Stress Reducers for Today - How to Deal with Stress

Stressed Spouse? Tips on How to Deal with Occupational Stress

A recent study has confirmed that the support of a spouse can go a long way toward alleviating workplace stress. Here are some tips for spouses on how to deal with stress from work.

But there were certain supportive characteristics that had a deep impact for most couples such as:

Awareness of one’s spouse’s daily work demands (i.e., time pressures, lack of resources, deadlines, and supervisors).

Not “forcing support.”

Understanding that communication lines are open regardless of the circumstances.

Recognizing that distancing oneself from the family or lashing out is not a practical way to foster help. In fact, it tends to bring out the worst in others — and even causes the supporting spouse to become distant and act out as well.

Being able to bring one’s spouse back to the middle — up when down in the dumps and down when overly agitated.

Not bombarding the family with complaints about minor workplace irritants.

Not trying to “one-up” one’s spouse in terms of who has had the worse day.

Not being complacent — continuing to work at it.

Remaining rational and not automatically casting the spouse as the “bad guy.”

Not keeping a running tab on who is giving and who is getting.

At the end of the day, Hochwarter said the most telling sign of a supportive partner was “the ability for a spouse to offer support on days when he or she needs it just as much.

Read The Key to Less Stress on the Job is a Supportive Man at Home

Photo Credit: David Friel

Causes of Stress Don’t Explain Treatment Differences in Older Adults

The causes of stress don’t explain why older people don’t respond as well as younger people to cognitive behavioral therapy though it does appear to work better than drugs.

Gould says therapy might work better than drugs because it seeks to fix the causes of anxiety rather than the symptoms.

“If we can address the causes of symptoms of anxiety (e.g. by changing how we think about or interpret things) then we can stop them coming back in the future. If we only address the symptoms of anxiety then we can’t,” she said.

Though Gould’s analysis and those of studies in younger adults agree that cognitive behavioral therapy helps treat anxiety, the effect in older adults is small while the effect seen in younger adults is moderate or large, the authors wrote.

Gould said she doesn’t know why the therapy seems less effective in older adults, but it’s possible that talk therapy might take longer to work for them.

Read Anxiety therapy doesn’t work as well in elders

Photo Credit: Ed Yourdon

Reduce Money Stress in Your Relationship

Money stress creates more tension in relationships than just about any other issue. Many couples fight regularly about money and many divorces are rooted in tension around money. This article offers 10 ways to reduce the stress.

“Here are 10 tips for couples to help reduce financial stress:

1. Full disclosure of all debt and financial obligations

2. Raise your credit score

3. Plan for spending

4. Keep a credit card in your own name

5. Pay off debt

6. Emergency fund

7. Monitor your accounts

8. Get help

9. Talk it out

10. Add extra income”

Read the full article 10 Steps to Reduce Money Stress in Your Relationship

Photo Credit: 7rains

Dealing with Stress by Changing Your Questions

This article makes a good case for dealing with stress by examining your assumptions through the questions you ask yourself. It’s those assumptions that contribute to high levels of stress.

This is the awesome power of questions to focus our thinking (and subsequent feelings and actions) in life. If you take a bunch of people who have high levels of stress and compare them to a group of similar folks who have low levels of stress, you’ll find that the individuals in these two groups routinely ask themselves very different types of questions.

via ormanstressrelief.com

It’s interesting to think that you can reduce your stress simply by reframing the questions you ask yourself. So rather than just trying to be more positive, for example, which just creates more stress when you fail, you just have to reword your questions. The less stressful answers will follow.

So what questions are you asking yourself? And what assumptions do they reveal? Try reframing the questions and see what happens to those assumptions and your stress.

Photo Credit: arte_ram