Those knots in your stomach could me more than just an uneasy feeling. Chronic stress can impact the hormones released by your thyroid glands, which regulate your metabolism among other things. If these hormones get off track, it can lead to constipation.
When a woman is stressed, the level of sex hormones called adrogens in her body spikes, causing acne to flare up. In addition to zits on your face, stress can also show up on other parts of your skin in the form of rashes. That’s because anxiety wreaks havoc on your immune system, which can cause eczema.
Traumatic stress, meaning stress that occurs when you feel a threat to your life or a loved one’s life and feels like intense fear or helplessness. It seriously impacts your hipoocampus, the area of your brain where your memories are stored. This kind of stress causes the hippocampus to actually shrink, making it tough to remember facts, lists, the entirety of an event, or long gaps of time (from minutes to days). Plus, damage from stress can make it hard to create new memories.
The connection between reducing stress and losing weight could be that it helps cut back on stress-related binge eating. It has been discovered that women who were constantly stressed out metabolized fat and sugar differently than those who weren’t anxiety-ridden.
You could lose some hair
Just as a spike in androgens can cause your skin to break out, it can also cause your hair to shed more than usual, usually three to six months after a super stressful situation. The good news is that this unfortunate side effect should only be temporary, and a balanced diet can help the cells in your hair follicles heal back to normal.
