to everything from minor infections like colds and flu to serious and catastrophic conditions like cancer. Because the digestive system is suppressed during the fight-or-flight response, stress can cause constipation or diarrhea in the short term as well as long-term conditions like stomach ulcers and irritable bowel syndrome (IBS). Chronic stress can also cause acute muscle tension, such as headaches and muscular back pain, and it is a commonly cited trigger for chronic inflammatory conditions like fibromyalgia. Additionally, studies show that people suffering from chronic pain conditions like fibromyalgia are also especially prone to depression, adding psychological symptoms to physical pain. As the body ages, chronic stress can also open the Pandora’s box known as metabolic syndrome, which is a combination of conditions that includes hypertension, high blood sugar, high cholesterol, and excess belly fat. The cluster of conditions present with metabolic syndrome are generally believed to be more dangerous together than any one of them alone, and metabolic syndrome can be a precursor to heart attack, diabetes, and stroke. When we look at how common these conditions are in the U.S., it is easy to see the effects that stress has had on us as a population. A more subtle effect of long-term chronic stress is its role in accelerating the aging process, and the research on this phenomenon is not new. At a meeting of the American Geriatrics Society in 1970, Hans Selye presented research he had conducted on rats in which he concluded that aging is caused by stress—and not the other way around, as was previously believed (see References section for a link to the Abstract). Research conducted over the past decade points to stress having a damaging physiological effect as far down as the cellular level. Specifically, researchers are looking at the effects of stress on the length of telomeres, which are at the ends of the chromosomes in DNA. Elissa Epel had been conducting this kind of research at the University of California, San Francisco, Center for Aging, Metabolism and Emotion when she was interviewed for an article by the American Psychological Association. Dr. Epel stated: “Telomeres are a protective casing at the end of a strand of DNA. Each time a cell divides, it loses a bit of its telomeres. An enzyme called telomerase can replenish it, but chronic stress and cortisol exposure decrease your supply. When the telomere is too diminished, the cell often dies or becomes pro-inflammatory. This sets the aging process in motion, along with associated health risks.” (Lu, 2014) When you consider the attrition that chronic stress can induce, even at the level of our DNA, it is not difficult to comprehend that stress has reached epidemic proportions in the modern world. lower respiratory infections and tuberculosis. While there are many factors that contribute to these numbers, it is safe to say that in high-income countries, we are relatively protected from contagions, but we are not protected from our own lifestyle. The data can be interpreted to show that we are not catching the diseases that kill us; rather, we are causing them. Our advances and economic privileges haven’t made us any safer; rather, they have only afforded us the ability to make ourselves sick. For example, fast food, with all of its known health risks, would not exist if we were not in such a hurry, as is our cultural norm. The World Health Organization has also been credited with calling stress the “health epidemic of the 21st century.” Based on the data, it is not difficult to see why.
• Chronic muscle tension, pain, or inflammation (primarily manifesting as back pain) • Hypertension and heart disease • Digestive disorders • Weight gain or weight loss • Compromised immune health Effects of stress on the mind: • Anxiety • Inability to focus or retain information • Irritability • Depression • Poor or unsafe choices, including drug or alcohol abuse • Addiction Sleep is often the first function of the body to be affected by stress, as the hypothalamus that starts the fight-or-flight response is also responsible for regulating the circadian rhythm (the sleep–wake cycle), and the importance of the right amount of restorative sleep for physical and mental health cannot be overstated. Insomnia is a common problem, and without consistent, restorative sleep, the body loses its ability to heal and rebalance. Sleep deprivation prevents the immune system from making the tools it needs to function properly, it prevents the cardiovascular system from maintaining the health of its blood vessels and regulating blood pressure, and it prevents the endocrine system from producing enough of the right hormones and a surplus. A less common response to stress is hypersomnia, or excessive sleep, which is often associated with depression. Too much sleep, which can also occur under chronic stress at times when the demands cause someone to physically and psychologically shut down, can have equally negative effects on the body. Hypersomnia can increase the risk of obesity, heart disease, diabetes, and stroke. Though the effects may be different, both too little and too much sleep produce weaknesses in the body, making it susceptible to inflammation, infection, and disease. Optimal amounts of sleep are subjective and vary by age, lifestyle, and overall health, but without the right amounts of restorative sleep, the general health of the body deteriorates. The general health of the body is very dependent on sleep. Reflection Question #1: Know Your Numbers! How much sleep do you average per night? Keep a journal for one week logging how many hours per night you slept. Does it feel like enough? When stress is a chronic condition, the physiological and psychological effects of stress become cumulative and can eventually cause serious damage. A consistently compromised immune system will be more susceptible The stress epidemic A 2020 fact sheet compiled by the World Health Organization titled “The Top 10 Causes of Death” lists the recorded causes of death worldwide for 2019 (see Section 5: References for a link to this fact sheet). The information is presented in overall numbers, but it is also broken down by economic status. While noncommunicable diseases, like ischemic heart disease and stroke, accounted for 74% of deaths worldwide in 2019, those were two of the top three causes of death in high-income countries like the U.S., with ischemic heart disease at the top of the list. In fact, all but one of the causes of death for high-income countries were noncommunicable diseases. This is in stark contrast to the causes of death for low-income countries, which were primarily communicable, nutritional, or birth diseases, like
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