Good Friends; Strong Families The Podcast
Welcome to 'Good Friends, Strong Families,' where family coaches and lifelong friends Angela and Anna, armed with over a quarter-century of combined experience, share research-backed strategies, heartwarming chats, and a dose of humor to make your family stronger, more joyful, and deeply connected. Join us in building resilient families through friendship. 🎧💪❤️
Good Friends; Strong Families The Podcast
Uncovering Stress Management Strategies
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Ever wondered how stress affects your mind and body and what you can do about it? Join Angela and Anna on "Good Friends, Strong Families" as we uncover the hidden effects of stress and arm you with strategies to combat it. This episode offers a deep dive into the physiological impacts of stress, including how your brain's chemical responses can alter your decision-making and overall well-being. We break down the differences between chronic and acute stress and identify common stressors such as negative thoughts, relational challenges, and health issues. Plus, we highlight how nutrition and healthy routines can be critical in stress management, providing actionable steps like meal planning and avoiding dietary triggers to maintain your well-being.
But that's not all—we also tackle the universal challenge of managing stress and anxiety for your kids. Angela and Anna emphasize the importance of sharing stress-reduction tips and creating a more relaxed, balanced family life. Engage with us by contributing your methods for reducing stress and exploring additional resources available in our show notes. Continue the conversation on Instagram, where we build a supportive community focused on resilience and connection. By the end of this episode, you'll feel empowered to create a stress-free environment for you and your family. Don't forget to leave a five-star review and share this episode to spread the invaluable message of stress reduction.
Stress Management and Reduction Strategies
Speaker 1Hello and welcome to Good Friends, strong Families, the podcast where every episode equips you with a new skill, surrounds you with support and provides actionable steps you can immediately implement in your family life. I'm Angela and I'm joined by my co-host, anna. In today's episode, we'll talk about the different stresses in life how to manage what you can manage and reduce what you can reduce life. How to manage what you can manage and reduce what you can reduce. So let's dissect the what, the why, the how, so that, at the end of today's episode, you'll be better equipped to raise resilient, connected families. Welcome, welcome, welcome, anna.
Speaker 2Welcome. Yeah, I think everybody would agree that today we are all living in a pretty fast paced world. Schedules can be pretty demanding, distractions are abundant, yes, so it just feels like stress is at every corner right. So it's easy to lose sight of the moments that really matter and we can kind of just get lost in the hustle and bustle. Yeah, everyday life. So, yeah, there's a lot that we can't control, yep, but if we control what we can, we can reduce stress, and so we want to talk about ways that you can reduce the overall stress in your life and then manage what you can't get rid of. Right, there's things that we're going to have to figure out how to deal with.
Speaker 1Yeah, and we talk about stress. I know a lot of times people will talk about stress negatively, like you know oh my gosh, I'm under so much stress. But we know that there are a lot of situations where stress is good and there are different terms that we use in behavioral health around what is good stress versus what is a negative or bad stress. But doesn't matter what kind of stress it is. There are things that we can do that will help us with our stress, and then there are other things that we can do to get rid of some of the things that are causing us some stress.
Speaker 2To begin with, yeah, so I think we should talk about, like, what stress does to our bodies. This is important. Yeah, so when our brain perceives stress or a threatening situation, it actually triggers chemicals. I feel like we talk about brain chemicals a lot, but it makes it sound smart, so it triggers chemicals that shut down some body systems that aren't needed for that instant survival. So it raises the blood pressure and heart rate and it's diverting blood from our brain to our larger muscles. Right, we know this. Fight, flight or freeze.
Speaker 1OK, wait, I am definitely fight Gosh.
Speaker 2I'd like to think I'm fight, but I don't think I am. I think I'm a freezer. Right, right, right right, right.
Speaker 1It's probably not good to be fight, but sometimes I definitely am fight.
