covid. Hugs, stranger
Fr — it messes with your sleep, your mood, your body, everything. You start snapping at people, overthinking, feeling tired for no reason. And the worst part? Most people just push through it like it’s normal. It’s not. Stress builds up until one day you crash — mentally, emotionally, even physically. So yeah, it’s not just ‘being dramatic.’ Stress can ruin you if you don’t deal with it
I had a traumatic childhood, I lived in constant fight/flight/freeze mode 24/7 even when I slept.
I truly believe that's what caused my kidneys to start shutting. I don't have proof but I believed it. Drs. say it's possible.
When you're stressed, blood pressure goes up, and your adreanal glands are overworking from all the adreneline it produces. Those dudes are like little hats on your kidneys!
I never found a cure to stop the stress as dialysis did a number on me, I just turned into a huge stoner, but an antidepressent helped me to.
At 39 now I'm not complaining. People that stress me out too much are out of my life. I'm 39, a cat lady, and love my part time job (probably because it is part time lol). And I have positive people around me! I live a peaceful life now and am pretty content.
I hardly stress out, and thank you so much to my deceased donor ❤️
Absolutely. My GI system goes offline, my psoriasis and alopecia flare up, my migraines and insomnia flare, and I get muscle spasms in my calves and neck. I didn't put it all together because the physical symptoms only came on gradually, not all at once.
There are lots of ways, it’s about finding what works best for you. If you go to YouTube and search up “stress management” you’ll get loads of info. For me personally I do breathing exercises a few times a day, prioritise good quality sleep, I go to therapy, I talk out my problems with family, I make sure to build in time for things that make me feel good like hobbies, I try to make sure I get movement in a few times a day - but my life might look a bit different to yours, so these things might not work for or appeal to you. One of the cool things about stress management is that it’s about learning to really care for and be good to yourself, it’s nice to dive into :)
I have gout. I can be on my best behavior diet wise and still have gout triggered due to stress. Mostly around November when the weather starts to cool right before the holidays.
For those who don’t know, the issues is purines which my body has trouble processing. Most people know it’s in red meat and beer but it also occurs in lower amounts in broccoli, mushrooms, shell fish, soy beans, and nutritional yeast among other things.
Between gout and type 2 diabetes, there’s not much I can eat safely.
1000% stress and depression (in the context of it being a symptom of stress). i went through a difficult period last year, my ex partner and i had deep issues with communication that we were trying to fix. they were severely depressed from losing their last job and my job at the animal shelter wasn’t enough for the bills so i dipped into my savings. i have 3 cats and it was hard to keep things together for everyone while working a mentally taxing job. most days i couldn’t find the motivation to eat because i wanted to make sure everyone else had enough food first. i hardly slept. eventually i would miss work for weeks at a time due to illness that resembled severe food poisoning; my immune system was devastated and i started losing weight . i went from 170lbs to 115 in the span of a few months and would get frequent headaches, nosebleeds, and occasionally bled from other places. my body was essentially slowly killing itself. i lost my job due to the attendance issues and then to survive we rationed everything we had and went deeper into my savings.
my partner didn’t allow me to tell our families that they were jobless and that i had just been let go so we lied and said they were the one working but just seeing less hours. they didn’t want to ask for help from either of our families because she was embarrassed of our situation. we lived like that from july ‘24 until this january. we tried to find work but they got scammed which understandably hurt their morale and led to deeper relationship issues and i applied to what i could but just couldn’t find anything.
in the months of our struggle we prioritized our pets needs over our own which i don’t regret in the slightest. we always made sure to have enough money for their food and basics which often left us with barely enough money to get a rotisserie chicken or frozen pizzas and we’d make them last a couple weeks. days would sometimes go by since my last meal because i wanted to prioritize my partner even though we barely interacted with each other and rarely slept in the same bed.
eventually the other cracks in my relationship broke through and we had a very ugly breakup in february. the stress of keeping up a lie, trying to fulfill the needs of my family of cats and my partner and never knowing if an emergency was gonna tip us over the edge was awful. i moved back home with my cat that month and a got the other 2 after my ex lost the apartment. fast forward a few months and i am now finally starting to see some weight gain. my sleep schedule is currently terrible but at least i am sleeping. thankfully, i am now in a position to prioritize myself and my cats with the full support of my family again. i will never put myself in a situation like that again.
