Celebrated on the first Wednesday in November, Stress Awareness Day is designed to help people identify stress in their life so that they can more effectively combat it. Stress significantly impacts both mental and physical health, affects people of all ages, and is becoming more widespread and far reaching. Chronic stress can have much greater effect on your overall health if you are not able to cope with it. Stress can make existing conditions worse as well as cause disease or increase your risk for disease.