At Sunstone Recovery, one of our biggest challenges is helping people deal with stress. Humans perceive stress in the cerebral cortex. This part of the brain system helps people adapt to an environment. Experiencing emotional and physical distress creates a memory to help people avoid a similar situation later in life. Stress involves a mental and physical response to unpleasant experiences.
When the body is under stress, it releases adrenaline, cortisol, and norepinephrine. This mixture of hormones and chemicals helps prepare the body for the physical act of fighting or fleeing. These chemical changes cause several physical reactions, pumping blood to muscles, including increased heart rate, and shutting down the systems that will not help us fight or flee. One example of a system that is disrupted during stress is the digestive system.
Call Sunstone Recovery in Oregon at 855.833.9199 today for help managing stress through telehealth addiction therapy services. In the meantime, these stress management techniques can help you ease tension in your daily life:
Ease Your Fight Response to Stress
When early humans encountered stressors, one of the ways they survived was to fight for their lives literally. When the body and mind enter states of stress, it causes some people to act aggressively. Stress causes blood to flow to the muscles and heart, rather than to the brain. People experiencing high levels of stress often have trouble thinking clearly for this reason. If you tend to feel angry and aggressive in response to stress, realizing this tendency is the first step.
A critical stress management technique is to remind yourself of what matters, and try to look at any conflicts from an outsider’s perspective. A good mental health and addiction therapist can help you develop healthy coping mechanisms when dealing with stress.
Ease Your Flight Response to Stress
A flight response to stress involves getting away from the thing that is causing stress. This can save a person’s life in a dangerous situation; if a car swerves onto the sidewalk, you’ll want to get out of the way as fast as possible. Avoiding problems rather than dealing with them often cause problems in relationships and work scenarios. Taking a flight response to stress often ends up causing more anxiety in the long run. For example, if you avoid talking to people about difficult topics due to fear, the problems are likely to worsen. In a stressful situation, keep in mind the issues that are the most difficult to approach are often the ones holding us back.
Confront Problems Instead of Running Away
Many people find it challenging to regulate their mind and body when they experience stress. This can be the result of certain genetic factors, learned behavior, and life experiences. Stress for extended periods can be extremely detrimental to our health, resulting in high blood pressure and sexual dysfunction.
When you start to feel stress, try out several stress management techniques. Remember to take slow, deep breaths. Be thankful for the gifts you’ve been given in your life, and remind yourself that you can handle this. Remind yourself that avoiding problems doesn’t solve them, and confronting our issues is sometimes the only way to heal.
If you are experiencing any problems with substance abuse, the rehab center in Oregon can help ease the stress of addiction recovery.
Breathe and Remind Yourself What’s Important
It sounds like a cliché, but regulating your breathing can actually help people reduce stress. Some people find it nearly impossible to regulate their body and mind when they experience stress. This may be the result of genetic factors, learned behavior, and life experiences.
Stress for extended periods can be extremely detrimental to our health, resulting in high blood pressure and sexual dysfunction. When you start to feel anxiety, remember to take slow, deep breaths. This stress management technique is used across the country to reduce stress during tests, addiction trigger encounters, and more.
Learning to manage stress doesn’t happen overnight, be patient with yourself. Be thankful for the gifts you’ve been given in your life, and remind yourself that you can deal with this.
Stress Management Services
Dealing with anxiety does not need to consume you. Contact Sunstone Recovery for a variety of programs that help manage stress. Our services include:
- Individual and group therapy
- Family therapy
- Psychotherapy
- Trauma-informed therapy
Call 855.833.9199 now and a therapist will start developing a plan to help you manage stress.
