stress | davanti counselling

Don’t let everyday stresses spoil the moments of life

How you respond to the daily grind can affect your mental health. (pic: istockphoto.com/KariHoglund)

Oscar Wilde wrote in the Picture of Dorian Gray that we should “teach man to concentrate himself up on the moments of life that is itself but a moment”. But unfortunately too many of us let the beauty and fragility of the moment be spoiled by minor stresses and annoyances. And those daily stresses can add up to longer-term mental health problems, according to a psychology study by UC Irvine.

The researchers set out to discover whether “everyday irritations add up to make the straw that breaks the camel’s back, or make us stronger and ‘inoculate’ us against later tribulations”. They looked at how 711 men and women in the US reacted to daily stressors, such as being stuck in traffic or arguing with a partner. They found that negative emotional responses today can accumulate into anxiety or mood disorders 10 years later. And it was the little things, and our responses to them, that could be more damaging than major psychological upsets.

Susan Charles, UC Irvine professor of psychology & social behavior, says: “It’s important not to let everyday problems ruin your moments. We’re so focused on long-term goals that we don’t see the importance of regulating our emotions. Changing how you respond to stress and how you think about stressful situations is as important as maintaining a healthy diet and exercise routine.”

Sounds like a strong argument for daily mindfulness practices – observing our feelings but not reacting to them – to stop those little things getting to us.

Arguing parents make babies’ brains more sensitive to stress

Babies are affected by parents’ arguments even when asleep. (pic: istockphoto.com/OSTILL)

Growing up in a volatile household where the parents argue can affect the way a baby’s brain processes emotional tone of voice. Young children can respond to an angry voice even if the arguments happen when they are asleep.

That’s the key finding of a study from the University of Oregon, which did MRI tests on 20 babies aged six to 12 months. While asleep, the children heard sentences spoken in very angry, mildly angry, happy and neutral tones of voice by a man.

The research found that infants’ brains still respond to the emotional tone of voice they hear. “Infants from high-conflict homes showed greater reactivity to very angry tone of voice in brain areas linked to stress and emotion regulation,” say the researchers. They conclude: “Babies are not oblivious to parental conflicts, and exposure to them may influence the way babies’ brains process emotion and stress.”

This could provide an explanation for adults who are more prone to suffering stress, and it may make parents think twice before arguing in front of their kids.

Employees turn to drink and drugs to cope with work stress

A Mind survey reveals that 57% of UK workers drink to alleviate stress.

UK employees are so overwhelmed by stress at work that they’re turn to drink and drugs to help them cope. More than half (57%) drink after work, and one in seven drinks in the day to deal with workplace pressure, according to a survey of 2,000 workers by mental health charity Mind. More than a quarter (28%) smoke to alleviate their stress, 15% take antidepressants, and 10% take sleeping pills from their doctor.

Work is the biggest cause of stress , and yet there’s a culture of silence and secrecy surrounding anyone who’s stressed at work. One in five people has taken a day off sick for stress, but 90% make up a different excuse for being off. One in 10 has resigned because of stress – and yet one in five doesn’t feel able to talk to their boss about feeling overwhelmed. Managers are stuck, too: more than half who took part in the Mind survey said they’d love to do more to improve employee wellbeing, but 46% said preventing and handling stressed-out employees just wasn’t the company’s priority.

If you’re one of the one in six employees suffering from depression, anxiety or stress, don’t suffer in silence. Reach out for some help. Work-related stress is one of the areas Davanti Counselling specialises in. Call 07956 823501 or email davanticounselling@gmail.com for a confidential chat and to make an appointment.

Be mindful to stress less and sleep better

Mindfulness can benefit you day and night. (pic: istockphoto.com/2Mmedia)

Mindfulness can have benefits during the night as well as the day, bringing peace of mind and more restful sleep, according to new research from the University of Utah.

People who describe themselves as mindful were proven to have more control over their mood and behaviour in daylight hours. And because their minds were quieter and their emotions more stable during the day, this translated into better sleep at night-time and an increased ability to manage stress.

People who took part in the research were prompted at various points of their everyday lives to “rate their emotional state and mental functioning”. The results suggest that “mindfulness may be linked to self-regulation throughout the day, and that this many be an important way that mindfulness contributes to better emotional and physical wellbeing”.

