If you've been coming down with more than your share of colds and the flu, it could very likely be due to prolonged unmanaged stress.
Chronic stress makes you more vulnerable to catching colds and other infections, while actually impairing your immune system's ability to respond to its own anti-inflammatory signals, according to the American Psychological Association (APA). This may increase your risk of a host of inflammatory diseases, including allergies, autoimmune diseases and heart disease.
In fact, a full 75 percent to 90 percent of all visits to primary care physicians are thought to be for stress-related health problems, according to the American Institute of Stress (AIS). Most medical science agrees that to the degree we feel stress and suppress how we feel, to that degree we are interfering with the body's natural immune response.
Stress is the immune system's worst enemy. Whether you're dealing with a brief bout of craziness like Christmas shopping, or a longer-lasting stressor like divorce, your body's ability to fight germs is compromised by physical and mental tension.
Are you secretly sabotaging your immune system every time you feel stress?
Click to read Stress, Cortisol and Immune System
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