Recognizing Signs of Stress

By: Patrick J. Cohn, Ph.D.
Stress is a part of everyday life for athletes. The good news is that not all stress is bad stress. In the right amount, stress helps you focus better and achieve what you want.

Stress is a part of everyday life for athletes. The good news is that not all stress is bad stress. In the right amount, stress helps you focus better and achieve what you want. Stress can help athletes be more alert, more motivated, and gain a competitive edge. But bad stress or chronic, non-stop stress is debilitating to an athlete’s health and performance.


Stress occurs when a person perceives that he or she cannot cope with the demands of the environment. Stress occurs as a response to an event that is viewed as threatening, either physical or mental threat. Under stress, persons respond with the “fight or flight response,” which prepares them both mentally and physically to fight or flee the situation. If stress goes on too long, it can be harmful to an athlete’s health and performance.


The sooner you can recognize that you feel stress or anxiety, the faster you can react and shut it down. How do you know when you are under stress? Three changes can occur: (1) Physical, (2) Mental, and (3) Behavioral. Physical changes when under stress may include tense muscles, pounding heart rate, cold or clammy hands, headache, sweating, and a feeling of butterflies in the stomach. Mentally you are stressed when you begin to worry excessively, make poor decisions, have a limited attention span, make mental errors, and are forgetful. Other signs of stress include talking faster than normal, biting one’s nails, pacing, restlessness, hyperactivity, distractibility, and trembling. Under chronic stress the person will seem tired, restless, and feel out of control.


Chronic stress does harm to your health and performance, but moderate stress is helpful to performance. Stress helps you prepare better for the big game, be more alert, and get excited about playing. The important lesson is that you learn when helpful stress turns into harmful stress and be able to cope effectively. Next month, I’ll discuss some stress management techniques.


About the Author


Dr. Patrick J. Cohn is a leading mental game coach who consults with professional and amatuer athletes. He is the author of Going Low, Peak Performance Golf, The Mental Game of Golf and The Mental Art of Putting. For more information call (888) 742-7225. Or sign up for free mental game tips newsletter at: www.peaksports.com.

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10 Ways To Use Relaxation Techniques To Manage Your Relationship Stress

Relationship stress can be really hard and stresssful, especially when you are going through a tough in your life. Managing relationship stress can be difficult if you don't know how to relax. It can have some adverse effect on your health, your career and your social life if you don't manage the relationship stress properly. Fortunately, there are some relaxation techniques that can be used to reduce the stress and give your mind some peace. Here are 10 ways to use relaxation techniques to manage your relationship stress.
1. When you feel extremely stressed or you just had an argument, then go to a room alone and sit down on a sofa or a chair. Sit in an upright position. Then try relaxing your muscles, starting from your feet and moving upwards. When you are stressed your body starts producing chemicals that make our muscles tense. When you relax your muscles you send a signal to the brain that the situation is better now and there is no need for the intense stress.
2. Concentrate on something else rather than the reason that is causing the stress. Although it might seem hard to concentrate on something else when you have relationship problem but you won't succeed unless you try. Using step 1 relaxation technique will help you concentrate on relaxing your muscles rather than the stress.
3. Learn to use your hobbies as your solace. There comes a time in relationships when you just want to get away from your partner for a little while and spend some time on your own. It is important to have some hobbies that can do in your spare time which help you to relax.
4. Yoga is one of the best relaxation techniques today. It helps improve your health and teaches you many methods that you can use in your day to day life to feel better. If your partner is interested then both of you can join yoga classes together and learn the techniques to reduce the stress.
5. Relationships often get to a point when you feel like that there is nothing left in the relationship but fights and arguments. At such times there is very good way to reduce the stress and build your confidence in the relationship. All you have to do is close your eyes and think of the wonderful times you had with your partner. This will help your mind relax and will give you a reason to try to improve your relationship.
6. Aroma therapy is another popular technique used these days by many to reduce stress. Essential oils are used to alter the mood of a person in this therapy. You and your partner can do this together and once both of you are in a good and calm mood you can discuss many things that are difficult to discuss when stressed out.
7. You may have overlooked it all these years but one of the most effective techniques to reduce stress is touch therapy. If you are both stressed out due to some reason, then a simple touch from your loved one can create a lot of difference. Just holding hand with your partner sends a signal to the brain to reduce the stress. If not your partner, then a hug from your kids or parents can do the trick.
8. Breathing techniques are becoming more and more popular these days. They only take about five minutes to perform but can have a very good effect in stress reduction.
9. There are a lot of therapies available in the market that can be used to learn new ways to reduce stress. Mediation is one of those techniques that will always be popular because of its effectiveness. It teaches you to control your thoughts and help achieve a positive attitude towards life.
10. Exercises and healthy food are probably the most underrated stress reduction techniques. They help in many ways to reduce stress. If you can spare some time to run, jog, or swim everyday then you will see the difference yourself. Endurance training is also very effective. Healthy food is extremely important to maintain your health during stressful times.
Relaxation techniques might not find you the exact way to stop your relationship stress altogether, but they will help you reduce the stress that affects your physical and mental functioning. If you are able to reduce the stress and take control over your mind then you will be able to stop your relationship stress once and for all.

