National Stress Awareness Day founded in 1992, and sponsored by The Health Resource Network (HRN), a non-profit health education organization. It’s a cooperative effort by healthcare professionals across the country to:
- Increase public awareness about stress
- Discuss common causes of stress and potential treatment options
- Inform people about the dangers of stress
- Share successful coping strategies
- And educate the public to set the record straight in regard to harmful misconceptions about stress that are prevalent in our society
National Stress Awareness Day falls on April 16th every year. The Health Resource Network (HLN) specifically selected this date, April 16, because it is the day after taxes are due, and many Americans find April 15th, Tax Day, to be one of the most stressful days of the year. And although Americans have an extra month to file taxes this year, due to the Coronavirus, National Stress Awareness Day has not been postponed, and will remain in April.
Participating in National Stress Awareness Day
Dr. Morton C. Orman, M.D., Founder and Director of HRN had this to say about stress: ‘Even though we’ve learned a lot about stress in the past twenty years, we’ve got a long way to go.’ And he wants to ensure that any new information about stress is available to the public, to help millions of Americans better cope with suffering related to stress. He has invited leading healthcare organizations across the country to ’develop and disseminate helpful educational materials and other information about stress’. And encourages stress experts and other healthcare leaders ‘to conduct public forums, discussion groups, and other informative community events’.
Stress Can Be Dangerous to Your Health
Over time, stress can have a negative impact on your health:
- Even low levels of stress can make you emotionally volatile. It can impair our ability to control our emotions.
- It can make some people more prone to certain diseases. One study by researchers at Johns Hopkins University discovered that children exposed to chronic stress were more likely to develop a mental illness if they were genetically predisposed.
- Stress can damage your teeth and gums as people under stress often unknowingly grind their teeth which can cause lasting damage to your teeth and jaw.
- It can cause physical damage to your heart. Stress hormones can increase your heart rate, constrict your blood vessels, and force your heart to work harder, which can increase the risk for hypertension, heart attack or stroke.
- It can trigger a coping mechanism that causes us to overeat. This can lead to weight gain, in addition to leading to even more health problems.
- Chronic stress can prevent new cells from regenerating quickly, contributing to signs of premature aging.
- Stress can take a toll on your body, compromising your immune system and leaving you more vulnerable to colds and infections.
- And chronic stress can impact your mental health, increasing the risk of developing some mental health conditions such as depression and anxiety.
Online Mental Health Counseling for Stress
Dr. Alyx MacTernan of Elemental Mental Health offers secure online counseling sessions for clients wanting to learn coping mechanisms and better strategies to alleviate stress. Fill out the website contact form to learn more.
Elemental Mental Health offers online mental health counseling services to residents of Georgia, Florida and Texas.