Stress, Anxiety, and Panic Resources

Stress Anxiety Panic Attacks

Stress

Stress is your body’s response to a real or imagined threat and evolved as a response to help keep you safe and protected from harm. When under stress, you might notice physical symptoms like:

Increased alertness
Increased heart rate
Tense muscles
Sweating
Dry mouth
Upset stomach

You may also notice emotional signs of stress such as:

Restlessness
Hard time making decisions
Irritability
Confusion
Self-criticism

Moderate amounts of stress can be useful – it helps you think more clearly, stay focused, and respond quickly.

However, chronic stress and major stressors can negatively impact physical and mental health. While stress can’t be eliminated completely from our lives, there are strategies to help manage it.

Stress Management Strategies

Focus on the basics.

Try to get 8 hours of sleep (or close to it) as frequently as possible.
Move your body every day to relieve physical and emotional stress in your body.
Focus on eating foods that fuel your body. Avoid skipping meals.
Limit caffeine intake, since caffeine can amplify many of the physical manifestations of stress.
Don’t rely on alcohol and drugs as a stress reliever.

Implement time management strategies.

Try the Pomodoro method – do work for 20 minutes and take a 5 minute break and repeat as needed.
Say no to things that aren’t essential to your own wellbeing.
Be realistic about what you can and can’t do. Being overambitious with time is a frequent stressor.
Visit the StAAR Center to learn more about scheduling your time, effective study techniques, and more to help balance your time.

Make time for your own wellbeing.

Practice deep breathing when you’re feeling stressed.
Be kind to yourself and talk to yourself the same way you would talk to a friend.
Spend time with people who make you smile.
Talk to someone you trust about what you’re going through.

Anxiety

Anxiety is your body’s reaction to stressful, dangerous, or unfamiliar situations. Anxiety can manifest in many ways, like jitteriness, nervousness, increased heart rate, sweating, difficulty concentrating, insomnia, and changes in eating habits.

Stressful situations — a big test, public speaking, a first date — might make you feel anxious, but that feeling will probably pass once the source of the stress is gone. If you have an anxiety disorder, the fear and dread do not go away even when the source of the stress is gone.

Often, our first instinct is to avoid an anxiety-producing situation by procrastinating or physically avoiding the situation. Although this might lead to an immediate feeling of relief, the feeling doesn’t last long, and next time we’re confronted with that original anxiety-producing situation, we’re likely to feel even more anxious.

If you’re feeling anxious, try one of the following techniques:

Box Breathing: One of the physical symptoms of anxiety is quicker and shallower breathing. To combat this, try to breathe in deeply and slowly while counting to four. Hold the breath while counting slowly to four, and then breath out while slowly counting to four. Hold your lungs empty while counting slowly to four. Repeat this until your breath is steady and calmer. It can also be helpful to imagine a box in your mind, with each side representing each of the four steps
Count Down: First, identify five things that you can see. They can be big (like a tree) or small (like a stain on your clothes). List them off to yourself, one at a time. Do the same with four things you can hear, three things you can smell, two things you can physically feel. Finish off the exercise with one deep breath
Put It On Paper: Write out everything that’s whizzing around in your mind using a pen and paper. Writing it out can sometimes help you identify rational versus irrational worries, while physically writing it out (versus typing) is a slower and more methodical practice that can help calm you down. Writing things out on paper is a way of diffusing from your thoughts and creating some space between your worries and yourself
Reframe the Narrative: Sometimes, we get caught in unhelpful thinking patterns that can trick our brains and amplify anxiety. For example, we might use all or nothing thinking (“If I’m not perfect, I’ve failed), a mental filter (noticing our failures while ignoring our successes), or emotional reasoning (“I feel embarrassed, so I must be dumb”)
Freeze: One of your body’s reactions to stress is to produce more cortisol. Cold temperatures from a splash of icy cold water to the face, holding an ice pack to your body, or sucking on an ice cube can help offset the feelings of cortisol rushing through your body
Walk It Out: Movement can help relieve some symptoms of anxiety. For instance, going for a walk can help you shake out the physical and mental jitteriness that often accompanies anxiety. Walking also changes the way you breathe, which can also provide a sense of quick relief. While walking in nature has been shown to have powerful benefits, even a walk down the hall and back can help

Panic Attacks

A panic attack is a sudden rush of intense anxiety or fear together with a surge of frightening physical sensations and thoughts. People who experience panic attacks often describe them as the worst feeling they have ever had. Panic attacks are usually brief (5 – 10 minutes) but may be very frightening while they last. They can often seem to come out of the blue, which makes them even scarier. Not everyone experiences the same symptoms; below are the most common.

Physical sensations of a panic attack can include:

Pounding heart
Dizziness/faintness
Difficulty breathing
Chest pain
Numbness/tingling
Sweating
Shaking
Crying

People often feel:

Very frightened
Out of control
Like they are having a heart attack
A strong desire to escape
Like they are going to die

How to Help Someone Having a Panic Attack

Stay calm. Speak in a soothing tone. Tell them you’ll help them through it.
Quiet. Try to move the person to a quiet place, away from a crowd or commotion.
Reassure them. Panic attacks are temporary, and will not cause any lasting harm.
Ask. If they’ve had panic attacks before, what usually calms them down?

Calming Techniques

Encourage slow, deep breathing. Ask them to breathe into their belly through their nose on a count of 5, and then exhale through their mouth on a count of 5.
Take slow, deliberate sips of water
Touch each finger, one at a time, to the center of the palms.
Ask them to observe and describe the sights and sounds around them.
Hold and focus on an object to shift attention – stress ball, stone, keys, etc.
Listen to music or watch a video (if available)
Once the panic subsides, help the person figure out what they need to recover. Some people will feel exhausted and need a period of rest. Others will feel better engaging in activity, either alone or with the group.