Participants: Agatha Thrash (Host), Rhonda Clark, Don Miller
Series Code: HYTH
Program Code: HYTH000222
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00:01 Hello! Stress is a normal component of life
00:06 and some people handle it well, some people 00:08 don't handle it so well. 00:10 If you would like to learn more about stress 00:12 and how you can deal with it, stay with us 00:14 I think you will enjoy our program today. 00:36 Welcome to Help Yourself to Health 00:38 with Dr. Agatha Thrash of Uchee Pines Institute, 00:42 and now here is your host Dr. Thrash. 00:45 Stress affects people in different ways, 00:51 some people take it right in stride, they are what we call 00:54 laid back people, but other people, 00:57 even a small amount of stress 00:59 just really affects them strongly. 01:03 Now how can we be those who are laid back, 01:06 who have no problem with stress? 01:09 Well let me just talk with you some about the way that 01:13 people handle stress, and also what we can do 01:16 to alleviate some of the actual diseases that we get 01:21 from having excessive stress, and also the diseases 01:26 that come on because we don't handle stress well. 01:29 Some stresses are stresses whether we handle them or not. 01:33 But, I would like for us to understand a few things 01:36 about stress that can make handling it much easier. 01:40 I order to do this I have asked my colleague 01:44 at Uchee Pines Rhonda Clark to be with me today 01:49 and Rhonda welcome to the program, 01:52 and I would like to find out what you do at Uchee Pines. 01:56 -Well I work in the Lifestyle Center 01:58 in the office doing telephone counseling with people who call 02:00 with medical questions. 02:02 - Very good, you have a qualified background for that 02:05 being an R.N., very good, you will talk with us about 02:09 something concerning stress today. 02:12 - Yes! Some of you may have heard the saying 02:16 exercise neutralizes stress, and I wanted to share 02:20 today a little bit about why that is so. 02:23 Indeed exercise is the perfect antidote for stress, 02:27 but to understand why, we need to understand 02:29 a little bit about what happens physiologically to us 02:33 as we undergo stress. 02:35 When we see of are exposed to something that elicits 02:40 a stress response to us, our body makes stress hormones 02:44 adrenaline, nor-adrenaline, are a couple of examples. 02:47 These pour into our blood stream, and they make 02:51 our muscles tense so that we have quicker reaction times, 02:55 they make our senses keener, 02:57 they suppress the digestive system so more blood and energy 03:01 can be provided to the muscular system, 03:04 and raise our blood pressure, our heart rate, 03:07 our respiratory rate, even our blood sugar elevates 03:10 to provide more fuel for muscles 03:12 This is gearing our bodies up for what you may have heard of 03:16 fight or flight. 03:17 In prolonged stress conditions another stress hormone 03:21 called cortisol is released, cortisol continues to keep 03:26 the blood sugar level elevated to continue providing 03:29 a source of fuel, but it does another interesting thing, 03:33 it makes the cells themselves resistant to insulin. 03:39 Insulin is a hormone that takes glucose into the cell 03:43 to be used for fuel, and I liken it to under an emergency 03:48 situation, gathering the resources, but then 03:51 putting the cells on rations because the body interprets this 03:55 stressor as a long haul. 03:58 If stress is prolonged, disease conditions can result, 04:04 if your constantly elevated blood pressure, 04:08 elevated blood pressure, elevated blood pressure 04:10 with stress, you can develop a chronic hypertension. 04:14 The constant levels of elevated blood sugar can lead to 04:17 diabetes, weight gain, the muscle tension leads to 04:21 chronic headaches, chronic aching and pain syndromes, 04:25 a TMJ, where the jaw muscle is tight and grinding the teeth 04:30 at night, these are things that can result. 04:32 The suppression of the digestive system can lead to ulcers, 04:36 constipation, or chronic conditions of the abdomen. 04:41 So why then this exercise so effective, 04:46 exercise is the perfect neutralizer of stress, 04:50 because it does the very thing that the body has been 04:55 gearing up to do. 04:57 The body has been gearing up to fight or to escape the stressor, 05:02 both of which are physically active responses. 