10 minute read
Breaking Down Stress Chris Marrone
DR CHRIS MARRONE
FAMILY CHIROPRACTOR
BREAKING DOWN STRESS
Dr. Chris Marrone is the owner of Peak Wellness Family Chiropractic, a pediatric based chiropractic office in Summit NJ. Dr. Chris’s focus is on ensuring the health and proper development of children’s spines so that they may experience less injury and illness through their adult lives. Although Dr. Chris’s passion is in helping children, he sees a wide variety of ages and conditions. It is the sole mission of Peak Wellness Family Chiropractic to teach people about the detrimental effects that vertebral subluxation has on the spine. In doing this we hope to empower people to make more educated decisions regarding their health and wellbeing so that they may seek to prevent disease. If we can prevent conditions from occurring in the first place, we will lead to happier and healthier lives.
Taking care of families is extremely important to me. My goal is to help children grow into healthy adults by maintaining a properly aligned spine. In doing this those same children will experience significantly less health issues later on in life. But it doesn't stop there, once you reach adulthood your spine doesn't all of a sudden stop being important. It's the core and foundation of your body, taking care of it is the most important thing you can do for your health! Check us out at https:// www.PeakChiropracticNJ.com
Copyright Dr. Chris Marrone
A rundown of what stress, distress, and eustress are, affects they have on the body and ways to manage them. Stress. It seems to be a buzzword in today’s society. Everyone is talking about how stressed they are and are looking for ways to manage and reduce stress. Here are some sources I have identified. People are working longer hours, more days, with less time off. It seems, for many people, the traditional 9-5 doesn’t exist anymore. People are taking more prescription medication than ever before (about 70% of Americans take at least one daily prescription medication). Fast food and convenience-driven food are everywhere. These foods provide almost no nutritional value and shouldn’t even be considered food (in my opinion). For example, I spent almost 4 years in Spartanburg, South Carolina before moving back to New Jersey to start my chiropractic practice. On Boiling Springs Road, within a 3-mile stretch, there are 13 fast-food restaurants!
Eustress Vs. Distress
People very commonly use the word stress to describe the negative things that are happening to them but fail to realize that stress can be broken down into two subcategories: eustress (pronounced you-stress) and distress. Eustress is positive stress that www.influentialdoctorsmagazine.com is beneficial to health, performance, motivation, or emotional well-being. Distress is a much more common type of stress. It’s the negative side that over time destroys our health, motivation, performance, or emotional well-being. Avoiding distress is impossible; it’s just a natural part of life. In an 80-year lifespan, there are 29,200 days. There will undoubtedly be days that do not go well. The point is to minimize and manage distress as best as possible while also seeking out moments of eustress. Moments of eustress include listening to music you love, being around close friends and family, meditation, physical exercise, skydiving, getting a promotion at work, starting a new job, playing with a pet, and receiving a chiropractic adjustment. Some of these moments occur for everyone and some occur for certain people. Not everyone experiences eustress in the same way, just as not everyone experiences distress in the same way. However, the physiological response for both is the same, but the cognitive interpretation behind it is different. Distress is a very interesting topic with a lot of research behind it. As I said at the beginning of the article, people seem to be in more distress than ever and are looking for ways to help reduce it. Distress in itself is not inherently bad. The purpose of distress is to warn you of danger and begin to prepare to deal with it. This system developed in the early days of humanity when we needed to stay safe from predators such as sabertooth tigers, snakes, leopards, hyenas, bears, and many more. There were two basic options, fight or run. The physiological response behind these two choices is known as the “fight or flight” response. During this response, the sympathetic nervous system is activated. The sympathetic nervous system is one of two branches of the autonomic nervous system (a part of the nervous system that controls involuntary responses). When the sympathetic nervous system is activated, critical physiological responses take place that tries to keep you alive.
Sympathetic Nervous System Response
Firstly, cortisol (aka the stress hormone) is released from the adrenal glands. Cortisol increases energy levels, increases sugars (glucose) in the bloodstream, enhances your brain’s use of glucose, and increases the availability of substances that repair tissues. Cortisol also functions to limit processes that would be nonessential or even detrimental in a fight-or-flight situation. It suppresses the immune system, digestive system, reproductive system, and growth processes. This built-in alarm system can also cross the blood-brain barrier to communicate with regions of your brain that control motivation, mood, and fear. Almost every single cell in the body interacts with cortisol. The extent to which a cell can interact depends on how many receptors for cortisol it has. Secondly, epinephrine (adrenaline) and norepinephrine are released into the bloodstream. These two hormones act to increase heart rate, dilate the pupils (to take in more light), constrict blood vessels in the digestive tract, dilate blood vessels in skeletal muscle, active sweat glands, and dilate bronchioles (to increase airflow to lungs). Everything the body does to allow you to run for your life from a bear that’s closing in on you, leap off a 20-foot cliff into the river below, swim to the other side, and make it to safety, occurs through the sympathetic “fight-or-flight” response.
