Is It Really True That Stress Is Bad For Our Health?

It is frequently said that stress is not good for us, however there are occasions on which stress might in fact be beneficial.

Doctors have known for some time that stress can affect your health but we are only now starting to fully understand precisely how stress can affect the body. Many of the myths surrounding stress, such as the fact that stress may cause ulcers, are at last being exposed while others are now being confirmed.

Many of the obvious affects of stress such as, muscle tension, hypertension, a rapid heartbeat, headaches and digestive problems are easily recognized and well known, but there are also a few longer-term and potentially serious conditions which can be produced by chronic stress.

Studies which have been done at the National Institutes of Health and elsewhere for example strongly suggest that stress affects the body's immune system. Interestingly these very studies also show that the affect can be both good and bad.

As one particular definition of stress is that it is simply an individual's 'fight or flight' response to an apparent threat, it can have a positive affect. It can, for example, set off the release of chemicals which help heal infections from bites. That makes sense if you consider just how evolution may have tailored the body's immune system to deal with these problems.

But, when this particular response persists over a long time period, the affects may be harmful and one result is that the body's immune system becomes less effective resulting in a higher susceptibility to infection and a reduced resistance to flu and other viral illnesses.

Another result is a general feeling of tiredness and sometimes depression. If a person is stressed for long periods then a feedback loop develops between the cause of the stress (the belief that it is not possible to find a solution for the problem which is causing the stress) and its affects. This results in a cycle where your belief becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Chronic stress may also have an influence on your health by compromising you circulatory system. If stress hormones released as a result of the 'fight or flight' trigger are not depleted by {some form of physical activity such as fighting off infection|the physical activity of, for example, fighting off infection then they can lead to actual physiological stress on the body.

Hypertension increases the pressure on the walls of blood vessels and can result in tiny tears arising in the blood vessels. If the body then reacts to heal these micro-tears, scar tissue is usually produced and this lowers the flow of blood through these vessels.

When stress levels are very high or persist for long enough then heart attacks may occur. The likelihood of heart attack is also increased in older individuals or in individuals who carry certain genetic characteristics. With a narrowing of the blood vessels, the heart may well be unable to deliver enough blood and oxygen at moments of high demand.

It has also been known for a long time that stress can worsen the affects of rheumatoid arthritis and this is now also explained by the affect which stress has on the immune system as there is a well documented and proven connection between rheumatoid arthritis and the body's immune system.

Avoiding stress is vital for all of us to maintain good health and, fortunately, as we gain a better knowledge of stress we are also developing some extremely successful stress relief techniques.

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