A delayed work assignment. Traffic before an important meeting. Hearing your superior scold you. Remembering you left the stove on. Trying to cover up a mistake. Sound familiar?
Stress is a natural physical and mental reaction to life experiences. Everyone expresses stress from time to time. Anything from everyday responsibilities like work and family to serious life events such as a new diagnosis, war, or the death of a loved one can trigger stress. For short-term situations, stress can be beneficial to your health and helps you cope with potentially serious situations. Your body responds to stress by releasing hormones that increase your heart and breathing rates and ready your muscles to respond, known as the ‘fight or flight’ response.
Yet if your stress response doesn’t stop firing, and these stress levels stay elevated far longer than is necessary for survival, it can take a massive toll on your health. (Marks 2021) . When discussing stress, it is usually the psychological aftereffects that are highlighted and talked about, like depression and anxiety.
However, neurotic levels of stress can also lead to severe physiological dysfunction also. Under stress, your heart starts pumping faster. Stress hormones cause your blood vessels to constrict and divert more oxygen to your muscles, so you’ll have more strength to take action. Except: this also raises your blood pressure, and chronically high blood pressure can potentially lead to cardiovascular diseases. How?
When blood rapidly clashes with the vessels at higher-than-normal pressure, our veins and arteries experience little episodes of damage, and this leads to inflammation and plaque build-up in them. The plaque attracts fat and cholesterol, and the build-up eventually narrows your blood vessels. In extreme cases, this kind of stress can also lead to strokes and heart attacks.
Chronic stress can also lead to stiff muscles, acidity, fertility problems, shortness of breath, prolonged back pain, stomachaches and many other health issues.
Stress can have an impact on capillaries, which are small blood vessels that play a critical role in the body's circulation. Capillaries are responsible for exchanging nutrients, oxygen, and waste products between the blood and the body's cells. They are found throughout the body, including in the skin, muscles, and organs.
When the body experiences chronic stress, it can lead to the constriction of blood vessels, including capillaries. This can reduce blood flow to certain areas of the body and potentially lead to physical symptoms such as headache or dizziness. In addition to constricting blood vessels, stress can also cause other changes in the body that can affect blood circulation. For example, stress can cause the heart to beat faster, which can lead to an increase in blood pressure. This can also impact blood circulation, as the increased pressure may make it more difficult for the blood to flow freely through the body.
So where does Hijama come in?
Stress eventually causes constriction of blood vessels & impairment of Capillaries which are underlying factor through which so many diseases are triggered due to stress. Hijama Cupping does exactly opposite to the what chronic stress does! Hijama dilates blood vessels with action of certain vasodilators such as adenosine and histamine, promoting blood circulation, contributing to the relaxation of blood vessels and potentially reducing the degree of constriction. The increase in blood flow to the treated area potentially alleviates vasoconstriction. Additionally Hijama cupping if preceded with Gliding Cupping techniques, increases blood circulation and vasodilation. These combined approaches potentially enhances the overall impact on vasoconstriction.
When stress builds up and cumulate in the body the capillaries contract and over time they get stiff, calcified, almost dead and can no longer function and we get a buildup of poor tissue that feels dead and hard and cold and fatigue pain stiffness and even brain fog can all the symptoms of poor circulation Hijama Cupping is the permanent and effective solution to this situation as it breaks down the dysfunctional capillaries and allow the body to hit the restart button. Hijama Cupping, through its suction effect on the skin breaks/ruptures the dysfunctional capillaries, clears the mild to moderate blood stasis (Statis referred here is impairment of blood flow not blood clots as considered in western medicine). Body regrows new capillaries and restores the microcirculation in the treated areas. Enhanced blood flow may promote the delivery of oxygen and nutrients to tissues, as well as the removal of metabolic waste products, potentially aiding in reversing the stress effects. Stress often manifests in the body as muscular tension and tightness. Cupping therapy, by targeting specific areas of tension helps release tight muscles and promote a sense of relaxation.
Hijama (and dry cupping) also sedates the nervous system’s processes and therefore relieves any stress the patient might be feeling at that time.
At i-Revive the gliding cupping done before the Hijama process is extremely beneficial for stress-related issues. Neurotic stress can cause irreversible damages to our bodies and snowball into much serious health concerns than what may seem like a straightforward case of anxiety. The benefits of pursuing Hijama for stress-related concerns are many and should not be overridden for a life controlled by cabinets full of pills.
Writer
Imran Khan
Lead Practitioner at i-Revive
References
Marks, Hedy. 2021. Stress Symptoms. 19 8. Accessed 2 25, 2023. https://www.webmd.com/balance/stress-management/stress-symptoms-effects_of-stress-on-the-body.
