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Live Longer by Coping with Anxiety and Stress

A person suffers from stress and anxiety for so many reasons. It may start from small and simple things but the effects can be serious. There are also ways in order for one to cope up with it.

1) Fear is anxiety

Anxiety is a fear of something. One who is anxious feels apprehended. Anxiousness of a certain person can be different from another persons feeling uptight.

2) Set yourself free

For some, traveling via air or sea can cause anxiety. Fear from things will stop you from exploring yourself. There are some classes that you can enroll at to help you overcome your fear. Think of it, overcoming your fear is like gaining freedom.

3) Beware of the signs

Some symptoms can be sudden movement, muscle strain, headaches, dryness of the mouth, sweating, trouble in swallowing and pain in the abdomen. These indications can occur with hasty heartbeat and breathing, sexual problems, bad temper poor concentration, low energy and diarrhea.

4) The positive side of stress

Stress can be from ones negative notion or different circumstances that make the person feel anxious, discouraged and angry. On the other hand, stress is a normal thing that one faces almost everyday.

Given its negative effects, it can be good sometimes if it is moderate because it can make a person feel motivated and help one to become more effective.

5) Scary stress

If you face too much stress, it can affect your health physically and mentally. Such things are heart disease, different types of infection, depression, and unusual and fatal diseases.

6) Farewell to a loved one

Losing someone you love can be very painful. A persons grief can become more serious. You should go out and entertain yourself. Avoid having idle moments. Think of the blessings that still comes your way. It is good to divert your attention to different activities such as sports, hobbies, joining clubs or whatever things you may be interested in.

7) Stress at work

A job can also be stressful. You probably have a lot of deadlines to meet and too many responsibilities. Never forget that you also need to give yourself at least a few minutes of relaxation. During break time, you may do some stretching and breathing exercises.

After office hours, you could go out with friends and co-workers and just have a good time.

8) From crisis to suicide

Financial crisis is one of the causes of stress especially in third world countries. Some suffers from hunger and then depression. Their financial situation eats them and sometimes they kill themselves and even their husband, wife and kids thinking that it is the only way to get out of their mess.

If you find yourself in this situation, it would help if you will communicate with your loved ones. Tell them how you feel, what you are thinking and ask for advices. If you think it is not enough, you may also seek professional counseling.

9) The sick becomes more sickly

A patients physical and mental condition can be affected when they learn that they carry dreaded diseases. They may worry too much and might cause the disease to worsen and consequently slim the chances for survival. You may help a sickly patient by telling them positive things and stories of survival.

Remember that what is inside a persons mind and how one feels is reflected on the outside. So, always smile and think positive. Keep your cool and set yourself free from unhelpful thoughts. Live healthy and live longer.

Learn if You are Predisposed to Anxiety-Related Diseases

Anxiety has been the subject of many studies and researches, scientists are agreed that anxiety is still not fully understood even today. However, as a result of their researches, they have been able to help people effectively manage and avoid anxiety.

The first step to managing or treating anxiety is the recognition that one suffers from such attacks early on. However, it does not suffice to just say that you suffer from such a condition for it to qualify as such. While there are symptoms and signs the point to this ailment, you can also take this quick stress test to see whether you are at risk of suffering from chronic bouts of anxiety.

The Anxiety Stress Test
This stress test will help you find out whether you exhibit the symptoms of an anxiety-prone person. The more questions to you answer yes to, the greater the chance you will suffer from anxiety-related illnesses.

1. Do you feel irritable all of a sudden, even without reason or provocation? Most life experiences evoke differing amounts of anxiety. However, does anxiety becomes for you a chronic and even uncontrollable experience? Also, do you suddenly experience feeling terribly anxious for no reason at all?

2. If you were to describe how often you feel irritated, would you say it was often? Do you wake up grumpy or irritated? Are you always tired even after just waking?

3. Do you feel paranoid all the time? Are you always suspicious that people are talking about you? Do you have a low sense of trust for anyone?

4. Do you exhibit any repetitive, obsessive behavior? Ask yourself if you catch yourself counting tiles, wringing your hands often, biting your lips, washing your hands or uncontrollable mannerism.

5. Do you always feel guilty? Are you weighed down by guilt? Do you fell troubled often either because you had done something you regret or for no reason at all?

6. Do you have low self-esteem? Are you unsatisfied with who you are and find yourself wanting to be like other people instead? Do you feel helpless, unwanted, and useless to other people? Do you often wonder if people like you or if they even know that you exist?

7. Do you have suicidal thoughts? Are you lonely, thinking that life does not matter anymore and that the best way to go is to let go and end it all?

8. Are you sometimes breathless? Do you experience such physical manifestations of anxiety such as palpitations, wet or clammy hands, butterflies in the stomach, and others? Does a particularly stressing situation cause you to be paralyzed with fear and hard of breath?

9. Do you drink or take drugs? Do you smoke, drink alcohol or coffee, take drugs or any other mood altering substance?

10. Have you noticed a change in you diet? Are you able to eat regularly? Have you noticed an increase in the amount of food you eat, a change in the schedule of your eating?

