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The Effects of Stress on Our Brains · Talking FACS

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  Welcome to Talking FACS.
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  What you need to know about family. food,
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  finance and fitness.
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  This nationally recognized award winning podcast is hosted by the University of Kentucky Family and Consumer sciences extension program.
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  Our educators share research knowledge with individuals,
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  families and communities to improve quality of life.
• 0:24
  Hello and welcome to Talking FACS.
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  What you need to know about family food finance and fitness.
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  I am your host,
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  Mindy McCulley,
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  Family consumer sciences extension specialist for instructional support at the University of Kentucky.
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  I am excited today that my guest is Dr. Paul Norrod,
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  extension specialist for rural health and farm safety.
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  So welcome Paul.
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  Hey Mindy,
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  Glad to be here.
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  How are you today?
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  I I am doing great and I'm so glad that you're here because we're going to talk about a really important topic which is stress and how that affects our brain because I know that our brains are in tune with everything that happens in our body and in our lives and if we don't take care of them then we're gonna feel it in lots of different ways,
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  aren't we?
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  Yeah,
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  absolutely.
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  It's uh it's a very important topic that all Kentuckians experience and uh I think it's a needed topic that to talk about just to help us understand ourselves but help us to understand that,
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  you know,
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  some of the issues we may be experiencing aren't necessarily because we're weak or we're having problems or we're not connected.
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  It can just be a build up of
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  of things that uh we can we can work on to help ourselves and help our community.
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  That's a great segue into.
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  Let's talk about what are some common structures that people experience across the board.
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  Yeah.
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  You know,
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  you think about common stressors and I like to think of stress on a continuum.
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  And so we all have stressors that occur on a daily basis and that can be just from trying to log on to our computer at work,
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  getting out and trying to get in a cold vehicle and get it warmed up.
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  You know,
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  that's a stressor.
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  We can think of stressors that are a little bit more serious I guess,
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  I would say.
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  And we think of illness and things that just uh can take us out of work,
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  take us off the farm that can keep us away from family members.
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  And then we can think of crisis type stressors,
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  events or circumstances that that really are like the piece of concrete on our scale of life,
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  right?
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  It just sort of tips us over the edge or makes things makes life really unmanageable.
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  And so,
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  you know,
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  I think of our our friends and colleagues over in Western Kentucky with the tornado outbreak and just the amount of stress that that cause that's very much a is very much a crisis,
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  right?
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  And then it is inconvenient to have to get up and try to warm up my vehicle and get it de-iced and thawed out ready to drive,
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  but it's not changing my life really,
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  it is stressful trying to get kids through their school activities,
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  that's a stressor and then kids go through their own problems,
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  right?
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  You know,
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  you and I have certain stressful times.
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  So Paul does all stress have to be negative or can there be positive types of stress?
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  That that's a great question and uh you know,
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  not all stress is negative and while we we often think of stress is negative,
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  we we have positive stressors,
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  things that that are good in our life.
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  And so,
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  you know,
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  that could be graduating from high school,
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  it could be purchasing a new piece of farm equipment,
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  going to get a new chainsaw,
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  having our kids get married,
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  having Children,
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  grandchildren getting married,
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  you know,
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  those are getting in uh forming a new long term relationship and those are positive stressors,
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  things that ultimately serve as a source of uh coping and self care and help us out and reduce our stress over the long term.
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  But the thing to remember is when we think about stressors,
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  even some of those positive stressors can have some negative impacts on our brain,
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  especially when they occur in the presence of some long term stress.
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  Alright,
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  so sometimes maybe it's the transition that causes the stress,
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  it's not necessarily the event.
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  That's so stressful.
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  Right?
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  Yeah.
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  And so,
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  you know,
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  if you think if people think of getting into a new relationship or getting married,
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  you know,
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  or buying a house,
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  that transition,
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  you know,
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  going through that process is stressful.
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  But once you're in the relationship,
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  if it's a if it's a positive and healthy relationship when you're in,
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  once you're into the house and settled and and you're sort of moving forward,
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  that stress from that particular circumstance or event,
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  we typically think of it as settling down.
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  Right?
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  And so then what was once stressful actually becomes a source of security or comfort for us?
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  And so that that's where it has that positive effect.
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  Whereas that chronic that negative stress,
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  uh not really a source of security or comfort for.
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  So how does that chronic stress and impact our bodies and how does it affect our brain?
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  Yeah.
