Types of chronic stress
As per these examples of chronic stress, it is evident that chronic stress comes from recurrent exposure that will trigger the release of stress hormones. It is very easy for someone who is having this type of stress to experience wear and tear because they have little or even no control or whatever they are facing, unlike the case with acute stress. It is a dangerous zone for an individual to be in considering that scientists believe that the human stress system is not designed in a manner that should be frequently activated. Thus, when activated constantly, the individual is not strong enough can break down easily. They start developing health risks like high blood pressure, type II diabetes, heart diseases, and depression. It is these health problems that make chronic stress even worse for the people who are drowning in that sea. For instance, if an individual comes from a family that is affected by diabetes, heart disease, or high blood pressure, when chronic stress knocks, it opens even the door to these conditions. If the stress condition goes out of control, the other conditions like blood sugar and blood pressure have to stay in fight mode.
The third type of stress is Episodic acute stress. When severe stress tends to happen frequently, it becomes episodic acute stress. The individual who often tends to be having crises in their lives develop episodic acute stress. These people with episodic acute stress have traits such as irritability, short-tempered, and anxious. The people who are pessimists, worry marts, or those who always see the negative dimension of life and everything that they go through also tend to develop episodic acute stress. These people tend to have adverse health effects persistently due to the worries that they develop out, even the least of situations. The people with episodic acute stress are hard to change because they have gone ahead to accept stress as part of their daily routines. The lives of these people seemingly always lack order. They feel pressured to partake a lot of things, develop numerous responsibilities, all these coming from demands to escape some of the worries that they face in their lives.
Two major personality types are often present with episodic acute stress: these are “Type A” personality and The “Worrier.” The type A personality have an extreme drive for competition, impatience, aggressiveness, are abrupt,. And bare a great sense of time resolution. To add to those traits of Type A, these people react rapidly, and they do so in a hostile manner, and they are always worried about the performance they will put up at any stage of their lives. For Type A people, therefore, these characteristics give them recurrent episodes of acute stress. According to Rosenman and Friedman, type A people are significantly likely to develop coronary heart disease.
The “Worrier,” on the other hand, comes with unceasing negative thoughts leading to episodic acute stress on both mental and physical health. The Worriers, just like their names suggest, are worrywarts, they project problems in almost all their situations. They have a negative attitude towards the world at large, terming it as a dangerous, punitive, and unrewarding place where something bad is always about to come up. This type of thinking gives them an over-aroused system filled with tense. They are more depressed and anxious more than they are angry and hostile. In most cases, their thinking is always raised to the elevation of “what if…” conditions, which are directed towards, negative results. In numerous cases, they are diagnosed DSM-5 with a comprehensive anxiety disorder.
As can be noted from the types of stress above, stress brings detrimental effects to the life of an individual. The mental effects are the ones mainly noted, leading to physical health challenges. The mental effects are the ones that are experienced hugely at the beginning of it all. When one is hugely inflicted with stress due to huge workloads, failure in situations, and failed relationships, their mental stability tends to change as they lose their calmness. Anxiety starts to knock, and they lose their believes and trust, not just in people, but also in themselves. Such people feel as if the world is disowning them, and they lack value in everything. It is such points that depression starts hitting in because their emotions are overridden. When depression is ushered in, the life of the subject individual stands to be at risk. They stop being themselves and put even their own lives in danger. The physical effects are seen later on when an individual has suffered enough till their body is getting weak or they have harmed themselves in the process. Stress, therefore, is not an easy position as people tend to take it. Everyone has stress at a point in their lives, but that should not make it an ordinary circumstance.