How Stress Impacts Your Hormones

Our modern world has many conveniences, but it also has mountains of stress. We all deal with stress differently. And, stress has a tremendous impact on our hormones. If you suspect that stress is impacting your hormones, or if you’re feeling anxious, tired, irritable, bloated, or tense, you might want to assess the stress in your life.

Let’s take a look at how you can take a proactive approach, establish proper hormonal balance in your life, and have increased energy, better focus, cheerful moods, efficient digestion and elimination, and fewer headaches. You can pursue a happier, healthier, and more resilient life.

Hormones are messengers. They send messages. They “talk” to different parts of your body. Hormones are typically made from proteins, cholesterol, and fats. Your hypothalamus, which is your brain’s control center, receives different signals about imbalances in your body, typically caused by diet, lifestyle, and psychological habits.

Examples of signals that alert your brain are low or high blood sugar, a negative memory, an infection, pain, inflammation, feelings of being pressured, irritability, or sadness among others. Your brain receives signals that you’re stressed in some way: emotionally or physically. In response to these signals, your brain releases hormones that instruct different glands in your body to secrete more hormones that will help to deal with the immediate stressor and bring those imbalances back to homeostasis. When you’re physically or emotionally stressed, a lot of hormonal activity occurs to help you deal with the stressor.

The hormones most closely associated with stress are cortisol and adrenaline. Cortisol is often referred to as the stress hormone, and adrenaline is the fight-or-flight hormone.