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  So,
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  you know,
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  if we think of our brains and our nervous system,
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  no,
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  I can't think of it like an electrical system and so it's full of switching mechanisms,
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  It wants power.
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  And if you think of stress when we have a what we call the perceived stress or say for example,
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  that,
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  you know,
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  one of my Children,
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  my my daughter a couple of years ago,
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  her sister landed on her leg and broke her leg and it was actually displaced.
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  Like you could see the bone that was,
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  that was a stress,
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  like it wasn't out of the skin,
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  but you can see it poking through this,
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  poking,
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  you know,
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  trying to poke out.
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  I'm like,
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  oh my gosh,
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  right,
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  I'm a registered nurse and uh but with your own kid,
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  like I'm like,
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  oh my gosh.
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  And so what that does is it essentially puts our body into survival mode and divert all of the electricity in her brain and basically slipping all the switches.
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  It's turning all the lights on and it's just getting us ready to survive.
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  And uh and and it's so we can we can see everything,
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  we can hear everything we can run.
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  If we need to,
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  we can freeze,
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  we can fight.
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  We've got all the resources we need for our body to survive.
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  Obviously my daughter's broken leg doesn't require me to fight,
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  right,
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  or require me to run.
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  But that doesn't matter.
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  That's how our bodies respond.
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  That's our nervous system response.
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  And so the problem with that is once her legs fixed and she's good,
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  I'm happy.
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  I'm good.
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  My daughter is safe,
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  Right?
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  And uh,
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  I'm,
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  I'm reassured.
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  But if when we build up this chronic stress in our body,
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  what happens is we go through this ongoing activation.
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  It's just like sitting there flipping the light bulb,
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  the light switch on and off,
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  but it's essentially flipping all the light switches on and off,
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  on and off in your house the entire time.
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  Well,
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  if we think of our of our bodies is like the light bulb,
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  the receiver of that energy,
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  it's not gonna hold up,
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  it won't hold up over time,
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  the light bulb's gonna burn out eventually.
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  And so our bodies are gonna burn out eventually.
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  And it's gonna cause us some both short term and long term consequences.
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  I can imagine that that is so true.
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  And so these consequences,
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  what what are they gonna look like?
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  What consequences are going to see?
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  Right?
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  So it's one of these acute phases or as stress is building up and we're not dealing with their stress.
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  What we usually see is uh you know,
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  people feel tense,
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  will fill those,
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  that tension in our shoulders,
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  will fill it in,
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  you know,
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  in our in our head and neck and we may be losing sleep.
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  We may feel more sleepy part of that survival mode.
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  We may feel that we need to withdraw from people and get time alone,
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  may feel that we need some downtime,
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  right?
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  Just some time away may have headaches,
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  right?
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  May grit your teeth at night.
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  There's any number of things.
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  May have muscles,
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  aches and pains in your major muscle groups,
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  like the back,
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  like your back and even in your knees and hips quite frankly.
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  But as that builds up over time.
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  And as it goes on for for a few more weeks,
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  we have what's called a chemical build up in the front part of our brain that that controls our ability to think.
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  And this can occur on a continuum.
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  And so for a really stressful situation,
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  like a hospitalization of loved ones.
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  People may not be able to think and that chemical is called cortisol.
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  And we get what's called red brain and it basically just were chemically unable to think clearly.
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  And so what that manifest as is people may describe it as a fog.
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  And it's like that's what I like to say brain fog.
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  We call it brain fog.
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  So you experience a brain fog.
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  You may find yourself sitting at your desk just staring at a computer screen and realize,
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  wow,
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  10,
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  15 minutes have passed.
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  You may uh not recall what you watched on tv.
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  You may forget what you ate,
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  you know earlier in the week.
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  You may even forget people's names.
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  You may forget appointments.
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  That's a part of the brain fog.
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  And it just really is just trouble thinking is how we describe it.
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  So those are some of the early manifestations,
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  some of the long term manifestations of not dealing with stress that we can see in the body.
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  It can affect your heart.
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  People have heart attacks for stress,
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  Men and women,
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  you can develop high blood pressure,
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  your blood pressure goes up when you're under stress stress.
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  In some studies have also been connected with dementia as well.
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  And so it just has negative consequences in the long term.
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  Especially these these negative stressors that we think about when you you talk about that brain fog.
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  I immediately thought about when I was pregnant and I remember we talked about the mom brain and pregnancy is a long term stressor.
