I noticed changes; it was my brain!

2017, as brilliant of a year it was, it wasn’t without challenges. I discovered I don’t have systems in place to help me deal with stress and whilst I manage to stay on top of everything, and on the outside appear to have everything sorted, on the inside I can be a mess. I believe everything happens for a reason and challenges are presented to us, to overcome. Therefore, what I am about to share, I am sharing because I truly believe I can learn from it and maybe others can too.

"I noticed changes; it was my brain!"

Over the year I noticed changes in my body and through investigations, we discovered I have an overactive pituitary gland which is producing too much of one particular hormone. And when I say too much we’re talking levels should normally be less than 500 and mine are 1600! With such a busy year I’ve ‘kept on keeping on’, started taking prescribed medication and ignored it a little. But as a future health professional the underlying question of ‘why’ has been in the back of my mind. Why has it happened?? What caused the change in my BRAIN (in my brain).

When the problem was discovered they suspected two causes. Either 1) a growth on the gland itself or 2) stress. Brain scans cleared me of any growths (which I am very grateful for) so that’s left ‘stress’ as the potential culprit. Therefore, I’ve recently taken on a bit of extra reading into stress-induced brain plasticity and have found common vulnerable areas of the brain include the prefrontal cortex, hippocampus and amygdala (the pituitary is right next to the amygdala) [1].

“The brain is a target for stress and stress-related hormones. It undergoes functional and structural remodelling in response to stress in a manner that is adaptive under normal circumstances but can lead to damage when stress is excessive” [1-2].

This year in my studies, attention has been drawn to mindfulness and its application to food however, I haven’t actively put into practice consistent mindfulness meditation. Mindfulness meditation has been shown to reduce stress [3-9] and reductions in perceived stress correlate with reductions in amygdala grey-matter density [10].

It is suggested that mindfulness meditation could prevent sympathetic nervous system fight of flight stress responses [11-12]

I tell you what, my fight or flight is always off the chart and when I am frustrated I get the feeling of ‘hands’ in my stomach - which has since been explained to me that my intestines are actually physically tensing and tightening. (which could form the basis of a new post - stress and the gut).

Therefore for me, one of my New Year’s resolutions is to take more time for myself to ‘de-stress’ and investigate how I can best incorporate mindfulness meditation into my life.

What is mindfulness meditation?

It is often described as non-judgemental attention to present-moment experiences and involves three components ;

1) attention control

2) emotion regulation

3) self-awareness

I still need to do a bit more reading on the practice, but it originated from Buddhist meditation traditions and ties in with non-judgement attention to experiences in the present moment [13-18] (which I have begun to cover in regards to food and eating but can adapt further to other areas of my life).

Whilst more investigation needs to done a some immediate ‘goals’ that come to mind;

1. Continue with vinyasa yoga and focus on breathing and the state of mind

2. During down time (eg the movies) be present and stop taking my mind to other things like uni study

3. Accept self-care is vital and not a selfish act

4. Don’t let things get to the extreme before taking action

5. Finish reading ‘The Happiness Trap’ (I think I need to make the switch to audiobooks because I take a million years to read a book)

I wanted to share my story with you to let you know, stress management is not an ‘airy fairy’, waste of time. Continuous excess stress can have serious health effects and I encourage you to take time for yourself!

** Side note but no less important – if you are struggling with something don’t be afraid to reach out to a friendly face. My fiancé has been a big support for me but I found even letting my lectures know my circumstances helped (just to know someone else knew and they kindly checked in with me). Support is out there.

Even me; always here for anyone that needs!!

*** Side side note; you can’t judge a book by its cover and you can never truly know what’s going on in someone’s life.

xo

References

1. McEwen, B. S. & Morrison, J. H. The brain on stress: vulnerability and plasticity of the prefrontal cortex over the life course. Neuron 79, 16–29 (2013)

2. Tang, Y., Hölzel, B.,K., & Posner, M. I. (2015). The neuroscience of mindfulness meditation. Nature Reviews.Neuroscience, 16(4), 213-225.

3. Tang, Y. Y. et al. Short-term meditation training improves attention and self-regulation. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 104, 17152–17156 (2007)

4. Creswell, J. D., Pacilio, L. E., Lindsay, E. K. & Brown, K. W. Brief mindfulness meditation training alters psychological and neuroendocrine responses to social evaluative stress. Psychoneuroendocrinology 44, 1–12 (2014).

5. Tang, Y. Y., Tang, R., Jiang, C. & Posner, M. I. Shortterm meditation intervention improves self-regulation and academic performance. J. Child Adolesc. Behav. 2, 4 (2014).

6. Chiesa, A., Serretti, A. Mindfulness-based stress reduction for stress management in healthy people: a review and meta-analysis. J. Altern. Complement. Med.15, 593–600 (2009).

7. Jacobs, T. L. et al. Self-reported mindfulness and cortisol during a Shamatha meditation retreat. Health Psychol. 32, 1104–1109 (2013).

8. Fan, Y., Tang, Y. Y. & Posner, M. I. Cortisol level modulated by integrative meditation in a dosedependent fashion. Stress Health 30, 65–70 (2013).

9. Fan, Y., Tang, Y. Y., Ma, Y. & Posner, M. I. Mucosal immunity modulated by integrative meditation in a dose-dependent fashion

10. Brefczynski-Lewis, J. A., Lutz, A., Schaefer, H. S., Levinson, D. B. & Davidson, R. J. Neural correlates of attentional expertise in long-term meditation practitioners. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 104, 11483–11488 (2007)

11. Thayer, J. F. & Lane, R. D. A model of neurovisceral integration in emotion regulation and dysregulation. J. Affective Disord. 61, 201–216 (2000).

12. Creswell, J. D. in Handbook of Mindfulness: Theory, Research, and Practice Ch. 23 (eds Brown, K. W., Creswell, J. D. & Ryan, R. M.) (Guildford Press, 2014).

13. Hart, W. The Art of Living: Vipassana Meditation (Harper and Row, 1987).

14. Ivanovski, B. & Malhi, G. S. The psychological and neurophysiological concomitants of mindfulness forms of meditation. Acta Neuropsychiatr. 19, 76–91 (2007).

15. Chiesa, A. & Malinowski, P. Mindfulness-based approaches: are they all the same? J. Clin. Psychol. 67, 404–424 (2011).

16. Baer, R. A. Mindfulness training as a clinical intervention: a conceptual and empirical review. Clin. Psychol. Sci. Practice 10, 125–143 (2003).

17. Grossman, P. Defining mindfulness by how poorly I think I pay attention during everyday awareness and other intractable problems for psychology’s (re) invention of mindfulness: comment on Brown et al. Psychol. Assess. 23, 1034–1040 (2011).

18. Kabat-Zinn, J. Full Catastrophe Living: Using the Wisdom of Your Body and Mind to Face Stress, Pain, and Illness (Delta Trade Paperbacks, 1990).