Is Chronic Stress Stealing Your Holiday Joy?
It’s fairly easy to recognize the signs of the holiday season coming back around – the festive decorations and twinkling lights as you drive around town. But is it possible that in the midst of your busy preparations and commitments this end of year, you’ve overlooked the signs of chronic stress on your nervous system?
There’s no greater thief of joy during the holidays than chronic stress due to an overloaded and overwhelmed nervous system. This is why it is so important to be mindful of how stress is manifesting in your body, the sources of stress, and the ways to release stress daily.
In this article, we’ll explore the effects of chronic stress on the nervous system, top sources of stress during the holiday season, and some healthy ways to release stored stress from the body so that you can feel calm, regulated, and at peace this year.
The Effects of Chronic Stress on The Nervous System
Chronic Stress doesn’t just affect our mental health, it affects how we interact with others, the way we respond to the world around us, and it actually changes our body’s physiology.
What is Chronic Stress?
While some stress is normal and in fact, necessary to live out our daily lives, it’s important to note that stress is meant to be a response that is transient within our body.
Think about when a stressful event occurs: another car cuts into your lane, causing you to quickly hit the brakes. Your blood pressure rises, heart rate increases, and anger ensues. Although this is incredibly irritating, by time you get to your destination, you’ve most likely let it go and can move on with the rest of your day.
When stress becomes chronic, your body is no longer able to just let this stressful experience go and your nervous system begins replaying it over and over again, perpetuating the sympathetic nervous system’s “fight or flight” response. Instead of returning to a resting baseline, this unprocessed stress becomes stored in the body as “allostatic load.”
Allostatic load or, the unprocessed stress stored in the body, can be deeply detrimental to your health overtime by causing your nervous system to stay “stuck” in a dysregulated state of Sympathetic, Overwhelm, or Dorsal Vagal (see our Nervous System 101 Section for more details on each).
Image: NEUROFIT
How does chronic stress manifest in the body?
Chronic stress causes a number of distressing health issues that range from slight discomfort to fully debilitating symptoms and illnesses such as cardiovascular disease and IBS. Chronic stress takes a toll on our mental, emotional, and physical health and will always eventuate to burnout and nervous system dysregulation if not dealt with effectively.
10 Common Signs of Unresolved Stress + NERVOUS SYSTEM DYSREGULATION
1. Brain fog - inability to concentrate on even simple tasks.
2. Sleep issues - trouble falling asleep or staying asleep.
3. Digestive issues - bloating, indigestion, IBS
4. Emotional sensitivity - frequent mood swings, poor mood regulation
5. Hypervigilance - constantly assessing threats around you
6. OCD - obsessive, looping thoughts
7. Numbness or dissociation - feeling detached from the body
8. Procrastination - lack of motivation, lethargy, apathy
9. Feeling Irritable - frustrated, stressed, or “on edge” often
10. Chronic pain - aches and pains with no clear source
How long does it take for stress to become chronic?
Chronic Stress is typically defined as stress that persists for weeks or months. As everyone’s nervous system is unique, the side effects of stress can and will show up differently.
This is where practicing mindfulness techniques and using somatic exercises comes in handy. Somatic exercises are designed to foster a sense of groundedness in the body, cultivating higher levels of self-awareness.
The Importance of Nervous System Regulation for Chronic Stress
When the nervous system’s sympathetic state is activated, the body moves into a heightened state of alert. Heart rate increases, pupils dilate, and muscles are primed for action – all with the objective of keeping you safe.
Put simply, stress from our external environment causes our nervous system to feel threatened. When it comes to chronic stress, our nervous system learns to stay in this heightened state of alert, leading to dysregulation and the numerous issues that come with it.
Therefore, the importance of nervous system regulation for chronic stress is its ability to cue a sense of safety within the mind and body. Creating an inner environment of safety, where the body feels secure, allows for a shift from hyperarousal into a more calm and relaxed state.
Top Sources of Stress During the Holiday Season
In their 2021 Nationwide Holiday Mental Health Poll, the American Psychiatric Association (APA) found the top source of stress to be financial, with 46% of adults worried about their ability to afford gifts. Another 35% reported stress in affording a holiday meal.
Besides financial stress during the holidays, there is the stress associated with managing additional responsibilities during the season, maintaining a healthy work-life balance, navigating family conflict (or just family members with different point-of-views).
Not surprisingly, mental health issues can become exacerbated during the winter months, many struggling with Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) and bouts of loneliness or even grief during this time.
5 Tips for Reducing The Effects of Chronic Stress During The Holidays
To help reduce the effects of holiday stress, we encourage you to explore these 5 Tips further:
1. Setting Healthy Boundaries
Give yourself the gift of time by setting healthy boundaries. This may sound fairly obvious, but setting boundaries is one of the most commonly reported struggles, especially with younger generations. In a recent poll taken by the Thriving Center of Psychology, 58% of Americans report having trouble saying “no” to others.
The holiday season brings enough pressure as it is, with demands of additional family responsibilities (think school performances, buying gifts, etc.) and end of year business or work obligations. Learning to prioritize your time and energy by saying NO whenever possible is vital to managing stress and maintaining a regulated nervous system.
2. Managing Expectations for Yourself and Others
Taking things a step further, by properly managing expectations for yourself and others, your nervous system is much more likely to feel a sense of calm and peace during your holiday celebrations.
This could mean establishing how long you will be visiting family members ahead of time, setting a spending limit for gifts, or even creating an “exit plan” in case things go awry. Remember, as hard as it can be to set these boundaries and standards for yourself, the toll your body takes by not doing so is much more uncomfortable.
3. Self Care
Prioritizing self care over the holiday season is more important than ever. Oftentimes, we get so caught up in trying to make the season “merry and bright” for everyone else, we lose the sense of joy for ourselves.
Taking time to pause, give yourself breaks, and scheduling alone time to reset mentally and emotionally will help keep stress at bay.
4. Stay Active
Despite the busyness of the season (and the dropping temperatures…brrr), it’s important to find ways to stay active and move your body. Physical exercise has a number of benefits, but most importantly for this time of the year, it releases endorphins which can boost our mood and help relieve feelings of stress and anxiety.
5. Somatic Release Exercises
As mentioned before, somatic release exercises foster a sense of groundedness and can help us be more attuned to stress in our body, giving us an opportunity to release it.
Targeted somatic exercises (like the ones we demonstrate inside the NEUROFIT App) can help break up the energy of stored stress in the body and help us find more clarity and balance in the present moment. The good news is, somatic exercises only take a few minutes a day to begin having a positive impact on your nervous system and overall well-being.
Check out the Somatic Exercises section of the NEUROFIT blog to learn more about how somatic exercises work.
CONCLUSION
So there it is! We’ve detailed the effects of chronic stress on the nervous system and how additional holiday commitments and responsibilities can further add to that stress.
However, you now also know how possible it is to manage stress – and even reduce stress – in a healthy way. By setting the right boundaries and expectations this holiday season and prioritizing self-care, you are taking your joy into your own hands.