11. Do you overwork yourself? Do you catch yourself working overtime, or working more, and accomplishing less? Do you pull all-nighter after all-nighter?

If you answered yes to most of the questions above, you will want to seek professional help regarding depression and anxiety. You do not have to be ashamed of your situation; it is an illness like most illnesses, with specific causes and cures. A qualified professional will help you find emotional and physical support to combat your anxiety.

How to Gain Stress and Anxiety Relief

Here are several ways to obtain stress and anxiety relief:

Do You Know Whats Causing It

Some people dont even know that what theyre feeling are general symptoms of stress and anxiety. They simply believe that theyre overly tired and one night of complete rest is sufficient for them to get back on their feet. You should know what the common symptoms of stress and anxiety are and most of them have already manifested, its highly possible that you are indeed suffering from this condition.

If so, the next thing you should do is to determine what caused it then make the necessary adjustments to alleviate the situation.

Are You Ready for Lifestyle Changing Effects?

Theres a good possibility that it could be some specific aspects of your lifestyle are whats causing you to experience stress and anxiety. Too much obsession on work and partying too hard are common sources of stress and anxiety. And obviously, the best way to get rid of them is what else get rid of the source.

All You Need is Some Sleep

Studies reveal that in most cases, sleep is actually the best answer against stress and anxiety. Adults generally need at least eight hours of restful sleep everyday. Napping every few hours or so dont count. When the human body is unable to obtain the needed hours of sleep, it tends to act abnormally and its why people who lack sleep are usually more emotionally high strung as well.

The Only Way to Conquer It is to Confront It!

If phobia or a traumatic event in your life is whats causing you to experience extreme stress and anxiety then the only way for you to survive it is to directly confront the source of your nightmares once and for all. Its reasonable to have fears, yes, but whats not reasonable is letting fears control your life. Remember however that this method applies to stressful but relatively harmless situations like conquering your fear of open spaces. Conquering hydrophobia is another matter entirely as directly confronting it will mean exposing yourself to the risk of drowning.

Escaping is Not Always Bad

As long as youre not running away from your problems, escaping to take a breather once in a while is not at all bad and it is quite good in reducing the amount of stress and anxiety in your life. If your work, for instance, consumes almost all of your time and thoughts then its extremely necessary for you to take one hours break at least two times a day just so you can relax and clear your mind bit. Let the pressures simply flow away. Youll see that youll be able to think more clearly afterwards.

No Man is an Island

And though some may say otherwise, its true in this case. Having a friend or relative to help you out is never a bad thing to have. Sometimes, we need other peoples support to conquer problems in life and thats not something to be ashamed of contrary to what others may seem to feel.

Be Careful of How You Obtain Stress and Anxiety Relief
If youve noticed, most of the techniques discussed here are natural ways of combating stress and anxiety relief. Its alright however if you wish to obtain relief through medication but be aware that you could suffer from side effects. Whichever way you prefer, good luck!

Depression Anxiety Stress Scale

People experience anxiety in different ways. Some tend to eat to much, while others let this off through smoking and drinking. Unfortunately, not everybody takes this the same way. When a person feels unhappy or loses the appetite to eat, there is a chance that the individual is suffering from depression.

Doctors have not yet been able to measure the degree into how bad depression can get. This is the reason that some scientists have made a self report scale called a depression anxiety stress scale. The objective of the study is to provide scientists and researchers better information to treat this problem.

The scale is divided into three sets. The first is the depression scale which will assess the person’s perception in life and interest in certain things.

The second is the anxiety scale which looks into situational anxiety, autonomic arousal, skeletal muscle effects and subjective experience of anxious effect.

The third is the stress scale which will look into how long before the person feels stressed. This will look into things that will arouse or upset the individual. This also includes what things makes one nervous or causes difficulty in relaxing.

Each of these are composed of 14 items that is subdivided again into 2 to 5 items which just goes to show how long and extensive the test can be. The person answers each question by answering on a scale of 1 to 4 which will assess how stressed the individual is for the week.

If the person has a hard time answering these questions, there is a shorter version that can be used. Doctors don’t only administer this with people who have anxiety disorders. The test is also given to regular people as part of the comparative report.

The questionnaires to be given out can be done individually or in groups. This is sometimes used in children as early as 12 years of age to determine if stress is caused by work or when this occurs as the individual is growing up.

Large companies who are concerned about the employees sometimes employ the help of social workers to administer the depression anxiety stress scale or DASS on people. These firms should remember that the results of these tests can only be translated by those in the medical field so that recommendations and treatment can take place.

There are two main differences between this test and those used in the past.

The first is that the DASS is that it is based on a dimensional rather than a categorical conception of what the patient may be experiencing.

The second is that it separates the categories into three namely depression, anxiety and stress and treating this separately to give a bigger picture of what is happening to the patient.

This means that classifying a person on the degree of help is far different and that this is often regarded as normal, moderate or severe as written in the DASS manual.

The DASS questionnaire can be downloaded for free from the internet. The person will have to pay $55 or more for the manual to be able to understand the findings of anyone who has taken the test.

The individual can learn more about this by surfing the web or reading up on this in some medical journals to get a better understanding of how this can help treat a patient.