How can a psychological factor like stress cause so many physical problems like heart diseases, high blood pressure, stomach pain and so on?

Question

Generally curious..

In: Biology

Answer 1

So if you want to do some research on this, I’d check out Bessel Van der Kolk’s book “The Body Keeps the Score”. It’s an approachable look at how stress, specifically PTSD, manifests and affects people physically.

Simply put, stress triggers a system in our bodies that puts us into fight-or-flight mode. And like any machine, when you put stress on it for a long period of time, it wears down. Think of a set of brakes on a car. Over time, friction wears them away. It’s the same in our bodies. In particular, as certain connections are made in our brains due to stress, and our bodies respond to those connections, the stress reaction becomes our new normal. Constantly living in stress mode strains brain and nerve function.

The book gets more in depth, and is a reasonably short and easy read. It’s also fairly inexpensive; I believe the last copy I bought I found on Amazon for about $15.