Stress Relief - About the Author:
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Acute Stress Disorder - Causes, Symptoms And Treatment

Acute stress disorder (ASD) is an anxiety disorder characterized by a cluster of dissociative and anxiety symptoms occurring within one month of a traumatic event. (Dissociation is a psychological reaction to trauma in which the mind tries to cope by "sealing off" some features of the trauma from conscious awareness). Acute stress disorder develops within one month after an individual experiences or sees an event that involved a threat or actual death, serious injury or another kind of physical violation to the individual or others, and responded to this event with strong feelings of fear, helplessness or horror. Psychiatric trauma, or emotional harm, is essentially a normal response to an extreme event. It involves the creation of emotional memories about the distressful event that are stored in structures deep within the brain. In general, it is believed that the more direct the exposure to the traumatic event, the higher the risk for emotional harm.

Acute stress disorder is caused by exposure to trauma, which is defined as a stressor that causes intense fear and, usually, involves threats to life or serious injury to oneself or others. Examples are rape, mugging, combat, natural disasters. Symptoms of stress disorder include a combining of one or more dissociative and anxiety symptoms with the avoidance of reminders of the traumatic event. Dissociative symptoms include emotional detachment, temporary loss of memory, depersonalization, and derealization. A person may be described as having acute stress disorder if other mental disorders or medical conditions do not provide a better explanation for the person's symptoms. Anxiety symptoms connected with acute stress disorder include irritability, physical restlessness, sleep problems, inability to concentrate, and being easily startled.

Causes of Acute Stress Disorder

1.Airplane crashes.

2.Terrorist bombings.

3.Inner-city violence.

4.Hit or harmed by someone in your family.

5.Domestic abuse.

6.Rape.

7.War.

8.Physical or sexual assault.

Symptoms of Acute Stress Disorder

There are four main types of Acute Stress Disorder symptoms. First is Re-experiencing the trauma: flashbacks, nightmares, intrusive memories and exaggerated emotional and physical reactions to triggers that remind the person of the trauma. Second is Emotional numbing: feeling detached, lack of emotions (especially positive ones), loss of interest in activities. Third is Avoidance: avoiding activities, people, or places that remind the person of the trauma and last is increased arousal: difficulty sleeping and concentrating, irritability, hypervigilance (being on guard), and exaggerated startle response. First, symptoms can be produced by re-experiencing the trauma, whereby the individual can have distressing recollections of the trauma. For example, the person may relive the experience as terrible dreams or nightmares or as daytime flashbacks of the event.

The second way that symptoms are produced is by persistent avoidance. The avoidance refers to the person's efforts to avoid trauma-related thoughts or feelings and activities or situations that may trigger memories of the trauma. This so-called psychogenic (emotionally caused) amnesia (loss of memory) for the event can lead to a variety of reactions. The third way that symptoms are produced is by an increased state of arousal of the affected person. These arousal symptoms include sleep disturbances, irritability, outbursts of anger, difficulty concentrating, increased vigilance, and an exaggerated startle response when shocked.

Treatment of Acute Stress Disorder

1.Cognitive behavioral therapy is the treatment that has met with the most success in combating ASD. It has two main components: First, it aims to change cognitions, patterns of thought surrounding the traumatic incident. Second, it tries to change behaviors in anxiety-provoking situations.

