How War & High Stress Occupations Reverses the “Benjamin Button Effect”!
War Might Be Making Young Bodies Old!
A study last month from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that veterans ages 25-64 had more than twice the rate of diabetes, hypertension, heart disease and cancer than non-veterans.
Milberg says the people researchers are seeing in Boston “really have a lot of things going on at the same time. It’s hard to know where one problem ends and another starts.”
He and the other scientists say early aging might stem from the nature of the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars, where troops served long and repeated deployments at an unprecedented rate. This meant living under a high state of vigilance, high stress over many months or even beyond a year, then doing it all over again and again with each subsequent combat tour.
Credits: War might be making young bodies old
Stress and Cellular Aging
How does lifestyle and stress affect health and aging?
UCSF researcher Elissa Epel* (see video below) explores the effects of stress on our cells and explains thing we can do to slow down the aging process.
A wide range of studies have shown that the stress caused by things like:
• Untreated depression,
• Social isolation,
• Long-term unemployment,
• Anxiety attacks etc
Can speed-up the aging process.
It not only our soldier that experience this accelerated aging process, other people in high-stress jobs may experience this too.
We’ve clearly seen the physical transformation in our presidents, how much their physical appearances change from the time they take office to the time they leave.
We’ve certainly heard the lore “stress can turn your hair grey”! Now scientist are proving that there is more to the urban legend.
Check out President Obama hair in the video below.
We are a society obsessed with looking younger and frantically searching for anti-aging products such as cosmetics and nutritional supplements. This has become a multi-billion dollar industry. However, the basic solution is reducing the impact of stress on our bodies.
Easier said than done! We certainly can’t get rid of stress!But we can develop the skill and tools to deal with stress, so that it does not ravage our bodies.*If you’re interested in this topic and would like to learn more I’ve include Dr. Elissa Epel talk on Stress and Cellular Aging. So, grab a cup of coffee and watch the video below.
