In recent times the medical and scientific community have scoffed at the motion that stress could be linked to obesity. In fact historically the two wouldn't be seen together. More than likely it would be the opposite. If your overweight you couldn't possibly be busy enough or 'stressed' enough to put on weight

Now days research is telling us that over half the Australian adult population is overweight or obese. Due to this recent public interest, there is an increase in research into why obesity has increased and ways to overcome it. Could stress be a key player?

In today's hectic society most people are under some form of stress trying to manage work with families and other home and social commitments. It is quite apparent that stress has a profound effect on our general health and mental health but how can it affect our metabolic health and our eating patterns?

Firstly we need to understand what stress is and how it can be unhelpful. We all need some level of stress however problems can occur when there is too much physical or emotional stress. When we think, we think in pictures. Each and every day we experience situations that cause pictures to be presented in our brain. Stress can alter our pictures and change our thoughts in our head to become more negative and it's these negative thoughts and images that can cause us to react with anxiety and lead to negative behaviours. The bottom line is that our emotions and thoughts have a huge impact on our behaviours and in context to this article, our health and eating behaviours.

Following is a summary of some common effects that stress and anxiety can have on health and eating behaviours:

• Encourages nervous eating. In some people stress diminishes the appetite but other people can be driven to overeat. It's not simply a matter of nervous hands as food provides comfort.
• Increases alcohol consumption. Alcohol is a common way to remove the effects of stress. After a few drinks you can relax but the trouble is it doesn't last. Alcohol is a short-term solution for stress. However the long term effect is increased calorie consumption. When we drink alcohol, we also tend to eat and eat the wrong things, which in turn increase our calorie consumption and stored energy. There are also many social and physiological risks in excessive alcohol consumption which need to be understood and considered.
• Immobilisation. Feeling that you don't want to move is a symptom of severe chronic stress. Not moving means not burning up energy. Not burning up energy means storing energy (body fat).
• Decreased sense of self control. Loss of control over your life is one of the main symptoms of stress and anxiety. This may flow through to other facets of your life, such as losing control of health behaviours such as weight control.
• Increase mobilisation of fatty acids. One of the apparent benefits of stress is that it causes fats from fat stores to be mobilised to be used as energy. However, if there's no accompanying movement or exercise to use up the fat, it can stay in the system for longer and can tend to clog arteries and cause heart disease.
• Decreased self-esteem. For many individuals, an increase in stress leads to a reduction in self-esteem, which flows through to affect all other facets of life including fat control.

Given the above stress related behaviour changes, stress may be identified as a contributor to the increasing overweight Australian adult population. Developing coping strategies for stressful situations, managing the negative thoughts and images associated with those stressful situations may have a direct effect in facilitating long-term weight-loss and thus improve the health of the Australian population.

For more information on diet and nutrition go to www.lifestylemedicine.net.au.

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