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Welcome to the laboratory of psychoneuroimmunology which basically studies how stress and the negative emotions stress creates manifest physically.

How about that gut feeling? And what about your broken heart?
The belief of Dr. Michael Jones, director of Northwestern Memorial’s Center for Functional Gastrointestinal and Motility Disorders is the stomach and the heart are merely dumb beasts. It’s what’s going on in your brain that’s expressed in your organs.

In fact, the stomach is one of the first organs to be effected by chronic stress. And since digestion happens in the stomach, digestion isn’t happening well when you’re stressed out.

Chronic stress is not a singular event like getting caught in a traffic jam. It’s the constant elevated stress.

What Rockefeller University neuroendocrinologist Bruce McEwen has found is stress can change the brain’s “wiring”. Stress hormones (cortisol and adrenaline) activate an inflammatory response in the body. Some folks may primarily experience it in the stomach, perhaps the intestines, perhaps the heart, perhaps the joints. That response fires back to the brain in areas controlling blood pressure, heart rate and digestive organs as well as memories, fear and anxiety.

Cortisol and adrenaline constantly flowing throughout your body play nasty with the immune system, increasing the risk of infection as well as cancer, heart disease, diabetes and osteoporosis.

(Laughing and exercise cool down inflammation and boost the immune system).

You’re more likely to get sick when you’re experiencing a lot of stress.

Ohio State University researchers Janice Kiecolt-Glaser and her husband, Ronald Glaser published a study in 1995 that showed relatives who were caring for Alzheimer’s patients took 24% longer to heal from small, superficial wounds than people in the same age and economic bracket who were not caregivers.

In a second study, they showed students coming up on midterms took 40% longer to heal than when they were ready for summer vacation.

Nutrition can help. But chronic stress is more of a lifestyle issue. Exercise, deep breathing, meditation, any form of relaxation. And of course, making changes in your life that alleviate the chronic stress.