Murdock 1

Eleanor Murdock

Dr. Cassel

English Comp 2

19 November 2019

Stressful Situation

Imagine walking and the next thing in front of you is a tiger, staring into your

eyes ready to pounce. You are terrified and you can feel your heart drop, feeling

every beat of your pumping heart pulsating in your head. Your body flooding with

hormones speeding up your breathing, minimizing bleeding, stopping digestion. This

situation is requiring instantaneous reaction, no second to think about what you are

going to do, kicking in your ‘flight or flight’ reaction. Preparing you to make a

decision here and now.

Everyone experiences stress at some point in their life, no matter how small

or large, everyone is going to be affected, but there is not only “one path” when

it comes how to react to stress. When considering the question, “How does stress

affect your mind and body?” there is a lot of research behind it. Stress doesn't

just affect a person in the short term but it can have harmful long term effects

that could impact your future.

Stress is such a common word that it is placed into out vocabulary without

thinking about what it really means. Same with the words depression and anxiety,
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they have all been exploited into our daily conversation making it seem like its a

normal thing that every has when really it’s a disorder that is something serious.

For how much the word stress is used, it has only been around for about 50

years. Medical student Hans Selye observed many patients exhibiting the same

symptoms where they all “looked sick” but had different diseases and this was

the first step in recognition of “stress”.

Many people use the saying “don't stress” to try to calm people down but

unless you are in their position you don't understand how those words hit them

and impact them. In all of history stress has been used as a defence mechanism

to face against hard times and protect your well being. Hans Selye in 1956

described stress as a physiological response pattern that he explained with his

general adaptation syndrome model which describes stress as the dependant

variable and includes three concepts consisting of stress being a defence

mechanism, explaining that stress follows the three stages of alarm, resistance, and

exhaustion and says that if stress is prolonged or severe it can result in diseases

of adaptation or in some cases death. He later introduced the idea that the stress

response can also result in positive and negative outcomes based on physiological

experience. When we are experiencing stress, it's our body sending out signals as

a reaction to harmful situations. Stress is generally a chemical reaction that

occurs in your body in a way to help prevent an injury. The general name for
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this trigger is “fight or flight”; during this your heart rate increases, your

breathing quickens, muscles tighten, and your blood pressure rises as a way to

protect yourself. As humans, our bodies are equipped to handle small doses of

stress, but we are not meant to handle long term stress without consequences.

The brain is one of the most valuable parts of your body not only physically

but menatly too. Most people see stress just as an effect of an event that causes

stress but it is so much more. Stress is a response, stimulus, and a transaction. In

any of these situations, your amygdala sends distress signals to the hypothalamus

gland which is almost like the control center of your mind which connects with

the rest of your body sending signals to say what to do and how to react. When

you experience stress your body releases cortisol and in high amounts it can wear

down the ability of the brain to function properly and can disrupt the synaptic

regulation making an inability to interact with others at a normal level. These

factors and hormones released can cause a death of brain cells and even reduction

of the brain as a whole, especially in the prefrontal cortex which is responsible

for your memory production and learning abilities. When the prefrontal cortex in

decreased in size it causes an increase of the amygdala making you more

susceptible to stress, sending out more signals and creating a never ending vicious

loop, unable to escape. The release of these hormones and signals may not seem

too bad in small amounts, but an accumulation of them and in large quantities
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they can impact your brain development and change your perception, making you

susceptible to depression, anxiety, and personality disorders, impacting your life

for good.

Stress is good for you in general because it keeps you alert, motivated, and

in a prime position to respond to danger. Yet, too much stress and chronic stress

is a key factor in leading to major depression is susceptible people. The lead

stress researcher and chief of neuroendocrine immunology at the National

Institute of Mental Health, Esther Sternberg, MD says that even positive events,

such as marriage or a new job can be stressful and lead to major depression.

About 10 percent of people suffer from depression without the leading trigger of

a stressful event. For anyone living with depression, chronic or not, any impactful

event in your life can still lead to major depression through an overactivity of the

bodies stress response.

Anxiety is one of the leading reactions to stress, they can connect hand in

hand interfering with your daily life. Causing you to avoid situations due to

irrational fears, constant worrying, and experiencing anxiety due to a specific

event. When the two are in overload together it can cause you to develop heart

disease, high blood pressure, diabetes, and even panic disorders.

When you are faced with stress on an everyday cycle there is a lot that can

happen because that is very unhealthy. It can cause you to act or say things

without thinking leading to some personality disorders without you even realizing.
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It may cause you to be susceptible to disregarding others feelings, lack of

remorse, aggressiveness, unstable self-image, up and down moods, and stress

related paranoia which can lead to Antisocial Personality Disorder or Borderline

Personality Disorder, and some others. These are just some of the factors of how

your brain and mental state can be affected by high levels of stress and chronic

stress.

