We all need to be recognized for what we do every day. At work, at home, in free time, in the family, it is essential that each person find their own space in which they are realized. Otherwise, not only the nervous system is at risk, but also heart health. To signal this, indicating that it is a risk to be reckoned with for the well-being of the middle-aged woman, is a research from the University of Pittsburgh, published in Journal of American Heart Association.
“Social” stress impacts on risk factors
We all know the “enemies” of the heart, even if many do not give signs of their presence, such as hypertension or the “bad” cholesterol or LDL or diabetes. And we know that failure to control the body weight, improper nutrition that breaks away from the lines of the Mediterranean diet, low physical activity and cigarette smoking contribute to increasing the dangers.
Stress, in this dynamic, can have an important weight. And it is right on psychological and emotional side that the American study focused, analyzing whether the right “recognition” of the social role of women, whether she is a worker or engaged only in the family or has to look after elderly parents, could have an impact on cardiovascular risk and therefore on the possible development of a heart attack.
The analysis examined a population of adult women, between 42 and 61 years old, evaluating on the one hand the gratification for the life they were having and on the other the cardiovascular risk profile, measured through a series of parameters: index body mass, blood pressure, cholesterol and blood glucose values, regular movement, diet and cigarette smoking.
It is at this point that a close correlation emerges between the recognition of one’s figure at work, at home and in social life, blood sugar, cholesterol levels, physical activity, diet and smoking. In fact, women who felt “recognized” because they had rewarding roles in the family and social fields regularly carried out demanding physical activity for at least two hours a week and had 30 percent more not to smoke.
As if that weren’t enough, with each additional point of non-gratification stress, the risk of keeping controlled increased by 13 percent blood pressure, a 10 percent risk of having a body mass index greater than 30, therefore indicative of obesity, and almost 20 percent more risk of following a correct and healthy diet. Obviously, the study is only observational so it does not allow to go back to a precise cause / effect relationship. But it nevertheless indicates a dangerous trajectory, which must pass through a proper recognition of the role of women, both at work and in the family.
Because it takes attention
Good habits they are a source of health for a lifetime. But there are phases in which they can be particularly useful, such as that of the transition to menopause, when the cardiovascular risk appears to increase as the “protection” of estrogen hormones is progressively lacking.
It is therefore a delicate phase for the heart, in which regular physical activity and healthy lifestyle habits can really make a difference. Dealing with stress in the right way, claiming its fundamental role in work and in the family, can therefore become a useful tool to preserve not only the psyche, but also the heart and arteries.
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