Coping with Stress Is Possible

We may not be able to escape stress in the daily routine, but we can manage it. Dr. Gözde Gündoğdu Meydaneri, Psychiatry Specialist at Istanbul Okan University Hospital, provided important information on ways to cope with stress.

Positive Events Can Also Cause Stress

Stress does not occur only in negative life events such as unemployment, bereavement, divorce, or loss; it can occur after positive or seemingly neutral life events that require adaptation, such as marriage, promotion, becoming a parent, or joining a new community. Stress can even emerge as a result of how a person perceives themselves and the external world, without any life event. If there is a life event that will cause stress, the quality of that event, whether the person's exposure to it is continuous, whether the person can control the event, and the person's mental structure are all important.

Muscle Tension, Palpitations, Trembling, Sweating, Fatigue and Weakness Result

In stressful situations, in addition to physical symptoms such as muscle tension, palpitations, trembling, sweating, fatigue, weakness, and gastrointestinal symptoms; emotional symptoms such as unhappiness, inability to experience pleasure, anxiety, restlessness, and anger; cognitive symptoms such as forgetfulness and concentration problems; and behavioral symptoms such as sleep disturbances, changes in eating habits, and alcohol and substance use may occur.

Take Control

To cope with stress, personal factors are first and foremost to be mentioned. How a person perceives the stress source, their responses to it, and coping skills differ between individuals. While some individuals can remain calm and handle what needs to be done with composure, others may exhibit responses such as avoidance, anger at the stress source, not knowing what to do, freezing, or procrastination. The first step in coping with stress is for the individual to recognize their own stress and confront the situation causing stress within themselves. Following this, gaining awareness of how they perceive this situation and how they respond to the stress source, developing strategies for what they can do, and coming to terms with situations where they cannot do anything and cannot control the stress source, and letting go of what they cannot do are among the recommendations. For example, a person can distance themselves from noisy, dark, or disliked environments that trigger their stress, or from people who trigger their anxiety. Remembering thoughts that feel good to them at that moment and motivate them, imagining that they have overcome the situation before and the feelings they experienced in that situation, thinking about how people they admire and take as role models would behave in the same situation, moving forward with what can be done, taking control, and doing only a few of the things that can be done individually are just some examples. In addition, the support of family and social environment, how the person manages their daily life, setting aside time for activities they enjoy, paying attention to nutrition and sleep patterns, exercising regularly, and psychoeducation on relaxation and breathing techniques can also be helpful factors in coping with stress. If despite all of this, a person cannot cope with their stress and this situation continues to negatively affect their life, professional support must be sought.