Relaxation Technique for Stress and Anxiety - Manage Your Stress

Stress, depression and 'hostility' put older people at greater risk of suffering a stroke, research has revealed

• Depression and stress associated with 'significantly increased risk' of stroke
• Factors could increase the risk for older people and middle-aged adults
• 'Hostility' can more than double the likelihood of having a stroke, say experts
• The research was carried out at the University of Minnesota in the U.S.

Stress, hostility and depression put older people at much greater risk of suffering a stroke, a new study has warned. 

The three factors are associated with a 'significantly increased risk' of stroke in middle-age and older adults, researchers have found. 

Hostility alone more than doubled the likelihood of having a full-blown or 'mini' stroke, also known as a transient ischaemic attack (TIA), a study claims.

Chronic stress increased stroke and TIA risk by 59 per cent, and depressive symptoms by 86 per cent.

Scientists used questionnaires to assess chronic stress, depressive symptoms, anger and hostility in 6,700 men and women aged 45 to 84.

Over a period of eight-and-a-half to 11 years, a total of 147 strokes and 48 TIAs occurred within the group.

The only trait not linked to a higher risk of stroke was anger, despite the strong association with hostility.

The researchers defined hostility as a 'negative way of viewing the world' and measured it by assessing participants’ cynicism.

Study leader Dr Susan Everson-Rose, from the University of Minnesota in the U.S., said: 'There’s such a focus on traditional risk factors - cholesterol levels, blood pressure, smoking and so forth - and those are all very important, but studies like this one show that psychological characteristics are equally important.

'Given our ageing population, it’s important to consider these other factors that might play a role in disease risk.

Older people are more likely to have a stroke if they are suffering from depression or stress, research has found.

'Stroke is a disease of the elderly predominantly, and so learning more about things that can influence risk for stroke as people age is important.'

The findings are published in the American Heart Association journal Stroke.

Chronic stress was measured in five different areas relating to personal health, the health problems of close others, work or the ability to do a job, relationships and finances.

Scientists used questionnaires to assess chronic stress, depressive symptoms, anger and hostility in 6,700 men and women aged 45 to 84

Based on participants’ answers, scores were allocated for depressive symptoms and anger levels.

The associations remained significant after accounting for age, race, sex, lifestyle and other factors known to influence stroke risk.

Dr Everson-Rose added: 'One thing we didn’t assess is coping strategies.

'If someone is experiencing depressive symptoms or feeling a lot of stress or hostility, we don’t know how they manage those, so it’s possible that positive coping strategies could ameliorate some of these associations or effects.

'We did not inquire about coping. I would say that’s one of the tasks for future studies.'

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-2687748/Stress-depression-hostility-older-people-greater-risk-suffering-stroke-research-revealed.html

Anxiety And Stress Management - A Chinese Medicine Approach

By Tracey-Ann Brown, Complementary & Oriental Medicine

These days, many people find themselves feeling excessively stressed and struggling to find the balance between work, family, their various commitments, and a feeling of relaxed endeavour. This stress may manifest with feelings of anxiousness, insomnia/sleeplessness, headaches, moodiness, and in some cases low energy.

Traditional Chinese medicine offers a number of approaches in managing some of these concerns.

Herbal remedies

In traditional Chinese medicine, several herbs are usually combined to calm and settle the shen/spirit, in order to reduce anxiety, irritability and restlessness, restore healthy sleep patterns and clear thoughts. Formulas are prepared from a wide variety of herbs, shells and minerals called SHEN CALMERS.

These include:

HERBS

Suan Zao Ren (Sour Jujube Seed)

He Huan Pi (Mimosa Tree Bark or 'Collective Happiness Bark')

SHELLS

Mu Li (Oyster Shell)

Zhen Zhu Mu (Mother of Pearl)

MINERALS

Hu Po (Amber)

Dai Zhe Shi (Hematite)

These Shen calmers are divided into two categories:

Substances that anchor, settle and calm the spirit - these substances have a sedative and tranquilising effect.

Herbs that nourish the heart and calm the spirit: These are used primarily in cases of anxiety accompanied by palpitations. These herbs are milder in character than the previous category and are more nourishing.

In preparing herbal prescriptions, herbs may also be added to address other accompanying or underlying health issues in order to achieve optimal healing. For example, if feelings of stress and anxiousness are accompanied by digestive problems or even hot flashes, then a formula would be prepared to address all of these issues simultaneously.

Acupuncture

Acupuncture also offers an additional course of treatment for relief, whether alongside herbal remedies or on its own. Acupuncture points are selected from over 1,000 points on the body and gently stimulated. This in turn stimulates the central nervous system, which assists the body in restoring its self-regulating systems. The Ear Shen Men Point is especially effective as part of a treatment to ease anxiety.

Tai chi

Tai chi is a Chinese martial art that is primarily practised for its health benefits. Tai chi emphasises complete relaxation and is essentially a form of 'meditation in motion'. It is characterised by soft, slow, flowing movements.

Dietary recommendations

As with any health care programme, to resolve ill-health, diet plays an important role. A number of foods can assist in the management of stress and easing anxiety.

