Is Stress a Modern Disease

Stress is not something you can see like a cut or a bruise and therefore is not always easily recognised. However our modern lifestyles make it an increasing problem, both personally and economically.

Government figures for the UK in 2013-2014 show stress, and its related conditions anxiety, depression and musculoskeletal problems, accounted for the majority of days lost due to work-related ill health: 11.3 and 8.3 million days respectively. On average this was 23 days off work per case of stress, depression or anxiety.

Are you affected by stress?

Some ways you can identify if you could be under stress are if you experience any of the following:

• A vicious cycle of insomnia and fatigue
• Achy joints and other signs of inflammation in the body
• Cardiovascular problems such as palpitations
• Poor immune system that is supressed under stress and when the body relaxes,
• illnesses often show
• Possible supressed appetite followed by sugar and salt cravings
• Caffeine dependence
• Poor liver function
• Light headed when standing up
• Pupils have a delayed or no dilation reaction to light

Physiological effect of stress

Stress makes your body want to run away from the situation to keep you safe. It does this by releasing cortisol to stimulate the liver and tissue stores to produce glucose for energy. To meet the demands you may crave carbohydrates and caffeine. However, you don’t really need the marathon amount of energy produced and the high circulating sugar causes glycation (aging, inflammation and damage to cells).

What to do: the first few steps

• Follow a high protein, low GL diet to balance blood sugar and reduce the aging effect
• Include foods or supplements containing vitamin B12 and folic acid and vitamin B3 which contribute to a reduction of fatigue
• Avoid grains as these contain gluten and lectins. Sensitivity to these is common and may cause inflammation that activates the stress pathway to intensify anxiety
• Consider supplementing chromium which forms part of the GTF (gluten tolerance factor) that contributes to the maintenance of a healthy blood sugar level
• Read The Stress Cure by Patrick Holford, who outlines HeartMath® and a quick coherence technique exercise for you to learn how to transform negative stressful experiences into something calming