By Marc Dellière, Medical Consultant & Trainer – Specialist in Stress, Prevention & Integrative Health
Some people become sick precisely at the moment they finally thought they could relax.
For weeks, sometimes months, they keep going without truly stopping. Work, responsibilities, deadlines, constant mental load… the body keeps up. Or at least, it seems to.
Then a few days off finally arrive.
And suddenly come the sore throat, the deep fatigue, the headaches, the flu-like symptoms, or that strange sensation of “crashing” once the pressure finally drops.
Almost as if the body had been waiting for that exact moment to speak.
Researchers have described this phenomenon under the term “leisure sickness”
Where physical symptoms emerge during weekends, vacations, or recovery periods rather than during the stressful period itself.
Interestingly, this phenomenon appears to affect highly committed individuals more frequently, people accustomed to functioning under sustained pressure and who often struggle to fully disconnect from work-related demands.
From a physiological perspective, this pattern makes sense.
During prolonged stress exposure, the body mobilizes considerable adaptive resources to maintain short-term performance. Cortisol, adrenaline, hypervigilance, and sustained cognitive activation help preserve a temporary state of equilibrium under pressure.
Then the pace finally slows down.
The nervous system gradually releases its grip, and what had previously been held at bay may begin to resurface: accumulated fatigue, underlying tension, and sometimes even infections that had remained silent until then.
Almost as if the body were finally saying: “Now that you’ve stopped, I can finally be heard.”
And yet recovery remains essential for long-term health.
Research consistently shows improvements in sleep, emotional regulation, and psychological well-being when individuals are able to genuinely detach from work-related stressors.
The issue, therefore, may not be stress itself.
The real challenge may lie in the transition between chronic hyperactivation and efficient recovery.
In modern environments that reward constant responsiveness and continuous availability, we have become highly efficient at sustaining activation… but often far less efficient at recovering from it.
This growing interest in “recovery physiology” is also driving attention toward nutritional and bioactive approaches capable of supporting stress regulation and post-stress recovery.
Among these approaches, Lactium®, a bioactive milk peptide developed by Ingredia, has been investigated for its potential role in supporting relaxation and recovery through modulation of GABAergic pathways.
The objective is not to suppress stress entirely.
Stress remains an essential adaptive mechanism.
But in high-performance environments, resilience may increasingly depend on the ability to recover efficiently, restore physiological balance, and prevent chronic overload before dysfunction appears.
Learn more about Lactium for stress management!
Scientific sources :
Leisure Sickness: A Pilot Study on Its Prevalence, Phenomenology and Background: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/12411765/
The Recovery Experience Questionnaire: development and validation of a measure for assessing recuperation and unwinding from work: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/17638488