Weird Stress Symptoms

Stress has a sneaky way of affecting your live and disguising itself as something else. Even if you don't suffer from insomnia, a racing heart, tension headaches, or any of the other classic signs of stress, you may be ignoring lesser known symptoms of stress. While a nap can be a sign of exhaustion, it's also possible that you're experiencing stress-based fatigue, the body's urge to try to shut down stress through rest. Stress-based fatigue can feel emotional, similar to how you feel spent after an intense argument with a friend. It can be physical, like how worn out your body feels after a long run. And it can be cognitive, similar to how your energy fades after a marathon meeting at work. It's important to see the difference between a rejuvenating cat nap and using sleep as a psychologically unproductive crutch. In some stressful situations, fear can immobilize us, in what is known as a freeze response. This manifests as a sense of stiffness, restricted breathing, and feeling stuck in some part of the body. Another less-recognized stress response is fawning, a desire to cooperate or submit oneself to one's threat. You may get into an argument with a loved one, you might withhold your true emotions to avoid conflict. This could be an example of responding to stress through fawning. In a watered-down sense, fawning can be likened to people-pleasing, a behavior some of us are all too familiar with. Ever wake up feeling sore like you ran a marathon the day before, but, um, you didn't actually make it to the gym? It's common to feel like you need to walk around after sitting for too long or need to get in a good stretch from everyday tension and stiffness yet in many cases, body aches are physical manifestations of stress. Headaches, low back pain, muscle aches, and gastrointestinal symptoms are the most common. But many more are possible—often several at once. If you find yourself having with lingering body aches you may be facing health-jeopardizing stress that may benefit from therapy.

SOURCE: The Healthy

See and hear more from the 98.5 KTK Morning Show

98.5 KTK Morning Show Podcast