Stress is a natural, and even vital, part of life. Short-term stress is part of the body’s natural survival response to situations that make you feel threatened or under pressure. The problem is that as the mental complexities of navigating modern life is increasing as the world changes and develops. Constantly evolving social and relationship dynamics, structures, and expectations, continual advancements in technology, and concerns over work and the economy are stresses our ancient ancestors didn’t have to figure their way through. All of this is making people feel more stressed than ever before and that stress has a negative impact on your health.

Adopting a healthy diet and getting regular exercise offers a whole host of health benefits, including a reduction in overall stress levels. However, when your stress levels are already high and chronic, making those changes can be so much more difficult. Let’s take a closer look at how stress can sabotage your efforts to change your lifestyle for the better.

Cortisol: The Stress Hormone

The huge hurdle stress places in your path is cortisol. In small, short-lived doses, cortisol isn’t harmful and helps you get through tough times. When your body is constantly being bombarded with it, on the other hand, it can turn into an enemy. What does cortisol do?

Stress is part of your “fight or flight” response. In addition to cortisol, adrenaline is released. Adrenaline raises your heart rate and blood pressure, which is already not good for your health. Cortisol is the main hormone produced, giving it the nickname the “stress hormone”. This hormone is responsible for:

• Changing how your immune system works
• Increasing the amount of sugar your brain uses
• Interfering with your digestive and reproductive systems
• Limiting bodily functions that aren’t essential to your survival in the face of a threat
• Sending signals to the parts of your brain that regulate fear, motivation, and mood
• Upping the sugar levels in your blood

Under normal circumstances, your stress levels should subside when a threat passes and everything should go back to normal in your body. Chronic stress doesn’t allow this to happen and over time it can cause disruptions and dysregulation that affects nearly all of your bodily functions. Side effects of chronic stress include:

• Anxiety
• Depression
• Difficulties with cognitive function
• Increased risk of diseases such as hypertension and heart disease
• Unstable moods
• Weight gain

Things like anxiety, fluctuating moods, a lack of motivation, and difficulties with thinking and concentration make changing your lifestyle more challenging. Change, in itself, is a stressful experience, even if that change is actually good for you. You’re taking yourself out of your comfort zone and maintaining that change takes motivation. Stress saps that motivation out of you and if you’re not motivated, what’s going keep you going?

Stress often leads to weight gain. It’s the anti-weight loss hormone and that’s part of its job. Weight loss isn’t high on your body’s priority list when it’s in “fight or flight” mode. However, chances are, you’re trying to lose a few pounds. While you’re chronically stressed, your body is actively fighting your attempts to shed body fat. Cortisol leads to weight gain because it stimulates appetite and cravings, especially for sugary, salty, and fatty foods. It interferes with your ability to eat intuitively, make healthier food choices, and stick to a calorie intake that’s in tune with your actual daily needs. In short, cortisol makes you hungry, makes you crave unhealthy, high-calorie foods, and eat more than you really need to.

In addition to draining your motivation and sabotaging your diet, chronic stress also causes fatigue. It’s tiring for your mind and body to constantly be on high alert. Eventually, that takes its toll and further lowers your mood and motivation. You’ll also feel like working out is a mission and who is going to want to do something that feels like torture because you’re always tired?

Final Word

Being stressed out for prolonged periods of time is known to be bad for your health and even deadly but it does more than just raise your blood pressure and increase your risk of disease. It also takes away vital motivation and decision-making, decreases your energy, and makes you crave an unhealthy diet. When you’re faced with a combination like that, your ability to make the changes necessary to transform your life and maintain them is weakened and it may even be impossible.

Managing stress can alleviate the symptoms standing in your way of successful, long-term lifestyle change. What are you going to start doing today to begin managing your stress so you can reach your health and fitness goals?