📌 When Stress turns Toxic

Why we need stress, just not toxic stress.

Stress is a natural part of life.

It keeps us vigilant, aware, motivated, and functioning. It's our body’s way of responding to pressure, a built-in system to help us take action and get things done. By definition, stress is a normal response to internal or external challenges - or to place emphasis on something important. Meant to inspire action.

But here’s the problem:

We’ve normalised, even glorified, toxic stress patterns.

We praise people for being “busy”, for how much they can juggle, how little they sleep, how productive they are while running on fumes. We act like exhaustion is a badge of honour, and chaos is just part of adulthood - especially for women. But why does no one seem to be questioning this?

Toxic stress doesn’t serve anyone.

It destroys - physically, emotionally, spiritually.

So why do we keep accepting it? 

Why do we think we have to suffer to be praised? 

Suffer to be productive? 

Why are we convinced that our value is measured by how much we grind?

We probably need to start showing a better way.

Because when stress starts working against us… that’s when we’re dealing with toxic stress.

We’ve Mislabelled Stress.

When we talk about “being stressed”, we’re often actually referring to toxic stress, not the natural kind. We've placed so much weight on the word stress - a bit like how we treat the word anxiety. Sometimes, someone says they have anxiety, or are anxious, and they might just mean they're feeling nervous. But we often interpret it as a reference to the extreme, as a clinical diagnosis.

Same with stress.

Everyone experiences stress and anxiety, both are a natural and healthy part of life - it’s just that we all experience them in different ways and at different levels.

So, What Is Toxic Stress?

Well, it starts with how you view stress.

If you buy into the misguided myth that “stress is bad for you” (like many of us have), you’ll start thinking of it as a negative thing. Then whenever you feel ‘stress’ it will be negative experience, and that’s what leads to the spirals, when it gets out of control, you start to feel overwhelmed. Then it starts happening every time you feel stress, and boom! You’re stuck in a toxic stress pattern. When stress stops working for you and starts working against you, that’s toxic stress. 

When the natural stress response becomes harmful. Toxic stress is the kind that messes with your hormones, disrupts your menstrual cycle, impacts your physical health, affects your sleep, weight, mood, and even how you think. It sends your nervous system into overdrive and leaves you feeling constantly overwhelmed. This is the stress that we should be concerned about.

It’s stress that controls you, instead of the other way around.

Are You Caught in a Toxic Stress Pattern?

If you’re wondering whether your stress has tipped into the toxic zone, try asking yourself:

• How do I respond to stress?

• What are my stressors - internal or external?

• Is my reaction motivating me to take healthy action, or is it spiralling me into panic, paralysis, or overwhelm?

The key that I’ve found to breaking a toxic stress cycle?

Regaining control of your mind. 

It's Not the Stress. It’s the Pattern.

Stress itself isn’t the issue.

It’s the thought or behaviour patterns behind it that often create the overwhelming physiological response. Once I realised this, (at the advice of my psych) I started journaling to track my stress in real time.

I carried a tiny notebook (small enough to fit in my pocket and handbag) and a mini pen, and jotted down every time I felt stressed - along with what I thought caused it. (The Notes app on your phone works too!) This helped me work out:

• What my stress triggers were

• Whether my response was proportionate

• And identify what kind of thought pattern I might be stuck in

Most of my stressors came from overstimulation and information overload.

I was trying to hold too much in my head at once.

Your Brain Is Not Meant to Store Everything

Let’s be real: our brains were not built to manage the constant barrage of information we deal with today. I love the technological information age, however, I need to be vigilant with what I store in my brain. So, I’m going to encourage you the same way I was encouraged:

Use the apps.

Write things down.

Use your calendars.

Do whatever you need to, to get the information out of your mind and help you remember only what you need to.

It’s not that you can’t remember everything - it’s that you shouldn’t have to.

I’ve heard women’s minds described as a laptop with 2,387 tabs open, overheating, and no clue where the music is coming from. Sound familiar? Can you relate?

