Understanding Stress

Understanding Stress

Stress is a natural feeling of not being able to cope with specific demands and events. However, stress can become a chronic condition if a person does not take steps to manage it. These demands can come from work, relationships, financial pressures, and other situations, but anything that poses a real or perceived challenge or threat to a person’s well-being can cause stress. Stress can be a motivator, and it can even be essential to survival. The body’s fight-or-flight mechanism tells a person when and how to respond to danger. However, when the body becomes triggered too easily, or there are too many stressors at one time, it can undermine a person’s mental and physical health and become harmful.

Stress is the body’s natural defence against predators and danger. It causes the body to flood with hormones that prepare its systems to evade or confront danger. People commonly refer to this as the fight-or-flight mechanism. When humans face a challenge or threat, they have a partly physical response. The body activates resources that help people either stay and confront the challenge or get to safety as fast as possible. The body produces larger quantities of the chemicals and hormones. These trigger the following physical reactions:

• increased blood pressure
• heightened muscle preparedness
• sweating
• alertness

These factors all improve a person’s ability to respond to a potentially hazardous or challenging situation and also cause a faster heart rate.

Environmental factors that trigger this reaction are called stressors. Examples include noises, aggressive behavior, a speeding car, and scary moments in movies, or even going to face a challenging situation. Feelings of stress tend to increase in tandem with the number of stressors.

Stress slows down some normal bodily functions, such as those that the digestive and immune systems perform. The body can then concentrate its resources on breathing, blood flow, alertness, and the preparation of the muscles for sudden use. How a person reacts to a difficult situation will determine the effects of stress on overall health. Some people can experience several stressors in a row or at once without this leading a severe stress reaction. Others may have a stronger response to a single stressor. An individual who feels as though they do not have enough resources to cope will probably have a stronger reaction that could trigger health problems. Stressors affect individuals in different ways.

The reason for some stresses is that they typically involve a significant change, extra effort, new responsibilities, and a need for adaptation. They also often require a person to take steps into the unknown. A person may look forward to an increased salary following a promotion, for example, but wonder whether they can handle the extra responsibilities. A persistently negative response to challenges can have an adverse effect on health and happiness. There are two different types of stress, Acute and Chronic

Acute stress -This type of stress is short-term and usually the more common form of stress. Acute stress often develops when people consider the pressures of events that have recently occurred or face upcoming challenges in the near future. For example, a person may feel stressed about a recent argument or an upcoming deadline. However, the stress will reduce or disappear once a person resolves the argument or meets the deadline.

Acute stressors are often new and tend to have a clear and immediate solution. Even with the more difficult challenges that people face, there are possible ways to get out of the situation. Acute stress does not cause the same amount of damage as long-term, chronic stress. Short-term effects include tension headaches and an upset stomach, as well as a moderate amount of distress. However, repeated instances of acute stress over an extended period can become chronic and harmful.

Chronic stress-This type of stress develops over a long period and is more harmful. Ongoing poverty, a dysfunctional family, or an unhappy marriage are examples of situations that can cause chronic stress. It occurs when a person can see no way to avoid their stressors and stops seeking solutions. A traumatic experience early in life may also contribute to chronic stress.

Stress is often the last thing considered when someone faces a situation of illness. Often physical or medical reasons are first considered before stress is even considered often with disastrous effects. Stress need to be among the first reasons considered when someone faces a state of illness.