Mental health: How stress affects your body

Stress is hardwired in most of us. When we hold back feelings, or when we are excessively competitive in everything we do, always in a hurry to get the work done, not satisfied with work or life, impatient or often carry office work home, then it's time to take a deep breath and blow off steam; in a positive manner.

If you're stressed out, it will show, especially if you are a Type A Personality. Our body is like a radar for stress; if you're losing it, you're losing your body. Today we walk you through the telltale signs of how stress affects your body. And it begins with your crowning glory - your hair.

Hair - You will lose or it will turn grey. Everyone falls victim to hair loss, even great leaders. The irony is that when you see your hair fall or see it turning grey, you stress out even further. So relax, the next person may have it worse than you.

Brain - This is when you think of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. Stress is a trigger for headaches, insomnia, nightmares, depression, anxiety, mood swing, compulsive behaviour, to name a few. You will also feel light in the head, dizzy, experience difficulty in concentrating as well as have frequent racing or incoherent thoughts.

Mouth - Sometimes ulcers may not be linked to what you eat but, instead, be linked to the stress you feel. The other symptoms include jaw clenching, teeth grinding, stammering, dry mouth and problem swallowing. While it's easier said than done, try and be conscious of your mouth's movements when you're thinking hard or involved in a stressful situation.

Muscle - Body aches and muscle aches are a common complain, especially among office goers. Spasmodic pains in which your muscles twitch, are extremely debilitating to say the least. Triggered by stress on muscle groups or joints, these aches need rest and nourishment for proper rehabilitation - something that our stressful lives do not allow. Further, a weak muscle or imbalanced muscle group are easy prey for poor posture and stress-related injuries. Maintaining a good exercise routine and complementing it with adequate nourishment is the best way to fight such aches and pains.

Heart and Lungs - Stress is linked to cardiovascular diseases and hypertension. Chest pains and palpitations are not just related to cholesterol but also to stress. A heavy heart or an overwhelmed feeling adds more stress to your heart in more ways than one. Asthmatics can associate with this point. Stress makes it difficult to breathe and this results in constant sighing. Practise deep breathing exercises to fight the effects of stress on your heart and lungs.

Digestive tract - Your stomach is not a silent observer. Irritable bowls, irritable colon, ulcers - these are all manifestations of and reactions to stress. Certain digestive ill-health concerns like constipation and diarrhea are also fairly common.

Reproductive organs - Women are prone to menstrual disorder and recurrent vaginal infection, while impotence and premature ejaculation is a common problem among men. All these issues are stress-related. While problems like PCO and other hormonal imbalance related disorders are just as affected by poor lifestyle choices, sometimes these can also be triggered by poor stress management. In the long run, such issues can impact your chances of conceiving.

Skin - This is a lesser known fact, but stress may also result in skin-related ailments like eczema and psoriasis. Besides this, sweating, rash, itchiness and infections are also linked to increased levels of anxiety. The more you share your nervousness and tension with others, the lesser you'll be stressed. Besides all other stress outcomes like poor digestion, weak lungs, hormonal imbalances, etc, will manifest themselves as skin problems as well. For instance, most cases of acne that persist through to adulthood are related to these internal problems.

5 point guide to get noticed at work

A step-by-step to cut promotion lines and be noticed at work

Forget spouting the 'right phrases' and walking the boss's dog. There are more solid ways to be noticed at work. And no, you don't have to stoop to sycophancy and late hours. If you really want to stand out at work, here are the things you should do:

1 Don't wait to be asked

Take the initiative and do little things that impact the team, without being asked. Preparing progress reports, putting back-ups in place or setting up reminders - it's a sure way to be noticed in a hurry. Very often, we only do as we are told and this turns the boss into a task-master. If you can see the logical conclusion of steps A and B, go ahead and do before being told to. You are acting like an adult, paying attention and displaying foresight. All good things.

