In 2013 I went on an international trip. It was supposed to be a fun adventure – and I love fun adventures. But instead, I was stressed out of my mind and very little of it felt like fun. I came home and sought help because I knew that just wasn’t ME.
What was wrong with me?
After some discussion followed by lab testing, my practitioner determined that my adrenal system was burned out. I’d been stressed too much for too long and my body was just not having it any more. For a couple of years I had been saying that it was ‘just a tough season’. But seasons don’t last years.
What Happens in Your Body During Stress
Your body is built to handle stress in short bursts.
When your brain senses a threat, your sympathetic nervous system takes over. Heart rate goes up. Breathing speeds up. Energy is mobilized so you can act quickly. If a tiger were chasing you, this response would keep you alive.
Once the threat is gone, your parasympathetic nervous system is supposed to bring you back down. Heart rate slows. Breathing deepens. Digestion resumes as your body shifts into a calm, relaxed state.
Fight, Flight, Freeze, and Fawn Explained
Most people have heard of the fight or flight response, but there are a few ways your body can react to stress:
- Fight – pushing back, lashing out, irritability, frustration
- Flight – staying busy, avoiding, always “on the go”
- Freeze – feeling stuck, low energy, shutdown
- Fawn – over-accommodating, people-pleasing to keep the peace
None of these are personality flaws, although your personality may lead you to default to one type of response over another.
When Stress Feels Constant
One stressor at a time is tough. Most women aren’t dealing with one, but an accumulation of several.
Work. Kids. Schedules. Decisions. Notifications. Lack of sleep. Hormone disruptions.
And there’s no clear off switch. Culturally, we’ve normalized a pace that doesn’t leave much room for recovery. Kids’ extra curricular schedules alone can fill every evening of the week if you let them. This wasn’t always the case. And just because it’s common now doesn’t mean your body, mind, and heart handle it well – or that you’re even supposed to.
When stressors like these accumulate for long periods of time, it can wear us down, leaving us feeling foggy, listless, tired, bloated, and sore.
ps: this is true for men as well.
Causes of Stress in Women (That Often Get Overlooked)
Breakups, deaths of loved ones, sickness – these are big crises and obvious stressors. But a lot of chronic stress comes from the little things:
- Overpacked schedules
- Constant decision-making and emotional/mental labor
- Lack of downtime
- Poor sleep
- Undereating or inconsistent eating
- Trying to do everything “right” all at once
Individually, these are easy to blow off. But they add up.
Common Signs Your Body Is Under Too Much Stress
Most of us have experienced at least one of these at least once.
- You feel tired but can’t fully relax
- You wake up in the middle of the night or too early
- Your tolerance for small annoyances is lower than usual
- You feel moody, anxious, and/or out of control
- You struggle to find the motivation needed to get things done
- You rely on caffeine to get through the day
- You feel like you’re always “behind”
- You crash at the end of the day but your brain stays active
- You have less interest in sex, socializing, and doing the things you used to love.
These are early signals that your system isn’t getting enough recovery, which is more than just a concept. You can do very specific, practical things to help yourself mitigate and recover from stress, which I’ll go into in a sec.
Physical Symptoms of Stress in Women
If stress continues, it starts to show up in your body:
- Headaches and muscle tension
- Brain fog and difficulty concentrating
- Increased belly fat or difficulty losing weight
- Stronger cravings, especially for sugar (quick energy)
- Digestive issues like bloating or irregularity
- Pain (mostly back and neck)
- Lower immune function (getting sick more often)
- Hormonal disruptions, including changes in cycle or energy patterns
- Skin issues
- Upset stomach and/or bowels
How Stress Affects Weight, Energy, and Hormones
Have you ever heard the term “adrenal fatigue”?
In a nutshell, adrenal fatigue was the theory that chronic stress depletes the adrenal glands, reducing their ability to pump out the stress hormone cortisol, which left people drained.
Then two doctors from São Paulo in Brazil looked very closely at the research and concluded that “adrenal fatigue” was bogus. Their exact words were, “Adrenal fatigue does not exist.” The reason for their conclusion was that in most people tested for the condition, cortisol levels showed as normal – meaning, not depleted.
More study needs to be done but at this time it’s understood that whatever it’s called, the issue is considered “HPA axis dysfunction”, which means the stress response doesn’t work as it should. Cortisol production stays on when it should be off.
(I’ll go deeper into this in How Stress Is Blocking Your Fat Loss.)
When Healthy Habits Start Adding More Stress
Some strategies that are often promoted as “healthy” can add more strain depending on your baseline.
Intermittent fasting
Long gaps without food can increase stress hormones, especially if you’re already under-recovered. This often shows up as energy dips, cravings later, or poor sleep. So for some, this otherwise healthy practice isn’t appropriate for where you’re at right now.
Oh, and just to be clear, intermittent fasting is only beneficial if you still meet your caloric needs. If you’re skipping breakfast but not doubling down at lunch/dinner, you’re not intermittent fasting. You’re missing a meal and are likely underfueled – another stressor.
High-intensity cardio done too often
Intensity has its place, but stacking it on top of an already tapped life can push your system further without enough recovery to balance it.
Remember, exercise is good, but it’s also a stressor. You need to be fueled for it in advance and have recovery practices in place after.
A note on cold exposure
Cold plunges are often framed as a recovery tool, but they’re still a stressor. Some emerging research and expert discussion suggest women may respond differently to very cold exposure, particularly in how it impacts hormonal and stress responses.
This isn’t fully settled yet, but it reinforces two useful principles: more intensity isn’t always better and listen to your body.
7 Ways to Start Reducing Stress (Realistically)
A full life overhaul is not often realistic, nor it is always necessary. The unsexy truth is that practicing these fundamentals usually moves the needle toward improved health and an overall better life experience than the novel extremes anyway.
Start here:
- Protect your sleep as much as possible. Aim for 7-9 hours every night, without fail. Yes, even on weekends. Your body needs consistency and sleep is a major tool for stress recovery.
- Get outside (ideally in some nature) and move daily. Nature is restorative.
- Eat regularly to stabilize energy. No skipping meals and calling it ‘intermittent fasting’. Get enough lean protein, healthy fats, and plenty of veggies. Quantity and quality matter.
- Build short periods of quiet into your day. The world is noisy. Turn of notifications. Put down the screen. Let yourself rest.
- Look at your schedule and identify one thing you can adjust. Some things can’t be cut out. But most people have something that can go in order to make some space and reduce the stress load.
- Move your body – vigorously! Exercise in one of the most underrated tools for stress reduction and recovery. Make your muscles work hard and get your heart rate up. Movement is medicine!
- Breathe! So many people unconsciously hold their breath or live with shallow breathing patterns. This is both an effect of stress as well as a cause and becomes a stress cycle. I know it’s hard to be aware of your breathing habits while you go through daily life. Start with something small like 3-5 minutes of mindful breathing where you take deep inhales through the nose, expanding your lower rib cage in all directions (not just forward) followed by a long slow exhale. Aim for the an exhale that is twice as long as your inhale. This helps calm the nervous system when stressed.
Change can be hard so don’t aim for everything all at once. I encourage my clients and people I love to pick ‘low hanging fruit’. Choose one thing (go for the easiest one first) and implement it consistently for a week or two. Once you’ve got your groove, then add another. That is how we build healthier habits that will shift how our bodies feel without making the habit change itself another source of stress.
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