From the FMS Global News Desk of Jeanne Hambleton (UK)
COURTESY OF KELOWNA CAPITAL NEWS – bclocalnews.com
By Annie Hopper – Kelowna Capital News- April 18, 2009
Does stress damage the brain? Accumulative stress not only affects your ability to remember and learn but research scientists have now discovered that chronic stress actually damages and kills brain cells.
Eliminating sources of stress and finding ways to reverse and minimize the effects of stress is our number one health challenge.
Stress is much more than feeling uptight about life.
Unhealthy forms of stress can be emotional (consistent fear, anger or worrying), mental (obsessive thought patterns, negative self talk) or physical (like a car accident, accumulative chemical exposure, virus, infection or chronic pain).
Is it possible that these stressors are at the very root of many life ailments?
The answer here folks is an undeniable YES.
Accumulative stress, in all of its forms, can have a damaging effect on brain function and structure.
This results in faulty brain wiring that not only causes impaired brain function, but can also manifest as a variety of health challenges as well as a maladapted response to stress.
A surprising consequence to brain function as the result of stress is that it can impair the normal neuronal sensory input and the circuitry in the brain can become interrupted or cross-wired.
What this means is that the regular function for a specific part of the brain becomes impaired somehow. The degree of impairment is directly related to how the brain has “crossed its wires” so to speak.
In the case of chronic pain this can mean that the pain signals keep occurring despite lack of a trigger or tissue damage.
We literally get stuck in impaired brain pathways that “feel” real.
Travelling down this impaired pathway also triggers us to think in specific ways in order to protect the perceived injury.
Our thoughts become consumed with how we can avoid pain, and worrying about what might happen if we trigger the pain.
This “protective” thinking strengthens and reinforces this abnormal pathway.
This protective thinking can also set off a cascading effect of stress in the body that not only causes more pain, but can also set off a cascading effect in the body.
Chronic stress also effects immune system function.
The good news here is that the brain has the ability to change and heal itself.
This is known as neuroplasticity and it is the greatest breakthrough in neuroscience in the last four hundred years.
Through practiced mental and behavioural training we have the power to act back on the brain and alter the neuronal patterns that are at the root of many illnesses. And I am not just talking about learning how to meditate here, although meditation is always a valuable tool to have in your wellness tool kit.
I am talking about tools that will help you retrain your brain, transform your health and reclaim your life.
Tools that will assist you in creating your personal health makeover—both internally and externally.
On May 8 to 10, I will teach a three-day brain training workshop called the Dynamic Neural Retraining System at the Hotel Eldorado.
In this workshop, I will show you how to promote radical, positive neuroplastic changes in the brain and how to decrease the body and brain’s stress response.
I consider this workshop extremely valuable for people with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, fibromyalgia, chronic pain syndromes, multiple chemical sensitivities, electro-magnetic sensitivities and a host of anxiety disorders.
Seating is limited to 10 participants.
Please contact me for more information or to register. Early bird registration is until April 27.
Annie Hopper is a Core Belief Counsellor in Kelowna. 250-862-1766. http://www.anniehopper.com
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