A psychologist shares three ways to deal with stress before things go too far.
“We stop noticing mental discomfort itself and the sensations in our body then become the warning sign that we need to put the foot on the break. In essence, we are very good at neglecting our feelings but it’s harder to ignore our physical, whole-body needs.”Dr Windgassen explains that this happens by a process called eustress. “It’s in those acute moments when the brain perceives a stressor and readies the body for action.
“This is because your body has been hyperaroused below the surface trying to keep you safe, which changes your chemistry, the landscape of hormones coursing through your blood and how your organ systems function. It also demands more of your metabolism, and the body can’t sustain this level of activity long term without some side effects. We often experience these as fatigue, pain, irritability, increased or decreased appetite and poor concentration.
What does matter is noticing your stress before it becomes chronic. “To prevent the accumulation of stress in body and mind, simply noticing and acknowledging it goes a long way. This also gives you the active choice about whether you need to act any further in tackling the stress,” she says.“Developing practices that help you to drop in on your body can help to reduce the accumulation of physical and psychological stress,” Dr Windgassen says.
When you start noticing your breathing turn shallow, saying ‘I’m stressed’ might be as useful as re-regulating your breath to remind you that you are safe.“If you only notice emotions when they are really strong, you miss important data to help orient the brain to safety as well as to threat,” Dr Windgassen says.
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