While the brain is very important in your being, the body is an important

factor in your well being. Stress hormones may seem to only affect the brain but

quite the contrary. Stress is just as harmful on your physical state. Stress doesn't

not only impair your cognitive function but it can also lead to a higher risk of

heart disease, high blood pressure, and diabetes. Your digestive system can start

to shut down, and even cause incapability of conceiving children in the future.

Your immune system has a likelihood of being impared and exacerbate an pre-

existing illnesses. Stress doesn't only weaken your body but can cause death of

organs or extreme pain prohibiting your way of living. Changing not only your

higher states of risk with diseases and disorders, such as insomnia or heart attack

or stroke but it causes low energy, loss of sexual desire, clenched jaw, constant

shaking, and pains all over your body. The effects of stress on the body are

endless and impact everyone differently but they can prohibit and inhibit a lot in

your body in ways it shouldn't. When faced with chronic stress you should be

concerned about cardiovascular diseases, head and brain problems, gastrointestinal

troubles,
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and reproductive capabilities that can all impact your life and future in negative

ways.

In your body the heart and blood vessels comprise the two elements that

work together in providing nourishment and oxygen to the organs. These two

elements are also in coordination with the body's response to stress and when

your stress hormones are released it causes an increase in heart rate and stronger

contractions of the heart muscle and your blood vessels that direct blood to the

heart dilate, increasing the amount of blood pumped. With chronic stress though,

you have a higher likelihood of hypertension, heart attack or stroke, or

inflammation in the circulatory system. There is also a lot to be worried about

for postmenopausal women. For premenopausal women their levels of estrogen

help blood vessels respond better during stress but after menopause you lack that

estrogen putting you at a greater risk of heart disease.

Stress is a common factor for migraines between day to day life you face

stressful factors such as balancing work, family, and social times you become

more susceptible to often headaches. Especially when you are stressed and are

unable to sleep properly, not allowing your body to fully recharge the way it

needs to. Then you become more stressed when you can't sleep but you can't

sleep because you are stressed and the headaches make everything even more

difficult, and yet it is a constant loop. Never ending leading to potentially things

like insomnia or sleep apnea which can affect you for all your life.
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Your gut has millions of tiny neurons that function independently but they

also are in constant communication with each other and the brain and when your

stress hormones are released it “talks” with your gut giving you those ‘butterflies’

that you get when you are nervous. This can also trigger things like pain and

bloating too reacting with the bacteria in your gut influencing your brain and

mood. You also tend to eat more or less which can cause large amounts of

heartburn and may be severe enough to cause acid reflux and vomiting. Your

stomach and esophagus are largely affected by the fact that your muscles go into

spasm and contraction which can cause large problems of indigestion.

Stress can also greatly impact your reproductive system and sex drive in the

long run making it hard for you in the future, for not only females but makes

too. For males, chronic stress over an extended amount of time can affect your

tesosterone levels bringing a decline in your sex drive and can even cause erectile

disfunction or impotence, potentially negativly impacting your sperm production

making it difficult for couples trying to concieve. For females, high levels of

stress may cause absent or irregular menstrual cycles or more painful periods. It

can also greatly affect the health of the mother and child during pregnancy.

Depression caused from stress is the leading complication of pregnancy and

postpartum adjustment for pregnant mothers. As for after menopause, women who

are more stressed and anxious, they may experience an increased number of hot

flashes or more intense hot flashes. Both males and females are susceptible to
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reproductive diseases as well causing a lot of problems for them and their future

children.

The mind and body work in constant unison together but when stress affects

one it is going to have negative effects on the other. Many people live with the

idea that stress is only a factor on your mental state but it is so much more. Not

many people realize the true effects of how stress really is impacting your mind

and body. Many live with the idea that if they have depression or anxiety, it is

just something that they have to deal with, and yes it is, but they might not

know where it originated from. Depression can be caused from many things but

chronic stress is one of those big factors, same thing with cases of anxiety. Small

amounts of stress and stressing factors aren't going to be the end of the world,

and the younger you are the easier your body is going to be able to bounce back

from whatever it goes through. But, large amounts of anything is going to be

unsafe, that's including stress. Many live with stress on the daily, but living with

chronic stress can be scary for many people and can cause a lot more damage,

pain, and ‘badness’ than good.

Stress truly is apart of life whether you like it or not but it's not about

getting rid of it but how you handle it in the long run. You may not be able to

stop it because you never know when it is going to hit but you can learn how to

prepare for it when it occurs, and that starts with understanding your symptoms

and try things to help you cope with it until you find something that sticks. This
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might not be the easiest thing for everyone but the smartest thing you can do for

yourself is figuring out what you can do and what others can do to help, because

living your life with chronic stress is going to impact you hard before you even

realize it.
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