Is Stress Killing You?

Timothy McCall, M.D.

When I was in med school in the early 1980s, there were only a few illnesses-ulcers, migraines and irritable bowel syndrome come to mind--that doctors tied to stress. Even in those instances, we weren't taught a thing about how stress-reduction measures might help, much less encouraged to recommend them to our patients.

These days the scientific evidence is mounting that stress is more than something that leaves you feeling frazzled: It can harm your health. (We're talking about a recurring pattern here, not the occasional hectic day or nightmare traffic jam.) Chronic tension can increase your odds of developing serious health problems--from chronic fatigue to heart attacks to diseases like lupus and rheumatoid arthritis-or aggravate the situation if you've already got them. Doctors also now realize that stress is a major contributor to serious skin problems like eczema and psoriasis and even to infertility.

And it may not just be your health that's at risk. Recent evidence suggests that stress may be contagious. Atlanta psychologist Robert Simmerman, Ph.D., has found that your spouse and kids can catch stress from you. And, of course, it works the other way, too: If your husband comes home all stressed-out from a bad day at work, he can pass it on to you. As an old country song put it, "How come every time you get a headache, you always got to give it to me?"

But the news is not all bad: Growing evidence suggests that several strategies designed to beat stress (see box: Rx Stress) can heighten you ability to recover from and cope with serious illness (and, yes, even to conceive a child). Better still, if you implement a sensible strategy to deal with stress before it takes control of your life, many problems can be avoided entirely.

Next: The Toll of Stress