by Katarzyna Radzka

Created on: June 16, 2009

Stress is one of the biggest causes of health problems, ranging from heart disease, depression and stroke. Stress is one of those secret killers that have only recently been discovered. It causes things to happen in your body that lead to diseases and other health problems. Therefore, it's best to avoid stress at all costs.

Initially stress may show early symptoms that are a part of every day life. Headaches and migraines are popular, as well as other mild ailments like stomach ache, diarrhoea, back pain and other aches and pains. Most of the time we disregard these as nothing, however they can lead to other ailments like cold and flues due to a weaker immune system. Other symptoms may include a stiff neck, fatigue, weight loss or gain, insomnia and shortness of breath.

If these ailments are left untreated for a long period of time than they can become much more serious and have a negative impact on ones mental health. Depression, anxiety, short attention span, a short temper and lack of patience are just some of the effects of stress. By stressing you're increasing your risk of developing new diseases and allow new already existing ones to accelerate.

Once your health suffers, other areas of your life begin to suffer also, leading to added stress. Work, family, and other responsibilities, appear much more demanding of your time and due to your low patience threshold you are putting yourself under more stress. Every problem around you seems inflated.

Long term stress can be even more damaging. Stressing out for too long has been shown to lead to heart disease and stroke. Our bodies are incapable of handling stress for long periods of time without fighting back somehow.

If you want to reduce the amount of stress in your life you can. The important thing to do is to admit that you are stressed and uncover what you're stressing about. There's no point in worrying about things that are out of your control like traffic or the weather. Don't over commit and clear any tension between family and friends.

Once you have that sorted, find a solution, a point of release that will eliminate the stress in your life. Sign up for a kick boxing class once per week, go for a run, get a massage. Physical activity is a fantastic way to kill stress and release any tension in your mind and body, it's one of the best ways to stay fit and strong and keep stress away. Remember to maintain a healthy diet rich in fresh fruit and vegetables that will help avoid stress.

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