Cortisol and Stress

On this page: Relationship between cortisol and stress. Points to biggest causes of stress, symptoms of stress anxiety, and stress reducer tips.

Our body's natural response in such a situation, when it perceives the change as harmful for our survival, is to try to fight the change; or to flee from it. Both these automatic responses require much more heightened sensory abilities, than what is available to us in our normal daily routine.

Some of us may have heard stories about how an ordinary man or woman displayed extraordinary strength or grit when they were attacked, and came out of the threatening situation successfully. That is nothing but our stress hormone, cortisol, in action.

Several changes, a few prominent ones being:

• It gives us that extra boost of energy needed to protect ourselves, either by fighting or fleeing from our real or perceived threat.
• Our senses are sharpened and become more alert.
• Memory momentarily improves, and
• Pain threshold is lowered.

So are we saying cortisol is good for our body?

Yes, and is in fact necessary for our potential survival - as long as it is released in a limited amount, or on a strictly as needed basis. In fact, too little cortisol is also known to cause fatigue and exhaustion problems.

But in today's reality, many of the situations we run into in our daily lives do not pose a direct threat to our physical survival.

And consequently, most of these situations do not warrant the release of excess cortisol into our system.

And yet, because of the importance we assign to these situations, these stress hormones do get released into our system on a daily basis. And our body reacts the same way to a perceived threat, as it does to a real threat, by releasing equal hormones.

You can check out here what happens to all the extra cortisol that gets released into our system, and how it affects us.

But, suffice to say:

• It affects our mental performance, our memory suffers
• Immunity reduces, we get sick often
• Blood pressure rises, we feel constantly on the edge
• Blood sugar imbalances can occur

And in many, many more ways.

Oh yes, we become stressed, and we feel the stress.

How do we keep cortisol under control?

Following preventive stress management tips, and proactively looking for ways to deal with stress, go a long way in helping keep the negative slant between cortisol and stress at bay.

If recurring anxiety is what is causing your cortisol level to constantly go up, here is a short presentation that talks about a natural technique to end anxiety quickly, that can help you overcome stress in the long run.

Click here for a short presentation of a natural technique to end anxiety.

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