Hello! How ya doing? I hope you are having an excellent year so far! 2013 is a great year, and it is only going to get better! Just thought I would let you know about that, but I am guessing, you already knew that.
For twenty years I was in the emergency field, and I still kind of consider myself to be because of all the emergency personnel I help with stress. When responding to an emergency call, and you are doing a patient assessment, a sign is what the assessor sees, and a symptom is what the patient describes they are experiencing. When I am doing a stress evaluation, a sign is what I see, and a symptom is what a client describes they are experiencing.
The reason I mention that is because I want to talk about symptoms of stress. Firstly, in my humble opinion based on my education, and observed evidence through experiences, stress is the number one cause of every illness, whether it be emotional, mental, or physical. If you are a reader of my blog, you have read this statement before. Whenever someone is sick, I think in my head, "Oh, they have stress." Whenever someone tells me they are sick, I ask, "Are you stressed?" Most people answer no because they think stress is some sort of catastrophic event when actually stress is strain.
How do I find out if someone is stressed? I ask them, "What are you worried about?" Then comes the words of stress.
Back to the symptoms...
The most common symptoms, which can also be signs, that I have seen in my over twenty years of responding to critical stress are...
Behavioral: Decrease in eating, healthy hygiene, and in sleep. An increase in alcohol, drugs, medications, eating, sleeping, or smoking. Finally, severe emotional and irrational outbursts.
Emotional: apathy, anger, anxiety, depression, guilt, helplessness, hopelessness, irritability, moodiness, nervousness, feeling overwhelmed, and sadness.
Mental: cynicism, difficulty concentrating, difficulty sleeping, doubt, fear, negativity, poor memory, racing mind, and worry.
Physical: anxiety attacks, backaches, dizziness, fatigue, gastrointestinal problems, headache, heart palpitations, high blood pressure, increase in heart rate, irregular heart beat, nausea, neck aches, panic, and upset Stomach.
In my experience the most common and The BIG SEVEN...
Addiction, anger, anxiety, depression, headaches, inability to sleep, and stomach issues (this can mean, but is not limited to aches, bowel problems, nausea, or vomiting).
It is my respectful opinion, anyone of these can be reversed if the individual is willing to do the stress reduction techniques and have enough faith in the laws of God, the brain, and physical health. Disclaimer: God allowing, naturally, and I say that because, of course, according to God's will. Nevertheless our hardships are our greatest teachers especially when we turn to God.
The many individuals I have helped have removed symptoms by removing the stress via changing their reactions, learning how to manage stress, learning how to deal with stress, and/or changing their environment, e.g., getting another job, ending a relationship, making more money, or moving.
Symptoms of stress can be resolved. Some turn to medication, which is wonderful but sooner or later we must learn how to reduce stress or we become dependent on the medication. I am all for medication for assistance but I am not for dependency on medication for stress.
There are three kinds of attitudinal beliefs, of peoples with stress, about their symptoms; the person that thinks everything is outside of his or her control, the individual that thinks they have total control over their destiny, and the one that teeters back and forth between the two depending on the subject and what they are going through in the moment. If we believe everything is outside of our control, then we tend to rely heavily on others, and medication, for dealing with stress, which comes from dependability. If we believe everything is within our control, we tend to seek the truth, healing, and self-reliability to de-stress, which comes from within.
The truth is that some have never been taught how to deal with stress, and if we were taught this is part of what we would learn...
Our mind is the very most powerful thing that we own. The brain can tell our body to automatically breath, beat our heart, think, react, and heal all at once. Just think, when a woman gets pregnant, the brain allows the body to function for two, and if she gets cut, or hurt, the body will heal her. Everything that the body does, the commands and functions are centralized in, and are from the brain.
There is major evidence that the brain does magnificent things. Thus, if we learn to reduce and manage our stress, i.e., de-stress, our brain can heal the symptoms.
If you have symptoms of stress, try to learn to de-stress, and you will most likely see the symptoms go away. Trust me on this. If you have tried everything to eliminate signs, symptoms, or illness, and nothing has worked try learning how to reduce stress, it's worth a try, you are worth a try!
Here are some post links that may assist you...
How to De-stress with Self-Worth
Praying this helps...
Speak soon...
Elizabeth