05:06 When we have a normal stress reaction, 05:10 something frightens us, or gives us stress, 05:13 these stress hormones come into our body into our 05:17 blood stream, as we have the opportunity to escape 05:20 or get away from the stressor, these hormones are burned off 05:23 and we return to a normal state. 05:26 In chronic stress, we have the stressor but we get hung up 05:32 in this cycle, we have more of these hormones pumping in 05:35 constantly, constantly, with no relief, 05:38 exercise brings the relief, when we exercise our body 05:44 undergoes the same physiological conditions it does 05:47 under stress, with exercise our heart rate goes up 05:50 our blood pressure goes up, our respiratory rate goes up, 05:53 our blood sugar is elevated temporarily for the purpose of 05:57 helping us burn it off. 05:59 Our senses are keener, our muscles react more quickly, 06:02 exercise begins that same cycle, but brings it around 06:07 to completion. 06:09 When we exercise, we burn off those stress hormones 06:13 we burn off that extra blood sugar, and bring our body 06:16 back down to a normal state. 06:18 If we exercise regularly we begin to condition our body 06:23 to respond better to stress, to more easily recover 06:27 from stressors. 06:28 This is why exercise is such a perfect antidote to stress, 06:32 not only after exercise you may have noticed that you feel warm 06:36 and relaxed, you have a clear mind, in addition 06:39 to just helping to get relief a good exercise session 06:42 helps you sweat, which helps relieve waste from the body 06:46 time spent out exercising, can be time that you commune 06:49 with the Lord, or process through things that are giving 06:52 you stress, so for many reasons exercise is the perfect 06:55 antidote for stress Dr. Thrash, and I appreciate the opportunity 06:58 to share that with you today. 06:59 - Yes it's a very needed thing, and people need to understand 07:04 that exercise can indeed neutralize stress. 07:08 I have another colleague who has made a study of stress 07:13 and he will talk with you about some of those things 07:16 that can really help you with the stress process, 07:20 that is Dr. Don Miller, thank you for being 07:23 on the program today, and you are going to talk with us 07:26 something about attitudes. 07:28 - Attitudes has a lot to do with stress, 07:30 and the best way to talk about it is to give you 07:32 basically some of my own case histories. 07:35 You have a thing called stress, Rhonda just talked about stress 07:40 Dr. Thrash just talked about stress, we are surrounded 07:45 by things called stressors, it's our reaction 07:49 to the stressor, that causes us stress. 07:52 There are some things that don't bother other people 07:55 and so it doesn't cause them stress, 07:57 let me just give you one example to begin with. 08:00 I was in the Marine Corp for many years, 08:02 got out and moved to a farm in Missouri, 08:04 outside my second story bedroom window there was a large 08:09 cedar tree, now I don't know what it was doing in that tree, 08:12 it sounded like it was in that tree, 08:14 it might have not been in that tree, but out there 08:16 somewhere in the darkness was a Whip-poor-will. 08:19 This Whip-poor-will had a constant call, 08:23 you know what they sound like, it would do that non-stop 08:28 for hours, that caused me unbelievable stress 08:31 because I like it dark, quiet, cool and neat it my bedroom. 08:35 That bird drove me crazy, it was causing me lots of stress, 08:39 and that went on for some weeks. 08:42 One day I received in the mail a magazine, 08:46 I was living in Missouri, they've got a magazine for 08:48 everyone who lives in Missouri called 08:50 The Missouri Conservationist, 08:51 in that magazine, was an article about that very bird 08:56 giving me the stress outside my window 08:58 and one of the things it said in this article 09:00 is that the Whip-poor-will in one night eats more mosquitoes 09:05 than a purple martin does, in a lifetime. 09:08 Stress was gone, because there is nothing worse to me 09:12 than that buzzz sound at night time, with the mosquitoes 09:15 flying by your ear, and so as soon as I changed my attitude 09:20 about that bird, it kept on singing that same song, 09:23 it would sing it as non-stop, it would sing it just as loud, 09:28 it would sing it every night, it never again caused me the 09:32 problem, my mind was changed, now that was not so much 09:36 a voluntary thing, that happened from reading. 