You don’t need to be trained in mindfulness meditation to reap the benefits of being mindful. Just check in with yourself at various points of the day to give you a chance to become conscious of how you’re feeling, and turn the volume up or down on your emotions.

Stop pursuing happiness if you want to be happy, say psychologists

Call off the pursuit of happiness if you want to be happy, say psychologists (pic: istockphoto.com/michaklootwijk)

It sounds a cruel irony, but if you put too much pressure on yourself to be happy it can have totally the opposite effect, according to psychologists. Focusing on your own fulfilment rather than your connections with others can leave you feeling lonely, they say.

Researchers from the University of Denver and the University of California, Berkeley, asked people to fill out an online questionnaire to gauge how far they valued happiness. They then filled out journals at the end of the day, reporting on stressful events during the day and how stressed and lonely they felt about them. The results showed that the higher someone values happiness, the lonelier they feel during a stressful event – regardless of their age, gender or background.

A second part of the experiment tested whether prioritising happiness is the cause of loneliness, asking people to watch a film clip after reading an article about the importance of happiness. Again, those who had higher expectations of happiness ended up feeling disappointed. The research authors say: “A desire for happiness can lead to reduced happiness and wellbeing. It may be that to reap the benefits of happiness people should want it less.”

This study backs up recent research from Germany suggesting that pessimists have a longer, happier life than optimists.

But rather than pessimism or optimism, perhaps it’s realism – and being grateful for what we have rather than continually wanting something more – that leads to real happiness? I’m reminded of the quote from Epictetu: “A wise man is he who does not grieve for the thing which he has not, but rejoices for those which he has.”

Why do women suffer more job stress than men?

Mimosa is the symbol for International Women’s Day.

International Women’s Day on 8 March is an opportunity to celebrate and support women across the globe. But it’s also an annual opportunity for survey-makers to analyse the experience of women in the workplace.

This year, research shows that women feel they’re more stressed than their male colleagues. The 2013 Work and Wellbeing Survey by the American Psychological Association (APA) has found that while 86% of women say they have good mental health, more than a third (37%) say they feel tense or stressed out at work. This compares with 33% of men. Here are some of the factors making women feel stressed:

Women don’t feel there’s a level playing field at work. The APA survey found that 48% of women felt valued in their jobs, compared with 54% of men. And just 34% believe their employer gives them the resources to manage their stress.
Women have less job security than men. A report by PwC says that childcare costs and many women only able to work nine-to-five has harmed their career prospects. Its Women in Work Index shows that the UK is ranked 18th out of 27 countries in terms of the opportunities it offers for women to advance in the workplace.
The pay gap isn’t cheering women up either. ‘Why is WonderWoman worth less than Superman?” asks the Chartered Management Institute, as it reflects on factors holding women back in the workplace.
There’s not enough ‘meaning’ in their jobs. Women aren’t always interested in power and money, says an Ernst & Young report. It’s ‘making a contribution’ that matters more. And the report advises women to seek our role models and mentors to help realise their ambitions.
Having no set goals can also make women feel stressed and lacking direction. That’s why the everywomanNetwork is encouraging women to invest an hour a week in their career ambitions. Owning your dreams, and devising a plan to implement them, can make you feel more in control of your life.
Not having enough sleep can make the stresses of the day loom larger. You can feel irritated and overly sensitive if you’re sleep-deprived. Don’t be superwoman and think you can survive on four hours’ sleep a night like Margaret Thatcher. Get your eight hours in, where possible.
The inner critic can be a woman’s own worst enemy. Arianna Huffington, founder of Huff Post, is urging women to ‘stress less, live more‘. In an interview with CNN, she says women’s pressures are self-imposed, and they feel victims of the “critical voice that constantly judges us, according to which we are never good enough”.

In summary, more self-confidence, more sleep, more control over ambitions, and more encouragement seems to be the answer to alleviating women’s job stress. Not all achievable in one day, admittedly. But the most important thing is to turn down the volume on that critical voice in the head.

One in 10 new mothers experiences obsessive-compulsive symptoms

Most new mums’ anxiety about their baby alleviates within six months (pic: istockphoto.com/c12)

Psychoanalyst Donald Winnicott says the only way to be a good mother is to be a “good-enough mother”. But “good enough” can feel a long way off for new mums struggling with feeding, nappies, sleeping, exhaustion and worries about her newborn baby.

