Help to Manage and Reduce Stress

What is Stress?

Stress is the body's reaction to feeling threatened or under pressure.

When we are stressed, our body releases a hormone called adrenaline (often called the "fight or flight" hormone), which usually gives us a boost or motivates us to act quickly.

But too much stress can affect our mood, our body and our relationships – especially when it feels out of our control. It can make us feel anxious and irritable, and affect our self-esteem.

Experiencing long-term stress or severe stress can lead to feeling physical, mental and emotional exhaustion, often called "burnout"

When is stress a problem?

Sometimes, a small amount of stress can help us to complete tasks and feel more energised. But stress can become a problem when it lasts for a long time or is very intense. In some cases, stress can affect our physical and mental health.

You might hear healthcare professionals refer to some types of stress as 'acute' or 'chronic':

• Acute stress usually happens immediately after an upsetting or unexpected event. For example, a sudden bereavement, incident or event. It can last up to a month and is very intense. 
• Chronic stress lasts for a long period of time or keeps coming back. You might experience this if you're under lots of pressure a lot of the time. You might also feel chronic stress if your day-to-day life is difficult, for example if you're a carer or if you're struggling to get by financially.

Is stress a mental health problem?

Stress isn't normally considered a mental health problem. But it is connected to our mental health in several ways:

• Stress can cause mental health problems. And it can make existing problems worse. For example, if you experience lots of stress, this might lead you to develop a mental health problem like anxiety or depression. Or experiencing a very stressful or traumatic event might lead to post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).
• Mental health problems can cause stress. You might find coping with the day-to-day symptoms of your mental health problem stressful. You may also feel stressed about managing medication, healthcare appointments or other treatments.
• You might use recreational drugs or alcohol to cope with stress. This could also affect your mental health, and cause further stress.

What causes stress?

The things that cause stress vary from person to person. We can experience stress in many ways, you might feel stressed because of one big event or situation in your life. Or it might be a build-up of lots of smaller things. This might make it harder for you to identify what's making you feel stressed. 

When might I experience stress? You may experience stress if you:

• Feel under lots of pressure
• Face big changes in your life
• Are going through a period of uncertainty
• Are worried about something
• Don't have much or any control over the outcome of a situation
• Have responsibilities that you find overwhelming
• Don't have enough work, activities or change in your life
• Experience discrimination, hate or abuse

Example causes of stress:

• Work related: volume of work too high, feeling unclear about role and responsibilities, lack of support in the workplace. (more detail on this further down)
• Illness or injury
• Bereavement
• Pregnancy and becoming a parent
• Infertility and problems having children
• Difficult or break down of a relationships with spouses, children, parents
• Being a carer/caring responsibilities 
• Money worries/managing debt
• Organising events such as getting married or civil partnered, house move, even a holiday!
• Living through a stressful community-wide, national or global event, like the coronavirus pandemic

Signs and symptoms of stress

Stress can affect our emotions and we may:

• be irritable, angry or tearful
• feel worried, anxious, hopeless or scared
• struggle to make decisions, have racing thoughts or feel overwhelmed

The physical symptoms of stress include:

• stomach problems, stress headaches and other odd pains including muscle pain
• skin reactions, like stress rashes and hives
• feeling dizzy, sick or faint

Sometimes, stress causes high blood pressure and chest pains – but these symptoms should stop when your stress goes. If you have any symptoms that you are worried about, or feel you have more severe stress, see a GP.

Stress can also make us behave differently, especially around:

• how much we eat or exercise
• our habits around drinking, smoking or taking other substances
• how much we see people or do things we used to do or enjoy (avoidance)

Work related stress

Everyone can face pressure at work, regardless of age, experience or job title. Sometimes pressure can motivate and make us more productive.  However, too much pressure can become stressful and affect our happiness and quality of life, leaving us feeling physically and mentally unwell.

There are many factors that can cause stress at work, these can include:

• too many or conflicting demands
• poor working conditions
• little control over how and when work is done or decision making
• lack of support or encouragement from managers and others at work
• bullying and conflict at work, particularly if these are not managed well
• not having enough training or skills to do a job
• feeling unclear about roles and responsibilities
• low trust and not feeling able to speak up about concerns
• change within the organisation

Support for Stress at Work

If you are experiencing stress at work, it is important to talk to someone, the initial person being your line manager. Talk to them as early as possible as this will give them chance to help and support the situation. You may be signposted to the following services for support:

Professional support for your mental wellbeing: Employee Assistance Programme ‘Health Hero’. A confidential and independent wellbeing support service that includes counselling. This service supports colleagues experiencing work-related stress. 

Occupational Health: this service offers a referral process for support and advice on physical or mental wellbeing problems is impacting an individual. You can find out more here.

Your GP: contacting your GP to discuss your current experiences of stress is important to access support and interventions that can help.

I do not feel I can talk to my line manager right now:

If you do not feel about to talk to your line manager about how you are feeling at this time, you could talk to:

• trade union representative
• People Partner for your area

View the drop down boxes below for help and advice on what steps you can take to help reduce stress.