Men and Stress
Stress doesn’t just affect women. Maybe we seem to be more frazzled by it than the other sex, but they experience stress as well. Men also have to learn to deal with stressful situations before they ruin their health.
Where do men get the majority of their stress? It is from their jobs. Men are thought of as the breadwinners in traditional households and it is they who have to shoulder the responsibility of household finances. This doesn’t mean that wives don’t work, but if there is any shortfall, the man is almost always purposed with finding a way to deal with it.
Most men internalize their feelings. Unlike women, men are taught from an early age not to show too much emotion. It is one of the reasons that men have such a hard time in relationships. They equate being strong with absence of outward emotion.
The problem with this philosophy is that stress can still attack the body without our consent. All of that bottled up anger and frustration results in poor health and even poorer choices for coping mechanisms. Many men have high blood pressure. It could be a result of getting older but more often than not it is due to stress-related factors.
High blood pressure can lead to other health problems. Strokes and heart attacks are prevalent in males due to high blood pressure. In the bedroom, stress can result in problems in the sexual arena. No one wants to talk about sexual dysfunctions but they do occur and stress can play a part.
Men gain the majority of their weight in their abdominal region. Stress releases a hormone called cortisol. Cortisol causes the body to hold on to fat like during a famine. Their body preserves the amount of cushion so the body can survive tough times.
We are well out of those tough times now, but cortisol is still produced in stressful situations. People experiencing times of high stress also crave sweet or salty foods due to the rise in cortisol levels. In spite of ourselves we tend to eat too much of the bad stuff when we are stressed.
Men also take up destructive habits such as alcohol, smoking, and gambling. These activities numb the pain of stressful situations but create their own nightmarish reality. A man may never say that he is experiencing stress but his actions will tell the entire story.
Dealing with stress is not just a job for women. Men also experience stress and it is important for them to find healthy ways to handle it. Taking up exercise, a hobby, and learning conflict resolution skills are a few of the ways that men can deal with their stress without turning to less helpful strategies.
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