{"id":850,"date":"2017-07-18T23:30:41","date_gmt":"2017-07-18T23:30:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/drellireilander.com\/?p=850"},"modified":"2018-07-25T16:32:23","modified_gmt":"2018-07-25T16:32:23","slug":"how-stressed-out-are-you","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/drellireilander.com\/index.php\/2017\/07\/18\/how-stressed-out-are-you\/","title":{"rendered":"How Stressed Out Are You?"},"content":{"rendered":"

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I was recently invited to speak at Mother Nature’s Market<\/a> to members of the community on the topic of stress. \u00a0I was really excited because stress is something that almost all of my patients are struggling with (whether they know it or not) and it impacts so many parts of our health and wellbeing. The challenge can be figuring out how much stress is impacting your health then, what to do about it!<\/p>\n

According to Statistics Canada, 1 in 4 Canadians perceive that most of their days are “quite” to “extremely” stressful. That’s a lot of stress! And those are just the people who recognize that their lives are stressful. A lot of people are so busy keeping their heads above water they often don’t even recognize the constant stress they’re enduring. Stress isn’t just word we use to describe how busy and chaotic the world is; it’s a physiologic process that affects our entire body.<\/p>\n

Understanding Stress<\/h2>\n

Stress starts in our brain – when we perceive a threat, our brains use chemical signals to tell our bodies how to respond. This cascade of signals is called the hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis. Ultimately, to escape the threat, the brain wants to flood the body with stress hormones (epinephrine, norepinephrine, and cortisol). These hormones produced from our adrenal glands give us instant energy and optimize our bodies for survival and physical performance. We call this the “fight or flight” (sympathetic) response. This state is extremely important for survival – if you were being chased by a bear in the woods, you would rely on this flood of adrenaline to save your life.<\/p>\n

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So, what’s the problem?<\/h4>\n

The problem is that, in our modern society, we are not usually encountering the occasional bear in the woods but we are now under constant, low-grade, stimulation and stress. When stress levels stay high we don’t allow our bodies to return to a normal “rest and digest” (parasympathetic) state. It’s in this state that our bodies can heal, sleep, and digest our food. This means that if we are constantly in “fight or flight” we may experience insomnia, fatigue, blood sugar issues, infertility, weight gain or loss, and poor digestion. \u00a0Long term exposure to high stress (specifically cortisol) the HPA axis becomes dysfunctional. Chronic HPA dysfunction (aka “adrenal fatigue”) can have major health implications including diabetes, heart disease, low thyroid function, and autoimmune diseases.<\/p>\n

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