2 Don't shut up

Meetings are black holes that gulp time, attention and energy. Very little gets done in them and the average drone is dozing off or checking up on Twitter during them. First
off, don't sit in a corner or near the door which indicates you are anxious to buzz off or remain unseen. Sit up front and pay attention. Ask questions and voice opinions - but not too much. You don't want to be the person that extends meetings pointlessly and makes everyone groan. Don't be afraid to disagree, just do it in a way that address the issue and does not make it personal. And keep it short. You don't want to get into an argument.

3 Jot it down

It's a boring job, but the rewards make up for it. The reputation for being reliable is slowly built and start with small steps. Keeping all the visiting cards you collect handy, phone numbers in a file, pens in a stand, a calendar on your desk - and you become the goto guy for everything. Jot down every little deliverable, task, errand so that you can remember or bring it up when everyone else has forgotten.

4 Keep books around

Sure, you can find everything on the Internet, but books give you an air of intellect. They also indicate that you keep yourself updated, cross-check your knowledge and believe in reference. Keep reference books, dictionary, thesaurus and journals pertaining to your profession at hand in your cubicle or desk. People may laugh at first, but then they'll head your way to look-up a thing or two; then you can laugh back. A word to the wise: Keep bathroom reading at home.

5 Know the staff

Be kind and respectful to the staff you don't have to 'work' with - janitors, liftman, peons and watchmen. But don't be condescending. Know their names like you would your colleagues' and address them by it. Don't forget 'please' and 'thank yous' and never raise your voice at them. Treating people, from whom you have nothing to gain materialistically, with respect immediately gives you exemplary character traits. While you are at it, also know the names and a little information about your colleagues' spouses and children.

Think positive, keep heart healthy

Positive psychological characteristics such as optimism, life satisfaction, and happiness appear to reduce the risk of heart attacks, strokes and other cardiovascular events, a new study has found.

The study conducted by Harvard School of Public Health (HSPH) researchers is the first and largest systematic review on this topic to date.

"The absence of the negative is not the same thing as the presence of the positive. We found that factors such as optimism, life satisfaction, and happiness are associated with reduced risk of CVD regardless of such factors as a person's age, socio-economic status, smoking status, or body weight," said lead author Julia Boehm, research fellow in the Department of Society, Human Development, and Health at HSPH.

"For example, the most optimistic individuals had an approximately 50 per cent reduced risk of experiencing an initial cardiovascular event compared to their less optimistic peers," she said.

In a review of more than 200 studies published in two major scientific databases, Boehm and senior author Laura Kubzansky, associate professor of society, human development, and health at HSPH, found there are psychological assets, like optimism and positive emotion, which afford protection against cardiovascular disease. It also appears that these factors slow the progression of disease.

To further understand how psychological well-being and CVD might be related, Boehm and Kubzansky also investigated well-being's association with cardiovascular-related health behaviours and biological markers.

They found that individuals with a sense of well-being engaged in healthier behaviours such as exercising, eating a balanced diet, and getting sufficient sleep. In addition, greater well-being was related to better biological function, such as lower blood pressure, healthier lipid (blood fat) profiles, and normal body weight.

If future research continues to indicate that higher levels of satisfaction, optimism, and happiness come before cardiovascular health, this has strong implications for the design of prevention and intervention strategies.

"These findings suggest that an emphasis on bolstering psychological strengths rather than simply mitigating psychological deficits may improve cardiovascular health," Kuzbansky said.

The study was recently published online in Psychological Bulletin.

Let’s make growing up fun

Balancing nutritional needs, adequate rest and replacing the word 'exercise' with 'activities' can bring a lot of enjoyment into growing up

You know how important exercising is for kids but are they ready to do it your way? Will they agree to go through your boring gym routine? Most probably not. What do you do then? India's leading holistic health guru Mickey Mehta says, "First of all it is important to switch the word 'exercise' with 'activity' and then make it interesting and fun for kids."

Daily activity: Fast-walking, jogging etc., work very well for kids and can be easily incorporated into their hectic daily lives. "Simple things like asking your child to take the stairs instead of the lift can work wonders," says Sunandita D, mother of a growing child.

