I read something recently in 'Anxiety and Panic Attacks: Their Cause and Cure' by Robert Handly (anybody read it?), which I have read before, but which has only just come to mean something to me. We all react to stress in one of three ways: Some of us are "muscle reactors", we constantly brace our skeletal muscles, such as our neck and shoulders , we suffer from tension headaches and even back pain. Others are "Gut reactors" who brace their lower intestine and are vulnerable to ulcers and colitis. While the third group are "Vascular reactors", people who clench the smooth muscles such as the arteries when they are under stress. They have chronically cold hands and feet and are prone to migraines.
At first I thought I was a muscle reactor, because my neck and shoulders are always knotted up, I'm always achy and I'm very un-limber (if there is such a word!). But then I thought, "well, I do get very cold hands and feet" and at school I nearly fainted when we played sport in the cold. Plus, my chest always feels really tight. I know I'm not a gut reactor, but it made me think of my uncle, who runs his own business and suffers from chrone's disease (bleeding from the back passage). He doesn't really seem like he gets stressed, but it seems likely that his illness is caused by being a gut reactor.
So, the question is: Are you a muscle, gut or vascular reactor?
Ships in harbour are safe..but that's not what ships were built for.
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