Speaker 2So that is like our physical response to stress, right, and so I think it's important to note that blood is being diverted from our brain. What do we need our brains for? A lot, right to make, uh, wise decisions, right. And so if we're constantly stressed out, we probably aren't functioning optimally and handling things that normally, your normal day-to-day things that you don't really think about, you're fine. But then add stress and maybe now you're not sleeping well, maybe now you're turning to junk food, yeah. And so what can we do when we're overly chronically stressed?
Speaker 1That's a good word that you actually use, though like chronically stressed, because I think there are definitely some things that over the years, has had the most impact little versus teens, a lot of work on my plate versus a lot of parenting duties, that type of thing. Um, there are some things that I always have to do and so sometimes those things cause some chronic stress, and that you know that long-term stuff that I carry. But then there's also this acute stress where maybe I have a deadline that I have to get to, or maybe I sort of have an activity that we're all trying to get through. So those are some of the differences, but can you give us a few ideas of things that actually can stress, maybe things that we didn't even think about?
Speaker 2yeah, yeah, so I mean one internally. We can have our own negative thoughts. Yeah, we don't like talking about that. But but relational problems, um health problems you usually don't plan for being sick, right? Or emergencies, right? Um? Are you feeling unsafe? Yeah, um. Too many activities, yes. Do you need to remove things from your plate? Too high expectations, procrastination, holding resentment and grudges.
Speaker 1You have an episode on forgiveness, so we're going to plug that one in there, so you didn't take all the things that cause stress, some of the things that they actually are in our hand. You know you talk a lot about nutrition. You and I've had this conversation a lot about nutrition, and that's actually one of the things if I know stress is coming, or not even just bad stress, but if I know that I'm going to be in a stressful situation, so first thing I do is start thinking about what I'm eating, and not not because you know I'm super fancy, but because I know that my body reacts weird to stress, and so I want to make sure that I'm getting believe it or not, I actually make sure I'm eating a lot more spinach and you know those things that I know will make me feel good and I don't have anything weird to my diet. Yeah, that's good and a lot like extra spicy foods.
Speaker 2It'll really mess with my stomach. It's a good, it's a good time to think about those. Yeah, I think if we have some things like routines in place, um, when unexpected things happen and we can fall back on those routines, yeah, I think that helps us manage those unexpected things. But then also those routines are good to handle the everyday busyness of our schedules. If we know that this is a stressful time, we want to make sure we are planning ahead for our dinners that week. We want to make sure that we are sticking to our bedtime.
Speaker 1Yes, right. So I think having those can be preventative, but then they're also helping us in the moment. One of the families was asking questions of the psychologist on the show and they asked you know, we've gone through this particular tragedy and there's a lot going on in our family. Should we make their bedtime later or, you know, give them extra snacks or whatever? But I do remember the psychologist said absolutely the opposite. What you want to do when there's a lot of tragedy going on around you or uncertainty is you want to solidify routines food, bedtime, food, blah, blah, blah all the things. That you're normal doesn't mean you can't be like. You know, give a little flexible, yeah, but you definitely it's. It is good to keep those routines.
Speaker 2Well, yeah, that makes sense, because you've already been thrown into chaos. Yes, and so if you can fall back on those foundational things that your kids can count on when there's certain things that you can't right Control what you can because there's other stuff you can't- yeah, that's all you can your energy is now just moment to moment versus.
Speaker 2Hey, we know we start our day with a healthy breakfast, we know that we're going to have a family meal together. It may look different right now. We may have to order out because we don't have time to cook, or we may whatever. Maybe you're not able to stay at home in that situation, or whatever it is, but if you can keep any sense of normalcy, that will absolutely reduce stress. So you know, make sure that you're eating healthy moves, healthy moves All the healthy moves Is known to reduce stress. Sleeping enough is known to reduce stress. Another one is exercise. So exercise reduces stress by triggering. Again, we're talking about triggering chemicals, but they're triggering pleasure chemicals in our brain. So serotonin, dopamine, those are going to help us feel a little bit more calm and happy.