These include:

Grains: whole wheat, brown rice, oats

Vegetables and their juices: mushroom, cucumber, celery, lettuce

Spices: dill, basil

Teas: chamomile, valerian, rose hips

Milk (cow and goat)

Wheat germ

Foods to avoid include: alcohol, coffee, cigarettes.

Lifestyle recommendations

Daily practises that calm and nurture the spirit. Such as: prayer, meditation, silent contemplation, mantras, chanting, and various relaxed and mindful processes that promote self-reflection and quiet.

Your physical, as well as emotional environment is another key factor. Try to avoid excessive pollution or noise, harmful speech and relationships that are more of a burden than a joy.

http://jamaica-gleaner.com/gleaner/20140702/health/health1.html

6 Relaxation Techniques to Cope with Stress, Anxiety and Depression

Brain 'switch' may control stress

Many of us find ourselves swimming along in the tranquil sea of life when suddenly a crisis hits - a death in the family, the loss of a job, a bad breakup. Some power through and find calm waters again, while others drown in depression.

Scientists continue to search for the underlying genes and neurobiology that dictate our reactions to stress. Now, a study using mice has found a switch-like mechanism between resilience and defeat in an area of the brain that plays an important role in regulating emotions and has been linked with mood and anxiety disorders.

After artificially enhancing the activity of neurons in that part of the brain - the medial prefrontal cortex - mice that previously fought to avoid electric shocks started to act helpless. Rather than leaping for an open escape route, they sat in a corner taking the pain - presumably out of a belief that nothing they could do would change their circumstances.

"This helpless behaviour is quite similar to what clinicians see in depressed individuals - an inability to take action to avoid or correct a difficult situation," said study author and neuroscientist Bo Li of the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory in New York. The results were published online May 27 in the Journal of Neuroscience.

Because there is no true animal equivalent to the depression that affects humans, researchers instead model certain symptoms of the disorder, such as despair and, in this case, helplessness.

In his famous 1967 experiment on dogs, American psychologist Martin Seligman discovered that helplessness can be learned. He put a dog into a box with two chambers divided by a barrier that could be jumped over. When one chamber became electrified, the dog ran around frantically, finally scrambling over the barrier to escape the shock. In later trials, evading the shock becomes easier and easier for the animal until it would just stand next to the barrier waiting to jump.

But the outcome is much more grim if a dog first learns that electric shocks are uncontrollable and unavoidable. If animals are repeatedly shocked while tied up beforehand, then later placed in the same box free to roam, most didn't jump the barrier. Instead, they lay down while whining and taking the jolt. Subsequent trials showcased the animal's same passive, defeatist response.

Seligman formed a theory he called learned helplessness. It occurs when an animal or human has learned that outcomes are uncontrollable and thus fails to take any action in the future despite a clear ability to change its situation.

Learned helplessness has been observed in human experiments, such as subjects enduring a loud, disturbing noise if they had been taught that it wasn't under their control. Since then, the theory has been used to build up the human spirit. (Seligman set up a resilience-training program for US Army soldiers to do this, as well as to break it down.) Before President Barack Obama banned the practice, the CIA used sleep deprivation, stress positions and sometimes multiple methods while interrogating detainees in order to create a "state of learned helplessness and dependence" in them.

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In Li's experiment, mice were put into a two-chambered cage with a door between them that at first was closed. For one hour, they were subjected to inescapable foot shocks in an unpredictable manner, giving them the impression that nothing could be done to prepare for or avoid the jolts. This learning period occurred over two days. On the third day, the door opened to allow the mice to escape by running into the other chamber that was not electrified.

After a few trials, most mice avoided the shocks by standing near the door, waiting for it to open and running through to the other chamber. But about 20 percent developed learned helplessness.

"They sit in the corner and just take the shock," said study author and biologist Zina Perova, who worked on the study in Li's group as a graduate student. "It's this belief of 'No matter what I do, it won't change anything' - it's hopelessness."

The team investigated which part of the brain lit up during such an experiment by using a genetically modified mouse whose neurons glow green when activated.

After the learned-helplessness trials, the researchers extracted brain slices and found that neurons were tagged with green in the medial prefrontal cortex.

Then they looked closely at these tagged neurons, searching for differences among the two groups of mice. Li and his colleagues discovered that the neurons from helpless mice had more nodes of connection and mice that showed determination had fewer. They presumed that this could mean an increase and decrease, respectively, in how active those neurons were.

To verify that, the researchers artificially boosted activity in the medial prefrontal cortex of resilient mice - those that easily escaped the shocks. The mice suddenly became helpless. A switch seemed to flip in their brains, and the previously strong rodents lost their determination and failed to avoid the painful jolts. Although learned helplessness can be overcome through antidepressant drugs or if an experimenter shows the animal how to escape, the researchers had never seen once-persevering mice turn helpless before.

Next, Li hopes to investigate whether the switch goes the opposite way - whether inhibition of activity of these neurons makes helpless mice strong - and suspects that it may.

