Learn To Chill - For Your Health's Sake
Arthritis Today|September/October 2016

Research links the effects of stress to arthritis. Learn to chill – for your health’s sake.

Timothy Gower
Learn To Chill - For Your Health's Sake

For Lysa Modica, a typical day at the office feels like an endless fire drill. “It’s always frantically busy,” says Modica, 57, of Chelmsford, Massachusetts, a project manager who obtains environmental permits for power plants and factories. Modica constantly finds herself fielding calls and emails from clients who are in full-blown crisis mode. “Time is money,” she says. “Everything has to happen now.”

It’s often hard for Modica to leave work behind when she gets home – which makes managing the severe osteoarthritis (OA) in her lower back an even greater challenge. “Stressful days definitely make my pain levels worse,” she says.

Modica has plenty of company: According to one survey, more than three-quarters of Americans say that stress causes them to experience aches and other physical symptoms. Scientists around the world study the impact of severe and chronic stress and have uncovered troubling evidence indicating that frequently feeling frazzled promotes and worsens a number of diseases, including arthritis.

What is stress?

Humans have been coping with fear, anxiety and other sources of psychological distress since our earliest ancestors found themselves fleeing sabertooth cats and other predators. Scientists can’t agree on a single definition of stress, but there’s no doubt about what happens inside when the body’s “fight-or-flight” response kicks into gear. Signals from the brain release a flood of stress hormones, triggering a variety of biological changes, such as revving up your heart rate and causing the liver to dump glucose into the bloodstream, giving you the energy and strength to flee or swing your fists when danger looms.

This story is from the September/October 2016 edition of Arthritis Today.

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This story is from the September/October 2016 edition of Arthritis Today.

Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.