Speaker 1Um, so yeah, does feel a little bit like the opposite of what I would normally do when I'm stressed, like I wouldn't just be a walk. Yeah, no, that's right. That's exactly right. Oh, let me start working out now that I'm under stress, because I'm already under stress. I have all this extra time.
Speaker 2But remember, our body is pumping extra blood, those larger muscles, right and so if we don't do anything with that, it's kind of like you can have like that adrenaline crash, and so if you can get some of that energy moved out, another thing is that have you ever almost been in an accident? Yes, and, and your blood is pumping and you it takes a while to calm down, right. So it's also important to talk about how we can kind of force the hand of our body into a relaxation.
Speaker 2Oh, I love that so you love to talk about a certain kind of breathing? Yeah, I call this.
Speaker 1This is a little good. Listen, frances, you're listening to this part and I'm really wanting to feed you in terms of basics, right? So one of the things that we know works is what I call fat-belly breathing. This is really just a method of breathing that will reduce stress and anxiety, but there's a real method to this. I call it fat belly breathing because one of the things that we know is that and maybe it's because we're always trying to suck our belly in is that we often breathe into our chest, but we don't really need to get our breath really far down into your belly in order to get all the oxygen we need for our blood. So, friends, if you're trying this with us, your belly needs to stick out when you breathe that deeply. So you want to take a deep breath that gets it all the way down into your belly and then, if you will take the deep breath for four seconds, hold it for seven seconds and then slowly breathe it out for eight seconds. We're going to do it with you just one time. It's a little weird to do it on a podcast, but let's do it Four seconds in, hold it slowly, breathe it out. All right, do not fall asleep. I need you for the rest of today.
Speaker 1So, friends, that is what we call fat belly breathing. Do that a few times. Even if you just did a minute of that, you would actually feel a tremendous difference in your anxiety, absolutely Finally, the other thing I do want to talk about this today is when you think about how to relax, because this is really important. One of the things that you can do is what we call tense and relax, and this is good because you can actually start really as high up on. You can squeeze together your forehead, squeeze together your cheeks, squeeze together the muscles of your neck, and what you're doing is you're tensing all of your muscles. You can even think about like a warm waterfall over your head and so that you're tensing those muscles and then let that warm waterfall go down your bottom to release those all tension in your bottom. You'll find these.
Speaker 2There's so many great things that most students I love that one because oftentimes I don't realize that I'm holding tension or stress in some parts of my body and it's hard to release something that you can't acknowledge or recognize is there. So if you just start at the top of your body and work your way down, intentionally adding some tension there, and then you can really let go, that's really helpful. Other things that can reduce stress is we already talked about the routines, but maybe you need to change up your routine during time um, eating healthy exercise, we've got those. Really avoiding for caffeine that you may be relying on. Um, we talked about these relaxation techniques like deep breathing and the muscle relaxation. Also, rehearsing stressful situations ahead of time. If you know that you've got to make a difficult phone call or something like that, plan that out a little bit more. Be assertive, learn practical coping skills. Break large tasks into smaller ones.
Speaker 1Stop negative self-talk. That stop procrastinating. I feel like we've said that a lot.
Speaker 2Maybe we're procrastinating music, what, what are things, what are hobbies um? Can you carve out time for yourself, things that feed your soul?
Stress and Anxiety Reduction Strategies
Speaker 1oh, I love that, yeah, okay. Well, here's the thing, friends. This is a big one. I think this is something that we all deal with, we all walk through, and so we're going to continue to talk about this. Look on our show notes. It's going to give you lots of ideas, and we'll continue this discussion as time goes on. We want to hear about what you have to say, about how you reduce stress, how you reduce anxiety. And, friends, this is just the discussion about you, but we can use all of these to train our children so that they are also reducing stress. If you enjoyed today's episode, please leave us a five-star review, share it with a friend, join our conversation on Instagram, go to those show notes, find all of the resources that we've given to you. We want you to be a part of this conversation and don't forget to share with us how you reduce stress and anxiety, for yourself and also for your family. Until next time, take care and goodbye. M-e-n-e-m-e-n-e-.
Speaker 2M.