Stress serves an important purpose: it prepares your body for action in order to keep itself out of danger. But unfortunately, the kinds of challenges we experience today aren’t always best solved by that kind of decisive physical behavior. The result, if stress continues, can be a host of mental and physical problems, including depression.

What is stress?

Stress results from many different situations , but the form it takes is generally the same. That’s because stress never developed to help us to cope with the demands of the modern world – high workloads, relationship problems, money worries, problem colleagues and difficult commutes. In its evolutionary context, stress is our body’s mental and physical response to a direct, immediate threat. Its job is to enable us to take typically one of two simple behaviors: fight or flight.

That’s why we experience stress the way we do. Our heart rate rises and we start to breath faster, to supply oxygen to the muscles. We sweat, to cool our bodies from the coming exertion. We may feel cold, or nauseous, as blood is directed away from the stomach to more essential areas. A cascade of hormones makes us more alert and faster to react. Essentially, it’s a one-size-fits-all response to a threat. That means we can feel much the same symptoms whether we are physically challenged – perhaps by a mugger, or less directly and intentionally by a careless driver – or threatened emotionally or mentally.

Changing the way we think

Stress has mental and physical effects. As well as preparing the body for action, it alters the way we think. Our thinking becomes polarized, black-and-white, or ‘all or nothing’ as psychologists call it – enabling us to take fast and decisive action to deal with the potential threat.
 

When the threat genuinely is physical – that car that pulls out in front of you without warning, or an unexpected noise in the house you thought was otherwise empty – then that makes good sense. But in the more nuanced situations that we more regularly find ourselves in, this kind of all-or-nothing thinking doesn’t tend to do us any favors. Relationships, tricky work situations and the like demand a more measured response than the immediate quick-fixes that stress evolved to help us deal with.

Unfortunately, when a stressful situation goes on for a long time, so do the changes in our thought patterns. We become more anxious and irritable, more impulsive and less flexible in our thinking. We are harder on ourselves, because – in its original context – stress demands that we have to be: it’s what keeps us safe. Stress forces us to think in terms of do/do not; at risk/safe; pass/fail. If the source of stress is still present, then we self-evidently haven’t succeeded in keeping ourselves out of danger. One consequence is that we become far more prone to depression, as our failures are implicitly emphasized over and over as the source of the stress remains unchecked.

Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) and other techniques can be useful in overcoming this unhelpful way of thinking, but essentially, it’s worth remembering that stress is often our body’s best – but ultimately inappropriate and unhelpful – attempt to deal with a bad situation.

StressingOut.org, is a website providing self-help resources for stress, depression, anxiety and related conditions.

I hope you will appreciate the following guest post.  I think Abby is an excellent writer and am happy to have her article on His and Hers Blog.

It’s a disease as deadly as cancer, yet we don’t accord depression the same importance – the latter eats away your body and turns you into a living vegetable, and the former does the same to your mind and soul. When you’re affected by depression, the world becomes a darker place and everything takes on a shade of grey. Your vision is compromised and you don’t see the positive side of any situation or circumstance. Some forms of depression are more severe than others and need medical intervention and continuous treat. They take years to cure, and by the time you learn how to cope and manage your thoughts, you find that every aspect of your life has undergone a sea change.

However, some kinds of depression can be banished at the outset if you’re aware of the problem and seek active help. Some people turn to good friends and close family members for support and guidance while others seek psychiatric care. Yet others feel that they can get rid of depression by keeping busy and focusing on all the positive aspects of their life. And for some people, writing a journal or blogging about their feelings makes it easier to cope with feelings of hopelessness and depression. Writing is a sort of catharsis because:

• It allows you to express what you feel in words: If there’s no one to talk to or if you feel that no one would understand, you can always take to putting down your feelings on pen and paper, or if it’s your blog, on keyboard and screen. Expressing your feelings and emotions in any kind of way is a catharsis, a cleansing of your mind and soul. You feel much better after you’ve poured out all that’s on your mind. And when you take to doing this regularly, it becomes a coping mechanism that helps keep depression at bay.

• It allows you to connect to others with similar problems: When you express your feelings on your blog, it helps you reach out and connect to others with similar issues and problems. Sharing your pain with them and helping them in return makes you feel much better in due course. There are also times when you feel that your problems are insignificant when compared to that of others, so you automatically start looking at the positive aspects of your life and chase away the blues.

• It brings comfort and support: An outpouring of feelings and emotions is bound to bring in support and comfort from many quarters. People who are regular visitors to your blog and those who have just stopped by offer sympathy and encouragement that work wonders in getting you back on track.

• It keeps your mind occupied: And finally, your blog keeps you occupied and prevents your mind from focusing on the negative aspects of life that are the cause for your depression. As you get better, you move to writing about other things, mostly about how you’re trying to overcome your problems and how much progress you’ve made. You’re doing something worthwhile, and this sense of achievement goes a long way in beating depression and keeping it away forever.

By-line:

This guest post is contributed by Abby Nelson, she writes on the topic of Masters in Counseling     She welcomes your comments at her email id: abby.85nelson<@>gmail<.>com.

Below is a guest blog post contributed by Rachel Davis.   I hope you enjoy it as much as I have.  Thanks Rachel!

Love is a wonderful sensation; it gives you wings to fly and you feel like you’re on top of the world. When you’re in love, the world seems much more beautiful and you’re at peace with yourself and all around you. However, love is also the perfect example for the saying – the higher you climb, the harder you fall; when this emotion starts to sour, it feels like the end of the world. Baser emotions take over and you’re either hurt badly or end up hurting the one you love with your harsh words and actions. The biggest fallout of love gone down the drain is depression, and very often, people who are dissatisfied with a relationship yet unable to break free of it for various reasons are prime candidates for depression.

We’ve all been in this phase at some point of time or the other – the lucky ones get over the fights and misunderstandings and patch up to live as near to happily ever after as possible; a few others know that this is not for them and find the strength to break off before the relationship eats into their happiness for good; but for the most part, people tend to stay on in relationships that are going nowhere and causing them more misery than happiness because they fear change and are terrified of the unknown. In their point of view, a known devil is better that living alone or a strange equivalent.

However, staying on in relationships that do nothing for your soul is the easiest way to become a victim of depression. Your energy is sapped, you don’t feel alive, and you never experience a moment’s inner peace. You’re always on tenterhooks expecting things that never happen – it could be a simple event like going out to dinner once in a way and enjoying a romantic meal together – and so being disappointed all the time; you’re worried about the constant fights that start from innocuous statements; and because of all these negative emotions, you’re stressed out all the time.

If a relationship causes you more grief than brings you joy, it’s time to let go. No matter how much you love the other person, no matter how much they promise to change, it’s best to save yourself while there is still time. If you lose your mental health, it’s extremely hard to regain it completely. Mental stress leads to depression and self-doubt; sooner or later, your physical health starts to become affected, and you’re unable to function normally.

It’s hard to let go of a loved one, especially when you’ve shared many happy memories together. But if push comes to shove, that’s what you must do when you have to dig really deep to find those happy memories or if you’re wondering if they were just a dream. Once you learn to let go and take care of yourself instead of worrying about the other person, you feel like a load has been lifted off you, and life is good once again.

By-line:

This guest post is contributed by Rachel Davis, she writes on the topic of Radiology Degrees . She welcomes your comments at her email id: racheldavis65[@]gmail[.]com.