2,Psychological debriefing and anxiety management groups are two other types of therapy that have been examined for the treatment of ASD. Psychological debriefing involves an intense therapeutic invention immediately after the trauma, so that traumatized individuals can "talk it all out."

3.anxiety management groups, people share coping strategies and learn to combat stress together. However, both types of therapy have proven to be largely ineffectual for the treatment of ASD.

4.Drug treatment is aimed at relieving fear and anxiety and restoring normal sleep patterns. Tricyclic antidepressants, such as Tofranil and Elavil, or SSRIs such as Prozac or Zoloft, are helpful.

Article Source: http://www.articlesnatch.com

About the Author:
Sander Bel writes articles for depression. He also writes for health care and cipralex.

Read more: http://www.articlesnatch.com/Article/Acute-Stress-Disorder---Causes--Symptoms-And-Treatment/325828#ixzz0lagDGoSR
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Important Information About Several Symptoms Of Stress

By: Jason11

When work is getting challenging, or money is getting tight, or a houseguest has overstayed his or her welcome, or you just cant take your husbands socks on the floor anymore, you might begin to feel a headache forming behind your eyes. Your heart may begin to race and your thoughts will return again and again to your troubles.

This is what stress does to us, and even small, seemingly inconsequential things can be a source of stress in our lives. The effects of stress can also accumulate within our bodies over days or weeks, causing feelings of anxiety, panic attacks, and even symptoms that feel like heart attacks. If you are experiencing palpitations, pain in your chest that radiates through the left side of your body, dizziness, and weakness, get help right away, as it is possible that you are having an actual heart attack.

Stress can cause both your health and quality of life to suffer, so it is important to be able to pinpoint its symptoms and causes so that you can begin work on treating and managing your stress. There are three primary ways that stress manifests in the body: physical symptoms, mental symptoms, and behavioral symptoms.

Physical Symptoms of Stress

When stress builds up within us, constant muscle tension can cause many different kinds of pain in the body, including back and neck pain, headaches and even chest pain. The tension associated with stress can also bring on stomach upset like heartburn or indigestion. Stress can also lead to symptoms like heart palpitations and heart disease if left unchecked and untreated. On a similar vein, stress can cause an increase in your blood pressure, which is dangerous for your health.

The aches and pains associated with high levels of stress can also make it difficult to sleep, or cause you to wake up multiple times during the night. Insomnia by itself can cause stress, so the situation becomes self perpetuating and can quickly get out of control. These symptoms can also combine to weaken your immune system. People who live with high levels of stress may get sicker easier, or stay sick longer than people who live peaceful or relaxed lives.

Mental Symptoms of Stress

Although stress causes physical symptoms, it begins in the mind. For example, a mother whose teenager is late when returning from a party might sit and worry and pace restlessly. Shell undoubtedly have several different types of strong emotional reactions. We would say that this woman is stressed, and we would be correct, but we rarely think about her churning stomach or her sudden headache.

Mental symptoms of stress include anxiety, restlessness, and worry, just like the mother in the scenario above. It can also include irritability, anger, or sadness, even going so far as to drive some people into an actual episode of depression. Stress can also cause feelings of insecurity or a lack of ability to focus, even on simple tasks. You might become extremely forgetful, especially of things that do not relate directly to the focus of your stress. For example, you might remember every detail of an extensive project for work, but cannot find your glasses or car keys, or remember to pick a child up from hockey practice. High levels of stress can also lead to a feeling of being burned out, or unable to continue working on your current projects.

Behavioral Symptoms of Stress

The effects of stress on our bodies and minds can be profound, causing us to become so caught up in our situation that we develop negative habits or tics. For example, some people try to ease their feeling of stress by eating, which is traditionally a comforting action. With high levels of stress can come an increasing desire to eat or overeat, even when we are not hungry. On the other hand, some people are so full of tension when they are stressed that they become physically nauseous and have little interest in food or eating. These people may make themselves sick or lose a lot of weight in an unhealthy way.

People under a lot of stress may also be prone to emotional outbursts, like crying or angry rants. This can cause conflict in relationships, even if the outbursts are relatively minor. Substance abuse may also arise during periods of high stress, causing people to increase or take up smoking, or begin to abuse drugs and alcohol.