No wonder so many women are in toxic stress patterns!

We’re setting ourselves up for failure when we try to remember everything for everyone - appointments, to-do lists, birthdays, shopping, school events, work tasks, the mental load of home life...Because it’s not just our own brains we’re managing - often, we’re also mentally managing other people too.

The Power of a Brain Dump

One thing that helped me immensely: regular brain dumps.

Literally sit down with a pen and paper (yes - go old school! It helps) and for 10–20 minutes (however long you have/need), write down everything in your head.

As it comes.

As it is. 

It doesn’t need to make sense. Just. Get. It. Out.

If you’re like me, and like things neat and orderly, you can colour-code or sort afterwards:

• Important vs. Not Important

• Urgent vs. Not Urgent

• Thoughts, To-Dos, Dreams, etc.

Then you can:

• Add tasks to your calendar

• Delegate what you can

• Write an ultimate to-do list

• Or close the notebook and come back to it later

Getting everything out helps you stop mentally carrying it all.

And by getting everything out of your head and physically writing it all down, you start to notice patterns.

What Are Your Brain Dumps Telling You?

Let me start with what I started to notice in mine.

If your brain dumps are full of things like:

• What you need to do

• Who you need to be there for

• Who you need to encourage or remember

• How you could be doing better

…you may be operating from an subconscious belief like:

“I need to perform to be loved and accepted.” or,

“My worth depends on how much I do for others, or how much they need me.”

The first one was me. I subconsciously thought I needed to perform to be loved and accepted and it drove every decision, thought, action, conversation. Everything. And it. Was. TIRING!

That belief was my main reason for falling into a toxic stress pattern. I had no idea I was doing it, but I was measuring my value through performance - being the best at everything, for everyone, all the time.

That’s not natural stress. 

That’s self-abandonment dressed up as productivity.

And if my psych hadn’t helpfully suggested brain dumps, (and I hadn’t actually started doing them). I’m not sure I ever would’ve figured that out. 

(Yes, I absolutely had help! Please don’t be afraid to ask for yours.)

Want to hear some good news? You Can Unlearn Toxic Patterns!

We don’t just fall into these cycles randomly.

Many of us learned to communicate, cope, and carry stress by watching our families or environments growing up. We were taught:

• To keep the peace instead of speaking up

• That vulnerability was risky

• That silence, people-pleasing or perfection was safer

But here’s the good news: we don’t have to stay stuck.

How would it feel to experience a natural stress response that works for you, instead of against you?

Well, when you start to get to know yourself better… You get to question the patterns.

You get to pause, reset, rewire.

And when you can figure out what’s making the stress toxic, you can finally start experiencing stress as it was meant to be:

A supporter, not a saboteur.

You Are Not Your Pattern.

Come on now, say it with me, like you believe it. “I am NOT my Pattern”. 

Some people fall back on: “Well, this is just who I am.”

But no, darling.

This is who you’ve learned to be.

Which means it’s a choice. 

And that means, you can learn to choose something different.

Or not. It’s Your choice.

See you on The Other Side,

Sarah

**If you'd like to do your own research or learn more: Dr Caroline Leaf, who is a communication pathologist, audiologist, and clinical neuroscientist specialising in research in psychoneurobiology... in other words, she knows A LOT about brain stuff... her PODCAST: Cleaning Up Your Mental Mess, has been extremely helpful for me in understanding and breaking my toxic stress patterns. Happy listening!

Reflection Questions:

As always, if you want to dive a little deeper, here are some questions to help you reflect on your own stress response and patterns:

• When I feel stressed, how do I usually respond?

• What are my most common stress triggers?

• Are these stressors internal or external?

• Does the stress motivate me or overwhelm me?

• Do I have a thought pattern driving my stress that I’d like to challenge?

• What’s one practical step I could take to lessen my mental load?

• Who can I talk to about what I’m carrying?