You may think stress is all in your head, but the most significant indicator of how you’re feeling is how you’re feeling. Whether you realize it or not, your body activates involuntary physiological changes when faced with a challenge. When you are under stress, your brain picks up threatening signals, creating a fear response which can increase your heart rate, blood pressure, and sweat.
All of this stems from overstimulation of your nervous system, may help you better realize when you’re overwhelmed. Its important to know yourself. These indicators will help you understand what your body is trying to tell you. Here are some things that can help if you feel any of these.
Sign: Tension Headaches
Most people experience a tension headache when experiencing levels of stress. Unlike migraines or unilateral, behind-the-eyes, clusters, and other types of headaches, a tension headache feels like a tight band around the back of your head.
Sign: Jaw Clenching
If you’re waking up with jaw, neck, and shoulder pain, you may be grinding your teeth or clenching your jaw. This could lead to temporomandibular joint (TMJ) dysfunction, which results in tension flowing into your neck and shoulders.
Sign: Respiratory Changes
You may not notice if your breathing pattern changes this way, but it’s certainly something those around you will pick up on. Sighing is not necessarily harmful to your body, it’s more an indicator of stress.
Another respiratory change that’s more noticeable is hyperventilation, when your breathing becomes shallow and rapid, potentially leading to dizziness. When you hyperventilate, you’re quickly blowing off carbon dioxide, but sighing is the opposite—you’re actually increasing the flow of oxygen and reducing the outflow of carbon dioxide, Dr. Fricchione says.
Sign: Gastrointestinal Distress
There’s a direct connection from your brain to your enteric nervous system, which lines your GI tract. Your stomach becomes an outflow track for mental and emotional stress. Symptoms can include abdominal pain, diarrhea, constipation, and frequent bowel movements. Whether or not you have a history of GI issues, such as irritable bowel syndrome (IBS), it’s important to notice when your GI acts up to prevent your discomfort from becoming debilitating.
Sign: Stuttering or Stammering
One neurological reaction to stress is a change in your speech patterns. If you start stuttering, stammering, using placeholder words like “um” and “ah”, and feeling flustered when you speak, your nervous system is overwhelmed.
Solution: Pay Attention
“It pays to learn your particular triggers and pay attention to what your body is trying to tell you,” Dr. Fricchione says. There are many ways to mitigate the effects of stress on your life and create a relaxation response. Daily breathing exercises, good sleep hygiene, exercise, and positive psychology can help. Learning to think more positively will help you take a less-stressful point of view. If your physical symptoms become a bigger problem, visit your primary care doctor to ensure there isn’t something else going on in your body.
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