Stress is a very real emotion with legitimate physical and mental symptoms. By understanding how your body reacts to stress, and pinpointing your specific symptoms, you can better manage your stress and avoid certain triggers.

Article Source: http://www.articlesnatch.com

About the Author:
Leslie Silver is a freelance writer who writes about self improvement and stress management.

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Stress At Work And Its Symptoms

By: Ludwig Reithofer

Do you believe that the Reflexology techniques reduce stress? Well I do. Reflexology techniques reduce stress in the most effective way. Whenever I am feeling stressed out or whenever I have a terrible day at work, Reflexology techniques reduce stress and bring my spirits back to their normal cheerful levels. Yes, the way you feel and your mood are largely reflective of what is going on in your body. Reflexology techniques reduce stress by addressing the problems in different parts of your body.

Reflexology techniques reduce stress through the concept of Reflexology, which is an alternative medicine practice which revolves around the idea that certain points on body parts like feet and hands are associated with different organs and glands in the body, from brains to the genitals. Reflexology techniques reduce stress through massaging and applying pressure to certain areas of the body parts, mostly feet and hands to soothe other organs of the body and the problems related to them. Obviously, as you can't access every organ of your body, so the easiest way to affect those parts is to stimulate and excite the reflexes that lead to them. This is how Reflexology techniques reduce stress. You can experiment with them, and can see for yourself that Reflexology techniques reduce stress.

Your hands are the busiest parts of your body and perform numerous tasks for you all day long. With such a huge workload and tension, your hands ask for the perfect hand massage. And what could be better for your hands if you know how to give that perfect hand massage?

My hands used to kill me with pain each day as I used to get back home from work, and I craved the perfect hand massage. It was not until I received probably the perfect hand massage that I discovered how the pain in your hands can be healed. I also learned that hands feature reflex points that connect different parts of hands to different organs of the body, so you can be sure that when you learn to giving someone the perfect hand massage, not only are you relieving them of the pain in their hands, but would also be benefiting their internal organs and functions of the body. You can find the key to your health with the perfect hand massage.

But doesn't everyone instinctively know how to massage their hands? You simply grab one by the other hand and start massaging it.

I wish giving the perfect hand massage was that simple. You need to work a bit more to find how to give the perfect hand massage. Although the techniques for the perfect hand massage are very easy to learn, your hand massages will not even be close to be effective unless you used the right techniques for the perfect hand massage used by massage experts. Although you cannot expect to be as good as them, but what if you could learn their secrets to give the perfect hand massage to your recipient? You need to learn about the right strokes and pressure points to be able to deliver the perfect hand massage to your recipient.

Moreover, for delivering the perfect hand massage, you also must explore the secrets of reflex points on the hands, which hold the key to the health and well being of the entire body. The concept of Reflexology is that your body organs and glands are connected with certain reflex points on your hands and feet. If you massage these reflex points, then you can fix a number of problems related to various parts of your body. The person giving the perfect hand massage should be putting these reflex points into consideration.

I have found out expert advice from the professional massage experts about giving the perfect hand massage to my recipients. With all the tips in my head, I often get complimented for giving the perfect hand massage. Once you get to learn them, the techniques for the perfect hand massage are so simple and easy that you will be amazed. But when I had no clue about them like most of the people out there, the techniques for the perfect hand massage seemed to be almost impossible. I used to believe that the key to a perfect hand massage was something which only the professional experts held. It is true, they do possess the knowledge to the perfect hand massage, but with a little effort you can discover all their secrets to delivering the perfect hand massage that your recipient will never forget.

Article Source: http://www.articlesnatch.com

About the Author:
Ludwig Reithofer is a certified massage therapist, consultant, speaker and author. You can learn more about how Reflexology techniques reduce stress by reading his monthly workshop. Ludwig is giving free access to his private site, but exclusively while charter memberships last. Join today at http://www.secret-massage.com

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Stress At Work And Its Symptoms

By: Bertil Hjert

Stress at work is not a new phenomenon. These days, in modern lifestyles, the nature of work has gone really stressful. One needs to do a lot in order to stay ahead in competition.

