Mental health is one of the most crucial requirements for the healthy being of an individual. When your mental peace is disturbed, you do not have the zest to complete your work or have fun. Along with mental health, the immune system that fights germs and diseases is another vital aspect of maintaining good health. Have you realized that your mental health can leave a huge impact on your immune system? Here we share a detailed guide on how your mental health can make or break the immune system of your body.
What Is Mental Health?
Before getting into the relationship between mental health and the immune system, let’s understand mental health. Mental health is an umbrella covering your emotional, psychological and social well-being. How you think, how you react, how you feel, how you handle stress, how you make choices and how you relate to things and emotions are covered under mental health. Good mental health is vital for sustaining a happy life. Remember when you’re angry or in bad mood, your head starts aching, you feel bad, you lose your appetite, etc. It’s now evident that if your mental health is affected, your physical health gets impacted too.
What Is Immune System?
The immune system of a human body is a defending system of the body made of cells, tissues, organs and proteins. It protects the body against antigens and infections. Whenever the immune system detects a foreign substance, it releases antibodies that keep the germs away. It also keeps a track record of whichever germ attacks your body, and if that germ attacks again in future, it gets destroyed badly. So, in short, your immunity power is your strength to fight germs and diseases and stay protected.
How Are Mental Health & Immune System Related?
You know that people with mental disorders are more vulnerable to inflammations and immune system disorders. It indicates that there has to be some connection between the immune system and mental health. Psychoneuroimmunology is the field that deals with the relationship between mental health and the immune system.
Stress & Immune System
Stress releases a hormone named cortisol that suppresses your immune system’s function of defending the body from germs and infections. Cortisol reduces the number of lymphocytes in the blood responsible for killing infected host cells, activating immune cells and regulating the immune system. Hence, stress plays a negative impact on your immune system. Sometimes in stress, you’re blood pressure raises. Increased blood pressure for a long time weakens the immune system and also leads to coronary heart diseases.
Also, when people are under stress, they resort to unhealthy practices like smoking, drinking, drugs, etc. that again take a toll on the immune system. A weakened immune system shows symptoms like swollen lymph nodes, frequent cold and cold sores, inflammations in the body.
Anxiety & Immunity
Anxiety is a common phenomenon that you would have experienced, either before an interview or while delivering a presentation. During anxiety, your heart rate increases and more blood is pumped to the brain sending emergency signals. But when the anxiety prolongs to anxiety disorders, there is a bad impact on health. More and more adrenaline hormones are released, and more and more oxygen is sent to the brain. With prolonged stress and anxiety the body fails to return to a normal state, and increased concentration of these emergency hormones weaken the immune system.
Conclusion
Stress and anxiety weaken the body internally and make a person vulnerable to infections. Thus, now you would realize how crucial it is to maintain good mental health to keep your immunity strong. Practice yoga and meditation to get relief from mental disturbance. Indulge yourself in activities that cheer you up, follow your passion and stay in the company of positive people and a positive environment. You can find more tips on how to boost your immunity power on https://www.ppezones.com
Stay healthy and fit both mentally and physically.
