Tolerance: When Your Body Handles Less Than It Used To
The shifting capacity to stay regulated in environments that once felt manageable.
When people talk about tolerance, they’re usually describing how much the body can handle before feeling strained. I didn’t think of it that way when mine started to change.
What I noticed instead was that familiar spaces felt harder. Not intolerable — just more demanding than they had been before.
Sometimes the environment doesn’t change — your margin does.
This didn’t mean my body was breaking down — it meant it was carrying more than it used to.
How Tolerance Changes Over Time
At first, the shift was subtle. I could still manage daily life, but I tired more easily. Recovery took longer after being indoors.
Over time, I noticed that my buffer was smaller. Situations I once brushed off now required more effort to move through.
The change wasn’t dramatic — it was constricting.
Reduced tolerance often shows up as less room, not sudden collapse.
Why Changes in Tolerance Are Often Misunderstood
Tolerance is easy to misread because it’s relative. There’s no clear line that marks when it shifts.
When I tried to explain this, it sounded inconsistent. “I used to be fine.” That made it easy to doubt myself.
I felt similar confusion while learning about exposure thresholds, where limits only became visible once they were crossed.
Capacity often becomes noticeable only after it’s reduced.
Losing tolerance doesn’t mean the experience is imagined.
How Tolerance Relates to Indoor Environments
Indoor environments can influence tolerance because repeated, cumulative exposure leaves less space for recovery.
This doesn’t mean low tolerance causes symptoms. It means environmental load can shape how much margin the body has available.
I began understanding this more clearly after learning about environmental load and how combined strain narrows capacity.
Supportive spaces preserve tolerance instead of slowly eroding it.
What Tolerance Is Not
Tolerance doesn’t automatically mean resilience or weakness.
It doesn’t explain every reaction someone may notice.
And it isn’t fixed — it can shift with time and context.
Understanding this helped me stop judging myself for feeling different.