ARE YOU STRESSING OUT YOUR BODY WITHOUT REALISING IT?

Are you creating more stress in your body by what you are eating?

If you have an intolerance to a certain food group and you keep eating or ignoring that intolerance you are creating more stress within your body and on your hormones.

Remembering that “stress” doesn’t have to be an external thing as such. It can be many different “stimuli” from many different things. Example:

1. Food can be a stressor when it is not the right food or if you have an intolerance to that food. An intolerance doesn’t mean it’s been diagnosed. Listen to your body next time you eat something you think isn’t agreeing with you and taking note.

2. Exercise can be a stressor and create tension within your body when it’s the “wrong” type of exercise for your current situation. What I mean by this is if you are highly stressed from work or a relationship strain or whatever it may be and your CNS (central nervous system) is already compromised than a cardio or HIIT session is not the answer. This will only drive up your cortisol levels in your body and send your CNS into over drive. If you also have a heart condition, PCOS or are sick HIIT or cardio is also most definitely not the answer.

3. Being sick will also cause stress within the body. When your body is trying to fight a disease or infection it goes into overdrive trying to solve the problem. The same can be said for when we drink alcohol, our bodies will normally experience broken sleep due to our liver working harder than normal to try and help the body rid and detox from the alcohol in our system. This is why we will wake anytime from 1am-4am after a night on the drink. Your live is working so hard that it needs more help from the rest of your body and this will cause us to wake from all the activity going on inside. Mind blowing right!?

So there is more to stress than the obvious. And our nutrition both food and alcohol or lack of water is another one can cause stress ESPECIALLY when we have an intolerance.

So think about that next time you reach for something you probably shouldn’t. Ask yourself what is my stress level at the moment out of 10. Ten being really highly stressed and one being not stressed at all. Jesus if your stress is one please contact me I’d love to know how you are doing it, living with that little stress in your life. I think most humans these days wouldn’t have anything less than a 5 if we are really honest with ourselves. However if you rate your stress at an 8 then you really need to look at strategies to HELP yourself bring that rating down or not let it exceed an 8. Turn towards your

1. Nutrition

2. SLEEP and your night time routine

3. Strength training/movement ie walking, pilates, yoga, a stretch class

4. Water intake

5. Strategising your “non negotiable” for the week in order to succeed with lowering your stress levels.

I hope this has helped you understand a little bit more what is stress and what can cause stress in our bodies away from the obvious.

Here is a good FACT to leave you with. This is from the great Dr Mark Hyman, MD.

11 million people are sick from an ultra processed diet and over a million will die from chronic disease caused by an ultra processed diet. If this isn’t alarm bells and proof that the wrong food is causing stress not only on our bodies but also on our lives.