Last Updated on Monday, 8 August 2011 11:33 Written by foodbeautiful Monday, 8 August 2011 11:33

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With school starting  you may find that your sleep and health decline.  Being away from stressful situation is beneficial for kids immune system. In all reality we can’t avoid stress – but we can adjust our lives and our child’s life live to accommodate stress without side-effects. There are different types of stress that your child can experience by simply going to school.

There are two types of stress groups 1) acute 2) chronic. Acute stress happens when there is an unpleasant experience, overstimulation/work overload, unexpected or uncontrollable noise, prestige or status loss, electric shock, uncontrollable situations, physical illness etc. Chronic stressors include sleep deprivation, daily “hassles”, work overload or underload, role strains, or social isolation. Emotionally, stress can lead to feelings of depression, anxiety, and anger.

Some people may cope well with stress, rising to the challenge and meeting their goals. Others may be more adversely affected by stressors, leading to mental as well as physical fatigue.

In order to understand these changes, I must first introduce you to the immune system. The immune system protects the body from disease organisms and other foreign bodies, known as antigens. The first line of defense is local barriers such as the skin, peritoneum, etc, and inflammation due to immunoglobulins, or antibodies. If those fail to block or destroy the antigens, the cell-mediated immune response and the humoral immune response kick in. The cell-mediated response uses sensitized T cells (white blood cells derived in the thymus) to recognize, attach to, and render antigens inactive. Other types of T cells, helper T cells, which aid in production of antibodies by B (bone marrow) cells, and suppressor/cytotoxic. Helper T cells are also known as CD4 cells, and suppressor T cells are known as CD8 cells (Glaser, Anderson & Anderson, 1992).

There are two general types of stress groups: those who are “high reactors”, and those who are “low reactors”. High reactors are significantly affected by stress, as shown by a significant increase in heart rate, blood pressure, catecholamines, and CD8 cells. Low reactors show little or no change in those areas (Manuck, et al, 1991).

Catecholamines are chemicals produced by the body that work in nerve transmission. The three main catecholamines include dopamine, epinephrine, and norepinephrine. Dopamine raises the heart rate and blood pressure, epinephrine raises heart rate and opens blood vessels (lowering blood pressure), and norepinephrine closes blood vessels (raising blood pressure) (Glaser, Anderson & Anderson, 1992). Epinephrine and norepinephrine are the catecholamines most commonly measured in stress experiments, and both increase under stress. Increases such as these can suppress aspects of immune function, including natural killer cell (cells that attack antigens without having recognized them first) activity. Increases in catacholemines may also rapidly alter cell numbers via redistribution (Naliboff, et al, 1991). In fact, changes in epinephrine levels are thought to reflect lymphocyte migration from bone marrow, the extremities, and the thymus (Kiecolt-Glaser, et al, 1992) to other areas of the body.

How do these chemical changes influence disease? It is well known that asthma, diabetes, various gastro-intestinal disorders, heart disease and viral infections are influenced by stress. When the immune system is suppressed, as it is under stress, latent viruses can obviously stage a comeback. In asthma, a disease which involves both external and internal factors, it is the internal factor that is most affected by acute effects of psychological stressors. Diabetes mellitus, the most common form of diabetes, is significantly affected by stress. Physical or psychological stressors can alter insulin needs; stressors may often be responsible for episodes of loss of control, especially in diabetic children.

There are many diseases like gastrointestinal disease, people with ulcers, high blood pressure, high cholesterol and emotional diseases – that are affected by stress.  So what can you do to adjust your life and your child’s life to overcome these chronic and acute (unavoidable) stressors.

Here is a short list of nutritional things you can do to balance your body systems and prepare yourself to have a low reactive response to stress:

1) Start using 2 tsp of Cod liver oil in a little plain yogurt, add healthy sweetener to it and take this at the start of the day.

2) Take 1 tsp of supa-boost. with water at bedtime improve immune system, balance nervous system, improve sleep quality , and decrease nervous jitters. It is also known for immediately helping someone cope with anxiety. Take 1/2 tsp with 1 little juice or water when you fell most anxious in the day. This product is one of our best sellers.  It works effortlessly on any chronic condition.

3) Follow proper food combining outlined in “Health Search & Rescue” try having a light breakfast with fruits and raw nuts, followed by a light mid-morning snack (maybe the cod liver oil and yogurt). Then have a protein at lunch and finish your day by eating a starch like oatmeal or brown rice at dinner. This will calm your nerves down and allow you to sleep.

4) Avoid foods that have natural flavors, sugar, aspartame, artificial colors etc. These are neuro and excito-toxins that can cause a flair up of ill feelings, physical and emotion stress.

5) Having a fool proof source of remedies and foods that can be customized for your family.  Feel free to contact us at 303.656.1991 to set up an appointment today.

In conclusion, psychological stress does have a significant affect on the immune system. You can’t fully avoid the daily stressors of life but you can adjust your food lifestyle so that stress has much less affect on your life.