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Stress Hormones -> Sleep Issues & Weight Gain
Gay men pay a heavy price for stress and loneliness. You will often notice accelerated aging and poor health in general. This is the outcome of chronic exposure to trauma and loneliness.
The fastest way to tell if you are exposed to stress is to look at the quality of your sleep, weight gain from emotional eating and anxieties from worries.
Please read below to learn how stress hormones set into motion a soup of imbalance in your body and mind, turning off higher level functioning (creativity, focus, purpose).
There are several stress hormones that are released by the body in response to stress. The primary stress hormones include:
1. Cortisol: This hormone is released by the adrenal glands and is responsible for the body's stress response. It increases blood sugar, suppresses the immune system, and aids in fat, protein, and carbohydrate metabolism.
2. Adrenaline (Epinephrine): This hormone is also released by the adrenal glands and is responsible for the "fight or flight" response. Adrenaline increases heart rate, blood pressure and blood sugar levels, and increases oxygen supply to the brain, muscles, and other essential organs.
3. Norepinephrine (Noradrenaline): This hormone is also released by the adrenal glands and acts as a neurotransmitter. Norepinephrine increases heart rate, blood pressure, and blood sugar levels, and it also enhances brain activity and alertness.
These three hormones work together to prepare your body for responding to a stressful situation. However, chronic stress can cause an overproduction of these hormones, causing long-term negative effects on the body.
For instance, sustained cortisol production can lead to sleep issues, weight gain, mood changes, and memory problems, while the constant release of adrenaline and norepinephrine can cause high blood pressure, heart problems, and anxiety. It's crucial to manage stress levels to avoid the long-term impact of these stress hormones on the body.
Here are some sources that provide more information on stress hormones and their effects on the body:
1. "Stress and the Stress Response" by Harvard Health Publishing - https://www.health.harvard.edu/staying-healthy/
2. "How stress affects your health" by the American Psych. Assoc.
https://www.apa.org/helpcenter/stress/effects-nervous
3. Chronic Stress, Cortisol Dysfunction, and Pain Health.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4263906/
Trauma Vocabulary
Understanding trauma is the missing link to finding love and happiness for gay men. Please read the descriptions below and ask yourself if you are experiencing those situations.
Cognitive Dissonance is the mental fog that helps to deal with 100's of negative situations that gay men experience across their lives.
Sensation Seeking is the mechanism to release the hurt and pain and is an unconscious "force" as an attempt to reduce the amount of hurt. This manifests itself as search for abusive sex, narcissistic partners, emotional eating, distractions.
Repetition Compulsion is an unconscious motivation to return to the abusive situation in an attempt to learn from it and to heal it.
Dissasociation is the fragmentation of the mind to deal with the trauma content. This leads to All-Or-Nothing thinking, closed-mindedness and black-and-white thinking. This can explain why gay men reject others when they don't fit into their sexual compatibility framework.
Taking things deeper:
Cognitive dissonance refers to the mental tension or discomfort experienced when acting contrary to one's beliefs (self-minimization). Within the context of gay men's experiences, this might manifest as a kind of mental fog, an evasive tool to manage the numerous negative situations encountered across a lifetime. These situations can vary from overt homophobia and discrimination to self-induced shaming by reducing everything to sex (self-minimization).
Sensation seeking, on the other hand, is a psychological trait defined by the need for varied, novel, and complex sensations and experiences and the willingness to take physical and social risks for the sake of such experiences. In the context of gay men navigating trauma or distress, sensation seeking can be an unconscious mechanism to alleviate emotional pain. This coping strategy might manifest in various forms such as seeking out abusive sexual relationships, engaging with narcissistic partners, emotional overeating, or using distractions as escapism.
Repetition compulsion is another psychological phenomenon that can be particularly pronounced in situations of distress or trauma. This is an unconscious drive to return to difficult or harmful situations in an attempt to understand, control, or resolve them. It is often seen as a way of trying to correct or heal past traumas by re-enacting them in some form.
