Watching ‘Stress, Portrait of a Killer – Full Doc 2008 by National Geographic’ ( a 15 minutes version is also available) I’m not so sure about the hard wiring. If baboons can change their culture so radically from aggressive into peaceful why could humans not do it, too?

True, for the baboons the cultural change was only possible after the aggressive stressor jerks of the community were killed by their own damaged immune systems (and some infected meat stolen from humans)…

Epicurus and his friends did not wait for all the aggressive human bullies to kill themselves but formed intentional alternative communities for the cultivation of human flourishing through stress-FREEDOM and friendship.

In fact, in our own days, too, more and more human groups are opting out from the majority’s aggressive hierarchical competitive structures and build alternative communities with different structures, like the 200 year old ordered anarchy on Tristan da Cunha or the hundreds of intentional communities in the US and West Europe.

The friendliness of the people at Dean’s in Stoughton Hospital and the lunch cooked in their own kitchen definitely go to the positive side of the pain/pleasure ratio.

I was sedated with Versed and slept nicely as the surgeon did a wide excision over the same spot they had biopsied a few weeks ago. He also removed a lipoma from my back and 3 lymph nodes from my groin and sent the tissues to the pathologists who will give us the results in few days.

I have got painkillers so I had an additional nap in the afternoon and a good night sleep till 5.30 in the morning when I got up and attended to the running projects.

I know that some?/many? people find the time of waiting for the “verdict” of the pathologists stressful, probably due to the emotional load of their hopes and fears.

For Epicureans there is no reason to be stressed about the results of histological analysis since they are aware of the fact that they will die one day anyway and it does not really matter what kills them, or as Metrodorus put it:

“It is possible to provide security against other things, but as far as death is concerned, we men all live in a city without walls.”

Epicureans try to live their lives stressFREE and to the full as long as they are alive instead of wasting precious time on pointless speculations about its possible length, true to the motto: “vivamus dum vivimus” (‘let’s live as long as we are alive’).

I will live my days the same way whether the pathologists prognosticate a survival chance of 90% or 60% or 30% for the next five years, depending on  the number and position of Merkel Cell Carcinoma cells in my body: enjoying my time chatting with my wife, children, friends and relatives, managing the projects of the company I work for (Allegro Translations in Madison, Wisconsin), taking walks in the snow, reading books ( at the time on the unique community experience of the inhabitants of the most remote island in the world, Tristan da Cunha), cooking, enjoying the meals cooked by my wife and daughter, and especially enjoying music, the most fascinating phenomenon for me.

• • pain
  • a lack of control over environmental circumstances, such as food, housing, health, freedom
  • social issues such as social defeat, relationship conflict, deception, break-ups
  • major events such as birth, death, marriage, and divorce
  • life experiences such as poverty, unemployment, exams, deadlines

Why are these very common issues and experiences perceived by many as threats? If they are so common, why are we not appropriately prepared for them? Is our failure to cope with the most common issues not a result of the malfunction of those whose responsibility it is to prepare us for life? Have our parents, teachers, educators and counselors all failed us?

Epicurus, the founder of the Epicurean school of philosophy and happiness-boosting life conduct, suffered all his life from a bladder pain that finally killed him. This fact, however, did not interfere with his pursuit of happiness, even though they had no pain relief medicines in 271 BCE.

So what was Epicurus’s secret?  His “four-part cure,” in Greek “tetrapharmakos,” can give us a hint:

Don’t fear the gods,
Don’t worry about death;
What is good is easy to get, and
What is terrible is easy to endure

But his anti-stress medicine could not be swallowed at once with a glass of water. His followers had to chew and digest it over many years in their communal educative life-schools. The effort must have been worthwhile since the Epicurean circles of friends flourished over 800 years from 300 BCE till 500 CE.

So how was Epicurus’s stress-prevention program practiced?

