Life is full of challenging circumstances or stressors. Stress is produced by real or imagined events that are perceived to threaten an individual’s physical and mental well-being. Today, stress is commonly understood to mean external events and circumstances, and as a result, we tend to think of stress as something external to us. As originally conceived, however, stress is a perceived, internal response to a particular challenge or stressor.
We now know that chronic stress can produce harmful changes to the brain and body. Over time, the effects of stress take a toll on us, depleting our cognitive, physical, and emotional reserves. Cognitively, stress can interfere with memory and learning. It can also bias us towards reactive or emotional decision-making. Physiologically, stress has been linked to a range of issues, including disturbed sleep, chronic pain, cardiac complications, gastrointestinal difficulties, hypertension and compromised immunity. Psychologically, prolonged stress can contribute to anxiety, depression, substance abuse, high risk behaviors and a range of stress disorders, including post-traumatic stress disorder. These various effects of stress are sometimes referred to as the stress spectrum disorders.
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