There is no way to avoid stress and it takes a toll on the body. The amount of damage it does varies from person to person, depending on how well they handle stressful situations, but often people donÆt realize their body is reacting to stress because it does not always cause overt symptoms immediately. Stress comes from many sources - work, natural disasters, illness, noise, divorce (Nathan, 2002). Stress can also come indirectly from reading or hearing about tragic events in the news. The American Psychological Association states that 75 percent to 90 percent of doctorÆs visits are for stress-related problems (Curry, 2002). The six leading causes of death - heart disease, cancer, lung diseases, cirrhosis of the liver, accidents and suicides - are all linked to stress. Stress, as well as causing psychological problems, causes physical problems in the body: headaches, high blood pressure, irritable bowel syndrome, eating and sleeping disorders, gastric upsets, temporomandibular joint disorder, and atherosclerosis (Berkow, Beers and Fletcher, 1997; Curry, 2000; Nordstrom, 2001).
Stress affects the body through a series of actions initiated in the brain (Nathan, 2002). The reaction begins in the hypothalamus, which sends signals via the nervous system to the medullary region of the adrenal glands, resulting in the secretion by these glands of the hormone epinephrine (adrenalin). Epinephrine increases the heart and respiratory rates, elevates the blood pressure, and raises the blood sugar. This is the ôflight or fightö response of the body when it senses danger.
If the stress persists, the hormonal reaction stabilizes and the breathing and heart rate return to normal. The hypothalamus then secretes a hormone that signals the pituitary gland to release adrenocorticotropic hormone. This stimulates the cortex of the adrenal glands to produce glucocorticoids, hormones which keep the blood sugar high to provide extra ...