Open up: After being confined to classrooms and travelling to and from schools for a major part of the day, children need to go out to open spaces. Games like chain, lock and key, catching the crook, kho-kho, kabbadi, tug-of-war, hide and seek, hoola hoops etc. can probably do more for them than your gym can. Kids should be taken to water bodies for swimming, rowing and water sports. "Their games should create a sense of excitement and non-aggressive competition - boot camp games like crawling on forearms, duck walking, getting into a gunny bag and then hopping a distance works well for kids," he adds.

Rest right: Children grow during sleep and it is important that they sleep for more than seven to eight hours say pediatricians. The 'early to bed' part is especially necessary. With demanding school hours, tuition classes, extra-curricular activity classes, they are drained and should be encouraged to sleep early rather than watch television till late in the night.

Nutrition needs: Along with exercising and activities you should make sure that your child has nutritious, wholesome food, says nutritionist Deepshikha Agarwal. "Kids do not eat the necessary amount of food most of the time, so it is essential to give them calorie-dense food so that they get required nutrition. Give them food while they are on the run - like salted almonds, walnuts and pistachios. Unsalted ones may not tempt kids much."

Deepshikha feels that food should always be within reach for kids. She says, "Always keep fruits on the table or counters, instead of fried and junk food packets. Keep flaxseed around in their bedroom; that will encourage them to snack on it instead of having chocolates or empty calories."

Breakfast well: Making your kids eat a healthy breakfast is important. Mickey says, "If parents think that giving them a bowl of milk and cereal is enough then they are wrong. Wholesome breakfast should include bananas, upma and poha, dates, figs, and stuffed parathas."

Divorce, depression plague Kerala’s youth

Even as God's own country boasts of a cent per cent literate population, the state tops the charts when it comes to suicide and divorce

Looks like God's Own Country is fast metamorphosing into the haven of two ominous Ds - depression and divorce. Statistics spanning over 2010-2011 point to an alarming increase in the number of suicides and divorces in Kerala. What exactly is happening to the state that announced its cent per cent literacy to the world years ago?

Till divorce do us part ...

Funny as it might sound, looks like special funds need to be allotted to set up family courts across the state, with the existing 16 teeming with divorce cases. For, anything from the partner's body odour to infidelity triggers divorce.

About 8 to 10 divorce cases are filed in each of these courts on a daily basis, reports say. From 8,456 divorce cases in 2005-06 to 11,600 in 2009-10, the statistics from recent months indicate only an increase in the number of broken families. Kerala accounts for 1.96 lakh of the nation's 23.43 lakh divorced or separated women. Says Krishnaprasad, a lawyer with the Kerala High Court, "When a woman registers a complaint against her husband, even on the basis of apprehension, he stands a good chance to get arrested. And once the arrest happens, where is the question of working out a compromise formula? It is their egos that will work out more than the compromise. There have been many cases where wives have misused the anti-dowry laws to blackmail their husbands."

The Protection of Women from Domestic Violence Act has many loopholes, lawyers point out. "It is a double-edged sword; 90% of people misuse it. Ironically, the law that has been intended to protect women have more or less boomeranged on them, with the number of sister-in-law and mother-in-law arrests also on the rise with this provision," they say. Interestingly, the capital city takes the lead in the number of divorces. As many as 6,000 divorces took place in the past few months alone in Thiruvananthapuram's family courts. Proposals have been mooted to set up one more family court in Thiruvananthapuram. The 18 family courts in the state had a total of 38,231 cases filed last year.

Most of the divorce cases filed at court are by couples who have lived together for less than five years. "Ours is a society where physical abuse of women is much less in comparison to other states; here, the reasons for marital discord are different - ego clash, economic independence, low tolerance levels, debt, drinking, infidelity and impotency - among others," says psychiatrist C J John.

Calling it a day...

Statistics show that more than 80% of suicides are committed by people between the ages of 15 and 59. It cannot be refuted that divorce brings with it a fair share of depression too, notwithstanding the fact that the social stigma attached to separated couples has reduced considerably over the years. "It is a fact that nearly 78% of suicides are committed by married individuals," says psychologist Balakrishnan, adding, "In many cases, couples can be talked into settling their differences amicably. Unfortunately, we do not have an effective counselling system in place."