09:39 But after learning this principle... 09:40 I was in a hotel one time, late at night, I am asleep 09:47 I like my sleep, I like it quiet when I sleep, 09:49 in the middle of the night someone on the other side 09:53 of the wall, no more than twelve inches from my head, 09:55 clicked on the television set, loud, some show 10:00 that had a lot of laughing going on, so all you hear is 10:02 Oh, ho, ho, ho, going on, just twelve inches from my head 10:05 stress levels rising, I'm getting upset with this problem 10:09 and then I thought wait a minute, now I've got to find 10:12 a way to turn my distress, into you stress. 10:15 I've got to look what is going on in the other side of the room 10:18 from the person watching this program's stand point. 10:21 So I started putting myself in his shoes, I say ok, 10:24 maybe he's like me, he travels a lot, he just came across many 10:28 zones, he is in serious jet lag, he's laying there in bed 10:32 at 2:00, 3:00 in the morning, nothing to do, 10:35 turns on the television, to help him get through the night. 10:39 I can understand that, my stress level went down 10:41 or maybe the person in the next room has just had a 10:46 real tragedy in his life, he's in a hotel because his wife 10:49 just kicked him out, or he's had a death in the family 10:50 and he's there for the funeral, whatever it could be, 10:53 the person is having a struggle, and so the laughter, 10:56 which we realize is a great way to make yourself feel better, 10:59 is helping him over this hump in his life. 11:04 That made my stress level down to zero, 11:07 now neither of those things may have been true, 11:09 he may have just wanted to watch television in the middle 11:11 of the night, but that was ok, it was my conscious decision 11:15 to look at the problem in a different way. 11:18 So what we have to do, is when we see a stressor 11:22 and we've got them all around us, we've got to find out a way 11:25 to turn it from something that is going to hurt us, 11:27 because stress damages the body, we get in stressful 11:32 situations as Rhonda described we have a stress response 11:36 and that is good, short term stress is good for us, 11:39 it's been put into our bodies for a purpose. 11:42 I will give you another example if I may, 11:44 I was walking down the street one morning 11:46 early in the morning, out by Uchee Pines, 11:49 there is a large country road, I like to take my morning 11:52 prayer walks, and I recommend this for you. 11:54 If you wake up in the morning and you are praying, 11:56 and you are kneeling there by your bed, and you are praying 12:00 and [snore], you are back to sleep again, you wake up 12:02 an hour later, that's not so nice to fall asleep in front 12:05 of the King, and so I have a short prayer to begin with, 12:09 get dressed and then I take what I call my prayer walk. 12:12 So I am walking down the street having a good time, 12:14 it is early in the morning, it is dark, there is a house 12:17 right up ahead, and there is a fence around this house, 12:20 the fence is still there, a high fence, for a good reason, 12:24 inside the fence dwells a Rottweiler, and if you know 12:28 what a Rottweiler is, it's one of those types of dogs 12:30 that would like to eat a person like me for breakfast. 12:32 So I'm walking down the road, and I just casually glance over 12:37 they have a night light in their yard, and the gate is open 12:40 stress begins to leak in, a few more steps, 12:44 I hear the sound of both the dog running and that low 12:49 thunderous issues forth from his chest, my stress level 12:53 now is maxed out, my eyes are dilated, my blood pressure 12:56 just went up, my respiration, my heartbeat is raising, 13:00 my blood is going to my muscles, I am blanched, my digestion 13:04 has stopped, everything is ready for fight or flight, 13:06 I know I can't outrun this dog he is right there, 13:09 and I can't fight the dog, I could try but probably have a 13:13 hard time with it, so now what do you do with this stress? 