The Epicureans did not give up their possessions as the Pythagoreans did, since that would have prevented them from generously sharing their resources with each other. They did not rebel against the state and its institutions, as the Cynics did, since they relied on the state to protect them in exchange for performing their duties as citizens. (Epicurus himself went to Athens for his two-year term of military service at the age of 18.) They did not plot against rulers or attempt revolutions, as the Platonists did, since they believed that the exercise of political power beyond the bounds of their own self-administrative communes endangered their peace of mind, necessary for a good life in freedom and happiness. For the same reason they did not participate in state affairs, as the Stoics did. They kept a low profile according to one of their principles: “lathe biosas,” in English,” live unobtrusively” or “unnoticed.”

This is what they did: The happiness-seekers lived together in communities where they could individually and collectively promote each others’ progress on their pathways from pain to pleasure. They studied intensively Epicurus’s therapeutical writings and memorized the most important precepts so they had them ready at hand the moment the specific philosophical-psychological pill was needed. They gave each other feedback on their progress and those who were more advanced helped the others in the way modern life-coaches and trainers do through lectures, discussions, conversations, and practical activities.

How  can an Epicurean lifestyle prevent each of life’s main “stressors”? Through the education and continuous practice of stress-busting, happiness-boosting attitudes towards all the issues related to pain, fear, frustration experienced today as social defeat, relationship conflict, deception, break-ups, births, deaths, divorce, poverty, unemployment, exams, and deadlines.

I will take up these issues individually and describe how Epicureans dealt with them over eight centuries and how we can deal with them today.

Epicurus drew a clear distinction between

-    choosing a basic general attitude (diathesis) toward action in a given sphere and

-    choosing to do or not to do a given thing within that field.

Thus Epicureans were trained to make these two choices.

They were trained, for example, to first choose what attitude they will assume towards, for instance, death, the gods, pleasure and pain, necessity, fortune, political life, food, fame and friendship.

The choice of a basic and general attitude, however, by no means abolished the necessity of making individual decisions.

The proper attitude toward pain, for instance, is to regard it as inherently evil and to be avoided; nevertheless, in the individual case the lesser pain, such as that of the surgeon’s knife, is endured for the sake of the greater good.

Again, the proper attitude toward food is to prefer a simple diet, but this does not preclude and even approves the occasional indulgence.

In a series of articles I will touch upon those topics that are considered as possible sources of stress and therefore can act as happiness blockers. By showing the attitude Epicurean practitioners applied over 800 years, I hope to help today’s happiness-seekers to escape from the most dangerous happiness-blocker: stress.

Read more here:

http://psychcentral.com/news/2009/10/05/beware-of-intense-stress/8755.html

The study of 1,011 adolescents (aged 10-15) and their mothers from low income families living in three cities — Boston, Chicago and San Antonio — was posted on the Web site of the Journal of Adolescent Health (http://www.jahonline.org/inpress), which will publish it in the August issue. Forty-seven percent of the teens in the sample were overweight or obese, but that percentage increased to 56.2 percent among those who were impacted by four or more stressors.

 ”We found that an adolescent or youth who’s more stressed — caused by such things as having poor grades, mental health problems, more aggressive behavior, or doing more drugs and alcohol — is also more likely to be overweight or obese,” said lead author Brenda Lohman, an Iowa State assistant professor of human development and family studies (HDFS).

 Susan Stewart, an ISU associate professor of sociology; and Steven Garasky, a professor of HDFS at Iowa State; joined Lohman on the research team. Former ISU faculty members Craig Gundersen, a member of the agricultural and consumer economics faculty at the University of Illinois; and Joey Eisenmann, a member of the kinesiology and pediatrics faculty at Michigan State University; also contributed to the study.

The study analyzes data obtained from the “Welfare, Children and Families: A Three-City Study” — a six-year longitudinal investigation. Researchers measured the height and weight of the adolescents to determine their body mass index, which was subsequently used to determine weight status based on two widely used classification systems. Adolescent food insecurity status and individual, maternal and family stressors were also determined through interviews.

The five factors used to determine the individual stressor index for the adolescents were:

* Academic problems

* Consumption of drugs and alcohol

* Depression or poor mental health levels

* Acting out or aggressive behaviors

* Lack of future orientation [...]

The study also found that a mother’s stress, [...]contributes to a child’s chances of becoming overweight or obese. [...]

While this study singles out mothers, fathers aren’t immune to their child’s weight status either.

“My own research focuses on fathers and shows that fathers, too, have an effect on children’s eating habits and obesity,” said Stewart, author of the book “Brave New Stepfamilies,” who had another study posted by the Journal of Adolescent Health last month on nonresident father involvement and adolescent eating patterns.

“In our latest study, we found that kids who are involved with nonresident dads eat better — more vegetables, less fast food,” she said. “However, similar to the Lohman study, living with a single mom was associated with worse eating habits.”

Lohman says the new research should emphasize the need for healthcare professionals to take a more holistic approach in their treatment of obese teens.

“We absolutely have to focus on their (teens) health, well-being, nutrition and exercise — and education of these things for them,” she said. “But we really need to also look holistically at their life and work towards reducing stress [...]

Original title:

Stress, obesity linked

Source and full text here:

http://www.scientistlive.com/European-Science-News/Medical/Stress,_obesity_linked/22357/

 The authors used nude mice that had been inoculated with human ovarian carcinoma cells, and the mice were stressed by being immobilized for several hours a day. Stressed mice had a three-fourfold increase in the number of tumor nodules and tumor weight; they also had more metastases. These results were replicated using other tumor cell lines and another method of stressing the mice.

 The stressed mice had larger adrenal glands and greater sympathetic nervous system activity than the controls, so the authors investigated whether the effect of stress on tumor growth is mediated by -adrenergic receptors. An agonist for 2-adrenergic receptor and a general -adrenergic receptor agonist increased tumor nodule number and tumor weight in a similar manner to chronic stress. Moreover, a -adrenergic antagonist could reverse these effects and the effects of chronic stress itself. By contrast, 1-adrenergic receptor agonists had no effect. [...]

 These results show one way in which stress increases tumor growth  [...]

Source and full text:http://www.nature.com/nrc/journal/v6/n9/full/nrc1986.html

 Original title: Tumorigenesis: Stress and cancer

Author: Patrick Goymer

 Objective: This study investigated whether cytokine responses to acute mental stress are associated with adiposity in healthy young women.

 Design and Subjects: A laboratory study of 67 women, aged 18-25 years, recruited from University College London.

 Measurements: Height, weight and waist circumference were measured and body fat mass was estimated by bioelectrical impedance body composition analysis. Laboratory mental stress testing was carried out and blood pressure and heart rate were recorded at baseline, during two moderately challenging tasks (Stroop and speech) and during recovery 40-45 min post-stress. Blood samples taken at baseline, immediately post-stress and 45 min post-stress, were used for assessment of circulating cytokines. Saliva samples taken throughout the session were assessed for cortisol.

 Results: Women who had larger cytokine responses to stress were more abdominally obese than women with smaller cytokine stress responses. Specifically, there was a positive correlation between waist circumference and stress-induced increases in plasma levels of leptin (r=0.35, P<0.05) and IL-1Ra responses (r=0.29, P<0.05). There was also a significant positive correlation between prolonged diastolic blood pressure responses to stress and measures of total and abdominal obesity (r=0.28-0.33, P<0.05).

 Conclusion: Increased cytokine production could be a mechanism linking stress and abdominal obesity.

 Source:

http://www.nature.com/ijo/journal/v32/n3/abs/0803767a.html

Original title of the study:

Stress-induced cytokine responses and central adiposity in young women

Authors:

L Brydon, C E Wright, K O’Donnell and A Steptoe from the Department of Epidemiology and Public Health, Psychobiology Group, University College London, London, UK

I Zachary from Centre for Cardiovascular Biology and Medicine, Department of Medicine, BHF Laboratories, The Rayne Institute, University College London, London, UK

J Wardle from the Department of Epidemiology and Public Health, Health Behaviour Unit, University College London, London, UK