How Stress Can Hurt Your Body
Stress can not only affect your emotional and psychological well-being, but can also take a serious toll on your physical life as well. Periodic or minor levels of stress are completely normal and generally symptom-free, but once you enter the realm of chronic and medium to severe levels of stress, the effects become more dramatic and more harmful to your health.
Some of the more serious health risks you may encounter along with stress include:
• Depression
• Sleeplessness
• Hairloss
• Diabetes
• Erectile Dysfunction
• Ulcers
• Obesity
• Obsessive-compulsive or anxiety disorder
• Heart disease
• Hyperthyroidism
• Tooth and gum disease
• Heartburn
Stress-related conditions often go away on their own once stress levels are reduced to normal, but can often have longer lasting effects, especially with conditions like obesity and hyperthyroidism.
The good news, is that each of these conditions comes along with many treatment options (natural methods or medications) that you can rely on during periods of high stress and afterwards, until your condition clears up.
De-stressing and learning how to relax can be extremely effective—try taking lots of warm bubble baths and practicing yoga! Other stress-tackling tips include exercising, eating well, drinking lots of water, sharing thoughts and concerns with someone your trust, writing in a journal or a blog, and meditating.
It’s also totally okay to turn to medications when your drug-free solutions don’t work. Anxiety and depression medications (like Klonopin and Prozac, respectively) may help get to the root of your stress problem (along with counseling), and other medications like Prevacid (for heartburn), Propecia (for hairloss), and Viagra (for sexual dysfunction) can help with other stress-related symptoms.
Talk to your doctor about all your different options. It’s important that you know that treatment is available—in fact, just knowing that should help you relax and move well on your way to a stress-free lifestyle!
Tags: stress