Brain Vs Stress !?

 In this digital era, human beings use technologies in making their lives simple or disentangle. However, none of us would neglect the fact that as technologies are taking over our life's control, to ease our way of living, the level of stress, anxiety, and depression within an individual is raising constantly.

Hey everyone, my hearty greetings to all my readers. Today, I'm here with a new blog on a very well known subject I.e. STRESS.

As we all are well aware of the fact that Stress is bad for our physical and mental health. It has been linked to several leading causes of death, including heart diseases and mood disorders such as depression.

Lately, new research suggests that the actual number of stressful experiences that we encounter can have dramatic consequences on the health of our brain. These experiences include being expelled from school during adolescence and experiencing unemployment as an adult. The research further informs that each instance of stress is said to age the brain by an average of 1.5 years. 

Reductions in the efficiency of our memory and thinking skills are a natural part of ageing. As the years pass, we lose brain tissues and cannot support cognitive functions as readily as in our youth.

But exposure to stressful episodes could feasibly speed up this process, producing an accelerated or more pronounced decline. 

The study related to the research included people who were, on average, only 58 years of age, yet there was already noticeable in their cognition based on different stress levels. While anxiety, depression and poor cerebrovascular health have been identified as potential risk factors for dementia, the decline in cognition can occur for a variety of reasons.

The prolonged exposure to stress leads to long term alterations in the body's response to adverse events that involve the hormone cortisol.

 Chronic over-production of cortisol hurts regulatory systems responsible for mood, blood pressure, immune system function and memory formation.

There is likely a complex interaction between biological factors and our experiences, encompassing not only stress but also how mentally active we are, our nutrition and exercise habits.

Lifestyle factors may provide a buffer again resulting brain damage, and support how the brain adapts to the challenge of ageing. This concept, known as "COGNITIVE RESERVE", explains why some people are more or less susceptible to the effects of stress.

Cognitive reserve defines brain function as something we have some control over, to shape our life course and maintain our thinking skills. 

With each life event adding years to their cognitive ability, this highlights the need for support in managing the potentially devastating consequences of stress on the body and the brain.

So, to all my readers, at last, I'd like to say, although, this era has developed a human's way of thinking, but it has given a consciousness of being perfect in all aspects and less communication with our close ones which has been proved to be the root cause of stress. Therefore, to deal with small or big stress is to communicate with your close family members and it should be taken as one of the important responsibilities to listen to the person and help them to overcome their problems.

Stay safe, Stay healthy, Stay happy!

                                                  ~Ridhima kaul