Stress Management: Identifying Your Stressors

For many of us, stress just seems to be a part of everyday life. With demanding jobs, busy families, households to run, bills to pay and a chronic shortage of ‘me time,’ it’s easy to feel overwhelmed. But what if I told you that you have a lot more control over your stress level than you might think? It’s true. By taking charge of such things as your thoughts, your schedule and your response to problems, you get closer to having a balanced life, with time for all of the things you need to do, plus the things you want to do.

The first step in managing your stress is identifying your stressors. It’s easy to just chalk your stress up to work, bills, children and the like, but many times there are less obvious factors that are actually contributing to your stress, and you can do something about them. Here are some of the most common types of stressors:

source: http://www.sxc.hu/photo/446665

• Emotional (Internal) Stressors
  This group includes fears and anxieties, personality traits such as pessimism and perfectionism. These factors can distort your thinking and perceptions and vary widely from person to person.
• Family Stressors
  These include changes in your relationship with your partner, financial problems, unruly children, rebellious teens and even empty-nest syndrome.
• Social Stressors
  These stressors show themselves in our interactions within our social community. This can include dating, parties and public speaking.
• Change Stressors
  This group consists of feelings of stress related to big changes in our lives such as moving, starting a new job, having a baby or a change in your living situation.
• Chemical Stressors
  These are any drugs a person abuses, including alcohol, nicotine, caffeine and sedatives.
• Work Stressors
  These stressors are brought about by such things as tight deadlines, unreasonable workloads and unpredictable supervisors.
  

  Stress can leave you feeling overwhelmed

• Decision Stressors
  Stresses caused by having to make important decisions, such as the choice of a career or a spouse.
• Phobic Stressors
  These are caused by situations that you fear, such as flying in an airplane, being in a crowd or being in a tight space.
• Physical Stressors
  These are situations that take a toll on your body, such as sleep or food deprivation, standing on your feet all day, pregnancy, premenstrual syndrome or excessive exercise.
• Disease Stressors
  This type of stressor can be attributed to long- or short-term health problems. These may cause stress (being unable to leave your home or unable to work), be triggered by stress (such as herpes or shingles flare-ups), or be aggravated by stress (such as migraine headaches).
• Pain Stressors
  Acute or chronic pain can be included in this type of stressor. Pain stressors can cause stress or be aggravated by stress.
• Environmental Stressors
  Noise, pollution, heat, cold and lack of space are all included in this group.

To identify the sources that are contributing to your stress, you need to begin by assessing yourself, including your habits and your internal dialogue, ask yourself some questions and give honest answers. For instance, do you blame your stress on others? Do you overreact to relatively small ‘bumps in the road’? Do you procrastinate? If you can answer yes to these or similar questions, you need to accept some responsibility for the level of stress that’s in your life.

Journaling can help identify stress triggers

If you’re not sure where to begin with your self-assessment, try keeping a stress journal, which can be an online or written journal. To use your stress journal, begin by making note of each time you feel stressed. Describe the situation as best you can, including the type of stressor (from above), how it makes you feel (emotionally and physically), how you’re reacting and what, if anything, you did to calm yourself down. Do this daily for a period of a couple of weeks. Soon, you will probably notice patterns and recurring themes. What is stressing you out most often? What are the most serious stressors?

Once you’ve identified your main stressors, it’s time to learn some coping strategies.

Watch for the next article in this series,  “Healthy Strategies for Coping with Stress.”

Tagged as: journaling, Stress Management