Teachers in Transition - Episode 42 - