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If you’ve been going through a nasty divorce or child custody battle that has lasted years, it’s likely you have experienced a great deal of chronic stress. Years of such stress can create devastating health problems that are often misunderstood and inadequately treated. The stress of dealing with a high-conflict co-parent is particularly likely to badly damage a person’s health as the troubles often continue until well after the children grow into adulthood. But often medical professionals treat these problems as merely mental health issues when in fact there has been significant physiological to the body. This article points out some of the common symptoms of the physiological damage and refers you to additional reading on medical tests that can help you determine appropriate treatment for such conditions.

Personality Disorders and “High Conflict Personalities” Can Cause Severe Mental and Medical Damage

Parents who are dealing with a person who appears to suffer from a personality disorder such as Borderline, Narcissistic, Histrionic, Antisocial, or Paranoid personality disorders are particularly prone to devastating health effects. Often these people engage in parental alienation child abuse such as by blocking the children from contact with a capable or loving parent and trying to force the children to hate that parent. The children are clearly being abused along with the target parent. It’s entirely possible that the young ones will develop mental and physiological injuries from this abuse, too.

Some are literally driven to their deaths by years of abuse. A few even commit suicide to escape it. Others end up on work disability and require expensive medical care for many years. Yet for them, the symptoms still linger for even decades because often medical professionals treat these people as if they are simply suffering from “major depression” or “generalized anxiety disorder” when in fact they are physiologically very ill and in need of medical care, not just counseling and psychotherapy.

Common Symptoms of Physiological Damage from Chronic Stress

The following symptoms are often signs of long-term damage to the stress management systems in the body. Every one of them can result from damage to the adrenal glands after they have been forced to pump out vast quantities of cortisol for years trying to help you cope with the ex’s harassment and attacks.
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