CH:17 Stress and Health

Stress is an arousal of one’s mind and body in response to demands made upon them. Stress can have several responses and even physical effects followed by psychological factors and health.  For this, there are several ways of coping with it. Stress is actually really common which is why it is of concern. In fact most students seek counseling because of stress. Stress is seen in the everyday life with work and other assignments. 

 One may think that all stress is bad, however not all of it is indeed bad. Positive stress is called eustress while a negative stress is a distress. The origin of stress weather it is an event or situation, is called a stressor. There are several types of stressors. These are frustration-being blocked from obtaining a goal, daily hassles-stresses from everyday life, life changes-such as moving, serious illness, or death in a family, and conflict-being pulled into two directions by opposing forces. There are several types of conflicts, which include avoidance-avoidance, approach-avoidance, and multiple approach-avoidance conflict.

Stress has many responses. People respond to stress differently. Also the stress of an event depends on the situation. Responses to stress include self-efficacy expectations (beliefs that people have that they can accomplish something), psychological hardiness (personality characteristics that helps people withstand stress), social support (the presence and interests of others help certain people cope with stress), predictability (ability to predict a stressor), and a sense of humour towards the stress. There are also several physical effects caused due to stress. The body responds toward stress with a response called General adaptation syndrome, which has three stages. These are the alarm reaction, which is initiated when a stressor is perceived, the resistance stage where people try to deal with the stressor, and the exhaustion stage where one would continue if we have not yet coped with stress in the resistance stage. Stress also affects the immune system negatively because when undergoing stress we produce steroids, and these steroids interfere with the formation of antibodies, which are crucial for the immune system. Psychological Factors and health are also included. Due to the tension caused by stress, one tends to feel headaches. Cancer could be a problem because of stress due to the role of the immune system explained before.

People cope with stress in several ways. One of this ways is called defensive coping, which is not exactly a good way to cope with stress. These include substance abuse, aggression, withdrawal, suicide, and defense mechanisms. A good way to cope with stress is with active coping, which involves changing the environment or situation to remove stressors. These include changing stressful thoughts, relaxation, and exercise.

As seen, stress can be something quite serious. It can affect our body health as well as our psychological health. Not only that. Many people today think they cope with stress all right but they may be wrong. They may be coping defensively, which is not exactly the healthiest way to deal with stress. Sometimes these methods are worst than the stress. Learning how to live with stress in a healthy way is important because stress will always be there, it is just the way we view it. 

Stress seen where the stressor is that the person has a lot of assignments.