NORTH BRUNSWICK – With your hand on your stomach, take a deep breath through your nose. Hold that breath for four seconds. Slowly exhale through your mouth. Repeat this over the course of five minutes.
At the end of the deep-breathing cycle, you shouldmore feelmuchmore relaxed and collected, according to Dr. Sangeetha Nayak. The clinical psychologist presented information about stressmanagement tomembers of the SouthAsianMentalHealthAwareness in Jersey organization, part of the National Alliance onMental Illness ofNewJersey, at the group’s North Brunswick location on Route 130 onMarch 6.
Nayak said that the mind and the body work together to support each other,which is the key for stablemental health. She said the physical impacts the emotional, and vice versa, and that stress causes an imbalance.
With stress being defined as a lack of control, the inability tomake a decision, a lack of motivation or a feeling of being overwhelmed, Nayak said the physiological or psychological response to internal and external conditions could be detrimental, but also advantageous.
“It is a perceived threat; it may not be a real threat,” she said. “A lot of it is how we view the world and how we perceive it. The reason we view it as a threat is because we see we have no control over it.”
Nayak said stress was an integral part of life for cave people, especially because of the fight-or-flight response. She said that increased heart rate, increased glucose levels for energy, more clotting ability, more blood flow to the brain, blood flow away from the gastrointestinal system and toward muscles and limbs, and higher blood pressure all helped primitive humans either fight off their opponents or run from danger.
She said that although nowadays there are fewer physical threats, “our bodies still react the way we used to react.”
However, she also said that “in a lot of ways, it is adaptive and it can help you,” but only if stress comes in acute periods.
Nayak provided statistics from a study done in 2006 and published in 2007 by the American Psychological Association. The study said that stress is linkedwith heart disease, cancer, lung ailments, anxiety, depression, accidents, cirrhosis of the liver, and suicide. Forty-three percent of adults suffer adverse health effects from stress, and twothirds of doctor visits are due to stress-related symptoms.
“Effective stress management can help eliminate a lot of this,” she said.
She said overscheduling, traffic, money, work, children, loss of life, bad health, milestones, immigration and the nightly news all contribute to daily stress.
Instead, she suggested taking deep breaths, rescheduling, sharing tasks, planning a fun activity,making light of the situation, writing in a journal, meditating, praying, spending time with family and friends, reading and listening to music as ways to combat stress.
She also said to set realistic goals, pamper yourself and be selfish.
“You can’t be as useful or productive for [others] if you are not in the best place yourself,” she said.
Sleep and fatigue is another important aspect of de-stressing, especially sincemost people take a nap and ruin their nighttime sleep ormake negative associationswith their bedroom and then cannot fall asleep right away. She recommended not stimulating the brain with reading or television while in bed; rather, try being in another room first. She also said if it takes more than a half-hour to fall asleep, you should leave the bedroom for a little while, so the brain doesn’t become trained to associate a bed with not sleeping.
Exercising is another key component because most people choose to lie down and watch television when they feel stressed. Instead, Nayak said a 10- to 15-minutewalk releases endorphins and gets the blood flowing, which helps more than sitting on the couch.
She also said that unhealthy behaviors such as drinking alcohol, using drugs, overeating, and ingesting too much caffeine should be avoided.
Overall, she said the best steps to take are to take care of yourself, to identify the source of the stress, to learn howto reduce andmanage stress, to keep things in perspective and to get support from friends or professionally, if needed.
“The important thing is to understand we need tomaintain a balance…andmake sure we’re in the realm of healthy negative emotions,” she said.
For more information, contact NAMI at (732) 940- 0991 or at www.NAMINJ.org.