Stress Management
A Functional Medicine Approach to Stress Managment
Many of us believe stress is a byproduct of our modern life. We push ourselves daily through our modern-day living situations and always-on environment, accumulating the effects of stress. Over time, our bodies ability to deal with stress becomes weaker leading to health issues. Chronic stress has become an epidemic and it’s not just by feeling the pressure, or sleeplessness or overreacting to a certain situation. This type of stress is mental stress, however, there are other types of stressors in your life contributing to your symptoms.
Causes
At the London Centre for Functional Medicine, we aim to identify the source of your stress – whether they be dietary, structural, psychological or environmental. We create a personalized treatment plan to reduce your exposure to these stressors and supporting the other body systems that maybe be affected.
- Chemical: exposure to various toxins, pesticides, heavy metals, pollution and drugs.
- Environmental: exposure to xenoestrogens and electromagnetic fields.
- Nutritional: caused by highly processed food, and nutritional deficiencies.
- Biological: exposure to bacteria, viruses, moulds, parasites & fungi
- Physical: caused by strenuous physical exercise, surgery, trauma and infections
- Psychological: caused by anger, anxiety, mental illness depression, grief, mental illness, negative thinking, overwhelmed by a change of circumstances eg divorced or losing a loved one.
Common Symptoms
- Feeling wired at night
- GERD
- Irritability
- Waking up feeling unfreshed
- Low sex drive
- Panic attacks
- Headaches
- Compromised Immune system
- Insomnia
- Heart Palpitations
- Chronic fatigue
- Teeth Grinding
Treatment
Every patient is unique and while one situation might affect one person in a negative way, this might not affect another person in the same way. Your practitioner will develop a treatment plan that addresses the root cause of your health concerns
One of the key points is to be able to support the stress response in the body. We all have a certain tolerance to stress and can handle a certain amount of stress. However, the problem that happens is when there are repeated or prolonged bouts of stress when the body fails to mount a stress response. This can lead to a myriad of problems causing and contributing to a disease state in the body.
Two areas we tend to focus on with any stress-related conditions are
Adrenal Glands support:
the adrenal glands are the building blocks that help us deal with stress, perceived or actual, and responsible for secreting our stress hormones. For this particular process, we need to have the necessary nutrients eg vitamin C, magnesium, B-vitamins and their co-factors
Nervous and endocrine system support:
Adrenals need support and are connected to other systems including the pituitary gland, thyroid, reproductive glands and hormones that balance blood sugar. The whole endocrine system can be supported with adaptogenic herbs that also support the nervous system.
Approach
Optimal Nutrition
Your practitioner may recommend eliminating foods you are intolerant which can help decrease inflammation and physiological stress. Additionally, they may recommend certain macronutrients and micronutrients that you maybe deficient in.
Supplement Support
Adaptogenic herbs or glandular extracts can be extremely useful to reduce stress and help with the stress response.
Testing
Our practitioners can recommend specific testing related to endocrine and nervous systems such as urine or saliva tests. Toxic heavy metal testing can also be useful to look at any toxicity and reveal mineral deficiencies which can be a contributing factor.
Targeted Treatments
Our practitioners can recommend additional treatments such as relaxation techniques including specific breathing techniques, meditation, mindfulness and specific exercises programmes.
Our Client's Feedback
Why Choose the London Centre for Functional Medicine?
Support
Once you reach out to us, the team will guide you through the collaborative process with a practitioner, We will gather the information we need to understand you better and help support and motivate you along your health journey.
Experience
We take the complex and try to make it simple. Many patients have gone to multiple doctors before they reach us. By taking a functional medicine approach, we can focus on the core imbalance and what needs to be addressed to improve your health picture.
Custom Approach
There is no one size fits approach as each patient is unique. Thus, no plan or protocol is the same. Everything about you including symptoms, lifestyle, diet, genetics and capacity to heal is different and will require a personalized approach.
london center for functional medicine