Stress and Anxiety

I tend to write fairly often about the subjects of stress and anxiety. Why? Statistics show that about 40 million people or 18% of the adult population of the US are affected by this disorder each year.  That would make it the #1 issue facing the mental health community.  

How is stress different from anxiety?

Stress is your response to a change in your environment, be it positive or negative. Anxiety is an emotion that’s characterized by a feeling of apprehension, nervousness, or fear.  Acute anxiety is temporary, like a roller coaster ride, and can be positive, whereas chronic anxiety is pervasive and long term and likely to cause very negative results.

Chronic stress is long-term stress, such as that caused by traumatic events or miserable living conditions. Untreated chronic stress can contribute to major depressive disorder, a form of intense depression that lasts for long periods and can prevent someone from living a normal life. Chronic stress also can contribute to physical illnesses, including high blood pressure, heart disease, depression, and obesity.

Money, work, and the economy continues to be the most cited (75%) causes of stress for Americans.

I see stress separate from distress. Whenever I visit a brand new place, particularly when it is very unfamiliar, I tend to feel stress. But I am not distressed, just excited. Distress comes when I cannot maintain a degree of control in the new environment.

Here are some truths about stress and some myth-busters.

• Stress does not cause your hair to turn grey.
• Cuddling your pet, significant other, child or listening to music lowers your stress. 
• Stress does not cause ulcers, it just makes them worse. 
• There is no link between stress and infertility. 
• According to the American Cancer Society, no definite link between stress and cancer has been found. 
• Stress can cause erectile dysfunction and loss of libido. 
• Women are twice as likely as men to be affected by generalized anxiety disorder. 
• Daily exercise greatly helps to reduce the effects of stress. 
• Anger or hostility releases stress hormones into the blood and can cause heart problems. 
• Smoking cigarettes does not reduce stress. 

Focusing on the positive (gratitude), speaking soothing words to yourself, praying and practicing deep breathing can be very helpful. The combination of medications and psychotherapy is highly effective with anxiety issues. 70-90% of people experience an improvement.  

Learn to set realistic goals for yourself at home and at work, and have good boundaries with people. If it is hard for you to say “no”, then you need to enlist some help. Prepare for change as far in advance as you can, and lower your expectations. You will likely lead a much calmer life.

Help! Stress!

I came across a good article on stress the other day – it went into a lot of the biological and physiological changes that take place in us, as well as the emotional. For me, the most helpful part of the article was when it talked about the psychological damage that is caused by stress.

Studies have shown that stress is most damaging when it has one or more of these conditions:

Repetitive

Unpredictable

Beyond your control

Repetitive – Prolonged exposure to irritations and annoyances takes its toll on our coping abilities. Doing the same boring task over and over again dulls our mind. It becomes more difficult to concentrate and perform well. We worry that we may make mistakes or reach our limit of patience. “I can’t drive this crowded freeway one more day during rush hour.” “I can’t cook one more meal for this ungrateful family.”

Routine in relationships has the advantage of creating stability, but if the routine is inflexible it may become negative and stressful.

Unpredictable – Even more harmful is when there is no possible way of knowing when something bad is about to happen. If you live with an angry or alcoholic person, there most likely is an atmosphere of “walking on eggshells”. You know that things may fall apart at any moment and you will live in a heightened state of alert. Especially if you are a parent you will feel the stress of wondering when to step in and protect the kids from a spouse or even another sibling.

If your job situation is unstable and could end, or your stability is tied to the financial markets there will be a lot of pressure on you. If you live paycheck to paycheck and drive old cars and own old appliances you may always be waiting for something to break and wreak havoc.

Beyond your control – This is most likely the worst of the lot. Having control makes us feel safe and we will often go to great lengths to try to keep from the anxiety produced by uncertainty. Unfortunately that includes trying to control other people or uncontrollable situations. When we try to control others, they will likely rebel after a certain point and we will feel even more at a loss.

As a business owner I can’t make people buy from me. As a husband I can’t force my wife to agree with me. When taxes are raised and food and gas prices continue to escalate, I can mostly sit by and watch it happen.

What are the solutions?

Minimize your exposure to the really annoying people or tasks and alter your routines to break up the tedium of life if repetitiveness is your stressor. Try making more positive responses to people and take the negative thoughts captive.

For the last two, I would encourage you to take control of what you can control. For things that are unpredictable, rather than focusing on worst case scenarios and feeling stuck, work on having several contingency plans to address possible events. When situations are beyond your control, set boundaries and limits and ask for what you need in order to maintain as much positive control as you can. Focus on gratitude even when you don’t feel like it.

Then let the rest go. Be comforted that God is in control – always. He is never blindsided. 

Hurry Sickness

A while ago we were hanging out with my father-in­­­­­-law waiting for something (I can’t remember what it was), but he seemed agitated. Nan asked him if he was in a hurry. On reflecting about it for a second he answered:

“No, I’m not really in a hurry, I’m just impatient.”

It has become one of those answers that we both remember when we approach things throughout the day.

How often do we find ourselves rushing around as if we are being chased by some unknown force? Where does the feeling come from? Is it real?

For some it may simply be habit, perhaps a habit instilled by parents early in our development. How many times as a child were you encouraged to hurry up, when enjoying the wonders of discovery? Or perhaps you were often perceived as “idling” during a task and were yelled at.

