Stress Signs – Don’t Ignore Them.

Stress doesn’t always look stressful.

Psychologist Connie Lillas uses a driving analogy to describe the three most common ways people respond when they’re overwhelmed by stress:

• Foot on the gas – An angry or agitated stress response. You’re heated, keyed up, overly emotional, and unable to sit still.
• Foot on the brake – A withdrawn or depressed stress response. You shut down, space out, and show very little energy or emotion.
• Foot on both – A tense and frozen stress response. You “freeze” under pressure and can’t do anything. You look paralyzed, but under the surface you’re extremely agitated. 

Please watch the video and think of how many of these stress signs do you have? Maybe you never linked them to stress or your food cravings?  

If you experience even one or two of these stress symptoms as listed out by The American Institute of Stress, it might be that your body is trying to tell you something.

1- Physical Stress Signs

These include chest pains, dizziness or fainting, breathlessness, feeling restless, frequent colds, and nervousness that leads to nail-biting.

You could even have symptoms like cramps, aches and pains, twitches, digestive problems like constipation or diarrhea, low sex drive or erectile dysfunction.

Even headaches, dry mouth, trembling hands, tight neck and shoulders, low back pain, cold feet, and increased sensitivity to noise and light can cause stress.

2- Mental Stress Signs

When you are stressed mentally you might feel depressed, worried or anxious. You feel weepy, angry, and remain hungry always or have no appetite at all.

You might also isolate yourself from others, procrastinate or neglect responsibility, use alcohol, cigarettes, or drugs to relax. And you might develop nervous habits like shaking your leg or keep pacing around.

You may always feel tired and drained out, sleepy, and experience a lack of concentration. I have some of these stress signs too!

3- Emotional Stress Signs

Emotional stress symptoms can make you moody, agitated, feeling overwhelmed, and you might feel lonely and isolated. Even when you want to relax, you might not be able to.

There might be feelings of guilt, resentment, irritability, hopelessness, powerlessness, and panic attacks.

4- Cognitive Stress Signs

Cognitive signs of stress like poor judgment, memory problems, seeing only the negative, anxious or racing thoughts, and constant worrying can also affect you.

5- Behavioral Stress Signs

Behavioral symptoms like decreased or increased eating, sleeping, or smoking can lead to stress.

Even nail biting, hair pulling, restlessness, aggressiveness, obsessive thinking, edginess, and withdrawal are signs of stress.

Fortunately you have a choice. Even two :)

The easiest choice is to do nothing and let chronic stress and elevated cortisol levels slowly break down our bodily defenses and increase your risk for diseases, and makes you fat and your weight loss ineffective.

The more effective choices are to do something – about either your stress level, the way you handle stress or how your body responds to stressful situations. 

Lets face it - stress is here to stay, and its already well known that stress is going to be the number one health/wellness/well-being problem for majority of mankind in many years to come. 

You simply can’t afford to leave it unresolved.