Inflammation within your body is a symptom of internal stress, and in response to an injury, it can protect your body. Your body sends blood to the site of injury, creating swelling that protects from further injury. In a short time, this swelling will subside as the injury heals, and the body goes back to functioning as normal. An internal stressful situation has been dealt with in a healthy rhythm.
However, Chronic Inflammation because of chronic internal stress has a much different effect on your body. With chronic stress inflammation, the body continues to react as if there is an injury present. When the body is taxed for one reason or another, cells send distress signals (and inflammatory response) until the cause is removed. If the cause is not removed (i.e., the injury healed) then cells continue to alert the immune system that there is trouble.
With chronic stress inflammation, your body never gets a chance to rest and re-set. The immune system is constantly on guard, fighting, and the consequences of this can be dire. Internal stress inflammation can happen when we have too much external stress, when we have sleep deprivation, eat a poor diet (high in sugar and processed foods), and take too many prescription/OTC drugs.
When your body is chronically stress inflamed, you can experience:
• swelling
• brain fog
• joint pain
• bloating
• digestive problems
• fatigue
• sick often/difficulty getting well quickly
and the worsening of diseases such as:
• Alzheimer’s
• depression
• cancer
We are commissioned by God to care for our bodies and use them to honor and glorify Him. He designed our bodies to work perfectly and when something is off, He made our bodies capable of telling us through symptoms. If you have symptoms, your body is telling you something. Will you listen and make some changes?
Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash