Hair Loss Stress Related Condition

Stress related hair loss is more a poignant problem than a physical one. One thing everyone must understand about their hair is that it doesn’t serve any vital function for our health. We can live and function normally without it. Years ago, hair on the heads of our ancestors reduced heat loss and kept their head warmer. However, this is not the case in today’s modern society. Hair loss advice is quite frequent nowadays, with many people losing their hair.

An unexpected and stressful event could cause the hair follicles to prematurely stop growing, thus entering into a resting phase. Severe mental stress could have this effect as your mind and body tries to deal with your emotional issues. This process identified as telogen effluvium occurs when more hair goes into a resting phase and is shed.

Telogen effluvium is characterized by abrupt, diffuse hair loss caused by a disruption in the normal hair growth cycle. This disruption is often the result of trauma, such as chemotherapy, major surgery, childbirth, severe stress and severe chronic illness. This trauma causes huge numbers of hair follicles to enter a stage of telogen or rest at the same time.

The telogen phase could last for 6 to 12 weeks (and much longer if not treated) and affects women much more than men. Stress factors that could lead to temporary hair loss are:

* Death of a family member or friend
* Accident or intense work related stress
* Financial problems, divorce, child birth and major illness or surgery

The good news is that this stress associated hair loss (telogen effluvium) is temporary. In fact, because of the nature of the hair growth cycle, by the time your hair starts shedding heavily, your stress related problem might have already been resolved. The odd thing about this condition is that you’re generally over the stressful event even before the hair loss starts. Nevertheless, for many people a major stressful event could be more lasting. At times like these, the following tips for handling stress are useful:

Exercise: Just 15 to 20 minutes a day could produce enough endorphins to reduce stress levels.

Write in a Journal: Writing your thoughts and feelings down in a journal could help you to take out the frustrations you are keeping inside.

Apart from all these, taking a medical advice is not a bad idea at all to improve your stress levels.