When our hair looks good, we feel good. There is something innately personal about our hairstyles. We show our personality, our style, and how we’re approaching the day through how we show off our hair to the world.

So when our hair starts to thin prematurely, it can feel like we’re losing part of ourselves.

Any number of factors can cause hair loss. One of the most silent but destructive ways is through high cortisol increasing stress levels. While the average person loses between 50-100 strands a day, elevated cortisol can cause chunks to come out during brushing or showering.

Understanding stress-induced hair loss helps you combat it.

What Is Cortisol

Let’s start with what cortisol is and how it affects your body. Cortisol is a chemical often called the stress hormone. It’s your body’s stress response manager and is released during short-term or long-term stress, or in response to trauma. It helps you cope with anxiety by regulating metabolism and blood pressure.

Read: Why Supplement Potency Depends on Cold Storage Standards

How Does It Affect Hair Loss

Believe it or not, stress and cortisol levels strongly affect your hair.

“When cortisol levels stay high, hair follicles may switch from growth mode into a resting phase,” explains Dr. Melissa Piliang, MD of the Cleveland Clinic. “That can lead to increased shedding seen days, weeks, or even months later.”

Essentially, your body is focusing so hard on keeping everything else running well and keeping you calm during periods of stress that it can’t focus on hair growth. So instead, it sends the hair into a dormant state.

How To Identify Stress-Induced Hair Loss

Extreme shedding doesn’t happen overnight. It starts slowly, over weeks or even months. As mentioned, some daily hair loss is normal, but take stock of what’s average for your hair.

Look for these signs of extensive hair loss:

• More coming out when you brush or shower.
• Hair on the pillow when you wake up in the morning.
• A widening at your natural part, showing more of your scalp in that area.
• Sudden, patchy shedding.

If these start to occur, think about things like recent changes in your diet or lifestyle, any illnesses, and personal anxiety causes. If you determine stress-induced anxiety is the major difference, you can target those causes.

Addressing The Problem

Exercise and Sleep

We get it: exercise and sleep aren’t a “get well quick” solution. It almost sounds cliché to tell someone they can solve a lot of their problems.

But the truth is, few things can reset the body like the balanced approach of raising your heart rate and flushing toxins with physical activity, then following it with a good night’s rest.

• Exercise: Exercise resets the central nervous system, which has numerous positive effects a biology teacher would love to explore, but the main one for this topic is that a CNS reset can force your body to remove damaged cells and molecules, such as dormant hair follicles.
• Sleep: A good night’s sleep does wonders for hair regrowth. Research shows hair follicles are intricately tied to our circadian rhythm; they’re even considered circadian genes! This is because when our bodies enter that period of rest, our cells and central nervous system can operate as intended. This includes letting a hair follicle work through its natural life cycle. When we disrupt our circadian rhythm, we also disrupt the growth rhythm needed for hair and skin, leading to patchy skin, weak hair, and more.

Laser Therapy Caps

Low Level Laser Therapy (LLLT) has changed the game for modern, technology-based at-home remedies. This option lets you target the problem in effective, non-invasive ways.

With prescription-strength effects, the pulse-wave emissions of red light laser therapy caps send energy and red light to the cells beneath the hair follicles. The cells harness this energy and perform what’s known as cellular respiration, essentially entering and staying in a growth stage.

The pulsed emissions also increase blood flow in the scalp, which supports the natural hair growth cycle.

Build A Self-Care Routine

Few things in life do more good for your body than taking time for yourself. Simply letting your brain turn off for a period of time, however short, can work wonders for reducing blood pressure and lowering cortisol levels.

A self-care routine doesn’t have to mean changing your entire life to relax more; some of us are too energetic for that anyway. Instead, it means prioritizing your well-being and finding what helps you relax.

Whether you set aside time for a massage, turn off your phone to read for an hour every evening, or go ax-throwing, make sure you create time to take it easy. Your body and your hair will thank you.

Conclusion

Stress and high cortisol levels lead to hair loss, which in turn causes worry about the shedding. Don’t let it become a vicious cycle. Once you’ve addressed your anxiety, use these four techniques or explore options like laser therapy for hair loss to tackle the problem and be your best self.

The post The High-Stress Burnout Guide: How Cortisol Causes Thinning Hair and What to Do About It appeared first on Self Care Advise.