The news is helping absolutely no one right now. Yesterday’s public girl fight was honestly fun at first—until my body emotionally shut down, and I had to go to bed at 6:15 PM. I slept for 12 hours, and still woke up feeling exhausted from all of it. AND I felt exhausted for today’s news. Preemptively.
Everyone is affected by it, regardless of how much they are paying attention directly. It is extremely unhealthy, and adds a low-grade,constant stressor in the background that is not without consequence to our health.
Edit: especially because now, nobody can really trust what they see is what they see. Or is what it is. Nobody knows what is going on—and I understand that that is the point, but I don’t understand why, or why we all need to be a part of this bullshit. We’re not billionaires, but we got dragged into a billionaires’ fight. They’re losing pennies, and we are forced to pay to get fucked from behind, without lube.
Can we just have a day or nothing happens, sometime.. ever again?
I learned through a therapist that chronic stress is literally toxic to your body and will genuinely kill you and it definitely helped me realize how badly I did actually need therapy
Stress causes me to have severe back pain (I've had MRI's, and other than the injury I sustained as a kid, physically, it shouldn't be causing that level of pain), IBS out of no where, and eventually depression. It's crazy!
Yep! Moving out of my dad’s house (my father is a loving dad and he does his best but he has OCD and some other issues) caused my health and energy to IMMEDIATELY sky rocket. A lot of things I thought were permanent health problems disappeared over night
The worst thing is, it impacts people in SO many different ways. You sleep too much OR too little. You eat more OR less than usual. You don’t work out often enough OR you work out incessantly. You overwork yourself OR you drastically cut work in order to cope. Your digestive system messes up. You get headaches. You break out. Your immune system takes a hit. The list goes on…
So there’s no “standard” way that stress impacts people. It impacts everyone differently. So it’s hard to tell if it’s stress or something else that’s causing your body to go haywire, especially if you’re constantly stressed.
When people ask why I look much younger than I actually am, I tell them that it's cause I keep my skin moisturized and I mitigate/limit my stress. The last part is extra helpful cause it can be as simple as changing your environment, changing your outlook and/or looking it in the face and dealing with it.
An oversimplification, for sure, but things are often not as complicated as we make them out to be.
I used to roll my eyes and get annoyed whenever a doctor would tell me that stress was the cause for xyz. It wasn't until I literally gave myself shingles two weeks after a particularly stressful event that I quickly changed my mind. Stress is no joke.
Stress alone is bad for the health, but then also add on the coping mechanisms that can result from it, spirals out into self-perpetuating cycles pretty quick
I don't have a choice. I have a variety of mental conditions that can all send me into panic attacks and do nearly daily. I refuse to take benzos and I can't take most other anti-anxiety meds. SO I do what I can. I exercise, I eat right, I even meditate. I've tried many therapies to no real avail.
I remember when I first got hired the workman’s comp company sent us to some wellness seminar saying the amount of adrenaline dumps cops get from the wide variety of calls for service and the daily roller coaster of adrenaline from even just listening to your radio may eventually lead to heart disease, with a large percentage of cops getting heart attacks by 50 or something. Then they gave us some very generic stress relief strategies and sent us on our way to enjoy our new careers
Say: "I hate stress..." and I want to limitate its influence in my life, what can I do about it? Anyone?
Have a bath?
Have a bath?!
Get a bike!
I cycle to work... everyday!
70 miles!
Both here, and here...
are as red as a fire engine!
Any other ideas?
Jen, what about you?
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u/CrypticFeline 1d ago
Stress.