8-25-99
Managing Stress For a
Balanced Life
More
and more, Stress is becoming a normal part of everyday life. While sipping
on your morning cup, you sit down to read the daily newspaper. There
you learn for the first time that your employer of 15 years has announced
a major re-organization plan which would involve a massive layoff of
employees. You sit down with your partner in the evening to discuss
your plans for a weekend get away; the telephone rings; a sibling 3000
miles away is calling you from a hospital room where your ailing father
has just been admitted following a massive heart attack. Last Friday,
you left work around noon with the intention of returning over the weekend
to complete the project due to your superior early Monday morning. You
show up to the office on Sunday only to find out that all circuitry
is down and the whole building is inaccessible due to some undetected
leaks in the roof.
Let
us assume that all the events noted above took place around the first
week of April when you had to ready your tax returns for the April 15
dead line, and while planning for an early-June graduation of your daughter
and a late-June wedding of your only son. Add to these circumstances
a normal dose of the regular daily requirements of juggling your multiple
roles of spouse, parent, driver, shopper, subordinate, boss, Etc, and
the result is a stress- laden existence which if not well managed, could
seriously diminish the balance of your life and bring about negative
consequences.
What is Stress?
Stress
is a person’s adaptive responses to stimuli that place excessive
psychological and physical demands on him or her. Each person has a
certain level of resistance to stressful events. Some can tolerate a
great deal of stress, whereas others can handle much less. Dr. Hans
Selye conceptualized stress as a three-stage response process which
he named the General Adaptation Syndrome (GAS).
Stage 1-- Alarm: This is
the stage when you first encounter a stressor and experience some
degree of panic or feel unable to cope.
Stage 2--Resistance: If the
stressor is extreme, you may be unable to cope with it initially.
In most cases, however, you may be able to gather enough physical
and emotional strength to resist the negative effects of the stressor(s).
Stage 3--Exhaustion: In many
cases, the resistance stage ends the GAS. However, prolonged exposure
to a stressor without resolution may bring about stage 3, exhaustion.
At this point, you may no longer fight the stressor and give up instead.
What Causes Stress?
Two
broad categories of factors are known to cause stress: Organizational
or work-related stressors, and individual life stressors.
In
the work place, four general sets of factors are known to impact individual
stress levels:
1. Task Demands: By nature, some jobs
are stressful, such as air traffic controllers, surgeons; others
are more threatening to a worker’s health such a s coal
mining, and toxic waste handling; others offer little job security,
and others create a condition of overload--when a person simply
has too much work to do and very little time to do it.
2. Physical Demands: Such as those associated
with excessive noise, smoke, poor ventilation, poor lighting,
crowded conditions, and inadequate work surfaces.
3. Role Demands: A role is a set of
expected behavior. Stress develops when a person is not sure
of what exactly is expected of him or her (Role Ambiguity),
or when there is a perceived incongruence among two or more
roles(Role Conflict).
4. Interpersonal Demands: These consist
of group pressures, management style of supervisors, and conflicting
personalities on the job.
Individual
life stressors could be categorized as Life Change or Life
Trauma. Life Change is any meaningful change in your personal or
work situation that can have negative consequences on you. Detention
in jail or other institution, being fired at work, pregnancy, sexual
difficulties, death of a close friend, taking out a mortgage or loan
for a major purchase, foreclosure on a mortgage or loan, building a
new house, even planing a vacation or Christmas could be major sources
of stress to individuals in our society.
Life
trauma is any upheaval in a persons’s life that alters his or her
attitudes, emotions, or behaviors. Major life traumas that may influence
stress include marital problems, family difficulties, and health problems
initially unrelated to stress. Death of a spouse, divorce, marital separation
from a mate, etc. are all Life Traumas that could significantly impact
your emotions, behavior, and capability to respond to life challenges.
Consequences and signs of stress:
The
consequences of stress can be positive or negative. Some mild doses
of stress may increase energy, enthusiasm, and motivation. The negative
consequences of stress , however, manifest themselves in a number of
ways:
Individual consequences:
1. Behavioral changes: smoking, alcoholism,
drug abuse, accident proneness, violence, and appetite disorders.
2. Psychological consequences: These
concern a person’s mental health and well-being. For example,
some work stress may cause sleep disturbance, depression, family
problems, and sexual difficulties.
3. Medical consequences: These could
affect your physiological well-being and result in headaches,
ulcers, skin problems, heart disease, and even strokes.
Unresolved
individual stress situations could further complicate life because of
the negative consequences that such situations bear directly on the
work place. Performance decline, increased irritability, withdrawal
behavior that may become manifest in missing deadlines, longer lunch
breaks, tardiness, absenteeism, and even quitting are but some of them.
Negative changes in attitude may also follow in the form of poor morale,
low motivation, and low job satisfaction. If the process is allowed
to continue unresolved, it may result in total burnout , loss of self-confidence,
and psychological withdrawal, all of which impact our earning capabilities
and thus introduce additional stressors into our lives.
How to Manage your stress? .....Individual
coping strategies:
1. Accept stress as an inevitable life challenge and not a
problem.
2. Develop a positive attitude towards life and work
3. Rely on friends, family and support groups
4. Exercise regularly. Exercise can reduce stress and tension,
increase self-confidence, and improve your health. (Check with your
doctor before beginning an exercise routine.)
5. Plan your time wisely. Avoid procrastination and learn
effective techniques to manage your time . Make sure to allow for
some quiet time in your schedule for relaxation, such as days off
and weekends away
6. Channel your energy into hobbies and special interests.
Gardening, photography, music, painting or the like could offer
an outlet to reduce tension
7. Alter the "workaholic" characteristics that got
you into your rut in the first place. Learn to say no to excessive
demands on your time and energy, and ask superiors and others in
your life to clarify their expectations of you.
8. Eat right. Give up Smoking, and limit the intake of caffeine,
alcohol, refined sugar and salt. You will be better off eating low-fat,
and high-fiber foods.
9. Get enough sleep. Your body needs the energy to deal with
stress.
10. If you are having difficulties coping with stress, seek
the help of a professional therapist. Contact your physician, your
Employee Assistance Program or call us at (630) 850-2121. Our qualified
clinical staff will help you regain balance to your life.
Stress
is unavoidable, but definitely manageable! Manage it well FOR A BALANCED
LIFE!!
Disclaimer
This material is provided for informational
purposes only. None of the information provided in this site is to replace
a timely visit with a health care provider or your behavioral health
professional.
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