Nope, don’t worry. This is not another article about the price of gasoline. This is about a different fuel conversation all together. GAS in this case stands for General Adaptation Syndrome. It refers to something that is going on in your body all the time. First coined by the godfather of stress - Hans Selye, GAS was used to describe how we respond and adapt to longer term stresses. What exactly could these stresses be? Well we won’t put a limit on what is and is not stressful as this is something entirely up to the individual. So, we could say it depends…on you! 

 

Now, everywhere we look, there are different techniques, treatments and tonics designed to help us combat stress. Just researching the different ways to ‘hack' our biology begins to make one’s head spin and lead to us feeling ‘stressed out!’ So, rather than complicate things, we will see what the original researcher had to say about it.

 

            Stress is defined as the nonspecific response of the body to any demand.

                                                                                                            - Hans Selye

 

What did he mean by nonspecific? 

 

Well, when Hans was doing his experiments, he noticed that in addition to the specific response in the body, there was a general response happening as well. Meaning; the effects were not only happening in one spot. There were systemic or global changes taking place as well. Some of these changes don’t sound too outlandish either. 

 

He was seeing things like:

 

• Adrenal hyperactivity  

• Lymphatic atrophy 

• Peptic Ulcers

 

Now, what do these findings mean? 

 

Let’s get a smidge ‘sciency’…

 

            Prior to adrenal fatigue and burnout becoming a common conversational piece, Selye found that the adrenal glands became way more active than they normally were. Reacting to temperature changes like hot or cold, excessive exercise and others we don’t need to mention, these little glands became active sooner than normal and stayed active long after they needed to be. Known as the suprarenal glands, these little guys can be found atop your kidneys. The adrenal glands are endocrine glands responsible for hormones such as adrenaline. Yes, it is called that. And, cortisol, which is also known as the stress hormone. These hormones help shift our bodies into a sympathetic or ‘fight, flight or freeze state. In response to longer term stresses and / or repeated stressful events, Selye found the adrenals become more active, more often than they needed to. Moving on to the lymphatic system…

 

            When we bring up the lymphatic system, most people think of their neck lymph nodes getting inflamed if they are sick. And, yes, that is partially true. What most people don’t know about the lymph system is that these are only part of the whole picture. There are lymph nodes throughout your body housing a big part of your IMMUNE system. The lymph system in general acts like the slow garbage collector. Taking particles that are too large to be in the venous system, lymph vessels collect fluid and particles from every nook and cranny of your body. These vessels eventually hit nodes which are housing cool things like lymphocytes. A specialized white blood cell, lymphocytes do their best to eliminate bacteria and other things we don’t want floating around in our bodies. When these nodes are battling more than usual (like when you’re fighting an infection), they become swollen and tender if poked. Eventually the lymph system drains into the large veins through the thoracic and lymphatic ducts near the collarbone areas on both sides. Selye found that this system showed signs of general atrophy meaning that it decreased in size and activity.

 

            And finally, peptic ulcers, or stomach ulcers, These begin as irritations in the stomach lining usually caused by excess stomach acid. Some can also be caused by different bacterial strains. If there is enough irritation, a hole forms in the protective stomach lining and the stomach itself  become affected. Ulcers can also be found ‘upstream’ in the esophagus or ‘downstream’ in the small intestine. As you already know and maybe have experienced, these are not naturally occurring phenomena. So, their mere presence meant something was up.

 

Or, in a less ‘sciency’ way:

 

Hans found that these stressed animals were generally:

 

• in fight / fright or freeze,

• sick or on the way to being sick 

• and had poor digestion / upset stomachs

 

Is this starting to sound familiar? 

 

Maybe too much? 

 

Well, the good news is that Hans also offered some advice in one of his later books:

 

"Our experimental studies on ‘pluricausal’ diseases have taught us that many maladies have no specific single cause but are the result of a constellation of factors, among which mere nonspecific stress often plays a decisive role. Similarly, many common diseases […] may not be primarily due to such apparent causes as diet, genetics or occupational hazards. They may merely be the nonspecific stress effects of attempting to endure more than we can. Here, instead of complicated drug therapies and surgical operations, we can often help ourselves better by identifying the decisive cause, which may be a member of our own family, our boss, or merely our won overemphasis on the importance of being right every time." (Stress without Distress, 1974, p. 127-128)

 

Tune in next time for more on the GAS….