As someone who gets pressured and worries quickly, even about minor things, like me, stress dramatically impacts my daily living. In terms of body reactions or clinical manifestations, I frequently experience migraines when I am stressed. Sometimes, I also experience difficulty breathing, a racing heartbeat, the urge to puke, cold hands, slight panic attacks, and blurred vision. Furthermore, there are times when my menstrual cycle gets interrupted due to stress, whereas my period gets delayed for 2-3 months. After studying the endocrine system, I learned that there are specific glands that respond to stressors. In this scenario, the hypothalamus and the endocrine glands—pituitary, adrenal, and cortisol, play a huge role in stress response. The hypothalamus, responsible for regulating emotional response, sends signals to the adrenal glands through the sympathetic nervous system. Due to this, epinephrine and norepinephrine are secreted in my bloodstream. This can explain why it felt difficult to breathe, and my heart was racing.
Additionally, the pituitary gland secretes ACTH, sending signals to the adrenal glands and releasing cortisol (stress hormone). Cortisol plays a functional role during stress as it regulates blood pressure, boosts energy, controls sleep and wake cycles, stimulates gluconeogenesis, and more. Cortisol is secreted in response to the stressor, activating our fight-or-flight mechanism, which also explains heightened breathing, panic attack indicators, and such.
Although the presence of cortisol plays a massive role in responding to stress, too much cortisol affects my menstrual cycle due to the disturbance in the interaction or changing of signals between the hypothalamus, pituitary, and ovary glands; thus, it explains the late period.