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Diabetes and Stress

More than just a bad day; stress increases your risk for heart disease

The importance of discussing diabetes and stress cannot be understated. The negative health effects are far-reaching, including and beyond diabetes. For example, stress increases the risk for the biggest complication found in diabetes. And yet we can't help but experience it in our hectic days. What can be done?

One of the first things is to recognize and be convinced that stress affects your health. Don't minimize its effects. Check your sugars during or after stressful periods. Stress can increase blood sugars. Diabetes and stress isn't the only concern. Even if sugars are fine, stress can also negatively affect blood pressure, heart disease, heart beats, eating, sleep, relationships, depressive symptoms, quality of life..yes, the list is long.

The InterHeart Study, which had over 20,000 participants from 52 countries, showed that stress is just as much to blame for first heart attacks as is uncontrolled high blood pressure. People with diabetes already have higher risk for heart disease; stress is compounding the problem.

Understand Your Stresses and Your Reactions

Understand what causes you stress.
Understand how you react to each of the stresses.
Talk with trusted friends, family and health care workers about your stresses.
See if you can remove or resolve any of the causes of stress. Eg. can you change job responsibilities.
Find stress management methods and resources for help with changing your reactions to stress.
Ask, "what will happen if I do nothing?" This can help motivate you to do something positive to help address the stress.

When you are ready, seek out resources to help reduce your stresses.

They might be as simple (and effective) as deep breathing exercises or may be more involved like counseling.

Talk with your doctor and health care team about resources. Let them know about your life stresses as these often play a critical role in how you manage your diabetes. Diabetes and stress and your ability to self-manage blood sugars are all interconnected. Life stresses are often the barriers to better health and better quality of life. Sometimes you can't get rid of the cause of the stress (like a job) but more often than not you can better manage how they react to that stress. This means less of the damaging stress hormones that are responsible for so much of the negative health effects of stress.

Calgary Stress Resources

Access Mental Health. If you live in Calgary, Alberta or area you can call 403-943-1500. Don't be scared off by their title of "Access Mental Health". This resource is a clearing house of wonderful resources. As an example, a few years back one of our staff called and asked about resources for stress management. The reply she got was, "Certainly. But could you be more specific. Is it work stress, home stress, health stress...because we have over 50 listings for stress resources in the Calgary area."

Clinic for MInd-Body Medicine 403-943-8662 They discuss the connection between mind, thoughts, feelings and the body and explore the potential for healing using the human mind.

Diabetes and Stress: Is it Raising Your Sugars?

Diabetes and stress: Not sure of the impact of stress on blood sugars? Here's an interesting study looking at how it can affect your blood sugars after meals. Of course food does this, but see the effects of stress with the meal and no stress with the meal.

Juggling Diabetes and Life Too Much?

It's normal to have diabetes slip down your list of priorities when life changes. But what can you do to prevent the blood sugars from suffering?