Overall, this response is positive. It serves to prepare you to deal with potentially life-threatening situations. Thankfully in today’s society, we don’t have bears chasing us down. However, when we experience a stressor in our lives, the physiological response remains the same. With small moments of distress, it may take about a minute for the body to return to baseline (homeostasis). With high levels of distress, homeostasis may not occur for over 2 hours!
Although the purpose of the stress response is positive, the long-term effects of cortisol in the blood can be devastating. As humans, we are not meant to be in fight-or-flight for extended periods. Let’s go through a quick scenario. You wake up to a blaring alarm clock to find out you are running late to work. After quickly getting dressed and downing some coffee, you hop in the car only to sit in traffic. Once you arrive at work, your boss scolds you for being late and tells you the deadline for a project you have been working on has moved up a week. You spend all day at work, working on this project, drink another cup of coffee at 1 pm, and head home at 5 pm, only to sit in more traffic. Once you’re home you see your dog has chewed up part of the sofa and your spouse is angry at you for some reason you can’t remember. For many people, this is everyday life, and it may be your everyday life, too. In every line of that scenario, the body is experiencing the same stress response as if a sabertooth tiger were chasing you. If the body is not able to clear out the cortisol before another stress response is initiated, you begin to develop chronically high levels of cortisol.
Effects of chronically elevated cortisol levels:
· Suppressed immunity
· Hypertension
· High blood sugar
· Insulin resistance
· Carbohydrate cravings
· Metabolic syndrome and type 2 diabetes
· Fat deposits on the face, neck, and belly
· Reduced libido
· Bone loss
What Can We Do About It?
GET ADJUSTED
This is one of the best things you can do for your health overall and especially if you are experiencing high levels of stress. The stress response is initiated through the sympathetic nervous system and chiropractors work directly with the nervous system, correcting any subluxated vertebrae that are placing pressure on the nerves. For more information on tune with your body. You will begin to notice small changes in your body which will allow you to make positive changes before big issues arise.
GET MOVING
Exercise has been shown to reduce depression and anxiety. This is actually due to exercise’s role in increasing cortisol. This is where eustress comes in. Exercise is a positive stressor that benefits the body. However, it is most beneficial to exercise in the morning due to cortisol’s energy boosting effect. Exercising at night can interrupt sleep. For continued reading on exercise and stress check out this article from Harvard Medical School.
MEDITATE
This is such a widely overlooked tool in American culture. It should come as no surprise that many of the most successful people in the world meditate frequently. Just a few minutes (5-10) daily can significantly reduce anxiety and perceived stress. Not only does it help to ground you but it helps to frame the stressors around you. If you are new to meditation, being consistent for the first two weeks is the most important. At first, it may seem frustrating that you can’t achieve a peaceful state, but like anything, it takes a little bit of practice. I highly recommend starting with some guided meditation that can easily be found on YouTube. For more information on meditation, check out this article from the Mayo Clinic.
START WRITING head by putting them down on paper. You can also try starting a gratitude journal. This helps redirect your attention to the positives, which helps to decrease the stress response.
LAUGH
Laughing is proven to release endorphins which are your brains “feel good” hormones. They are natural pain killers, can help to improve sleep, ward off anxiety and depression, and can even boost self-esteem. When you are feeling particularly stressed out, try watching a stand-up act of your favorite comedian.
SOCIAL SUPPORT
Having a close group of friends and family that you can lean on in times of heavy stress is extremely beneficial. Due to the long-term effects, distress has on motivation and emotional well-being, having social support around you to bolster those areas helps to get you through those tough periods. This article by verywellmind.com goes into some research and explains this very well. Nobody enjoys the feeling of being stressed out, yet everyone experiences it at some point. It is how you manage your stress that makes the difference. If you are someone that shuts down during times of high stress or if you are someone who experiences stress constantly, it’s time to make a change. Peak Wellness Family Chiropractic is here to help you get on the right track. ~ Chris Marrone
WE TAKE YOUR PERSONAL GROWTH TO THE NEXT LEVEL
WELLNESS
HYPNOTHERAPHY
EMPOWERMENT
WE CARE ABOUT YOUR WELLNESS
It is widely believed that wellness can be achieved only through exercise and diet. While both of these practices are important, the concept of wellness goes beyond just physical health. It concerns the state of a person as a whole (mind-body-soul), and not just the absence of disease and physical weakness.
Alchemical Center of Change (ACC) takes an integrated approach to wellness. What we do is examine different aspects of your life –be it spiritual, emotional, social, environmental, intellectual or occupational- and evaluate how they impact your wellbeing. After this, we help you make the necessary changes that elevate your mental, physical and spiritual health and let you enjoy everything life has to offer.
But all this is easier said than done. We at ACC realize that making permanent behavioral changes is difficult in the first place and sustaining them is a different ball game altogether. That’s why, we work closely with all our clients and try to develop a more personal connection with them. What’s more, our program is based on the effective strategies in neuroscience that have proven to yield positive results.
