1.Holiday Stress and its Impact on Mental and Physical Health
Holidays bring a host of stressors: family obligations, financial pressures, and the pressure to create a “perfect” holiday experience. When your stress levels rise, your body releases more cortisol, the stress hormone. Chronic stress leads to inflammation, poor digestion, weakened immunity, and even weight gain—especially around the abdomen.
Stress also disrupts mental wellbeing, leading to feelings of anxiety and depression. When you’re emotionally drained, you’re more likely to indulge in emotional eating, turning to high-calorie, sugary, and fatty foods for comfort.
2. Lack of Sleep and Its Role in Poor Health
During the holiday season, our schedules often become chaotic, resulting in a significant loss of sleep. Whether it’s late-night gatherings, shopping, or prepping for events, sleep often takes a backseat. When you don’t get enough rest, it affects the body’s ability to regulate hormones, particularly those related to hunger and satiety. These are the same hormones that GLP-1 medications work to regulate.
Sleep deprivation leads to an imbalance in grhelin and leptin—the hormones that control hunger. As a result, you tend to eat more and crave unhealthy foods. Additionally, lack of sleep worsens stress and mental health, contributing to depression and irritability.
3. Poor Eating Habits and Weight Gain
Holiday indulgence is common, but consistently eating high-calorie, sugary, and fatty foods can lead to unwanted weight gain. These foods, coupled with stress and lack of sleep, create a perfect storm for health problems. Sugary and processed foods contribute to inflammation, poor digestion, and blood sugar spikes that increase cravings and fatigue. This unhealthy cycle exacerbates both physical and mental health, increasing the likelihood of weight gain and depression.
Just as the doctor ordered!
Our non-forceful and non-invasive methods of chiropractic and acupuncture offer natural and effective ways to counteract these negative health impacts. Chiropractic care and acupuncture offer powerful tools to restore balance and alleviate many issues caused by stress, poor sleep, and bad eating habits. Chiropractic focuses on the spine, which is the central hub of your nervous system. By correcting and aligning the spine, the nervous system sends signals to all of the systems of the body to tell it to relax. This is crucial during periods of high stress when your body is in overdrive.
Acupuncture helps restore balance and calmness. This helps alleviate depression and anxiety, improve quality of sleep, aid in digestion such as bloating and IBS, help control appetite by regulating hunger hormones, and reduce cortisol, the stress hormone. The combination of non-force chiropractic and acupuncture is a winning combination to help get you through the holidays and restore health. What better gift can you ask for than good health, reduced stress, better digestion, and healthier weight management?
Let us help you get through the holidays or any period of stress in your life. Call us at 480-396-4400 and go from Blah to Aaaah! at Aaaah Wellness in Mesa Arizona.