13:16 Yes exercise would be good in this case, to run 13:18 but you just sit there and run just ahead of those 13:21 gaping jaws, which will finally get you. 13:23 So I try to do something else, and if you have a hard time 13:26 with stress, stressful situation, 13:27 here is what I recommend you do, you go to the Lord, 13:30 He has promised to deliver us from our problems 13:33 and so what I did with this dog is I quoted a Bible verse, 13:37 It's found in Exodus 11:7, and I paraphrased for the dog 13:42 because he didn't understand King James and so I said 13:44 the Bible says, I held up my hand and said the Bible says 13:47 an Egyptian dog shall not wag his tongue against an Israelite, 13:50 and that dog stopped right there dead in his tracks, 13:54 he just stopped right at the edge of the road, 13:55 and I just walked on by. 13:58 So when you get into these stressful situations 14:01 and we're all surrounded by them, no matter what it is 14:05 we're to go to the Lord, and say Lord I can't handle 14:07 this piece of stress, whether it's something happening 14:10 in the family, something in your environment, 14:12 take it to the Lord, and say Lord help me look at this 14:16 thing a little bit differently, if we can place ourselves 14:19 in someone else's shoes, and find out what might... 14:22 Because usually our stressors are coming from other people, 14:25 put yourself in their position and try to look at them 14:29 in a little bit different light, and I have found for myself, 14:32 it really helps. 14:33 You are driving down the road... we have this thing called 14:35 Road Rage, you've all heard about this, well work keeps you 14:40 from getting into road rage. 14:41 As you are driving down the road, and all of a sudden 14:43 this car [zoom] pulls over right in front of you, 14:45 and that usually makes your knuckles get real white 14:49 and you are wanting to say a few choice words. 14:52 But you have to look at it in a different way, 14:53 maybe this is somebody who themselves is under 14:57 great stress, or on their way to the hospital, 14:58 whatever it might be, look at them in a different way 15:02 or just back off and say Lord help that poor person. 15:05 I find that as I give these things to the Lord, 15:09 and as I quit looking at them in a negative way, 15:11 my stress is not nearly as high. 15:13 Stress makes you get older faster, 15:15 stress makes you get sicker more, stress has a lot 15:17 of problems, it wears out the forces, and Dr. Thrash 15:20 time goes fast enough as it is, I don't think we need to 15:24 make it accelerate it any by getting into 15:26 stressful situations. 15:27 - Yes, I quite agree, I think that what you have shared 15:30 is really quite good, and taking things to the Lord 15:33 may not result in a miracle for you as it did with the 15:36 stopping of the Rottweiler, but certainly taking it 15:42 to the Lord can give you through His guidance 15:45 the path that you should take, in order to avoid being stressed 15:51 by the stressor. 15:52 Let us take a look at some of the things of the nervous 15:57 system that can help us to know why this thing of stress 16:03 can have such a pervasive effect on the body. 16:07 Let's just take a look at some of the things that 16:10 we have here: The first thing is the spinal nerves, 16:14 we have all of these spinal nerves that come out 16:18 from the spinal column, and they have been traveling 16:23 through the spinal cord, which is a cross section of 16:26 which is shown here, some of these nerves are coming out from 16:30 but some are going into the spinal cord, 16:35 you can see how many of these there are, 16:37 they are throughout the body, in fact what we are seeing 16:41 here is just a mere fraction of how many there really are 16:46 in the body, then on this side, we see something else. 16:50 Here is this spinal cord, this is the mid-brain, 16:54 and here we have the spinal cord, and then we have these 16:59 ganglia that you can see here on both sides. 17:03 These have to do with the running of things, 17:08 the first ones that I showed you had to do with 17:10 motor activity, or the working of our muscles, 17:13 and the receiving of sensory impulses from the outside. 17:18 But these have to do with the running of the various organs 17:22 of the body, the pancreas, the liver, the stomach, 17:25 the colon, the small bowel, even such things as the heart 17:30 beat and respiration, all of these are under the influence 17:33 of this part of the nervous system. 17:36 So you can see why it is that so much of the body 17:39 the skeletal system, the muscles, as well as all of the 17:44 internal organs, these are all involved in the nervous system. 17:49 But the part that is the cap of it all is the brain, 17:54 here we have a most marvelous mechanism, 17:57 in fact some who have spent a lifetime studying this organ, 18:03 say that it is more complex, than the entire universe. 18:08 If it is then we can expect that one person would never 18:13 learn it all, in one lifetime. 18:15 Let's just take a look at some of the anatomy, 18:18 the function of it, and even the microscopic anatomy: 18:22 Even the gross description of this organ, is more... 18:28 we just don't know what so much of it means, 18:32 but here is one hemisphere and here is the other, 18:37 with a portion cut off from the front part. 18:41 Here is what is called the hind brain, or the cerebellum, 18:46 and the cerebellum has only to do only with, maybe only, 18:50 with the coordination of movements, 18:53 and the way that we can do a smooth movement 18:57 is under the control of the cerebellum. 19:00 Now you can see a faint shadow right here, this is what we call 19:05 the hippocampus and it has to do with... and the 19:11 thalamus, and this has to do with various parts of the 19:16 control of many of our functions like blood pressure, thoughts, 19:21 and anything that comes into the thalamus, can make 19:25 quite and important change in the way that we think. 19:30 Notice how complex the blood vessel system is, 19:34 here we have the vertebral arteries that come up to make 19:38 the vascular artery, and then we have three major branches 19:43 of this vascular artery, as it makes what is called 19:49 the Circle of Willis, not only the vertebral arteries 19:53 are involved here, but also the internal carotid arteries. 19:57 So there are four places where the Circle of Willis can get 20:03 its blood supply. 20:04 Why did the Lord give us such an elaborate way to just see 20:10 the blood supply of the brain? 20:12 Well it is because without this elaborate blood supply 20:17 we could get a serious problem by blockage of just 20:21 one of these, let's say we have one of the vertebral arteries 20:26 cut, then we still have three other ways that we can supply 20:31 blood to the Circle of Willis. 20:33 Now we also have several coverings, the meninges are here 20:39 the dura is here, it's absolutely marvelous. 20:42 But let's take a look at what is done in various areas, 20:45 Broca's area, that's this area right here, is where speech is 20:52 interpreted, but where we do speech, is with the tongue 20:57 the larynx, the lips, in this area, so we do, do speech here, 21:02 we understand what speech is about here. 21:03 Then we have the nose, the eye lid, the brow, 21:08 the fingers and the index finger is a large part 21:13 of the brain, and all these other parts, have to do with 21:17 the movement of the brain, then the sensory portion of 21:20 the brain which senses the various sensations that we 21:27 can sense from the outside world. 21:29 Many different places where we do specific things 21:33 in the brain, and the little brain cells themselves 21:39 are complex enough that we could spend probably two days 21:43 just studying the complexity of the brain cells themselves 21:49 to say nothing of the total gross anatomy of the brain, 21:55 what a wonderful thing that it is that God made mind. 22:00 So with this background of Anatomy and Physiology 22:03 let me just tell you what Dr. Hans Celia who was a 22:08 Canadian physician back in the 1940's, 22:12 did a lot of study on stress and he found a number 22:17 of disorders and conditions that were related to stress 22:22 angina, asthma, various cancers, cardio vascular disease, 22:29 auto-immune diseases, colds, depression, diabetes, 22:34 headaches, hypertension, reduced immune system function, 22:38 irritable bowel syndrome, menstrual irregularities, 22:42 pre-menstrual syndrome, rheumatoid arthritis, 22:45 ulcerative colitis, ulcers, and on and on. 22:48 There's hardly an end to the things that can be caused 22:54 by stresses, therefore if you have some kind of strange 22:57 disorder in your body, you wonder why you are having it 23:02 look at this matter of stresses in your body. 23:05 See if there are those things that you need to change your 23:09 attitude about, as Dr. Miller was saying, that 23:13 just a change in attitude can sometimes make quite 23:16 a difference in the way that you are stressed, 23:20 by a certain stressor. 