Feeling perpetually on edge despite having no obvious reason to be stressed? Your daily habits might be silently sabotaging your mental health. A physician with expertise in interventional pain medicine has identified six common lifestyle patterns that keep cortisol—your body’s primary stress hormone—chronically elevated, leading to a cascade of negative health effects.
Cortisol is essential for managing acute stress, but it’s meant to fluctuate throughout the day in a predictable rhythm. When daily behaviors disrupt this natural pattern, cortisol can remain elevated far longer than intended, affecting everything from your ability to fall asleep to how efficiently your body processes food. The medical expert emphasizes that this isn’t about isolated incidents of stress, but rather the cumulative effect of multiple daily habits that stack on top of each other.
Sleep deprivation tops the list of cortisol disruptors. Your body is programmed to lower cortisol levels at night to facilitate rest and recovery. However, when sleep is cut short or of poor quality, evening cortisol remains elevated. Studies demonstrate that total sleep loss for just one night can raise cortisol levels significantly, while ongoing sleep restriction keeps late-day cortisol high and amplifies your stress response to challenges the following day.
Overtraining is another hidden stressor that many health-conscious individuals overlook. Exercise does cause cortisol to rise temporarily, which is a normal physiological response. The problem arises when training intensity or volume exceeds your body’s capacity to recover. Without sufficient rest between sessions, cortisol rhythms become abnormal, indicating that your hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis—the body’s central stress response system—is dysregulated rather than functioning optimally.
The physician’s recommendations focus on addressing the root causes rather than just symptoms. Improving sleep hygiene, allowing adequate recovery between workouts, timing meals appropriately, and moderating stimulant intake can collectively reduce your overall stress burden. These adjustments help restore the body’s natural cortisol rhythm, leading to better sleep, improved mood, enhanced metabolic function, and more efficient physical recovery.