What is toxic stress? We have grown to perceive stress as a bad thing, but stress is like any other nutrient, the right amount is the right amount. Our body grows and develops in response to the stress placed upon it. Without stress we would just be a blob of protoplasm on the floor. Gravity is a stress that is essential to stimulate bones to grow, but too much gravity and we are flattened like a pancake. That much gravitational stress would be considered a toxic stress. Stress is a simplified term that refers to the hundreds of stimuli each day that challenge our body and mind to cope and adapt to what is. Toxic stressors are challenges that are too great for us to adapt to. They take us down, either quickly or slowly over years.
CHEMICAL STRESS AVOIDANCE LIST
Polluted air
Polluted water
Contaminated food
Genetically altered food
Partially hydrogenated oils
Multiple drug interactions
Artificial food additives
Medical drug residues
Excess carbohydrates
Excess heat or cold
Recreational drugs
Pasteurized milk
Food in plastics
Immunizations
Heavy metals
Dehydration
Rancid fats
Aluminum
Pesticides
Radiation
Tobacco
Alcohol
Coffee
Sugar
Mold
BASICALLY JUST AVOID THESE ALL OF THEM ARE TOXIC
We have had millions of years to develop biologic coping skills for dealing with most forms of stress the world would throw at us. Unfortunately over the last couple hundred years and especially over the last 75 years we have created thousands new kinds of stressors that we never had to deal with before. Our modern world is demanding we adapt to kinds of stress that we have no evolutionary history to draw upon for dealing with these new stressors. Consequently most of us are slowly being taken down by them. Our bodies have no idea what to do with the modern world of poisons on so many levels.
We have an immensely long history of dealing with such things as bacteria, viruses, and parasites. Our immune system is amazing. We have built in biologic systems for dealing with physical trauma, heat, cold, dehydration, and so on. But now we have all this new stuff. The first level of new stress has been around somewhat for a couple thousand years – overcrowding. Too many people crowding into too little space is a profound stressor. There have been tiny spots of this for a while, but this while is but a few hundredths of a percent of the amount of time humans have been dealing with life. In that last 75 years the world population has grown from 2 billion to 7.6 billion.
With the rise in population has come the need to grow lots and lots of food and move it from one place to another. To do this efficiently we have developed thousands of chemicals that have never existed on the planet before. Every one of those chemicals is a toxic stressor. Plastics are toxic, pesticides are toxic, herbicides are toxic, preservatives are toxic, fuels to run farm and manufacturing machinery are toxic, and the list goes on. Modern life is toxic.
All those people need a place to live. Modern building practices are drenched in toxic substances – glues, paints, lumber treatments, carpets, flooring, plumbing, electrical equipment as well as the electrical fields they generate. The industries that support all those people are rife with toxic chemicals – food processing industries, transportation industries, clothing industries, cosmetic and personal care industries, cleaning product industries, the list just goes on and on. Everything in and about our modern world is a source of stress that our bodies have no way of dealing with effectively. So we are stuck using ineffective makeshift methods for dealing with the poisons.
Sequestration is a major way the body tries to deal with things it does not recognize and know how to deal with. Since all these toxins interfere with the healthy functioning of the body and the body does not know how to neutralize them, it does the next best thing – it tries to corral the poisons into areas of the body where they will not do as much damage – fat cells and bone tissue. Our bodies are not able to do this with all the poisons, but enough to create the modern obesity epidemic. There is no coincidence that the rise in obesity directly parallels the rise in chemical toxicity in our food, water, and air. Everyone is born with different levels of effectiveness at eliminating toxic poisons from the body through the bile from the liver and the urine from the kidneys, and even through the sweat. I believe over half of weight gain is this difference between people that makes some people more prone to weight gain than others.
Our modern world has brought numerous other lifestyle changes that we don’t recognize as stress initially, but which is a very definite stress none the less. The shift from manual labor for most people to desk jobs is a significant stress due to the lack of movement. Movement is a vital form of nutrition for the body. Without it the brain degenerates, hormones go wacky, blood sugar levels don’t balance, and inflammation spirals out of control. 
The loss of daily sun exposure is another similar “toxic” impact to our body. We need daily sunlight falling on our skin. Indoor lighting is a stressor. Our nervous system bases its circadian rhythms on the gradual changes in the color spectrum the sun provides through the day. Sitting under artificial lighting, which is the same color all day long, is not healthy. Even focusing our eyes on stuff only a foot or two away all day is a stress our body does not know what to do with.
Another negative impact of population density is having to deal with people socially all day long. We are designed to have long periods of quiet reflective time every day. Constant socialization and the hyper-activation of the brain this produces overstimulates our sympathetic nervous system. This is our stress system for revving up our body to participate with the onslaught of differences that social diversity presents us with. We are designed to spend most of our day in a parasympathetic nerve activation state. Parasympathetic nerve system is the relax and digest state for the body. This is where and when we heal and detoxify ourselves. We never get that chance in our modern fast paced lifestyle.
The over stress we experience socially drives folks to artificially seek release from this stress so they turn to drugs like alcohol, tobacco, pharmaceuticals, and so on – and these are all toxic. We are trapped turning to one set of toxic exposures to help relieve us from our other toxic exposures. This pretty much describes our entire medical delivery system.
As you can see, the subject of toxic stressors is really the story of each of our lives. Hardly a minute goes by when we are not directly dealing with multiple toxic challenges, most of which our bodies have no clue how to deal with. Since we are each biochemically different from each other, we will each be challenged differently by these stressors. Getting healthy is a personal journey of finding just which toxic stressors are most impactful in your life and eliminating them. Most of the types of stressors I am writing about in this article are not the type that you can develop better coping skills with. When something is a poison to your system and your body can not eliminate it on its own, you have to take the steps to eliminate that poison exposure from your life. 
Eliminating toxic exposure is the bottom line challenge I find with most patients, because eliminating these exposures means giving up part of the conveniences of modern day living. It is our addiction to convenience that is killing us. Most every convenience comes with a load of toxic waste we have to deal with. Most of the time all we do is ignore this reality. We like electricity, and carpets, and cheap super tasty food. We like our cars and our indoor air-conditioned jobs in our cushy chairs. We complain about having to sit in front of a computer all day, but given the choice between that and pushing a plow behind a mule in the hot sun all day, our choice is obvious. Fast food is easy and in no way healthy, but to get healthy you have to cook your own food. You have to buy local and organic and that is both time consuming and frequently more expensive. Real food is seasonal, and we like the convenience of having our favorite foods all year round. It is emotionally comfortable to have whatever you like always available. It is not comfortable to live with the truth that what you want is often unavailable. Interestingly, one of the greatest hallmarks of a healthy successful personality is the ability to do delayed gratification – the adaptation to what you want being unavailable today. 
Healthy living is inconvenient living. Choose your battles. How much do you want health? How much do you want to be functional into your old age? Disease is painful, so maybe the question is how much do you want to avoid pain? Most pain killers are toxic, so in the end maybe it is just about avoiding pain.
Take care,
David