Stress making you age before your time?

[IronMike]

I've long thought stress was a killer. Plenty of known effects - balding (ego killer), heart etc. And the immune system is frequently downgraded and most of us have experienced how stress can affect your physique, but maybe there will soon be evidence of it shortening our life times. IronMike

Stop stressing: you'll grow old before your time
By Benedict Carey and Jacqueline Maley
December 1, 2004


Some stressful events seem to turn a person's hair grey overnight.

Now a team of researchers has found that severe emotional distress may speed up the ageing of the body's cells at the genetic level. The findings are the first to link psychological stress so directly to biological age.

The researchers found blood cells from women who had spent many years caring for a disabled child were, genetically, about a decade older than those from peers who had far less experience of this. The study, which appears in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, also suggests that the perception of being stressed can add years to a person's biological age.

"It's fascinating research," said David LeCouteur, a specialist on ageing at Sydney's Concord Hospital. "It shows how environmental factors might lead to biological ageing."

In the experiment, researchers from the University of California analysed white blood cell samples from 58 young and middle-aged mothers, 39 of them caring for a child with a chronic disorder such as autism or cerebral palsy.


The study found that the longer the women had taken care of their child, the shorter the length of a piece of DNA called the telomere. Change in telomere length over time is thought to be a rough measure of a cell's age.

The researchers also gave the women a questionnaire, asking them to rate how stressed they felt. The women who felt they were under heavy stress also had significantly shortened telomeres, compared with those who felt more relaxed - whether they were raising a disabled child or not.

Professor LeCouteur said the link between short telomeres and ongoing stress was "an interesting hypothesis" but the research did not prove the correlation beyond doubt. "The high stress seemed to be in older, fatter women but it may be that older women are more likely to have shorter telomeres and sick children."

 

[bigkraut]

Man, they want kids that cause stress? Try my son on for size! He's in the 7th grade and has been suspended for a total of 13 days in the last 3 months! This doesn't include detention! He's ADHD and gets a little antsy. When they try to call him down, he goes off.

Here's some of this years highlights:

He ran outta his class room one day with a trash can and tossed it another teachers room, then gave her the "bird". From there, he went to the cafeteria, stole a few cartons of milk, went into another class room and started opening milk, toasting himself by bashing cartons together. He then turns up the milk cartons and pours the shit half in his mouth, half all over everything else ala Stone Cold Steve Austin. From there, he goes to the gymnasium, grabs a basketball, dribbles it around the hallway announcing "recess" at the top of his lungs. A Sheriff's Deputy had to be called in.

In another incident, he dropped a kids pants during a fire drill!

In yet another incident, he bombed class room doors with wet paper towels from the boys room. One teacher opened a door as he was releasing a "Bounty" bomb as he calls it. She was hit right in the kisser.


He has been removed from class frequently for making "flatulent sounds and emanations". Their words folks. Apparently the boy enjoys making the loudest farts possible.

Those are some moments that stand out. With 6 months left to go in this school year, we ought to be treated to quite a bit more. Fellows, evertime the phone rings during the school day, my bp goes through the roof.

My father would call this "karma".

 

[IronMike]

...

Man, they want kids that cause stress? Try my son on for size! He's in the 7th grade and has been suspended for a total of 13 days in the last 3 months! This doesn't include detention! He's ADHD and gets a little antsy. When they try to call him down, he goes off.

Here's some of this years highlights:

He ran outta his class room one day with a trash can and tossed it another teachers room, then gave her the "bird". From there, he went to the cafeteria, stole a few cartons of milk, went into another class room and started opening milk, toasting himself by bashing cartons together. He then turns up the milk cartons and pours the shit half in his mouth, half all over everything else ala Stone Cold Steve Austin. From there, he goes to the gymnasium, grabs a basketball, dribbles it around the hallway announcing "recess" at the top of his lungs. A Sheriff's Deputy had to be called in.

In another incident, he dropped a kids pants during a fire drill!

In yet another incident, he bombed class room doors with wet paper towels from the boys room. One teacher opened a door as he was releasing a "Bounty" bomb as he calls it. She was hit right in the kisser.


He has been removed from class frequently for making "flatulent sounds and emanations". Their words folks. Apparently the boy enjoys making the loudest farts possible.

Those are some moments that stand out. With 6 months left to go in this school year, we ought to be treated to quite a bit more. Fellows, evertime the phone rings during the school day, my bp goes through the roof.

My father would call this "karma".

Admit it, you called him "Bart", didn't you?! (some classic comedy though, gotta give him that!)

So what does that make you kraut, 65 (stress-induced)?

IronMike

 

[Kahn]

Why are my posts being deleted? Who is doing it and why. Why didn't get an explanation? If there is a reason like they are nonsense, why aren't other waste of space posts being deleted? Could the mad deleter please offer an explanation?

 

[airlfloww]

Edited