Stress and Your Heart
Stress and the heart
Why is stress such a big deal for our hearts? Can you avoid getting heart disease by lowering stress? Experts say yes! That feeling of stress that you get when everything seems too much, when you cannot sleep well because your thoughts race at night, when you are feeling “wired but tired”, these are all signs that stress hormones like cortisol are elevated, depressed, or in other ways dysfunctional.
Our enduring heart
And what is interesting is that our perception and capacity to endure stressful situations could be formed during early life (prenatal). If during your mother’s pregnancy she had a major life event (like divorce, a family member die, or lost her job for example), her stress response could have affected your infant nervous system, influencing how you would cope later in life. This is also true if you are a survivor of childhood trauma, like abuse. That early stress also has been shown to shorten the tips of your chromosomes called telomeres. Shorter telomeres may mean a shorter lifespan.
The good news
The good news is that you can alter your stress response. You can learn better ways of coping!
Meditation, talk therapy, and biofeedback are proven methods to assist you in increasing your capacity and perception of stress. APPs like Head Space and Calm to get you started with meditation, and Talkspace is a well-regarded way to get support from a therapist. Love is also a wonderful healing force. Our need for face-to-face human contact is vitally important. Who is your tribe? What are your social supports?
If you think you may be depressed, contact your clinician or get seen in an urgent setting right away.
Want to know more?
View therapist bios in your area at https://www.psychologytoday.com/.
Telomere research- https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3370421/.
HeartMath biofeedback technique- http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1520.037X.2002.01029.x/full
Talkspace Online Therapy, Head Space, and Calm are all available through the iTunes App store.