THE THREE STAGES OF STRESS

Once under the influence of a stressor, people’s bodies respond in remarkably similar, predictable ways.  For example, when asked to give a speech for a class, your heart rate may increase, your throat becomes dry, palms sweat, and you may feel lightheaded, dizzy, and nauseous.  If an individual lost her or his job or discovered that her or his partner wanted to terminate their relationship, s/he might experience similar sensations.  It is clear that different stressors are able to evoke these common physical reactions.

Selye described the typical physical response to a stressor in his general adaptation syndrome model.

  selye stated that the human body moves through three stages when confronted by stressors as follows.

Alarm stage

Once exposed to any event that is perceived as threatening or dangerous, the body immediately prepares for difficulty, entering what Selye called the alarm stage.  These involuntary changes are controlled by the hormonal and nervous system, and trigger the fight or flight response.  For example, you realize that the final exam you thought was today was actually scheduled for yesterday.  You may begin to experience: fear, panic, anxiety, anger, depression, and restlessness.

Resistance Stage

The second stage of a response to a stressor is the resistance stage, during which the body attempts to reestablish its equilibrium or internal balance.  The body is geared for survival and because staying in the alarm stage for a prolonged amount of time is not conductive for the body’s optimal functioning; it will resist or attempt to resolve the problem and reduce the intensity of the response to a more manageable level.  Specific organ systems, such as cardiovascular and digestive systems, become the focus of the body’s response.  During this phase, you might take steps to calm yourself down and relieve the stress on your body: you might deny the situation, withdraw and isolate yourself from others, and shut down your emotions.  Thus, in the example above, you may not tell anyone about missing the exam, may tell yourself that you don’t care about that class anyway and go back to bed.

Exhaustion Stage

Your ability to move from the alarm stage to a less damaging resistance stage will determine the impact that the stressor has on your physical and psychological health.  As you gain more control and balance is reestablished, you can begin to recover from the stress.

The length of time, energy and effort demanded in accomplishing this will decide how exhausted your body becomes as a result of the stressor.  Of course, the longer your body is under stress and out of balance, the more negative impact.  Long-term exposure to a stressor or coping with multiple stressors at the same time often results in overloading your system.  Specific organs and body systems that were called upon during the resistance stage may not be able to resist a stressor indefinitely.  When all the psychological and physical resources we rely on to deal with stress are used up, an exhaustion stage results, and the stress producing hormones such as adrenaline rise again.  This is when chronic and serious illness can begin to develop.  In the above example, the individual may develop clinical depression.