Stress is the mother of all modern illnesses

By Abdul Mujeeb Khan Clinical Psychologist

Stress effects every one of us in different levels. A high level of stress is that phenomenon which we call “modern plague”. Today’s world’s high volume of information influx in our lives along with technology advancement brings tremendous psychological pressure in our minds. On one hand, our world is faced with crisis such as poverty and serious health hazards, while on the other hand, material gains and a desire to supersede each other in every field would even deprive us of the chance to ponder over all these elements, which are bound to adversely affect our psychological health. Every day bombardment of advertisement of new products promises to make our lives easier than ever before but at the same time, it is creating a ‘rat race culture where our social problems have gotten more complicated. High level of stress is not only harmful to our physical health but it affects greatly our mental health. While one can’t just remove stress in his/her day-to-day life completely, however, with conscious efforts, he/she can bring down the level of stress in his/her life.

Hans Selye, the first researcher on stress, was able to trace exactly what happens in our body during stress. He found that any problem, imagine or real, can cause the cerebral cortex (thinking part of the brain) to send an alarm to hypothalamus (the main switch for the stress response located in the mid brain). The hypothalamus then stimulates the sympathetic nerves system to make a series of changes in our body. Your heart rate, breathing rate, muscles tension, metabolism, and blood pressure all increases. Your hands and feet get cold as blood is directed away from your extremities and digestive system into the larger muscle that can help you fight or run. You experience butterflies in your stomach. Your diaphragm and your anus lock. Fortunately, the same mechanism that turns the stress response on can turn it off. This is called the relaxation response. As soon as you decide that the situation is no longer dangerous, your brain stops sending emergency signals to your brain stem, which in turn ceases to send panic messages to your nervous system. Three minutes after you shut off, the danger signals the fight or flight response burnout. Your metabolism, heart rate, breathing rate, muscle tension, and blood pressure all return to normal levels. In the 19th century, many researchers on stress focused on internal bodily changes due to external factors. For example financial crisis, unemployment, work place stress, divorce, etc., are environmental factors which damage greatly our internal body mechanism.

In the past 60 years, researchers are constantly trying to find the relationship between stress and physical illnesses. Their findings suggest that different people get to be effected by stress differently. For example, chronic stress can result in muscle tension and fatigue for some people. For others, it can contribute to stress hypertension, migraine, headache, ulcers, or chronic diarrhea. Stress not only effects badly our” immune system” but almost every system in our body. Suppression of the reproduction system can cause amenorrhea (cessation of menstruation) and failure to ovulate in women, impotency in men, and loss of sexual desire in both. Stress-triggered changes in lungs increase the symptoms of asthma, bronchitis, and other respiratory conditions. Loss of insulin during the stress response may be a factor in the onset of adult diabetes. Stress suspends tissue repair and remodeling, which in turn causes decalcification of the bones, osteoporosis, and susceptibility to fractures. A prolonged stress response can worsen conditions such as arthritis, chronic pain, and Heart disease.

Psychologically, stress produces many disorders, i.e., “Anxiety” in which a person is always preoccupied with fearful thoughts that something bad is going to happen, sleep disorder, etc. “Depression” is another example of stress response in which someone loses his/her interest in every thing and he/she may have wishes for death. Fortunately, in the past many years, behavioral scientists have discovered many techniques which help individuals for stress elimination, such as psychotherapy, stress management training, relaxation therapy, worry control training, and coping skills. The magnitude of the effects on us of the ‘Mother of all modern illnesses’ is largely depends upon how we think, behave, act, and react.
(Source: The Relaxation & Stress Reduction Workbook, 5th Ed by Marth Davis, Ph.D. and colleague)

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Saeed Ahmed Consultants Sdn Bhd