College students and Stress
College can be stressful and knowing that going into it can help you to handle it as it comes to you. With deadlines, schedules, friends, and more all vying for your time and attention it can be easy to succumb to the trap of stress. Anyone who has been in a high stress environment can tell you about how it has affected there mental and physical health. An example of high stress environment is the pandemic that we have all been living with for the past two years and all the challenges that have come with it. A recent survey showed that 70% of students report emotional distress or anxiety due to the pandemic and going back for spring term. This indicates that stress is a huge factor in what students consider when going back to campus, and as many have possibly learned to much stress, which is a mental problem can manifest physical symptoms. These include forgetfulness, tiredness, headaches, and digestive issues to name a few. Your sleep can be effected by stress as well which for those who have trouble sleeping can be stressful. It is known that stress can increase both adrenaline and cortisol which can cause bad sleep and the cycle continues. Having and holding all this stress can leave you anxious and depressed. This past fall a survey of 33,000 college students nationwide showed that 50% of them have increased anxiety or depression. So what does all of this mean? Seems to me that there is a lot of overstressed future of the world people out there that are having a hard go at things.
But there is hope out there, with many different ways to mitigate stress one can live a good and fulfilling life and not succumb to the stress. Different people of course react in different ways to different stimuli. Know yourself is the first tip that every should consider can think to do. As Thomas Frank states "know the signs" in his burnout video the same applies to this know the signs of being stressed and then know or learn how to help yourself to handle it. Some ways to deal with it is to schedule downtime, doing this puts the importance on the downtime and makes one more likely to do it. Another way to help is with proper eating including your portion size. This has be proven to help with brain fog and with possible digestive issues. Being active is one of those things that you may have to schedule as well. Along with all of this try not to pick up any bad habits like drinking or smoking.
But it is understandable that things can get to a place where its beyond hard to handle. When it gets to this point there are a few organizations that will stretch the ends of the earth to help. Active minds is an not for profit organization that is focused on destigmatizing mental health. They are headquartered out of Washington D.C. and have chapters located on college campuses across the nation. It was started as a response to Alison Malmon's brother taking his own life from mental health issues that had been accumulating for years and left unsaid. You talk to your campus representative and they talk and listen to you. They also have number's for the test talk hotline 741-741 and for the national suicide prevention hotline at 1-800-273-8255 in case you are in a crisis and need critical help right away.
Sources:
https://medlineplus.gov/ency/article/003211.htm
https://www.mattressclarity.com/blog/stress-and-sleep-in-college/
https://www.cnbc.com/2021/11/09/how-to-keep-stress-during-college-from-sabotaging-your-future.html
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