23:22 Now we have learned through the years since Dr. Hans Celis 23:27 back in the 1940's first described stress, 23:31 and all of it's ramifications, we have learned a number 23:34 of things to do, one thing is the diet, 23:36 cut out the caffeine, and it's relatives, that would be coffee, 23:41 tea, colas, and chocolate. 23:44 These can intensify the reaction that you have to stress, 23:48 then alcohol, refined foods, those foods that are stimulatory 23:54 like hot spices, those should all be cut out, 23:58 if you know any food that you are allergic to, 24:00 you should cut that one out, because that can 24:02 intensify the reaction that you have to stress. 24:05 Be regular, in all your habits, go to bed on time, 24:10 get up on time, eat your meals on time, 24:12 exercise on time, go to work on time, 24:14 do as many things on a timed schedule as you can. 24:19 Now you may say, but I don't know how to handle my time, 24:23 well there are some tips that I can give you about 24:26 how to handle time: one is set your priorities 24:30 for what you can do, you can't do everything, 24:32 but there are some things that you can do 24:35 in the time that you have. 24:37 Pray for guidance, that the Lord will help you to know 24:41 what is that most important thing that you should do now 24:44 and as you do that you can set priorities through prayer. 24:49 Then organize your day, you can do that with a pen and paper 24:54 those thing that you must do they must be done today 24:57 without fail, put those things at the top of the list 25:00 and you will recognize that you will need to do those 25:03 before you go to bed. 25:05 Then you should decide what can be neglected, 25:08 there are a few things that you don't have to do today 25:12 they can be done at some later time. 25:14 Make a list of those, they have to be done, 25:17 they should be done in the next day or so perhaps, 25:19 make a list of those, but they don't have to be done today 25:22 if you get some of them done fine, but otherwise you may need 25:27 to put those off to a much later time. 25:29 If you need to hire an assistant to help you, 25:33 perhaps you need some help with housekeeping, 25:35 you seem somehow not to be able to keep your house neat 25:40 and clean and orderly, you may need an assistant. 25:43 If you get such an assistant, help them to know how 25:46 you want things done, because an assistant who does things 25:50 in a way that you don't like that may be worse than not 25:54 having an assistant at all. 25:55 You should accept the way that others interact with you, 26:01 let's say that your neighbor is always going to ignore you 26:04 at certain times, don't let that stress you out 26:07 just think about that but some of these days she will be 26:11 nice and socialable and I'll wait for that time, 26:16 an I'll work for that time but in the mean time, 26:18 I'll accept the fact that she is just not maybe very social 26:22 or maybe she just doesn't like me for some reason. 26:27 If there are some tough jobs that you have to do today 26:33 when you pick them up don't put them down before you do them, 26:37 sometimes you will pick up something, 26:39 yes I know I have to do this today, but I won't do it right 26:41 now, I'll put it down. 26:43 That's usually not the best thing, if you have to pay a bill 26:48 or you have to answer a letter, pick it up, you are already 26:51 handling it, while you are handling it, go ahead and 26:54 finish it up, and put it aside, chances are pretty good 26:58 that you will spend less time on it if you do it 27:01 when you first pick it up, then you will if you 27:04 just put it aside and hope that some later time you will do it. 27:09 Hanging up clothes is this way, take off your jacket, 27:11 hang it up, don't lay it down, because when you have to 27:15 pick it up again and hang it up, it will take longer. 27:18 Then another thing is to avoid the drowsiness of the afternoon 27:25 put some running around, maybe doing some errands 27:28 because if you start doing your letter writing at that time 27:32 it will take much longer. 27:33 So do those things that you can do on your feet 27:37 or going about and it will be very pleasant for you. 27:41 Now I hope some of these things on how to handle stresses 27:45 will be of eternal benefit to you, because it can help you 27:49 to deal with this life, and to draw closer to our Lord 27:53 may He bless you in these matters. |
Revised 2014-12-17