Do You Think Stress Does Not Affect Your Overall Health? If You Do, It May Be The Reason Why You Often Get Sick!

How does stress affect your overall health? Here are 3 ways how... Stress suppresses the functions of your immune system Think back how many times you called in sick at work during the last 2 months...or the last time you got a bad case of cold? Did you get it right after the holidays? I know a lot of people who were down with the sniffles a week after the holidays. The holidays brought with it not only fun but also stress....stress over the menu, or the gifts you bought for everyone, or the number of people you had to invite for dinner. Stress can truly depress your immune system. According to studies done by the National Cancer Institute, a stressor -- such as death of your spouse, money worry, or having a dysfunctional family -- alters how the immune system does its job. Being stressed all the time hinders your immune cells – both B and T cells – from fully functioning. Your immune cells become weak. They are unable to actively fight viruses and bacteria from attacking your body. Then you get sick with the flu, or the cold. What is worse is...stress can affect your overall health by encouraging the development of cancer. How? Too much stress can turn off the ability of your immune system... to repair, or to destroy abnormal cells that your DNA is unable to. Stress makes your body produce a large amount of stress hormones Frequent contact with and inability to manage a stressor also makes your body release an unusually higher amount of a stress hormone called cortisol. Why is a large amount of cortisol harmful? Again, according to the National Cancer Institute, large amounts of cortisol in the body can directly change vital processes in your cells -- such as regulation of cell growth and DNA repair. Both these processes are necessary in preventing cancer. More hormones will also mean bad news for hormone-related cancers such as breast, prostate and colon. And here is another piece of bad news: This is just one of the many dangers of too much cortisol inside your body. Stress leads you to make unhealthy lifestyle choices When you are under so much stress and unable to manage it, you tend to eat more than what your body needs, or choose junk foods that have zero nutrition. You may also start smoking or drinking heavily. All these unhealthy choices encourage inflammation inside your body. Inflammation has been found to be the root cause not only of cancer but of almost all diseases such as diabetes, heart illnesses, or arthritis. Besides encouraging inflammation, unhealthy foods, tobacco and alcohol all have a dampening effect on your immune system. They all then become part of a vicious cycle. How else can stress affect your overall health? A lot more. Read more of it in Physical Effects of Stress on Health can Lead to Cancer.