Recovering from illness

Medical conditions, illness or injury can be stressful and may adversely affect our lifestyle. A healthy diet, regular exercise, sleep and social support can relieve or manage the symptoms of illness or injury and help improve recovery. Taking a positive view can also make a huge difference to recovery from illness.

Worrying or negative thinking
Worrying or thinking negatively about possible situations can be harmful. It adds to your levels of anxiety or stress and can harm your health. Try to find out information about your problems and likely outcomes.

Stress and tension
Stress and tension can affect you physically in many ways, including increased muscle tension and chronic contraction. This may be experienced as tension in the eyes, jaw, neck, shoulders, lower back and stomach.

Prolonged muscle tension can lead to aches and pains, such as headaches, migraine, backache, muscular spasm and injury.

Regularly practise slow and deep breathing, particularly when you feel tense or stressed. Deep breathing using abdominal muscles is preferable to shallow breathing relying on chest muscles.