Feeling anxious? Sleeping badly? Worried about, well, everything?
You’re not alone. Here’s what’s happening — and what you can do about it.
BY JOANNE SASVARI
In the summer of 2022, in the space of just a few weeks, I started a new job, put my house on the market, moved to a new city — and then my mom had the fall that would have her in and out of hospital and lead to her death a few months later. I was hitting many of the high points in the life stressor list all at once.
I was also scratching my elbow. A lot. Overnight, it seems, I’d developed a weird rash that brought along its friends insomnia, headache, a touch of agoraphobia, weight gain, back pain and some truly unwelcome lines between my eyebrows.
I was, it’s fair to say, pretty darn stressed, and my body was letting me know it.
But what is stress anyway? The World Health Organization defines it as “a state of worry or mental tension caused by a difficult situation,” adding: “Stress is a natural human response that prompts us to address challenges and threats in our lives. Everyone experiences stress to some degree. The way we respond to stress, however, makes a big difference to our overall well-being.”
No kidding.
Stress can be positive or negative, mental or physical, short term or long. It is caused by many things, from small daily irritations to the sweeping anxiety that results from global disasters we have no control over. (Worldwide pandemic, anyone?) It can also have a serious impact on our health, especially if our coping mechanisms are not particularly sound.
Here’s how to recognize stress — and what to do about it before it becomes a serious problem.
Good Stress, Bad Stress
Back in the before times, when a threat meant a large, hungry predator rather than, say, a scary Visa bill, our bodies developed some handy ways to fight back. If a giant saber-toothed cat showed up around the campfire, our sympathetic nervous system would release a flood of hormones, notably adrenalin, that triggered an acute stress response. Better known as the fight-or-flight response, it gave us the boost we needed to escape near-certain death.
More recently, we’ve learned that a whole cascade of other hormones is involved in stress, too, including estrogen, testosterone and cortisol, as well as the neurotransmitters dopamine and serotonin. We’ve also reframed our stress response as “fight-flight-freeze-or-fawn,” recognizing that sometimes the best response to danger is to stay very, very still or to make nice to the aggressor that is terrifying us.
Here’s the thing, though. We may no longer have to flee that fanged feline, but all those stress hormones are still flooding our bodies. With nowhere to go, over time they are making us sick.
For instance, adrenalin makes the heart beat faster, which gives you more energy, but also causes your blood pressure to soar. Cortisol, the primary stress hormone, increases glucose in the bloodstream and, in short spurts, fights inflammation and boosts your immunity. But after a while, it does the opposite and, rather unpleasantly, can also lead to the sad, saggy condition known as cortisol belly.
Poorly managed stress can cause physical conditions including headaches, muscle tension, chest pain, fatigue, changes in sex drive, digestive problems, insomnia, skin disorders, weight gain (or loss) and a weakened immune system that makes us more susceptible to whatever bug is going around. These conditions can lead to more serious chronic health problems such as high blood pressure, heart disease, stroke and diabetes.
Stress can also affect us mentally, emotionally and behaviourally. It can mess up our ability to concentrate and make us anxious, restless, forgetful, irritable, easily overwhelmed, unmotivated and just plain sad. We can find ourselves making poor choices — overindulging in food, alcohol, drugs or risky behaviour, for instance — and avoiding the very things that will make us feel better, like spending time with friends or hitting the gym.
It’s Not Just You
As bad as it may make us feel on an individual level, stress also has a broader, and bigger, impact on our society.
According to research by the U.S. National Institute of Mental Health, American Heart Association, Mayo Clinic and others, a whopping 75 to 90 per cent of all doctors’ office visits are for stress-related ailments and complaints. The U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration, meanwhile, has declared stress a hazard of the workplace that costs American industry more than US$300 billion annually.
On this side of the border, the Canadian Mental Health Association has noted that 14 per cent of Canadian youth feel stressed “on most days,” and has identified increased levels of stress among the elderly. The CMHA also notes that women are more likely than men to report feeling stressed, and that men and women react to different kinds of stress. Women mostly worry about relationships as well as chronic stressors like never having enough time and never feeling like they can meet others’ expectations; for men, it’s mainly work and finances.
And then, aside from whatever is happening in our personal lives, there are the big things we have no control over — the climate crisis, polarized politics, an uncertain economy and conflicts from Ukraine to Gaza to Sudan.
I suspect you might be feeling a little stressed yourself right now.
If you are, it may help to determine what kind of stress you are dealing with and what your stressors are so you can find a healthier way to manage it.
There are three main kinds of negative stress: acute, which is sudden and short term; episodic acute, the kind of ongoing distress caused by crushing work deadlines or bickering with your spouse over money; and chronic, when a negative experience seems to be inescapable and never-ending, for instance, an abusive marriage, toxic workplace or childhood trauma.
There are also many different kinds of stressors, some of which you can control, many of which you can’t. A noisy, uncomfortable or unsafe physical environment can raise your stress level; so can unhealthy relationships, worries about family, conflicts with coworkers, anxiety about money and the many negative consequences of living with poverty, discrimination, harassment, isolation or loneliness.
And, of course, major life changes like a move, job change, divorce or death in the family can also amp up the pressure, even if the changes are happy ones.
Which brings me back to my elbow. It took me a long time to realize just how much stress I was under and even longer to start dealing with it. What can I say? It’s a process. But at least it led me to writing this story in the hopes it might help you — and me, too.
7 Ways to Suppress Stress
1 Get some rest.
Practise good sleep hygiene by making your bedroom dark, cool, quiet, comfortable and smartphone-free.
2 Get some exercise.
Go for a walk, do some stretches, turn up the radio and dance around the kitchen. Even a little movement will make you feel a lot better.
3 Nourish yourself.
Skip the booze and junk food (no matter how tempting it is), and feast on something that is both delicious and packed with nutrition.
4 Be mindful.
Even a few minutes of meditation, yoga or relaxation techniques can help calm your monkey brain.
5 Stay connected.
Spend time with friends, family and people who make you happy.
6 But not too connected.
Too much exposure to bad news is not great for our mental health. If the headlines are getting to you, power down your device and bake some cookies instead.
7 Do things that bring you joy.
Keep up with your hobbies, watch the sunset, read a good book, walk along the beach, bake a cake, plant some flowers, get a massage or steam away your cares in a sauna.
Finally, if you are feeling truly overwhelmed, helpless or hopeless, turn to the professionals. There are many resources that can help, starting with these three:
• HeretoHelp is a handy resource run by a group of seven leading mental-health and substance-use agencies.
• HealthLink BC offers free, non-emergency help at 811.
• If you are in distress, you can connect immediately to a B.C. crisis line, for free, any time of the day or night, by calling 310-6789.