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September 2015 | Read this issue and more at www.healthandwellnessmagazine.net |
How Do Stressors
Affect Our Bodies?
It is important to keep
in mind that the human
body doesn’t discriminate
between major and minor
stressors.
It’s a natural reaction
to tough life events
By Dr. Tom Miller, Staff Writer
After centuries of attempting to
understand how stress effects the
body, 21st-century science suggests
stress is a natural physical and mental
reaction to life events that impacts our
health and wellbeing (Miller 2013).
The body responds to stress by releasing hormones and increasing heart
and breathing rates. When stressed,
the brain seeks more oxygen and neu-
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rotransmission, giving you an edge in
responding to a challenge. In the short
term, stress helps you cope with tough
situations in life. It can be triggered by
the pressures of everyday responsibilities at work and at home. As may be
expected, negative life events such as
divorce or the death of a loved one
cause higher levels of stress. So can
physical illness and trauma, whether
brought on by war, disaster or a violent attack. So many situations can
keep the body’s stress levels elevated
far longer than may be easily tolerated.
When the body is stressed, the
brain generates what is known as the
“fight or flight” response. The body
shifts all of its energy resources toward
fighting off a stressful life event or
fleeing from a stress perceived as too
great to manage. The adrenal glands
release hormones called adrenalin and
cortisol. These hormones result in the
heart beating faster and the respiration
rate increasing. The blood vessels in
the arms and legs dilate, the digestive
process changes and glucose levels in
the bloodstream increase to deal with
the emergency. Hungarian-born scientist Hans Sale studied this phenomenon called general adaptation syndrome and is credited with generating
a theoretical explanation of it.
Sale’s theory first appeared in the
respected British journal Nature.
He explained that the body passes
through three universal stages of coping. Initially in any stressful situation,
there is an alar H