PREVENTIVE MEDECINE: STRESS IN OUR LIFE
The way we think and the attitudes and beliefs we subscribe to have a great influence on our health and the way we look at prevention.
In a stressful world which is full of change most of us have to cope with the problems of growing up, going to school, leaving school, forming relationships, having children, making a home, holding down a job, bereavement, problems with children, illness, and much more besides. Many of these problems are in no way ‘our fault’, yet they can have a profound effect on our health, often reducing our ability to withstand infections and even making us susceptible to killer diseases such as cancer. Several studies have confirmed that stress impairs the functioning of the immune system. The typical responses of individuals to bad luck and stress vary enormously. A few people seem to thrive by overcoming obstacles, but it is probably true to say that more ‘illness’ and ‘disease’ is caused by stressful events in people’s lives than is caused by ‘real’ disease. But as well as these ‘external’ sources of stress and emotional upheaval there are many more ‘internal’-or self-generated-causes and some people are much more likely to be troubled with these than are others.
Some people hold beliefs that are almost bound to make them suffer more than necessary in the hurly-burly of everyday life, and others have personality types that make them exceptionally vulnerable. Both of these can be modified-at least to some extent-and increasingly people are realizing that their personalities have an enormous influence on their health and illness patterns.
Uncertainty is a potent cause of stress in many people’s lives but rational, clear thinking can overcome or reduce many of the stresses associated with uncertainty. For example, if you think you are about to be made redundant you can explore all the possible alternatives ahead of time, perhaps even starting to look into retraining. This positive action will make you feel a lot better and you will be less uncertain about your future because you will at least have explored, and
Uncertainty over a physical symptom is a major source of stress to many people who, often quite wrongly, imagine they have a serious disease. The answer here is to seek a professional opinion, and get the necessary tests done, so that your suspicion is either confirmed or proved wrong, and you can deal with the resultant situation appropriately. We all seem to have difficulty coping with problems which don’t have definite boundaries, yet can do so much better once the problem is defined clearly. Fear of the unknown is a disease-producer, yet so much information is available today that there is no need to fret unnecessarily over all kinds of imagined horrors.
Another source of stress is the inability many people have to make decisions at all. This in itself tears them apart because the very act of choosing one direction in life by definition rules out certain others and such people cannot bear to have any doors closed-they want all their options open all the time and so decide on nothing. In such circumstances it helps to write down the problem in logical steps and then to work out on paper all the possible answers you can see. This is best done with the help of a partner or a friend, but for some people in certain circumstances a professional counselor may be the answer. Often an outsider can see a way through an apparently insuperable problem, partly because he or she is outside the problem that looms so large in the troubled person’s life, and partly because he or she can bring experience from dealing with other similar problems to bear on this particular one. Often an outsider sees a totally new way out of the dilemma that is entirely invisible to the individual involved because of his or her upbringing, education and way of thinking, emotional state, or whatever.
One of the things that makes many people ‘ill’ is coming to terms with the fact that in modern life many problems simply don’t have an answer. Things are so complicated today that the simple answers of our grandparents often can’t be made to apply. Coping with the unchangeable is a sign of emotional maturity and again professional help may be necessary.
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Tags: General health