"Watch your thoughts, for they become words.
Watch your words, for they become actions.
Watch your actions, for they become habits.
Watch your habits, for they become your character.
Watch your character, for it becomes your destiny".
- Lao Tzu
It's pretty well known that too much stress isn't healthy for us. When we are stressed, we are more likely to make unhealthy decisions: skip out on that workout, stay up all night to study for that exam, stop at a drive-thru on the way home, have another energy drink. We have also noticed that thinking of a future stressful event can even affect our bodies. It happens to all of us: the big exam is coming up, senior picture day is tomorrow, you have a blind date later in the week. Then, BAM... you get a pimple, you are have a "fat" day, or maybe you even get sick. Question: Why does our body do this to us!? How does it know? Answer: On the simplest level, our thoughts can affect our immune system. How we perceive our environment is directly related to our health. It kinda seems like common sense, but think about that. Stress isn't unhealthy for us, it's how we react to that stress that can be unhealthy.
Take Stephen Hawking for example. He is a world renowned physicist who in 1963 was diagnosed with a form of Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS), a very debilitating and stressful disease that affects every muscle in the body. He was told he had two years to live. Today, he is still alive with the ability to communicate only with a few muscles in his face and continues to contribute to society by studying quantum physics. You hear stories like this all the time. But why is it against all odds that he has been able to live for so long with this terrible disease? Stories like this fascinate me, so I decided to attend a seminar on topic of the mind-body connection and how it effects the immune system. Before you go thinking that this is all Hocus Pocus, the speaker of the seminar is a clinical psychologist, a professor at UCSF, and has been researching the mind-body connection for over 30 years. So everything that I am going to be talking about isn't my opinion, it's backed by science.
Let's take a look at the physiology behind stress and the immune system. Remember how I talked about the fight/flight reflex a few weeks ago, I'm bringing it back. The fight/flight reflex is and automatic reflex that very important for survival, especially for a zebra who needs to react quickly to run away from a hungry lion. This is reflex causes substances such as cortisol and norepinephrine to be released, our heart rate increases, and blood gets rushed to the extremities to prepare to run. Once the zebra has run away and hid from the lion, the zebra's is able to quickly calm down and their system goes back to it's usual balanced, cortisol levels come back into balance.
Even though we don't have to run away from a lion like the zebra, the same reaction occurs during exercise, which is a type physical stress on the body. Exercise activates the fight/flight reflex and releases substances such as cortisol and norepinephrine. When we are done exercising, these substances go back down within a few hours. This is good! Not only are we are activating our survival reflex and keeping it in tactic, we are enhancing our immune system.
Interestingly, this reflex reacts the same way whether we undergo physical stress, or emotional stress. This is because there is an overlap in the brain between social and physical distress. For example, I bet you have been embarrassed in front of your peers at least once... (I will never forget when in 4th grade I volunteered to read the sentence of the day and mistook 'Opera House' for 'Oprah's House' in front of the whole class... traumatizing for a 4th grader)... You were day dreaming in history class when your teacher calls your name to answer the question. Everyone is looking at you, waiting for your answer. Your heart starts pumping, you feel a little warm, your palms start to sweat, cortisol is released. This is that fight/flight reflex being activated because you are undergoing an emotional/psychological stress. You mumble some sort of answer out of no where right as the bell rings. Great, saved by the bell and within an hour, your body goes back to its normal resting state. Again, this reaction is totally normal, and actually good for the immune system.
As we grow up and have more responsibilities, our stresses change from being embarrassed in class to much more complicated situations --> taking care of a disabled child, loss of a spouse, caregiving for a parent, unhealthy relationships, work deadlines, mortgage payments, etc. We are constantly worried and thinking about our future. The immune system is sensitive to these types of distress including how we think others view us. The same cortisol from short term physical and emotional stress is also released with this type of chronic stress. However, this type of chronic stress is no longer good for our immune system since chronic psychological stress can cause the cortisol system to become altered, causing an over-production of cortisol. Even though a little bit of cortisol is a good thing, doesn't mean more is better. Too much cortisol in the system for too long is a problem, it weakens the immune system potentially causing illness/disease! It causes chronic systemic inflammation which directly causes a decrease in white blood cells (our immune system!) allowing foreign pathogens to invade more easily and we get sick.
Chronic, ongoing, never-ending, stress. We can't avoid stress. Our goal shouldn't be to live a stress-free life because there are going to be stressful situations that are outside of our control. And as I discussed above, some stress is okay, and even good. What we CAN control is how we perceive our stress. Even more specifically, we can control how much we allow others' perceptions of us to affect the feelings of ourselves. In fact, its not the stressful environment that is unhealthy, it's the feelings correlating with long term stress such as shame, neglect, exclusion, and loneliness that actually affects our immune system.
Here's another caveat. Feelings of embarrassment, sadness, anger are okay, and even good for the immune system. These short-term feelings jump start our fight/flight reflex, which again helps enhance our immune system. The key word is short-term, perhaps these are feelings that are lasting hours or days. It's when feelings turn into moods that we start to get into trouble. Negative moods such as depression, anxiety, hostility are found to cause chronic cortisol up-regulation, therefore suppressing the immune system. So again, the goal should not be to always be happy-go-lucky and playing down any negative emotion that you may be feeling. It's recognizing and validating these emotions, and working through them.
Now, psychological factors (i.e. perceived stress) is just one of the many factors that go into developing an illness. Others may include: genetics, environment, exposure to toxins, health behaviors (smoking, diet, exercise), and social factors (socioeconomic status). So I'm not saying just because you a stressful person that you are going to get sick. My hope is to teach others that even if we have "bad genes" and are surrounded by negative influences, we can still do something that can help our minds and bodies. It simply starts with modifying the way that we think. (Simple doesn't mean easy...)
Need some help with this? Call a friend! Studies show that just having one friend who you makes you feel safe and supportive can help decreases these negative feelings. Also, another super easy and healthy way of coping with these feelings is by journaling. If we don't feel comfortable talking about some of our life stressors with a friend, then writing them down is effective as well. Exercise is another great way to help keep a balance, and it doesn't have to be intensive exercise. Going for a run, swim, practicing yoga, Tai Chi have all shown to have positive effects on emotions and moods. Even going for a walk outside is great for our immune systems. Any mindful activity.
In summary:
- Short term stress (hours, days) is good, long term stress (weeks, months, years) is bad for our health and immune system.
- Negative emotions (sadness, anger, fear) is beneficial for the immune system. Negative moods (depression, anxiety, hostility) suppresses our immune system.
- It is not the context (i.e. stressful environment), it's how we perceive ourselves in that context that can make us sick.
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