The Short/Long Term Impacts of Stress & How to Combat Them

Any time that we are faced with the unknown, have unexpected changes to a plan, have an argument at work or with someone important to you, and much more can leave us feeling stressed/have failed/are failing. This kicks off the stress hormone cascade, and leads you towards the long term impacts of chronic stress. 

Stress, both weak and intense, triggers the following hormone and behavior cascade:

1 Spikes your cortisol hormone putting you in a fight or flight state

2 Stimulates the release of glucose from your liver to fuel your muscles to handle the stress

3 Increases your Lipoprotein lipase (LPL) enzyme activity and production pulling all of the circulating fats out of your blood and shoves them into your fat cells for later use

4 Depletes melatonin levels if it is within 4 hours of your typical bedtime, making it take longer to fall asleep, you wake up often, and wake up earlier than normal

5 Stimulates the addiction areas of the brain, which crave pleasure and relief, making you seek out sweets, high fat foods, alcohol, drugs, and sex. 

6 Accelerates cell death and the shift into developing chronic diseases

7 If the stress continues your body will breakdown functional muscle tissue to steal the sugars stored in there to continue to fuel the brain and organs of the body 

8 Then if all of that sugar doesn’t get used, it gets put back into your muscles, which you now have less of to store that sugar in, then put it back in your liver (if there is enough room for it all), and then the rest is converted into body fat. Congratulations you just converted your lean muscle tissue into belly fat.   

This cascade can last a couple hours if you don’t implement protocols that can quickly relax the body, significantly minimizing the cellular/metabolic damage, and unpleasant feeling of stress. 

Long term impact of stress

• High blood pressure

• Increased size of left ventricular of the heart

• Increased risk of heart failure

• Increased risk of a heart attack

• Increased risk of a stroke

• Increased joint pain/reduced mobility

• Migraines

• Prediabetes

• Type II diabetes

• Overweight/obesity

• Insomnia

• Fragmented sleep

• Elevated resting heart rate

• Low Testosterone

• More painful periods

• Irregular period intervals

• More pronounced PMS symptoms

• Symptoms of depression or anxiety

• Reduced visual acuity

Transform feeling threatened by stress

Positive self-talk is crucial to returning to a calm state and ending the goal sabotaging stress hormone cascade. 

How do you do positive self-talk?

1 Verbally tell yourself that feeling stressed or like you’re failing is a normal part of achieving goals and succeeding at something. The only failure is giving up on your goals that require stubborn persistence. Tons of people around the world also are feeling the same way you are or have before. All successful people have felt this way many times before they achieved the success or event that you know them for. 

2 Ask yourself how will this stressful thing even matter in a week, a month, a year, 10 years? Jot down your answers. 

3 Reframe the stressful even into something that is challenging you vs threatening you “this now is getting fun” or “this is making things interesting” 

4 Think of some good things that could potentially come from this i.e. address some things on a to do list that you’ve been meaning to get to, focus on some positive personal/professional growth activities, free time opportunities that can be focused on 

5 Troubleshoot this event and make a plan to overcome it, have it not happen again, and/or have it not impact you like this again in the future. 

Next Steps

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References

Epel, E. (2022). The stress prescription. Random House USA.