What causes stress?

What is at the foundation of Stress related illnesses

The Cause of Stress

Stress causes illness but what causes stress?

Poor nutrition is a contributory factor towards the cause of ill health. As a practising Naturopathic Nutritional Therapist I have clinically observed that poor diet causes many health problems, including stress itself. Once a healthy eating program is in place, stress is reduced and my client's health improves.

When my client starts a healthier eating program, their health begins to change and over time in most cases quite dramatically. Please read my testimonials. Everyone knows that a healthy eating program can change the way a person feels about themselves, in a positive way. It goes without saying that healthy eating improves health. If health improves, it should go without saying that people's energy levels improve, they feel more motivated and more positive, which in turn will help to improve business in the workplace. Ill health dis-empowers people and companies, dis-empowerment creates fear and fear attracts negativity. Empowering health helps to let go of fear, attracting positive outcomes. As the saying goes 'positivity attracts positivity'.

Poor diets are a major cause of stress
We hear a lot about how stress in the workplace causes stress related health problems and it is true to say that a stressful workplace can cause health problems. However, many people are actually generally feeling stressed inside themselves because of their eating habits, in turn toxicity from their diets alongside dehydration and too many challenging foods can create a stress upon their own bodies. When they are feeling irritable, unrelaxed, tired, fed up with their aches and pains, they become even more stressed. They may then manifest relationship problems at home and in the workplace because they feel irritable and angry.

Stress becomes a vicious circle

Stress then becomes a vicious circle causing dehydration alert in their bodies, this is when their bodies goes into fight or flight mode and they find themselves continuously in defence mechanism e.g. tired, defensive, irritable, do you see how it becomes a vicious circle. Dietary stress causes dehydration and illness, and dehydration and illness in turn creates a further stress upon health, keeping a person in a continual stress mechanism. This is when people manifest addictions to try to relax themselves e.g. many people come home from work and drink alcohol as a way of reducing stress. However, alcohol will dehydrate the body further, destroy nutrients and in turn create more stress.

So where does workplace stress fit in? If a person is feeling stressed through dehydration and poor diet, external stresses have a greater affect upon them. If a person eats healthily, drinks adequate levels of water a day (up to 4 pints a day, but you must wean up to that level gradually) and is receiving their anti-stress nutrients (they are lacking in the typical western diet and we need to supplement them), dehydration alert is switched off and external stresses have less of an affect upon that person. The person feels more refreshed, relaxed, more positive and happy so if in a stressful situation, they can handle it in a relaxed way.

External stresses are: dietary stress, workplace stress, relationship stress, electrical stress, pollution, unnecessary drugs, travel, vaccinations and geographical stress.

The typical western diet can cause dehydration alert
The typical western diet has a lot to answer to as it is dehydrating and challenging upon the body. When we drink fluids they tend to be, coffee, tea, and sugary drinks. These drinks act as diuretics stripping water out of the body rather than replenishing the body with water. We are 78% water and we lose water through perspiration, expiration and urination, we therefore need to replenish our lost resources.

Challenging foods
Challenging foods creates a stress upon the body causing dehydration alert, here is an example of some of those challenging foods.

Salt: can cause bloating, oedema, inflammation, high blood pressure, kidney stones, hardening of the arteries, anger etc.

Refined white sugar: ends up being turned to stored fats in the body and can contribute to late onset diabetes.

Wheat: gluten in wheat could cause I.B.S., and in some susceptible people, gluten alongside a poor diet could eventually contribute to more chronic bowel disorders.

Chocolate: is difficult to digest and has a diuretic effect upon the body due to the caffeine and sugar content. If over consumed can also lead to weight gain, and other health problems.

Cheese and milk: is difficult to digest and mucus forming and could possibly lead to earaches, colds, mood swings, bowel disorders and skin problems.

Fatty processed meats: too much could lead to heart disease, late onset diabetes, poor concentration and memory and can lower energy levels.

Challenging foods could lead to dehydration and stress

Because these foods are challenging, they are dehydrating. In turn as our bodies receive this dehydrating message, the body will try to do its best to protect itself and starts to overproduce cholesterol around the cell membranes. The cholesterol helps to hold fluids inside the cells so that we do not dehydrate even further. The liver becomes affected by the cholesterol production and starts to become sluggish, which will in time affect our health as the liver helps to rid the body of toxicity. When the liver is sluggish, our internal toxicity gets dumped around joints, in cells, tissues, muscles and organs leading to illness.

I help to teach people how to regain a better state of health so that they hopefully feel good on all levels. Whether they are suffering from low energy, I.B.S., high blood pressure, depression, anxiety, hormonal problems, poor concentration, lack of motivation or poor memory, improvements can be made. The best proof is clinical proof, please read the testimonials.

The more committed a person is to my program, the better the results will be, if a person is 50% committed they will gain 50% positive results. If 100% committed they will gain 100% positive results.

Changing the canteen food is the best place to start
Naturally business people are busy people and sometimes do not have the time to prepare their own food, what better way to start the program than in the workplace itself. There are companies who have their own canteens and offer healthy food. I can help advise the company and chefs on recipes as I am creating my cookbook at the moment. I advise on how to prepare simple healthy foods, I can even demonstrate some recipes to your cooks. Your company could offer a selection of salads at the salad bars and homemade soup, fresh juices, water and a fantastic range of herbal or fruit teas make a much healthier alternative to coffee, tea or fizzy drinks. Main meals can also be offered at lunchtime for staff who have not got the time to go home and cook evening dinner.

If a company shows to their staff that they care about the food they eat, their health in general and that they are prepared to do their best to help them feel well, staff morale will be boasted and in turn this will benefit your company a hundred times over.

Breakfast can be simple yet healthy and so can evening dinner, I explain how.

Contact me
Please contact me to discuss setting up workshops for your company. I start with management first and then I work through employees. For best results personal consultations with a Nutritional therapist is available. Nutritional Therapy consultations are a good way to help productivity of staff, who are frequently off work sick. Please contact me to discuss what program is best able to suit your company.