We can have this sense of needing to hurry because we “might miss out on something” and yet to hurry is to miss out on something: the joy in the journey, the blessing of “now”. This anxious feeling is the very thing that makes it hard for me to pray, to study, to reflect, to think deeper thoughts than just my daily tasks.

Solutions for deeply ingrained behaviors are difficult. They require discipline, which requires intentionality (a favorite concept of mine in many areas of life).

Often we are not in hurry because we are impatient by temperament, but because we are overcommitted. It is much easier to say “no” to the distasteful things in life than it is the desirable ones. But it is often the good things that must fall away to leave room to really enjoy the best. If I try to include everything, I will often find myself not fully present when engaged in the things I truly love, with the people I care about the most.

I have read recently that anxiety is rising in very young children because of the pressure being put on kids to participate and succeed in an ever-increasing amount of extracurricular activities. In an attempt to give their children an “advantage or head start” in life, they are really crippling them emotionally – and perhaps stressing the family out financially as well. The distress felt by kids to achieve academically to please their parents is, in some cases, related to teen suicide.   

When I become aware of feelings of hurry whether as a result of a state of mind or circumstances, I practice my self-soothing technique. I take the thoughts captive and slow myself down, both mentally and physically. Especially when I am actually pressed, I need to tell myself that I have enough time to accomplish my task.

Is this an area you need to work on in your private life or as a parent?

Thoughts or comments?

MARGIN - do you have it?

I love my job at C.A. (so does Nan). It is what I believe God designed me to do. It is challenging and satisfying and I love the people I work with. So when I feel myself pulling back from it or getting irritable, I know something is wrong.

A few years back Nan & I invited Dr. Richard Swenson to speak at Christian Assembly. He is the author of a book entitled “Margin: Restoring Emotional, Physical, Financial, and Time Reserves to Overloaded Lives.”  This concept of ‘margin’ struck a loud chord in my soul and it has been a theme I have been talking about (and paying attention to) ever since.

Margin is the space between your load and your limit.

If you have $3000 (limit) coming in and $2700 (load) going out, you have a margin of $300. You can relax in the area of finances. But if you spend or commit the $300, you have no margin. Any expense you incur after that throws you into a deficit position and you are in financial pain. Your load has just exceeded your limit. It is always sad to see someone who is so burdened by debt that their options have been virtually eliminated. It is doubly painful when they are the perpetrator of their own financial imprisonment.  

The same thing applies to time. When I am fully or over committed and have left insufficient time for rest or recreation I can begin to resent even the positive things in my life. Any new opportunity seems like a burden instead of a possibility.

In the same way we can run down our health by overeating (or eating junk food), under-exercising, under-sleeping. We use up our reserves and fuel ourselves with coffee and adrenaline and our body suffers.

I often see couples stress each other out with emotional baggage to the point that all the grace is used up. At times I have heard someone in counseling declare “I have reached my limit. NO MORE!” At this point the relationship is in real trouble and there is no margin for future error. Any new stressor may result in the total breakdown or breakup of the relationship.

So how are you doing in those areas in your life? Where do you lack margin?

The solution is to take positive control over your own life. Learning to say ‘no’ to yourself and others may be a challenge. It’s never easy to turn down fun opportunities, or resist spending money or take the extra energy to prepare a healthy meal. But the reward of margin will far outweigh the effort. It will allow you to be able to say ‘yes’ to really significant things as they present themselves. And you will experience joy in doing them instead of pain.

Wrap your mind around the concept of margin and reap the harvest.

Sleep Deprived – Joy Challenged

 Until just recently I have been suffering from a lack of sleep. I tried to do all the right things to correct the problem, but somehow it just never seemed to work. So what changed for me? I have no idea, I just thank God that I am now able to fall asleep in a timely manner. For those of us (and there are many) that are sleep challenged, we truly understand what a gift a good night’s rest is.

The sleep studies I have seen all agree that a minimum of 7 hours of sleep is required to function properly – and 8 hours is better.

The mental impairment from four hours or less sleep is just like having no sleep at all.

Can we oversleep? Well, yes, but usually that is a sign of depression unless we are engaged in ‘catch-up’ sleep. Most clinicians agree that we have one week to catch up on lost sleep before the effects take its toll.

What are the effects of being sleep deprived? Aside from the obvious tiredness, we are much more likely to get into car accidents, relational squabbles, make bad decisions at work and at home and generally have reduced productivity.

But from an emotional and spiritual standpoint, the worst part is that we are going to be joy challenged. Life will feel like a heavy burden instead of a great adventure. I will have an attitude of ‘just getting through the day’ rather than looking forward to what the day will bring.

Many people I have encountered have bragged about how little sleep they get and wear it as a badge of honor or strength. I feel sorry for them because I know that they are tearing their bodies down slowly. They will eventually pay the price.

For some, the solution may just be changing lifestyle habits to make room for and begin to value sleep differently. We dumped our TV cable and gained hours of our life back every day. For others it may require being intentional in other ways – like talking to a doctor to determine if the problem is physical or a counselor if anxiety related.

For all of us we can adjust some things in our lives to increase the joy factor. I suggest the following:

• Decrease your negative or controversial news intake.

• Connect with people who care about you.

• Listen to uplifting (worship) music.

• Limit time with emotionally draining people.

• Increase time with optimistic and life-giving people.

• Volunteer for something that matters.

• Guard your quiet time if you have any, if not make room for it.

And get some sleep if you need it!