For most new parents, it’s natural to feel some anxiety when their baby arrives. Winnicott adds that new mothers become totally absorbed with their baby “to the exclusion of other interests, in a way that is normal and temporary”.* But that maternal preoccupation can become all-consuming and develop into obsessive-compulsive symptoms for 11% of new mothers between two months and six months after giving birth. This was the core finding in a study by Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine, which says that OCD symptoms in the general population, by comparison, are around 2% or 3%.

The researchers say that the symptoms are normally due to hormonal changes, or adapting to the ‘stress’ that the pregnancy and birth may have brought on. “It may be that certain kinds of obsessions and compulsions are adaptive and appropriate for a new parent, for example those about cleanliness and hygiene,” says study senior author Dana Gossett. “But when it interferes with normal day-to-day functioning and appropriate care for the baby and parent, it becomes maladaptive and pathologic.” The researchers classify obsessions as “unwanted and repeated thoughts or images that create anxiety”.

For many women the anxiety can disappear within six months. This article on Yahoo!, Why anxiety is a natural state for new parents, argues that new mums and dads should just be left to get on with finding their own way as parents.

But for other new mothers, OCD can be linked with depression – especially if the symptoms appear a while after the birth. That’s the time to reach for support, where possible. This article by Bryony Gordon in The Telegraph, OCD takes the baby blues to a whole new level, is a touching account of her own experiences with OCD in pregnancy, and how she found support.

The organisation Maternal OCD offers advice and support on obsessive-compulsive disorder in motherhood.

(*quote from D. W. Winnicott, Michael Jacobs, SAGE Publications, London 2008, p. 48)

Lack of sleep can affect your health and your home life

Is burning the midnight oil affecting your health? (pic: istockphoto.com/Yuri_Arcurs)

We all know how groggy and out of sorts we can feel if we don’t get enough sleep. But two studies have shown just what an impact sleep deficiency can have on our body and our mood.

Getting less than six hours’ sleep a night for a week can alter more than 700 genes in our bodies, according to research from the University of Surrey. The immune system and how the body reacts to stress were the areas most affected by lack of sleep, the researchers found. Getting enough sleep is therefore crucial to replacing cells in our body to maintain healthy functioning.

This isn’t always easy though, especially for working parents. A separate study by workplace provider Regus found that a third (34%) of working parents sacrificed sleep to fit in all their work and personal commitments. Yet three-quarters find themselves sucked into the culture of ‘presenteeism’ because their workplaces prize a long-hours culture.

Work-life balance is a hard one to get right. “Lack of sleep is clearly detrimental to worker health and happiness,” says Regus UK MD Steve Purdy. Perhaps that’s something to reflect on next time you set your alarm extra early or find yourself burning the midnight oil.

Six signs you’re suffering from workplace burnout

Two-thirds of HR directors in UK employees say workload is the biggest cause of burnout (pic: istockphoto.com/olm26250)

Workload too heavy? Colleagues not pulling their weight? Putting in regular overtime but feeling resentful and short-changed because of it?

You’re not alone. Two-thirds of HR directors say workload is the main reason for employee burnout, according to a survey by recruitment company Robert Half UK. And those same HR directors are on alert for the signs that their staff are buckling under the stress that current economic burdens are placing on their shoulders.

You may feel pressure to stay late to keep your job, give your all to meet higher expectations, and end up without any praise or recognition for your efforts. On top of that, you may end up sacrificing your work-life balance that means no one wins: not you, your boss or your family.

But the thing about stress and workplace burnout is it can creep up on you over many weeks and months. You may think you’re ‘coping’, but sometimes a minor happening can become a major incident when stress takes over. ‘Good’ stress can help you perform at your best. But ‘bad’ stress – when it becomes you master, not your servant – can be detrimental to your work performance and to your emotional and mental wellbeing.

Here are the six signs from the Robert Half survey that show you could be heading for burnout:

Frequently turning up late for work.
Being less productive.
Frequently disagreeing with managers or colleagues.
Feeling disconnected from the work you’re doing.
Calling in sick more often.
Feeling low and moody, and sometimes having an emotional outburst.

Feel work’s getting on top of you? Recognise the signs, and speak to someone before you burst.