Q: My girlfriend went to one of your seminars just last week. Sheloved it and was so excited to tell me about how everything you saidmade so much sense and she finally understood how some of herongoing stresses have had a direct impact on her health and weight.Unfortunately, because I live in Dallas, I won’t be able to attend oneof your talks any time soon. Can you please give me a brief explanationon how stress affects our hormones?
– Barbara, Dallas TX.
A: One of the main causes of hormone imbalance and slow metabolismin society today is stress. Although a certain level of stressis normal and even necessary for both mental and physical development,too much causes an overload syndrome and can lead to thedeterioration of your health.
In many ways, we have more stress todaythan ever before. Modern developments suchas e–mail, cell phones, laptop computers, geneticallyengineered food, super–sized menus,junk food, caffeine, and lack of physical activityincrease our overall stress load. People are nowworking longer and harder with little to showfor it. Over 60% of Americans don’t take anannual vacation. Physical education programshave been drastically reduced or completelyeliminated in some of our schools. For thoseschools that continue to offer P.E., participationis often optional.
Kids are no longer playing outside; theyhave instead chosen to stay indoors and occupytheir mind in front of a television (idiot box), play video games,or park their rear ends in front of the computer for hours on endchatting to friends or surfing the Internet. The end result of all these“advances” has led to a society that is fatter and sicker than ever before.These metabolism–altering factors create additional stress onthe body, mind, and emotions.
The pressures of stress can come from mental (emotional),chemical, and physical sources. Interestingly, the body has the samebiochemical response to any one of these three types of stress. Forexample, if you’re stuck in traffic and stressed about being late towork, the biochemical response is identical to that response activatedby lack of sleep, too much physical work, or having an allergicreaction to food. Our bodies were never designed for repeated,chronic stress, day in and day out. We were designed to run awayfrom the tiger, and then relax and recuperate. But recuperation isnot happening in society today. Increased work loads, too little rest,constant deadlines, and processed foods all lead to the cumulativeeffect of the “stress response.”
Physiologically, when we are stressed out, our adrenal glandsrelease greater–than–normal amounts of a hormone called cortisol.This unique hormone allows our bodies to adapt to the increasedenergy demands of stress. But the release of cortisol from our adrenalglands is only intended for acute bursts of stress, not chronicstress. Prolonged and chronic stress leads to what has been termed“chronic stress syndrome.” This syndrome is a condition in whichyour body’s adrenal glands continuously release cortisol in responseto ongoing stress. Initially your body will respond to this stress withelevated levels of cortisol, but with time the adrenals will fatigueand lose their ability to keep up with the demand. Then the levelsof cortisol become depressed, blood sugar levels drop making themhungry, and people feel exhausted.
This pattern typically occurs in individuals who frequently missmeals (especially breakfast), eat and drink lots ofprocessed carbohydrates, and are fueled duringthe day by caffeine. They notice some degree ofinsomnia or don’t feel rested upon awakening.Further, they get sick more frequently, developchronic fatigue, experience more frequent achesand pains, and see their abdominal girth gettinglarger than their hip girth. They may even eatless and exercise more than they did a few yearsago, but they’re still unable to lose weight.
And then there’s that mid–day crash.It comes around 2:30 to 3:30, making them feellike lying down and zonking out or grabbing anespresso from Starbucks to keep them going.
Sound like you?
We really don’t understand the full impact of how chronic stressaffects our health. It’s a silent killer of large proportions. Compareour society with that of Europe. Europeans don’t work the longhours we do, they typically take two or three hour breaks in the afternoon,and most take at least a month off for vacation each year.Their food is freshly picked and does not come in a box. Fast foodhas not become the staple of their nutrition and they spend moretime walking instead of driving everywhere. If you’ve ever had theopportunity to visit Europe, you’ll notice the majority of the fat andobese are the visiting Americans. Europeans simply don’t have therates of obesity, diabetes, cardiovascular disease, or other diseaseslinked to stress that Americans do.
