This paper examines coping with stress or stress management in the responsibilities, schedules, and tasks of daily life. The paper begins with a discussion of the potential sources of stress where the demands of work, school, and home have been identified as probable stressors. The identification of sources of stress is followed by description of steps and initiatives taken to lessen stress.
Coping With Stress:
Stress has become a relatively common part of life since every individual is likely to experience it at certain times regardless of whether they are adults, teens, or children. Generally, stress can be described as a situation characterized by signs of emotional or physical reaction, particularly when responding to a situation when an individual feels threatened or is worried. While there are several common reactions to a stressful situation, stress can either be positive or negative. The positive or beneficial aspect of stress occurs when an individual develops the skills for coping and adapting to new situations in life. On the contrary, stress is negative if it's severe to the extent that it overwhelms the ability of a person to care for themselves and family. Therefore, it's important for an individual to develop healthy ways for coping and obtaining right care that lessens stressful feelings and symptoms ("Coping with Stress," 2013).
Potential Stressful Situations:
Similar to many people, stress has become a normal part of my life, especially with regards to balancing work, school, and home. Currently, I am a working mother, full-time teaching assistant for special education Autistic K/1 class, and a student completing degree for teaching special education with a concentration in Autism. In addition, I also spare some time to care for elderly patients as well as maintaining home.
Stressful situations are likely to occur from three major areas in my life i.e. work, school, and at home. As a working mother, I face a huge need to maintain home while providing full and effective concentration in my work responsibilities as a teacher. With regards to work, one of the major areas that are likely to cause stressful feelings is exposure to physically and emotionally stressful experiences when providing special education for Autistic K/1 class i.e. children with disability.
The full time teaching assistant job means that I have to provide comprehensive special education programs to children with disability. This requires the provision of direct school support and facilitating communication throughout the elements of autism. One of the central focuses in special education for Autistic K/1 class, which can contribute to stressful situations, is outcomes-focused teaching. Consequently, the services provided to the students include helping in communication difficulties, impaired social skills, and behavioral responses. Together with providing care for elderly parents, teaching Autistic K/1 class has increased exposure to stressful situations because of the conditions of these children and parents as well as the demands. Actually, the provision of care to the parents and children is a very demanding work since it's outcomes-focused.
The potential area that can result in stressful feelings and symptoms are school work i.e. being a full-time college student completing a degree for teaching special education with a major in Autism. School work is also very demanding because teaching special education, especially Autism requires the development of special skills and knowledge. Work and school contribute to major challenges in maintaining the home setting, which can lead to stress.
How to Cope with Stress:
The first step towards stress management or coping with stress is to identify the potential sources of stress, which in this case are school, work, and home. Stressful feelings and situations can arise in these areas when there is no balance between each of them. As evident in this scenario, there is a great need to maintain the home, work as a full-time teaching assistant, and concentrating on studies to complete the degree in special education. After identifying the potential sources of stressful situations and conditions, several steps should be carried out to cope with stress (Smith & Regal, 2013).
The first strategies I use to cope with stress are to avoid unnecessary stressful situations and adapting to the stressor. While addressing situations that need to be dealt with, one of the major ways of coping with stress is to avoid unnecessary stress. This basically involves learning how to say no by identifying personal limits and maintain these limits. In both personal and professional life, the limits include rejecting additional responsibilities, particularly duties or issues that cannot be handled. In addition, this process involves examining daily responsibilities, schedules and tasks when developing a things-to-do list.
After avoiding unnecessary stress through identifying limits and maintaining them, the second step in coping with stress is to adapt to the stressor through regaining the sense of control by changing personal attitude and expectations (Smith & Regal, 2013). This involves viewing stressing situations from a positive angle, adjusting personal standards, examining the whole picture of a stressful situation, and focusing on the positive aspects.
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