Stress And Anxiety: Do You Know The Difference? – Because stress and anxiety are similar but not identical, it is helpful to recognize the symptoms and their causes in order to properly treat them.
Anxiety and stress are sometimes mistaken. We often say things like “I’m stressed” or “I feel anxiety” without truly understanding what is going on. As a result, it’s useful to understand the symptoms that characterize each of these two responses that our body and brain have when they detect a ‘danger.’
The answer is a loud no if you’ve ever questioned whether stress and anxiety are similar. Both notions may be difficult to distinguish since they are both normal fight or flight reactions that our bodies have when they are threatened. Stress hormones are subsequently released, causing the heart to beat faster and pump more blood to the organs and extremities.
Differences Between Stress And Anxiety
Stress is a reaction to a recognized danger that happens over a short period of time. On the other hand, anxiety may linger for a long time and occasionally look as if nothing has prompted it.
Stress is a physiological reaction that occurs when the brain perceives a situation or a moment to be harmful or frightening. When it detects a threat to his safety or well-being, it concentrates its efforts to counter it. When a threat is detected, the organism’s homeostasis is disrupted, and a huge sympathetic discharge develops, boosting the body’s ability to do hard physical activity. It’s as though the body is preparing to ‘fly’ by adopting a defensive posture.
This stress is a genuine defensive mechanism that provides us with protection, and it happens, for example, in the face of true danger. When it comes to mental health, though, the issue arises when something is viewed as harmful that isn’t (either due to our own thinking or because of an external scenario), and the body responds as if it were. There is no way to initiate this defensive response since the reality is safe, so it accumulates and may be harmful, producing voltage spikes and even heart attacks.
Insecurity, uncertainty, or even a lack of knowledge and expertise in dealing with a certain scenario may all contribute to a stressful situation. Workplace stress is the most prevalent kind of stress, and it mixes personality traits with environmental variables. When one quits employment, this form of stress may lead to sleep problems, unhappiness, and anger.
When we speak about anxiety, we’re talking about the physiological reaction that results from the sympathetic branch of the autonomic nervous system being constantly activated. It is a physiological activation with particular symptoms that each individual expresses in one way or another, not an emotional state or a sensation. There is ‘positive’ anxiety, such as that experienced before an exam or an interview, in which the brain perceives the need to perform well. It’s a beneficial anxiety that adjusts to the situations that cause worry or anxiety.
Even though it is not a life-threatening scenario, anxiety may cause unpleasant symptoms such as dizziness, vertigo, tremors, headaches, sweating, or palpitations. When that anxious scenario overflows, though, it causes us to freeze up with nervousness, and we feel powerless to control it, just as it does with stress. We’re already talking about an anxiety illness that has a negative impact on our mental health and has progressed to the point of being pathological.
Also see: Sport And Menstruation: How To Train According To The Phases Of The Menstrual Cycle
