Talking About Stress

I get an email from Jillian Michaels' fitness website on a daily basis, and today's email really resonated with me. It's a perfect explanation of the impact of stress on your health and weight. Rather than try to explain it, I'm just going to reprint it here. It's brilliant. If you don't know who Jillian Michaels is, she's the trainer on the TV show, "The Biggest Loser". She's one kick-butt lady and I would love to meet her sometime.

http://www.jillianmichaels.com/fitness-and-diet-tips/stress-and-metabolism

From LOSING IT! With Jillian Michaels

Tuesday, December 15, 2009

Stress Less and Lose Weight

I'm sure you've heard of the "fight-or-flight" response, and you probably know that it's the way your body reacts to danger or stress. But do you know what's behind the fight-or-flight response? It's actually hormones.

When you're faced with danger, your adrenal glands release three hormones: norepinephrine, epinephrine (also known as adrenaline), and cortisol. Norepinephrine and epinephrine cause several changes to help you survive the danger, including a pause in insulin release so you have lots of blood sugar available for energy, an increase in heart rate and blood pressure, and a suspension of your appetite. After the danger has passed, cortisol tells the body to stop producing norepinephrine and epinephrine and stimulates your appetite again.

This response evolved to help people deal with short-term survival situations, like an attack by a predator. The trouble is, it occurs in response to all stressors, including the deadlines pummeling you at work and the traffic that drives you crazy. All that stress results in excess cortisol being built up in the blood. That cortisol just hangs around, causing lots of trouble: It turns young fat cells into mature fat cells that stick with you forever, and increases your cravings for high-fat, high-carb foods.

When you give in to those cravings, your body releases a cascade of rewarding brain chemicals that can set up an addictive relationship with food — you stress, you eat. If you don't consciously control the pattern, you can become physically and psychologically dependent on that release to manage stress. In fact, people who self-medicate with food tend to have hair-trigger epinephrine reactions and chronically high levels of cortisol.

You can help yourself keep cortisol in check by limiting caffeine intake to 200 mg a day; avoiding simple carbs, processed foods, and refined grains; and getting plenty of high-quality protein. It's also crucial that you find stress-relief techniques that work for you. If you can tame your stress response and lower cortisol levels, you'll have a much easier time losing weight. 

JILLIAN'S TIP OF THE DAY
Ways to De-stress

When I'm stressed out at night and can't sleep, I get up and write down all the things that are bothering me and how I might fix them. This gets the problems off my mind and calms me down because I know I have a game plan. Some other ways to de-stress include learning to meditate, getting a massage, taking a vacation, and most important, exercising! Whatever you do, please do not take any over-the-counter "adrenal support" supplements — you could actually do more harm than good. De-stress naturally instead!