While some stress is a normal part of life, chronic or ongoing stress can cause serious problems. Therefore, stress is not a illness, but continuous and uncontrolled stress can lead to a series of negative results. Imagine how one stressful thought after another feels in your body. If you take the time to pause and notice, you will notice that you feel tired and drained. However, very few people realize that you are also destroying your health and your brain with chronic stress. Many people are unaware of the damaging impact of stress on the mind, body, and general well-being. (Also read: Here’s how meditation can work wonders for stress relief )
Psychologist Dr. Ketam Hamdan hinted at important facts about stress that you may not know in her recent Instagram post.
1. Stress shrinks your brain
Chronic stress results in higher levels of cortisol. The studies found high levels of cortisol in the brain and reduced gray matter in the prefrontal cortex (the part of the brain that helps with self-control, attention, etc.) and reduced gray matter in the occipital lobe, which is the visual processing center Gray Matter is important as it helps process information in your brain.
2. Stress can change the way you process information
Normally, an alert person’s brain has moderate amounts of chemical messengers that cause the prefrontal cortex to take over and do higher-level thinking. Weaker control of thoughts, emotions, and actions. But with stress, those chemical signals can flood the brain. So instead of processing and flowing information, the brain’s threat system is activated.
3. Stress increases the chances of mental illness
Ongoing stress can lead to depression, anxiety, and other mental illnesses, such as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Stress affects hormones, the heart, and metabolism, and uncontrolled chronic stress leads to long-term changes in brain structure and function, which can lead to a variety of mental illnesses.
4. Stress kills brain cells
The researchers found that stressful events can kill new neurons in your brain’s hippocampus, which is the part of your brain responsible for memory, emotion and learning.
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