One thing that is permanent in a nursing students life… well in any students life really. With papers, exams, feeble attempts at a social life in between all that and other commitments add to the wonderful world of a student! Student life=NO TIME. No time for alone time, family time, or any of the sort. Any sort of commitment outside of school makes you feel torn, with your loyalty dragged all over the place. Stress is a silly thing, theres bad stress that makes you feel crappy and it has serious effects on your health – pimples, eating habits, digestive problems, headaches, dehydration, overcaffeination! However somehow there is a good stress? … “Eustress”. What is eustress you ask? Eustress is defined as the stress that is healthy for us... apparently… somehow stress can be healthy?
Distress is the most commonly-referred to type of stress, having negative implications, whereas eustress is a positive form of stress, usually related to desirable events in a person's life. Both can be equally taxing on the body depending on a person's way of adapting to a change. The body cannot tell the difference between distress or eustress.
So wouldn’t that really mean that the outcome is the healthy part? Not the fact that the body is under stress. And the body can’t decipher the difference, so either way you’re under stress. How can that be healthy?
Stress is an interesting, unfortunately inevitable part of adult life. Especially for students; every possible aspect of a student’s life is stressful. It’s only understandable that most are alcoholics, caffeine addicts, insomniacs or even the other extreme of narcolepsy. Everyone is affected differently with stress and deals with it differently. I, personally, like to throw shit around and I tend to cry when I am seriously stressed out. Or I have a serious problem of just not dealing with the particular thing that's causing me stress; I know unhealthy blah blah. But we each have our ways of dealing with stress but sometimes you just need to act a little crazy. I hope each of you has found a healthy-ish way of dealing with stress and for those who have yet to find a way to deal, fret not, I have found the best stress relievers. Just a few tidbits found and made up to bring a little joy to your day.
This comes from one of my nursing lab books (slightly changed)
-Use your Mastercard to pay off your Visa
-Pop some popcorn without putting the lid on
-Write "out to lunch" on your forehead
-Lie on your back; eat celery, using your navel as a salt dipper
-When someone says, "Have a nice day" tell him or her you've got other plans.
-Stare at people through the lines of a fork and imagine they're in jail
-Move Caution: Wet floor signs to carpeted areas
-Dance naked in front of your pets
-Games of “Marco Polo” in inconvenient places
-Drive to work in reverse
-Go shopping, buy lots of clothes, exercise in them and return them the next day
-Get a box of condoms, then wait in line at the checkout counter and ask the cashier where the fitting rooms are
-Fill out your tax form in roman numerals
- Set up a desk and chairs in the elevator like it’s your office and ask anyone who comes on the elevator if they have an appointment
-Go into a Superstore, Walmart, Target and set all the alarm clocks so they go off at 10 minute intervals
-Go camping – in a store outdoor display
You can try the traditional stuff; going out for a night away from homework, drinking, sleeping, sex, meditation, reading, bubble baths, yoga etc. but are they as much fun as these?
