Stress and Acne

Stress and Acne

Do you know that stress causes acne? Your body experiences hormonal imbalance every time you get anxious about something. To understand better how stress can contribute in the production of acne, we must first understand the definition of the word stress and how it affects our body processes.

Stress is a condition of the mind and body when we think too much or worry about something. Many factors can make a person anxious and stressed out. Examples of these factors are big events, upcoming examinations, family, health or financial problems. Stress can be both physical and emotional strains. In addition to continuous thinking, we oftentimes resort to actions that help relieve our stress. We turn to cigarettes, beer and even drugs. These things help us temporarily forget our stress but in the long run, they could actually cause further damage to our body.

What happens to our body when we are stressed?

The mind, which is responsible for processing our thoughts, produces chemicals which stimulate the release of various hormones. These hormones are secreted by a part of the brain called hypothalamus. When we feel anxious, the level of these hormones in blood is raised which in turn causes our pores to get clogged. Clogged pores hinder the natural activity of our skin. This leads to skin conditions such as acne.

Another example of hormonal imbalance that happens in our body when we are stressed is the over secretion of the androgens produced by the adrenal gland. Androgens are what we call male hormones but both men and women have the capability of producing this hormone. Increased production of these hormones stimulates the secretion of sebum or oil from our skin which results in acne formation. Several researches show that females produce higher amounts of androgens when stressed. These researches show why women are more prone to acne as compared to men.
Stress not only contributes in the production of acne, it also aggravates the skin condition. Hormonal imbalance in our body slows down the healing processes of the immune system. Instead of healing faster, acne just gets worse as stress continues to create this imbalance.

Now that we understand the role of stress in acne formation, the next thing that we need to know is how we can recognize the factors which may be causing the stress. It is already stated that we cannot escape stress especially in our modern times, what we can do instead is to understand various ways to cope with stress so as to prevent it from harming our body.

Stress can be caused by various factors. As already mentioned, it can be  caused by people around us especially our family and friends. Upcoming big events can also make us anxious. These things are unavoidable. One such example is examination time. Students often fret about the examination week causing them to lose sleep and change their diet style. Examinations are unavoidable. You know that examinations will happen; you cannot deny the fact by worrying or fretting about them. It is the same with almost all stress causing situations which we encounter on a daily basis. We know things or situations that are unavoidable or uncontrollable yet we often stress or worry about them. These are the things that we can not live without. Instead of focusing on the stress, we can just engage ourselves in some other activities that will not only take our mind away from the stress but also help us develop our body. We can do yoga, go to the gym, take swimming lessons or go for a brisk walk.

There are plenty of things that we can do to help us forget about our stress. Not only we do our skin a big favor but we also maintain good health.