Stress and How to Better it

What is Stress?

Stress is a state of emotional or physical strain. Any circumstance or idea that gives you cause for annoyance, rage, or anxiety can trigger it. Stress is a common human reaction that occurs to everyone. It is a body's natural “defense” against something not ideal. Stress can often be positive. For example, if you are a student, it can be possible you have experienced stress while worrying about a test or meeting deadlines. This type of stress can be good as it signals the body that this task is important and keeps you motivated.  However, stress can be negative too, especially if it is chronic. Understanding what are the signs of stress is essential in how to diagnose it and prevent or better it. 

Our body during stress:

Stress can induce a variety of responses primarily controlled by the body’s autonomic nervous system. Common responses are change in heart rate, breathing, and vision. Let’s study the physical and mental symptoms of stress on our body.

Physical: 

• Trouble Breathing
• Bad vision or sore eyes
• Sleeping problems
• Fatigue
• Headaches
• Body pain
• High Blood Pressure (BP)
• Heartburn or indigestion
• Constipation or diarrhea
• Feeling sick, dizzy, or sometimes fainting
• Immediate weight gain or loss
• Rashes or itchy skin
• Continuous sweating
• Changes to menstrual cycle 
• Trouble having sex
• Weak immune system

Mental  

• Anxiety 
• Depression
• Panic Attacks
• Becoming easily annoyed or moody
• Feeling overwhelmed
• Hard time relaxing

Types of Stress

Stress can come in all types of forms. The three broken down categories for stress are: acute stress, episodic acute stress, and chronic stress. 

Acute Stress:

Acute stress happens to everyone often. It’s the body’s sudden response to a challenging or unexpected situation. For example, a presentation at school or getting stuck in traffic are some common examples. Acute stress can also occur when you are doing something you enjoy like getting on to ride a roller coaster or watching a horror movie. Normally, these episodes of acute stress don't harm you. They may even benefit you. Your body and brain get practice responding well to challenging conditions by experiencing stress. Once the stressful situation is over, your body does return to normal. However, severe acute stress can be unhealthy. This kind of stress, like experiencing a situation where your life was in danger, might result in post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) or other mental health issues.

Episodic Acute Stress

Episodic acute stress is when one often experiences episodes of acute stress. If you frequently feel worried and concerned about potential outcomes, this may occur. You can feel as though your life is chaotic and that crises seem to follow one another. For example, certain jobs like being an emergency medic or a police officer can lead to short stress moments often. 

Chronic Stress

Chronic stress is when one expires high degree stress levels for a long period of time. This type of stress is detrimental to your health if not regulated or treated properly. Losing someone, relationship problems, and work issues can result from this. Chronic stress contributes to long term anxiety, cardiovascular issues, depression, high blood pressure, and more. 

Causes of Stress

Though stress can be caused by anything and is different to everyone, here are some common causes of it:

Work/School related:

• Having a heavy workload or too much responsibility
• Long work hours
• Working under dangerous conditions
• Loss of a job
• Financial stress
• Having to give speeches or presentations
• Stressing about college or gaining scholarships
• Grade stress
• Facing discrimation or harassment at work or school

Life/Social related:

• Unhealthy friend group 
• Toxic relationship 
• Family stress or toxicity
• Death of a loved one
• Divorce
• Getting married
• Bod Image
• Moving to a new location or new hour
• Emotional problems like depression or anxiety
• Taking care of an elderly or sick family member or friend
• Traumtic event like theft, assault, rape, or natrual disaster

How is Stress Diagnosed? When to be worried? 

Stress cannot be measured with testing. Its presence and intensity are only discernible to the individual experiencing it. If you are feeling like it is affecting your body often in a negative way, it is critical to seek a doctor. They will provide you with medicine or a therapy schedule. For example, if you are experiencing constant high blood pressure from stress, it is necessary to go see your doctor so they can give you medicine to better it. Loss of sleep is also another example. Doctor’s can provide you with melatonin or any other medication or tactics to help with better sleep. 

Ways to Avoid or Relief Stress 

1. Take care of your body: Avoid drugs or alcohol as they can heighten stress. Eating a well balanced diet, getting enough sleep, and exercising regularly help reduce stress. 