If so, the results would be consistent with deep brain stimulation, a treatment for depression that uses electrical impulses to inhibit neuronal activity in a targeted brain area.

The study "tells us pretty clearly that the medial prefrontal cortex is important in anxiety and stress behaviours," said neuroscientist Amit Etkin of Stanford University, who was not involved in the study. "There's a lot of interest in doing deep brain stimulation in that area."

In addition to emotion regulation, the medial prefrontal cortex has been implicated in such tasks as decision-making and memory retrieval.

"It's thought to be an area important for understanding your environment and how you fit in," said neurobiologist Ronald Duman of Yale University, who also was not involved in the research. "So disruption of that may alter how you feel about yourself in that environment."

Duman notes that other areas of the brain have been associated with depression in prior studies as well, such as the hippocampus and amygdala. Our complex brain circuitry - how all these parts interact - likely complicates any easy translation of this switch mechanism to humans.

"To really understand what's going on, we have to get down to the level of how [the medial prefrontal cortex] is talking to other brain regions," Etkin said.

- The Washington Post

http://www.stuff.co.nz/life-style/wellbeing/10128680/Brain-switch-may-control-stress

French women use colouring books to help relieve stress and anxiety

Publishers market the books as having "therapeutic" qualities

Usually associated with play-schools and toy boxes, colouring books have a found a new fan-base in France, where women have taken up colouring to help ease their stress and anxiety.

The trend is thanks to a clever marketing ploy used by publishers, which means more of the books are bought in France – mainly by women - than in any other nation in the world, the Telegraphreported.

By advertising the books as “therapeutic” and “anti-stress”, and swapping child-friendly scenes for more mature topics such as “medieval art” or “extraordinary gardens”, publishers have harnessed a niche market.

Now, colouring books sell faster than cookery books in France, according to trade publication Livres Hebdo.

One example of the success of clever marketing comes in the English title Secret Garden - An Inky Treasure Hunt and Colouring Book by Johanna Basford.  French publisher Marabout added “anti-stress” to the title, and the book sold many more copies than it did in Britain, the newspaper reported.

“We did a test run in 2012 when we launched 100 Coloriages Anti-Stress, which we had bought from a British publisher that sold it as Colouring for Grown-ups,” Anne Le Meur, who runs the colouring book section of publisher Hachette, told the newspaper.

“It was an instant success, love at first sight!”

35-year-old Cynthia Riviere from the souther city of Arles runs a Facebook group for colouring book fans. She told the newspaper she colours for an hour a day, and finds the activity alleviates her headaches, and moves her “into a deep calm”. 

http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/health-and-families/health-news/french-women-use-colouring-books-to-help-relieve-stress-and-anxiety-9479711.html

STRESS LEVELS ARE LOWER AT WORK

Ever feel like escaping to the office after a long day at home? Sounds counterintuitive but according to a new Penn State study, that's exactly how many of us feel.

Photo credit: Musketeer/Digital Vision/Getty Images

Researchers measured levels of cortisol, the "stress hormone," in people at home and on the job and were surprised to find the levels were lower at work. And not only were both men and women significantly less stressed out at work, but women also reported feeling happier at work than at home. In addition, they found that people who work full time are healthier mentally and physically. So how is it possible that the place with the plasma TV, pillow-top mattress and chocolate stash is the more stressful environment for women?

Lead researcher Sarah Damaske, Ph.D., an assistant professor of labor and employment relations, sociology and women’s studies, has two ideas. "Women continue to do more work in the household and have less leisure time there than men. That means that when they come home from work, they are maybe feeling more harried than men are," she explains. In addition, she found that women have to make tough decisions about workforce participation, particularly when they have children, which means that those women who remain employed are choosing to do so because they are more likely to have found a job that works for their lives.

Being a working mom myself, I can see her points, but I wonder if part of it isn't also the pressure that women feel to excel in both spheres. If we work outside the home, we feel more pressure to make sure nothing slips by when we are home. We feel like we need to make up for the time we are missing with our kids and also stay on top of the groceries, laundry and piano lessons. Plus so many people are taking work home with them these days, blurring that line between work and home. So I can understand why it might be easier to go to the office where the only thing you have to focus on is work.

Although that may not be as true for parents. The researchers found that parents experienced a less significant drop in stress at work than non-parents. As any parent can tell you, this isn't totally surprising — kids have a way of complicating things whether or not you're physically with them. (Did I tell you about the time I got called to the principal's office three times in one day? For the same kid? I might as well have set up shop in her waiting room.) Plus juggling multiple schedules just means more stress. But Damaske, also a working mom, says there's a bright side.

"Kids are a natural stress reliever, helping parents to be less stressed at home [accounting for the smaller distance between work and home stress levels]" she says. "I think about my daughter and all the joy she's brought to my life. She's almost 2 and likes to dance when she's happy — so there's lots of dancing in my house these days. How could that not lower your stress?"

Aw, now I want to go dance with my babies. What about you? Do you feel less stressed at home or at work?

Dr. Sandra Parker - Dealing with Anxiety