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  And of course that's one of those things that we we did,
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  we just kind of had that probably had that red brain for a long time during pregnancy,
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  and we did have that mom brain that didn't always think,
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  and then,
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  of course,
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  after the baby's born,
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  and you have sleepless nights and those other stressors that you aren't always thinking about,
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  then it made perfect sense to me all of a sudden,
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  and my children are in their twenties now.
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  So that's a great analogy and what that boils down to.
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  It's just hormonal changes and like with pregnancy and pregnant mothers and when they deliver and that postpartum period,
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  You know,
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  there's all these hormonal shifts in our bodies and that happens for men too,
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  when we're under a lot of stress.
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  And as we're going through,
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  as we're aging and hitting our middle age,
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  the middle age in our 40s and 50s,
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  we're all going through,
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  men are going through hormone changes.
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  And so those shifting those hormones when we're under stress are occurring,
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  and again,
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  it's just trying to get the body to survive,
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  and that's okay.
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  But you can't keep flipping the light switch on and off on and off,
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  on and off the light bulb's gonna burn out.
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  And so we want to ultimately,
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  ultimately what we're trying to prevent is our own burnout because if I if you burn out Mindy or I burn out,
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  or the people listening burn out from stress,
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  then,
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  then we can't really,
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  we can't help our communities and family members and the people who are depending on us?
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  Exactly.
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  Exactly.
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  So what are some tangible steps that we can take to help prevent that burnout?
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  Right?
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  And so that's a good question.
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  And uh they're actually very simple steps and and oftentimes we'll write those off.
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  And so obviously I want to make clear there are some stressors in our life that we can't escape that we shouldn't make go away.
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  I was talking with a farm family out in western Kentucky and they were talking about how the tornadoes just destroy their grain bins.
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  We can't make that goal,
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  can't recover,
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  it can't recover the corn grain,
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  it's done.
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  But we got to talk and I was talking with this individual,
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  we're talking about,
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  I was like,
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  what are you all doing?
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  She said,
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  you know,
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  we've spent more time as a family and we really come together.
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  That's a term that we use in rural rural communities and farm cultures come together.
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  That's the thing.
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  So when you feel like you need to pull away,
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  that's ok for the short term.
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  But when you're really starting to feel that brain fog and feel real test,
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  it's time to get together with people that care about you and people that love you.
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  And uh I always like to use this analogy.
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  And so I'm gonna ask you a question mindy when a baby's crying generally,
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  what's one of the first steps we take when,
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  when we we go right to that baby and we pick that baby up and we hug on that baby and we sing to it and say comforting words,
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  hugs,
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  just giving a person a hug for about 20-30 sec.
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  Shuts down that survival response in our body and activates what's called a rest and digest system in my brain and tells us that we're okay,
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  that we're safe.
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  That just a simple 22 2nd,
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  32 2nd hug of a friend or family member can help going hunting or fishing and getting out.
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  That can help listening to music,
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  can help making a plan.
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  I know it's It's difficult when we're in this brain fog to make a plan.
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  And so I like to say I'd like to talk about focus on 24 hours,
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  just can't focus on what's gonna happen two weeks from now.
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  But gosh,
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  I can keep in range and concentrate and try to work towards the next 24 hours.
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  And that's a good way to alleviate some of the stress.
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  You know,
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  just by focusing on a short time period,
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  right?
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  Engaging in self care is another good thing,
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  listening to music.
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  Those are just very simple,
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  tangible steps that we can take and sometimes it's baby steps,
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  right?
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  You don't have to you don't have to take the giant leap.
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  You might have to take that baby step to make it work.
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  Yeah,
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  it's not necessarily planning an entire vacation and trying to get away from a week.
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  It's just that little bitty simple step of calling a friend,
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  sitting down to watch a movie with someone that you know cares about.
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  You texting somebody eating your favorite meal.
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  My goodness!
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  Right?
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  I know I hear it in your voice.
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  You're like,
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  oh man,
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  you're already thinking of that comfort food,
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  right,
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  that is okay.
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  A favorite meal can just help turn down that response and give us a little comfort and act as a buffer to those stressors.
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  I think those are all great suggestions for helping anyone who is dealing with a stressful situation,
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  learn how to move out of that situation and and move on to better times,
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  paul.
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  Thanks so much for taking the time to share with us today.
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  I know that this is important information for anybody no matter where they might be in their situation and I know that you'll come back and share with us again and to our listeners.
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  I hope you will join us again on Talking FACS.
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