Does All Stress Lead To Hyperstimulation?

Does all stress lead to hyperstimulation, or is there a threshold stress has to cross before the body becomes hyperstimulated?

Hyperstimulation occurs when the body becomes chronically stressed. Once the body becomes chronically stressed, it can take a long time to recover due to the many changes hyperstimulation causes in the body.

However, a healthy, non-hyperstimulated body is typically relatively resilient to stress. A healthy, non-hyperstimulated body can take a lot of stress before the body becomes hyperstimulated. It also doesn’t take the body long to recover from normal stress.

For instance, in the illustration below, notice how a healthy body can take a lot of stress before stress crosses into the hyperstimulation range. As long as stress stays within the normal range, stress generally doesn’t cause too many problems and the body can recover relatively quickly even though it has become somewhat stressed.

Even if a person is experiencing stress daily, that stress can stay within the healthy range unless the stress becomes chronically elevated and above what is considered normal.

Naturally, the longer the body is stressed, even in the normal range, the longer it can take to recover, albeit much faster than when the body becomes hyperstimulated.

So, stress does take a toll. However, normal stress isn’t nearly as impacting as hyperstimulation.

This is one of the reasons we emphasize the importance of daily stress management…so that daily stress doesn’t creep into the hyperstimulation range.

Therefore, if you are encountering normal daily stress and actively managing it (by regular deep relaxation, taking regular breaks from stressful activities, making time for good rest and sleep, making time to play, etc.), you can keep stress and its effects within the normal and healthy range.

However, if you let stress build up or have a period of unusually high stress that isn’t managed well, it can crossover the healthy threshold into hyperstimulation.

The higher the degree of stress and the longer it persists, the higher the degree of hyperstimulation. As the degree and length of hyperstimulation increase, so can the length of time it takes to recover. And recovering from hyperstimulation takes far longer than most people expect because of how hyperstimulation affects the body. Far longer than the effects of normal stress.

Therefore, it’s well worth the effort to manage stress well. Being a good stress manager can prevent hyperstimulation and protracted recovery.

NOTE: Anxiety can spike up stress quickly. The more anxious you are, the higher and faster the spike. This is also why we recommended working at Level Two recovery (dealing with anxiety’s underlying factors). Eliminating anxious behavior and keeping stress within a normal range prevents hyperstimulation and a protracted recovery.

Working with an experienced anxiety disorder therapist is the most effective way to address Level Two recovery.