A healthy diet includes fruits, vegetables, whole grains, fat-free or low-fat milk, and milk products. It also has a variety of protein foods such as seafood, lean meats and poultry, eggs, legumes (beans and peas), soy products, nuts, and seeds. The diet is low in added sugars, dosium, saturated fats, trans fats, and cholesterol. It also meets or is close in the daily calorie intake. Let’s look at a breakdown of a balanced diet: 

• Vegetable and Fruits (½ of your plate)
• Whole Grains (¼ of your plate): White bread, white rice, and other refined grains have a stronger impact on blood sugar and insulin than whole and intact grains like whole wheat, barley, wheat berries, quinoa, oats, and dishes made with them like whole wheat pasta.
• Protein (¼ of your plate): All of these nutritious, adaptable protein sources—fish, poultry, beans, and nuts—can be included into salads and go well with veggies on a plate. Avoid processed meats like bacon and sausage and limit your consumption of red meat.
• Healthy plant oils:  Avoid partly hydrogenated oils, which contain harmful trans fats, and opt instead for healthy vegetable oils like olive, canola, soy, corn, sunflower, peanut, and others. Keep in mind that "healthy" does not equate to "low-fat."
• Drink coffee, tea, or water. Avoid sugary beverages, have one to two servings of milk and dairy products per day, and no more than one small glass of juice.

Here are some resources that help create a proper eating plan:

• Eating Plan
• MyPlate
• Eatthismuch

Additionally, in terms of exercising, at least 30 minutes of moderate physical activity will help reduce stress. You can improve your fitness and reduce stress with about any method of exercise. The most crucial step is to choose an activity you enjoy. Walking, jogging, dancing, biking, yoga, tai chi, gardening, weightlifting, and swimming are a few examples. 

Lastly, getting a proper 8 hours of rest is essential to calm and restore the body, improve concentration, regulate mood, and promote better decision making. 

2.             Take breaks as necessary: Taking breaks is completely okay! We are not machines and cannot work all the time. Our brain needs rest. Taking breaks can help you refocus and reorganize your ideas, especially at work or school. You'll be able to complete your work and stay productive as a result.

3.             Do self-relaxation activities: Relieve stress by yoga, meditation, swimming, prayer, or muscle relaxation techniques. Spend time outdoors or in the company of music. Here are some effective videos that help deal with stress:

• 10 Minute Meditation for Stress: Deep relaxation and mental calmness are two effects of meditation. You concentrate during meditation and get rid of the constant stream of disorganized ideas that could be stressing you out. The approach may lead to improved mental and emotional health. 

• 20 Min Full Body Stretch/Yoga for Stress and Anxiety Relief: Yoga promotes both physical and mental relaxation, which lowers tension and anxiety. The physical positions encourage flexibility, ease stress, and lessen discomfort. Yoga positions may aid in releasing emotional and tension-related blockages as well as physical ones like muscular knots.
• Bedtime Yoga Stretch to Release Tension and Stress

• Calm Nature Healing Sleep Music for Stress: Through soothing autonomic nervous system components, music enhances sleep by promoting slower breathing, a lower heart rate, and lower blood pressure.  

• Box breathing relaxation technique: how to calm feelings of stress: Exercises that involve breathing might be an effective approach to relax your body. An approach for continuing relaxation and a tool to utilize during stressful moments is to sit in a comfortable position and focus on your breathing. This can help you relax and release tension.

These are just common stress relieving techniques. However, whatever helps you stay calm, you should do it often.

4.             Surround yourself with people you love: A partner, friend, and family member can help cheer you up and ease all the stress. Talking to them about what is causing the stress can ease up your mind and also allow their input on how to cope with it or deal with the problems. 

5.             Stress Therapy: Psychotherapy and behavioral therapy are extremely effective when it comes to stress. Utilizing tactics, strategies, or programs designed particularly to lower stress levels, prevent stress, or cope with circumstances or events that could raise stress levels is known as stress management treatment. Here are some examples of great stress management during therapy:

• Anxiety Record: When prompted to reveal what is worrying us, we frequently feel more exposed. With the aid of the anxiety record worksheet, people can better understand what makes them anxious and develop effective coping mechanisms. An Anxiety record usually includes the situation that stresses one out, emotion and body sensations, anxious thoughts, and coping responses. Here is a template: 

Biofeedback training:  The idea of homeostasis is connected to biofeedback. You can  learn how to exert self-control over what appear to be uncontrollable body functions by using technology to measure and report brainwaves, skin temperature, respiration, and heart rate. In the end, you can learn to regulate their heart rate and blood pressure, lower their stress levels, and even successfully treat high blood pressure and cardiac disease under the guidance of therapists.

6.             Give back:  Sometimes putting your energy towards helping others, such as volunteering or lending a hand to a neighbor or acquaintance, can channel your energy in productive ways.

7.             Maintain a regular routine: Aim to wake up and fall asleep at the same time every day. daily, consume three meals.

Remember, stress is completely normal and part of our life. Seeking medical help or following stress relieving techniques can help you feel better and relieve this burden :)

References:

9.      **All Images taken from Canva Photos