What is Stress?

Thursday Halaqa Notes
Dr. Kinda
12/5/13
MCA Santa Clara, CA

Stress

• Stress is the psychological effects on the body from stressors. 
• It is good for the body. When something happens suddenly, your body defends you. Like when you go on a roller coaster, or sudden good news, or sudden bad news. This is called acute stress. 
• How does the body defend this? 
• You are about to enter the stress zone. Inside your body the alert goes out. Every part of the brain has a function - one part, taht al mihad - the hypothalamus, has the function of sending signals. This is the area behind the nose. It tells the adrenal gland, which is on top of the kidney, to make adrenaline. 
• Adrenaline is a hormone that makes your hands sweaty, your stomach ache, all your senses become very sharp, your whole body is fully aware of what is going on around it, and all the muscles are ready to take any action. 
• This is called fight or flight. You feel like you want to either fight or you want to run away. 
• Adrenaline doesn’t last long in the body. 
• If your stress didn’t finish, then the brain will send a signal to the adrenal gland to make cortisol. Cortisol is bad for the brain. And it lasts a long time in the brain. 
• When you have stress, less blood is going to the brain, which makes less oxygen get to the brain. And cortisol affects the hippocampus, which is the area of the memory in the brain, so your memory gets affected. That’s why you forget things when you are stressed. 
• Jihaaz al wuddy - the sympathetic nervous system - it quickens heartbeat, tenses the muscles, you work faster, and no one understands what you are saying, you forget where you put things or what you wanted. This is the adrenaline working. It is easy to start this process.
• The opposite - jihaaz natheer al wuddy - the parasympathetic nervous system, calms down the body little by little - sends signals to stop the production of adrenaline and cortisol. Then the brain sends signals for the body to makes hormones that relax the body - seratonin. It is hard to start this process. 
• This is homeostasis - one process excites you, then the other process calms you down. SubhanAllah.
• Acute stress - if someone has a heart problem, acute stress could kill them. Because the body keeps losing oxygen until the heart can’t work anymore. You see this the most in young people. Like someone playing soccer and suddenly dies. If an older person dies, it’s because they are weak from disease. 
• If you don't find a way to manage your stress, the constant stress will leave your muscles tense all the time and you will feel tired for no reason. The people with constant stress and the most stress are usually Type A Personalities. 
• Type A personalities are competitive, always angry, always blaming others, demand perfection. These people get heart attacks and strokes earlier than others.
• Type B personalities also have a lot of stress. They like to travel, laugh, joke, like to be the center of attention, they always look happy. But their stress is that they have to make sure that everyone likes them and that they get all the attention. They have a fear of rejection. If someone says something about them or ignores them they get very stressed out. 
• Type C personality has the least stress. They like routine, organization, they like to figure out how things work which makes them good engineers, they like to think before they give you a solution. They have the least stress and diseases. 
• Type D personality has low stress but doesn't handle stress well. They help everyone. They are the ones everyone goes to when they have a problem. But when they have stress, they have a bigger reaction in their bodies. They don't know how to ask for help so they keep their stress inside them. So this is also not good.
• Sometimes you are in a situation where you need to act like A, another where you need to act like B, C, or D... 
• Like when you are driving, you could become A. 
• Stress headache - prepared yourself that you have to be ready to deal with stressful situations. the neck muscles, head muscles,  
• Migraine headache - one cause: stress. 
• Causes of stress can also be noises (refrigerator, clock, etc)
• If you are tired without cause: could be because your muscles are using up the oxygen so they are stressed and tight. They don’t get a chance to rest so they stay tired.
• Qarha, stomach ulcer - stress not cause of it, but it affects it. 
• Everyday stress, there’s nothing you can do about it. Like taking the kids to school. You have to keep doing it. So how you do you deal with this? You need to have find ways to deal with these stresses. 
• Stress & worry can age a person to look older. 
• We have more stress these days. My grandmother - only stress was when her husband died. In those days, some women would have 10 kids and only 4 lived. Now when a woman has a miscarriage in first month she stays depressed in bed for a year. 
• Sadness is normal, but staying sad for a long time is not normal. If she stops doing anything, stops going anywhere. Some people if they have history of depression in family, they have a higher chance of getting depression. 
• al hathara la yunji minhu al qadar. We are living in the past and worried about the future. 
• Be optimistic: If life gives you lemons make lemonade. Always see the cup half full. 
• HW: For next halaqa think: what is the way that you deal with stress. Why isn’t prayer a rest for us (arihna biha ya bilal)?