Weekly Discussion: Reflection on Stress
Reflection on Stress
For your discussion this week, think about the last time you felt stress. Discuss the circumstances that lead to that feeling, and using the information from the chapter, describe the characteristics of the event that made it feel stressful. What does it mean to be stressed? or for something to feel stressful? Be sure to include in text citations, including the author’s name and year of publication, to any ideas that are not yours. Also, please give thoughtful and substantive responses to the posts of at least two of your classmates.
Main posts and asides are all due by 11:59 p.m. Eastern Time on Tuesday, June 22, 2021.
Please let me know if you have any questions or concerns. I’m looking forward to discussing your impressions of stress.
Sincerely,
Dr. Green
Student Responses
Student Response 1: LINDSEY CHALMERS posted Jun 15, 2021 10:36 PM
Something I have been stressed about recently is work. I’ve been living here in FL for the last 3 years. I am supposed to move next summer. I don’t really want to move. Problem is, when the Air Force says move, you move! Here in lies the dilemma. I could choose not to move but instead choose to retire. While that all sound great, there are things in my career goals that have not yet accomplished so I feel like retiring next year is the equivalent of running a marathon only to quit with 0.2miles left in the race! The more I think about it, the more I know the right answer is to retire. This offers my family a chance at stability. My kids can stay in the same school and not have to start over someplace else. That’s huge!
I am a planner. So, as I think through what retirement looks like for me, the stress levels shoot to the roof! I wasted so much time on my bachelors, now I don’t have time to finish a masters! I think about what kind of job I want/could I get? Will we be ok financially? The list goes on! For 18 ½ years this is what I have done. I don’t even remember what life outside of the military looks like. According to the reading this would be categorized as a long-term stress as this situation will not truly resolve itself for another 16 months. According to Lazarus “stress involves a transaction between the individual and their external world, and that a stress response was elicited if the individual appraised a potentially stressful event as actually being stressful” (Ogden 2012). How I interpret this is: the situation is not stressing me out, it’s me stressing me out. I am thinking all of the unknowns and working myself up over this decision. I have appraised this decision as stressful. More specifically, I have deemed this to be secondary appraisal as the appraisal involves me.
Something that stood out to me in this week’s reading. “Some people are simply more reactive to stress than others….two people may show similar psychological reactions, but different physiological reactions” (Ogden, 2012). Physiologically I am reacting like 1. I can’t focus, 2. My heart rate increases, 3. My breathing becomes labored, and I have to close my eyes and deep breathe, 4. If it’s bad, I’ll feel knots in my stomach. 5. At it’s worst, stress has me racing in circles, going nowhere. I can’t make sense of things so the safe thing to do is not act at all. This lines up perfectly with my personality. I need order, I do not like the unknown, I tend to want to control things and when I can’t, it stresses me out. Change stressed me out. Psychologically, my thoughts race, my brain does not shut off at night causing me to lose sleep. I’ve already caught myself beating myself up for not doing more with my time to better set myself up for retirement. This has caused me to short-change my accomplishments and doubt my abilities to get a job (when I know my Air Force job makes me incredibly hireable in the civilian world).
According to the video “How Stress Affects Your Brain” (UNGC, n.d.) exercise is an important coping mechanism for stress. When you exercise your body releases endorphins that help make you feel good and lessen the feelings of stress. I happen to exercise 5 days a week and use exercise as one of my primary methods of keeping mentally fit. If I skip days, I can tell. There are days (like today) where I was not mentally feeling like going to the gym. But I went any way. I left feeling more positive mentally than when I walked in. I also work out with my best friend so the accountability I get from her helps. 2nd. I speak up about my stressors. I learned a long time ago that keeping things to yourself does more damage than it does good. When I talk, it helps me make sense of the chaos going on in my head.
Ogden, J. (2012). Stress. In Health psychology: A textbook (5th ed., pp. 290–304). essay, McGraw-Hill Education.
UMGC. How Stress Affects Your Brain (n.d.). [Video]. YouTube. Retrieved from https://learn.umgc.edu/d2l/le/content/581897/viewContent/22376683/View………
Student Response 2: Arielle Burton posted Jun 17, 2021 5:34 PM
Think about the last time you felt stress.
I really do not have to think much about the last time I felt stress as I am currently experiencing a lot of stress at this current moment.
Discuss the circumstances that lead to that feeling.
The circumstance that lead to my feeling of my feeling of stress right now are mainly revolved around school. I started 2 classes in the beginning of summer and my other 2 just began, with all 4 of them overlapping for 4 weeks. I also work full time. My plate is extremely full at the moment, however I know it is possible with very precise time management.
Describe the characteristics of the event that made it feel stressful.
The characteristics of the events that make me stressed at this current moment is the feeling of being overwhelmed, not having enough hours in the day to complete everything and more importantly having to sacrifice other important things to me like exercise, friends, family, and personal time to focus on my school work right now. It does make me feel a bit depressed from time to time when I think about it but I am very quick to remind myself that this is temporary and my hard work will pay off, especially when I graduate in 5 months.
What does it mean to be stressed? or for something to feel stressful?
According to Ogden in Chapter 11, Stress, what it means to be stressed or what stress is not so easily defined. Stress differs from person to person. However, the text explains also that stress as something that “involves biochemical, physiological, behavioral and psychological changes” (Ogden, 2021).
Reference
Ogden, J. (2012). Health Psychology: A Textbook: Vol. 5th ed. McGraw-Hill Education.