Finally, dissociation is a psychological process involving a disconnection or lack of connection between different parts of a person's identity, memory, or consciousness. It is often a response to extreme stress or trauma. For gay men dealing with various forms of trauma, dissociation can lead to a fragmented mindset. This fragmentation can further result in all-or-nothing thinking, closed-mindedness, and a rigid view of the world, often referred to as black-and-white thinking. This could potentially explain why some gay men may be quick to reject others who don't fit neatly into their sexual compatibility framework.
Loneliness or Trauma?
While everyone else focuses on loneliness, we discovered that something else is the root cause for relationship challenges. These questions help to explore trauma vs. loneliness:
1) Why are gay men struggling with friendships and put everything in the "sex basket" and remain single and lonely for years?
2) Why are gay men focusing on sex, year after year, even though sex is not enough to create a loving relationship?
3) Why is sexual compatibility prioritized even though when sexual-compatibility occurs, it rarely leads to a long-term relationship?
If gay men were lonely, they would not care to have attractive friends. If loneliness is going on, gay men would be open to friends first. This is not what is happening. Gay men don't want friends because other "forces" are in charge.
Also, sex is no longer about intimacy, but about the release of tension. This is why friends are not desired. Sexual compatibility is also not about sex but about the satisfaction of sensation-seeking and a manifestation of dissociation, i.e. "all or nothing" thinking.
If loneliness were the primary concern, then gay men would not care about sexual compatibility; instead, they would welcome a friend or anyone who is loving. Other "forces" are at play here as well.
If sexual compatibility translated into loving relationships, most gay men would have lovers. Even those men who have relationships with sexual compatibility show a desire for open relationships and sex with others. Why? Because other forces are at play that have nothing to do with sex.
Trauma is the foundation for all behaviors and choices in the gay world, leading to the fragmentation of all standards, best practices, and dating methodologies that work.
This is why looking at trauma as the foundational problem in the gay population is more productive and leads to proper healing and transformation, from being always single to being in loving relationships that last.
Additional Resources
Research shows that loneliness doubles the risks for cancer, heart attacks and causes decline in health and quality of life.
Watch how cognitive dissonance creates a cycle of sensation seeking and trauma that lasts for decades.
What is Big Gay Family Social Program?
Big Gay Family started as a matchmaking service in Miami in 2010 and has since evolved into a comprehensive social program providing everything you need to meet relationship-ready men, create strong connections, and develop long-term relationships.
Unlike other services that focus on loneliness, we discovered that the real reason for relationship challenges in gay men is trauma-based. By addressing the root problem, we have created a successful dating methodology that keeps our members together for years.
As an example, gay men in their 60s and 70s, who meet inside BGF, stay together for years, which is unheard of in popular culture where such groups are often written off as the most challenging.
It is very difficult to fail inside Big Gay Family, where you are given world-class methods that address the complexities of shame, trauma and shadow sexuality. Without such methods, gay men experience years of toxic relationships and often go back to where they started: frustrated, single and lonely.
By joining Big Gay Family, you will experience a social transformation within just one year that would take 20 years to achieve without the program.
What is different about Big Gay Family?
Inside Big Gay Family, members receive a state-of-the-art dating methodology based on 10+ years of research into trauma, loneliness, and intimacy. All men who join Big Gay Family interact through a step-by-step dating system that guides them from first contact towards a trusting and authentic relationship.
Instead of a random approach, you follow three stages: Bridge, Extensions, & Agreements. Each stage is designed to deepen your connection, prevent mistakes, and cultivate a long-term perspective.
Psychologically speaking, when you meet gay men inside Big Gay Family, you are not treated like a sex object but instead, as a wholesome human being with emotions, intellect, and spirit. This is how our members feel uplifted and emotionally enriched after just a few months of membership.
How many men will I meet inside Big Gay Family?
When you join BGF, you get 12 introductions per year. These introductions are to gay men (not bisexual or closeted) who are single (not in open relationships).
Our members are relationship-ready, willing to learn, available to spend time and get to know you. They are not alcoholics, drug addicts, narcissists or otherwise challenging personalities.