dr. Lisa Silvani Stress is inevitable. We get it from our workplace, home, family and even from traffics. Many health problems are related with stress. The more stress, the more health problems you will have.
What is stress?
Stress is the process of an increase or accumulation of nervous energy. This energy is directed towards getting rid of undesirable events or into preparing you to deal with the next ones. Even if you manage to keep stress in control in daily life, you need to be aware that it can cause you to make mistakes, to be forgetful and to feel depressed. Stress can cause you to forget important dates and even also be responsible for psychological disorders like depression. According to the US Department of Health and Human Services, stress causes more than 15 percent of all cases of the common cold. It causes hormonal changes and creates a stress response.
How does stress affect your memory?
Stress affects the chemical reactions within your brain, and this can cause memory impairment. It also alters our behaviour to prevent your memory from getting affected, which causes new memory disorders.
3 Things Stress Does to Your Memory
1. Increase Inflammation
The most dangerous effect from stress is that it create inflammation. We already know that silent inflammation is the root cause of many chronic diseases from cancer, diabetes, Alzheimer’s, heart attack and many others. If it happens in short time, stress can actually beneficial. But, chronic stress will lead to increase of cortisol production and insulin imbalances which then increase the rate of inflammation that going inside our body.
2. Reduce Focus
When we are in stress conditions, we tend to lose focus because of the overwhelming situations that sometimes only happen inside. Although it can also happens in real life when we are having hectic situations. It’s only normal when it’s happening for a short period of time. But when the stress stays for a long period, our brain will start to get more distracted because than our neurotransmitter also become imbalance.
3. Increase Fatigue
Stress put us on a very high energy usage mode. It drains our energy because we usually think too much and do many things all at once. When it become chronic, stress can impair our energy production and make us prone more to exhaustion and fatigue.
The relationship between stress and the brain
All the functions of the brain are related to the nerve cells, which are connected via the nerve channels that are called synapses. These nerve channels are arranged in a chain and if a nerve channel is blocked, nerve impulses are not able to be sent between neurons. Your brain is the most complex human organ and it is able to control all the processes that we take care of every day. When the nerve channels are blocked, a circuit between the brain and the nervous system gets disconnected. That’s why, there are more symptoms that happen when a person is under too much stress. When the brain gets stressed, an increase of stress hormones is made so it’s hard to focus and put your attention on the things that in front of you.
3 Ways to Manage Stress
There are many ways to manage stress. You can do these ways after a discussion with your doctor or therapist.
1. Take A Break
You can take a break when you are feeling stressed. You can get out of your work and read a book. You can also listen to a favorite song or watch a movie. You can go for a walk or run in the park. Do whatever you want to do. Just to de-stress and then, come back to work or do your daily activities.
2. Exercises
Exercise is a great way to relieve stress and to manage it. To do so, you should do exercises that relax you, like swimming or some cardio exercise. Studies have shown that exercise can reduce the stress hormone cortisol and enhance the brain’s serotonin production. Exercising will also improve your mood.
3. Grounding
Grounding is one way that we can manage our daily stress. It’s initially is use to reduce the negative effect of EMF or Electro Magnetic Field, which is a very big problems nowadays. But since it’s also good to calm our nerves, it’s good to use it as stress reduction tool.
Conclusion
Chronic stress contributes damages to our body and also our brain. It will affect our focus, attention and also reduce our memory. Although it’s not going to happen overnight, but it’s important to understand these effects of stress that we put more prevention by managing our daily stress level.
