The role of stress in life: sleep problems, disease provocation, ulcers, osteoporosis

Con­stant stress has become almost the norm for many peo­ple. But not all peo­ple care about pre­ven­tion, believ­ing that noth­ing bad will hap­pen to their body. Mean­while, sci­en­tists have long proven the role of stress fac­tors in pro­vok­ing heart and vas­cu­lar dis­eases, dia­betes and bone patholo­gies (for­ma­tion of osteo­poro­sis). In addi­tion, stress is an impor­tant risk fac­tor for the devel­op­ment of stom­ach or intesti­nal ulcers, and can sig­nif­i­cant­ly dis­rupt sleep and meta­bol­ic process­es. All this in a com­plex neg­a­tive­ly affects health, reduc­ing life expectan­cy and pro­vok­ing chron­ic dis­eases.

The role of stress factors in impaired bone density

Bone loss, increased risk of osteope­nia and osteo­poro­sis can be caused by chron­ic stress and excess cor­ti­sol lev­els. As a result, the bones become brit­tle, patho­log­i­cal frac­tures can occur from the slight­est injury. It is known to those skilled in the art that steroid drugs cause loss of bone mass. Stress fac­tors also affect in a sim­i­lar way, chang­ing the ratio of steroid hor­mones in the body.

Chron­i­cal­ly ele­vat­ed cor­ti­sol lev­els or non-drug sub­clin­i­cal hyper­cor­ti­solism can also lead to increased bone loss and osteo­poro­sis. It is impor­tant to take care of your health, pro­tect your­self from the effects of phys­i­cal and emo­tion­al stress, take cal­ci­um and mag­ne­sium to keep your bones strong.

Heart disease, depression, anxiety

Heart dis­ease in old­er patients often coex­ists with dia­betes and chron­ic stress. Acute and chron­ic stress with hor­mon­al imbal­ance is def­i­nite­ly asso­ci­at­ed with car­dio­vas­cu­lar dis­eases such as high blood pres­sure, heart attacks and ath­er­o­scle­ro­sis.

Chron­ic stress, with abnor­mal­ly high or low cor­ti­sol lev­els, is a major cause of depres­sion and anx­i­ety. Oth­er adren­al hor­mones that are involved in the process, such as low DHEA (dihy­droepiandros­terone), prog­es­terone, preg­nenolone, testos­terone or estro­gen, also wors­en mood and lead to depres­sion, anx­i­ety, irri­tabil­i­ty, poor con­cen­tra­tion, and a high­er risk of neu­rode­gen­er­a­tive dis­eases such as Alzheimer’s dis­ease. .

An imbal­ance of these hor­mones and a dis­rup­tion in the func­tion­ing of the hypo­thal­a­m­ic-pitu­itary sys­tem can lead to a feel­ing of con­stant weak­ness or fatigue, cloud­ing of con­scious­ness, for­get­ful­ness, or decreased per­for­mance.

Mechanisms of influence of stress

Recent stud­ies show that when peo­ple with Alzheimer’s are exposed to stress, an active response to cor­ti­sol actu­al­ly caus­es an increase in the syn­the­sis of amy­loid plaques, which will pro­voke brain dam­age. It is assumed that the basis of Alzheimer’s dis­ease is also asso­ci­at­ed with dys­func­tion of the hypo­thal­a­m­ic-pitu­itary-adren­al sys­tem.

Research shows that hav­ing ade­quate lev­els of DHEA in the body is crit­i­cal for those suf­fer­ing from clin­i­cal depres­sion. DHEA helps counter the effects of high cor­ti­sol. Research data shows that peo­ple with depres­sion who received a DHEA sup­ple­ment respond­ed bet­ter to treat­ment over­all, whether or not anti­de­pres­sants were used.

Depres­sion can result from stress and dys­func­tion of the hypo­thal­a­m­ic-pitu­itary-adren­al axis, as cor­ti­sol lev­els tend to rise at night rather than in the morn­ing. The adren­al glands pro­duce cor­ti­sol, but at the wrong time in the dai­ly cycle.

Pathologies of the digestive tract, ulcer formation

Chron­ic stress and ele­vat­ed cor­ti­sol dam­age the lin­ing of the diges­tive tract. This leads to the fact that patients suf­fer from a spe­cif­ic leaky gut syn­drome or increased intesti­nal per­me­abil­i­ty. Exac­er­ba­tion of food aller­gies and food or drug intol­er­ances may occur. The devel­op­ment of irri­ta­ble bow­el syn­drome is a con­se­quence of high stress and ele­vat­ed cor­ti­sol, affect­ing the lin­ing of the diges­tive tract.

Ulcers in the stom­ach and small intes­tine may also occur. Chron­ic stress dis­rupts the blood sup­ply to the mucosa, reduces the syn­the­sis of pro­tec­tive fac­tors, due to which an ulcer can devel­op. In addi­tion, the syn­the­sis of stom­ach acid increas­es, and small ero­sions that form on the mucosa do not epithe­lize, but only progress, even­tu­al­ly form­ing ulcers.

There may be a prob­lem and a vio­la­tion of bile secre­tion caused by stress, or acid dys­pep­sia.

Stress management: the role of sleep, nutrition and daily routine

The effects of chron­ic stress are often ignored until the ill­ness­es esca­late and the per­son is admit­ted to the hos­pi­tal. Mean­while, you need to always mon­i­tor your health, observ­ing the regime of work and rest, eat­ing right and replen­ish­ing the loss of min­er­als and vit­a­mins.

First of all, ade­quate sleep is absolute­ly essen­tial. It is impos­si­ble to elim­i­nate stress and adren­al dys­func­tion if the quan­ti­ty or qual­i­ty of sleep is dis­turbed. Going to bed before mid­night, and ide­al­ly after 10 pm, is cru­cial. Those with severe fatigue and adren­al exhaus­tion should sleep until 8:00 or 9:00 am for full recov­ery. Good sleep can restore the dis­rupt­ed 24-hour cir­ca­di­an rhythm based on the nat­ur­al cycle of day and night. It is impor­tant to elim­i­nate light expo­sure at night before and dur­ing sleep to help nor­mal­ize the nat­ur­al cir­ca­di­an rhythm and restore nat­ur­al cor­ti­sol pro­duc­tion in the morn­ing.

Equal­ly impor­tant is phys­i­cal activ­i­ty dur­ing the day to waste ener­gy and sup­press the syn­the­sis of stress hor­mones. Reg­u­lar phys­i­cal train­ing (fit­ness, gym, swim­ming or jog­ging) is use­ful, as well as walk­ing before bed. Prop­er nutri­tion, refusal in the evening from stim­u­lat­ing drinks and foods (cof­fee, alco­hol, soda with sug­ar) will help to sup­ple­ment the pro­gram. Nutri­tion should con­tain nat­ur­al antiox­i­dants, anti-stress min­er­als and vit­a­mins, easy to digest, with­out bur­den­ing the diges­tive sys­tem.