Stress 101

My day started off a bit stressful as I did not have the greatest sleep last night. I woke up feeling groggy and found it really hard to get out of bed. I was extremely klutzy and seemed to be dropping everything and even managed to knock the glass coffee carafe off the counter and it broke into hundreds of pieces :( Now I have to find a new one that will fit my coffee maker - I CANNOT go a day without my cup of joe! So far I am not having the best of days, but I am intending that it will improve from here on in.

As promised the topic for today's blog will be Healthy Stress Management for you and the kiddies. Before I get to the management part of it I thought it would be a good idea to talk about how detrimental stress can be to you and your children's health.

While a little bit of stress is OK, prolonged stress or chronic stress can be detrimental to our health, physically and mentally. When we are in peril, stress triggers the body's fight or flight response which leads to the release of the hormones adrenalin and cortisol. These hormones cause your heart beat to speed up, slows the digestion process and brings the blood flow to all your major muscles. This comes in handy when you are dealing with danger, but once the threat passes the body should return back to normal and no harm is done. With chronic stress the body does not return back to normal enough, which over time, has a negative impact on our health.

Chronic stress can cause headaches and body aches, make you more susceptible to colds, insomnia, obesity,, and extremely serious conditions like depression, heart disease, diabetes, ulcers, hyperthyroidism and even god forbid, the dreaded "C" word!!

This is why it is so crucial to find healthy ways to alleviate chronic stress. We also need to remember that our children may also be dealing with stress on a daily basis and it may be impacting their lives negatively. In tomorrows blog I will discuss "healthy" ways to help alleviate the stress in our lives as well as the lives of our children.

Happy stress-free day,

Monicka