I can’t tell you how many articles I read about stress putting you at an increased risk for something –whether it be heart disease, obesity, diabetes, cancer, food allergies, autoimmune disorders, hormone imbalance, and the list goes on.  If we haven’t figure it out by now it might be time we start with some of the basics.  We all know how highly prevalent stress is in a society where we put so much emphasis and pressure on ourselves: to be the best in school, an amazing athlete or pianist, to be the skinniest, top of your profession, have a lucrative job, to have the perfect family, to buy a large home, raise your children in an affluent neighborhood..  Its a matter of how we handle the stress.

When you experience stress, your adrenal glands produce large quantities of cortisol — the stress hormone — but in turn this affects other processes in your body.  These include one’s ability to metabolize glucose levels, which in turn relates to storing fat, in addition to affecting your sex hormones, metabolism, etc.  When one continues to experience stress, they continue to produce cortisol, which only prolongs this chain effect.  As time goes on these minor issues can turn into much larger problems internally.

The truth is this stress we all talk about is killing us slowly.  Not to exaggerate but it might help us all to be a little more aware.  Is this pressure and stress we put on ourselves really worth it?

And then there is the issue of the millions of people on medication to treat stress and the myriad of problems it leads to…but I”ll save that for another post!