Stress is a normal function of the body. There is no life without stress. What happens is that the activation of the stress system above the usual limits causes symptoms and/or illness. Stress Fattens.
In general terms stress is a psychological, emotional, mental and biological process. So, it reaches all of our organs and systems affecting them in one way or another.
When a stress syndrome occurs there is no part of our organism that may eventually be affected.
Diet is a central part of our life processes. Insofar as it is strongly related to the metabolic needs of our organism. It is also intimately related to our cognitive and emotional processes.
The influence of stress on body weight is direct
Many physiological mechanisms explain this relationship. However, we will comment on some of the most important ones. You will see that it is actually easy to admit these mechanisms in our daily life.
The first point is that our stress system is activated in circumstances of threats to our personal interests. Or, psycho-physical overloads that the social system exerts on us on a daily basis. When these burdens exceed our resilience, our stress system is activated.
Consequently, in a stressful situation it is frequent to observe, among many other symptoms, a state of anxiety or nervousness. This condition promotes compulsive behaviors that try to diminish that degree of anxiety although almost always without achieving it.
Stress Fattens
What behaviors do I mean?
Well, it is very likely that a smoker in a stressful condition smokes more, that someone. Who habitually bites their nails in a stressful condition increases with that attitude.
Or, someone who habitually drinks alcohol in a stressful situation increases alcohol consumption. A series of changes that emphasize habitual behaviors. This of course includes food.
Reasons why Stress Fattens
You may have noticed that in a stressful situation where the dominant symptom is anxiety or nervousness, there is fertile ground for people to suffer more than usual as a result of that state of anguish or anxiety. So this compulsive behavior somehow tries to calm the level of anxiety.
This is one of the reasons, perhaps one of the most frequent, that relates stress to increased calorie consumption.
Fight or “run away”
When a person have a stress syndrome, a series of mental and physical mechanisms are activated. This prepare us to face reality in a condition that has been described as fight or “run away”.
Our mind and body is prepared to activate us physically and mentally to face in a physical way a threat. That is why this reaction has been called fight or “run away”.
In other words, it conditions a chronic activation that prepares us to somehow face reality. Competing and ultimately activating our whole body and mind to prepare for that condition described as fight or “run away”.
What is the problem?
It is simple, in a stress situation the activation of our entire metabolism will happen. Consequently activation of stress hormones such as adrenaline and cortisol will occur. Their function are, among others, to increase metabolism and promote energy consumption.
Stress Fattens
As a consequence, our blood sugar will decrease and our brain will detect that we´re consuming the energy we have. So, it will generate an order that will consciously provoke the sensation of hunger.
What I mean is that the activation of stress, places us in, I would say, Fight or “run away” Mode.
Metaphorically speaking, just like a phone that can be placed in airplane mode. When we have a stressful situation, our mind will be place in Fight or “run away” mode.
And it is precisely this situation that determines an energy consumption. With a decrease in blood sugar and the conditioning of hunger or appetite.
The activation of the stress system is by definition contrary to the situation of peace, tranquility or psycho-physical relaxation.
Finally, this condition will determine, among other things, that people find themselves in a Fight or “run away” mode. Over time, it will increase the intake and accumulation of fat in our body. Stress fattens.
