Stress And How It Effects The Human Body.

2 Pages 582 Words

I’ve always wondered if fear could actually cause illness or even death.
Growing up I heard terms such as scared to death or scared me to death and I
would ask myself could that really happen. In researching for this paper I’ve
found many cases of fear causing death or near death experience. In this paper
I will refer to evidence I’ve found too better explain the negative effects fear
may have on the human mind and body.
Fear is defined by the American Heritage Dictionary “as an emotion of alarm and
agitation caused by the expectation or realization of danger; extreme reverence
or awe, as toward a supreme power.” The medical and psychological definitions
from the Taber’s Cyclopedic Medical Dictionary are as follows: “Fright, dread.
Primitively, the emotional reaction to an environmental threat.” Fear may also
lead to terror, anxiety, and panic. It needs to be understood that fear, panic,
terror, and anxiety are spiritual principles.
The first case I want to bring out was printed in the New York Times, July 26,
1970. A four-year-old girl, which in the past had a bad experience while under
local anesthetic for the removal of stitches from her forehead, went to the
dentist to have some baby teeth removed. She screamed hysterically in the
dentist’s chair so, he gave the child a sedative to help calm her down for the
examination. A few minutes later, after she had her teeth pulled, she had a
heart attack and was immediately taken to the hospital. There, she died two
days later. The autopsy showed high levels of adrenaline in her blood, due to
the fear which caused her to have a heart attack. So one can see that because
of her past experience, she had a fear of that situation which resulted in her
death. This type of fear is called paradoxical fear. It is a type of fear that
may occur when one feels totally helpless in the midst of a threatening
situation. In this scenario, the gir...