Words to Know
What is stress?
How can stress affect you?
Dealing with Stress Self Evaluation
What to know about Stress
Eat a healthy, balanced diet. Poor nutrition (too much salt, sugar, or fats)
can hurt your health. This makes stress hit you harder. Good nutrition
helps you deal with stress better, both physically and mentally.
Get the sleep you need. Too little sleep makes you less able to
handle stress when it comes your way. Sleep deprivation can make you
irritable and more prone to over-react to stress.
Develop some good, supportive friendships or relationships. People
that you can trust to give you good, practical advice, and to keep
your confidences, can be a good "sounding board" when you need to talk
about what is bothering you.
Get some quality exercise on a regular basis. It can strengthen
you physically and relax you mentally. Exercise can actually
release chemicals in the brain (endorphins) that help you feel better
physically and emotionally. Exercise can also help to release stress
by working it out through exertion.
Limit or eliminate cigarette smoking. It raises your blood pressure,
and makes your heart beat faster, just like some physical reactions to stress.
Keep your weight appropriate for your height and build. Obesity
is hard on you physically, and can be damaging emotionally.
Don't rely on alcohol or drugs. At best, they are only a
"short-term" way of dealing with long-term problems. Drugs can
leave you less able to deal with stress, and may even cause you to
make poor decisions about how to deal with your stress. Drugs can
also do a lot of harm physically.
Try to find some leisure time on a regular basis. Sometimes,
just getting your mind off your stress can be a sort of
"mental vacation" from stress.
Stay in good health. Being sick takes a toll on you in a variety
of ways. It's hard to deal with stress when you are in pain, not
sleeping well, or dealing with other problems that are related to illness.
Don't rely on caffeine (coffee, tea, soda) for stimulation.
Artificial sources of stimulation can give you a "pick-up,"
but they also wear off, leaving you more tired than before.
Learn to organize your time efficiently. Being late or
rushed can be very stressful. Learn to plan your time so that you
have enough time to take care of the priorities in your day.
Learn suitable ways of expressing your feelings without
"blowing up" or by keeping them all inside. Neither extreme is
good for you. Good communication skills can help you cope with many
day-to-day problems in dealing with other people.
What other ways can you think of to help you become more stress-resistant?
Words to Know
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STRESS: the "wear and tear" that we experience as we adjust to
our continually changing environment. |
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POSITIVE STRESS: stress that can happen from "good" things
that occur in life. Examples: marriage, job promotion, vacation.
|
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NEGATIVE STRESS: stress that can happen from "bad" things
that occur in life. Examples: death of a loved one, job loss, arguments.
|
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HYPERTENSION: high blood pressure. |
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INSOMNIA: trouble sleeping, or trouble staying asleep. |
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COGNITIVE: thinking processes. |
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SLEEP DEPRIVATION: too little sleep. |
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OBESITY: overweight. |
|
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What is Stress?
Stress is the "wear and tear" that we experience as we adjust to our continually changing environment.
It has physical and emotional effects on us and can create positive or negative feelings.
As a positive influence, stress can help motivate people, or make us take action.
As a negative influence, it can result in feelings of distrust, anger, and depression.
These can lead to health problems such as headaches, upset stomach, rashes,
insomnia (trouble sleeping), ulcers, high blood pressure, heart disease and stroke.
Stress is often thought to be caused by "bad" things happening in life, such as the death
of a loved one, divorce, or the loss of a job. It can also be caused by "good" things that
happen, such as the birth of a child, a job promotion, or a new relationship. We experience
stress as we readjust our lives. In adjusting to these changes, stress will help or hinder us,
depending on how we react to it.
No one can completely eliminate stress from their life. Positive stress adds anticipation and
excitement to life. Deadlines, confrontations, and frustrations add depth to our lives. Too
little stress can leave us feeling bored or depressed; while too much stress may leave us feeling
"tied up in knots." There is no single level of stress that is best for all people. The stress
"comfort-level" is individual, it is different for everyone and can change over time.
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How Can Stress Effect You?
Stress may lead to a variety of problems, having both short-term and long-term consequences.
It has been found that many illnesses are somewhat related to unrelieved stress. If you are
experiencing stress symptoms, you have gone beyond the stress level that is comfortable for you.
You need to reduce the stress in your life and/or improve your ability to cope with it.
Physically, stress may cause the following:
- Muscle tension
- Headaches
- Rapid heart beat
- Heart disease
- Sweating
- Feeling cold
- Diarrhea
- Constipation
- Dizziness
- Back pain
- Weakness
- Aches and pains
- Hypertension (high blood pressure)
Emotionally, stress may cause the following:
- Anxiety
- Depression
- Anger
- Personality changes
- Nervousness
- Suspiciousness
- Nightmares
- Confusion
- Feelings of loneliness, boredom, and unreality
Cognitively (dealing with a person's thinking processes), stress can bring about the following:
- Memory problems
- Sleep disorders
- Distractibility
- Obsessive thoughts
- Decreased concentration
Behaviorally, stress may cause the following:
- Under-eating
- Impulsive behavior
- Overeating
- Alcohol abuse
- Substance abuse
- Aggressiveness
- Fault finding
- Nagging
- Arguing too much
- Being quick to anger
- Being cynical
- Inflexibility
- Isolation
- Antisocial behavior
- Blaming others
- Lowered sex drive
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Dealing with Stress Self Evaluation Form
Please list some things that may be causing you stress, in the box below.
Just as there are many sources of stress, there are many ways of dealing with it.
It all requires that you work toward change, either by changing the source of stress,
or by changing how you react to the stress.
Perhaps the most difficult part of dealing with stress is deciding what you can really change,
and what you can't change.
In your list of sources of stress, put an X in front of the items that you think you can change.
Put an O in front of the items that you can't change.
Think of one of the items that you put an X in front of. How can you change it?
- Can you eliminate the source?
- Can you reduce the impact of the source?
- Can you shorten your exposure to the source?
- Can you use time management, goal setting, or
- waiting strategies to help with the sources of stress?
Be realistic in what you can change, and how much you can change it.
There are many sources of stress in life that can't be changed no matter how much we may want
to change them. If that is the case, you need to figure out how to change how much
that source of stress impacts you.
Think of one of the items that you put on O in front of.
Can you change how that
source of stress effects you?
- Can you be more realistic (less exaggerated) about
- the source?
- Can you quit trying to please everyone else?
- Can you quit overreacting to the source?
- Can you put the source in a more positive perspective?
- Can you reduce how the source effects you by using
- relaxation techniques,
- such as slow, deep breathing?
- Can you realize that you don't need to get your way
- at all times?
Put some of your ideas of how to handle your sources of stress on the dotted line below each source.
This may take some time and effort to come up with realistic ways that you can deal with your
sources of stress. Sometimes just dealing with one source of stress can reduce the impact the
other sources of stress have on you.
The more you can adjust the sources of stress in your life, or adjust how you react to them,
the more you can reduce the impact stress has on you. Like any skill worth learning, how to deal
with stress is a skill that gets better with practice and experience.
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Beth Ann Leaf
Resource Specialist
CIAESC
For comments, suggestions, and/or ideas please email
Beth Ann Leaf.