Most people dont even realize that they are undergoing a lot of stress in their life. They dont have time to realize that they are under stress.

Work stress is a type of chronic disease. It is caused by different conditions in the workplace that negatively affect an individuals performance. This also affect overall well being of body and mind of the person.

In certain cases, job stress can even be quite disabling. According to a study, one must go for psychiatric consultation. This will let him or her validate the reason and degree of stress related to work.

Sometimes working on a project also causes a lot of stress. The early stages of job stress are not much irritating as it can enhance the performance due to the efforts put in to the whole thing.

However, in case, the condition goes unchecked the body faces stress on a regular basis the body tends to get affected adversely.

If you want to know whether you suffer from work stress, here are certain symptoms you need to look for:

Insomnia or sleeplessness

Family conflict or constant dispute

Lack of mental concentration

Anxiety; Depression; Extreme anger

Frustration

Physical illnesses such as migraine, stomach problems, headaches, heart disease and back problems.

Substance abuse

Absenteeism on a frequent basis without any regular reason

There are several causes of work stress. Here are some of the visible ones that would let you know how to handle work stress.

1) Insecurity at work place

These days, one requires to do a lot at job in order to survive the tough competition. There is a lot of reorganization, mergers, takeovers, and downsizing. All these situations lead to stress for employees. They need to work hard to survive and let their organization survive the competition.

2) Demand for performance

Today, employers, managers and team leaders keep unrealistic expectations and set unrealistic goals for their employees. This results in unhealthy and unreasonable pressures on the employee.

Now, this can be really tremendous and the person may suffer from serious depression. Big targets make employees work for long hours and physically stressed out. They may also require to travel a lot and too much time away from family results in emotional stress.

3) Balance

For woman, it becomes really difficult to strike a balance between work and home. After spending stressful work hours, it becomes difficult to work at home. There may be situations where women face sexual harassment at work place.

It is easy to cope up with stress at work if you want to. You can do a lot of things to keep yourself away from stress. Here are some tips:

Dont give in to alcohol

Dont cheat on your spouse

Develop positive attitude towards stress

Find time to refresh yourself whenever you get time

Take a short leave and enjoy with your family.

Article Source: http://www.articlesnatch.com

About the Author:
For more Articles, News, Information, Advice, and Resources about STRESS please visit STRESS TIPS and FREE FROM STRESS

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The Reasons Behind Smoking

by: Rob Mellor

So what are . Both you and me know that it is not good for our health? There are very many reasons to it but in this article we will look over the biggest reason in today’s world and that is to release STRESS. So what is stress, can we get rid of it through smoking, if not then how can we get rid of it, lets look at the reason behind smoking.

Stress – What is it?
Stress is the result of feeling helpless, incapable to perform, not able to meet the deadlines and pressurized. Stress could be due to any reason, be it down to pressure at the office, home or even a bad financial situation, or it could be due to anything your not happy with.

Can smoking get rid of it?
Can we get rid of stress through smoking? Will smoking make us relax and even feel better about life? Well lets look at it like this, will smoking get you out of that bad financial situation or do your work for you at the office or even ease things at home. I don’t think so! Then why carry on smoking, it’s not going to cure the problems but just ease it for a few minutes at the very most.

So what do you do?
Then what should I do in a stressful moment? The answer is to confront it head on. You need to find a long term solution to the problem. If you having financial trouble, go to the bank. Trouble at the office, see your boss. Don’t go to the shop and buy more cigarettes, they won’t sort the problem out long term. By confronting it head on you will ease your stress over time.

Don’t Smoke
Smoking is bad for you. Smoking increases the chances of death due to lungs and breast cancer by a number of times. It wrecks the lungs during sports. One good way of easing stress for the short term is to do sport, it can control it way better than smoking can.

Tobacco the chemical contained in the cigar narrows the blood vessels and strains our heart. This gives you a larger risk of strokes and heart disease. If you haven’t stopped yet them you need go for a stress free way of stopping. That way you’ll not feel worse off than when you smoked.

About the author:
Rob Mellor owns the www.quit-smoking-expert.comwebsite helping normal people stop smoking in less than 40 minutes. Please visit the site for more information on our stop smoking program

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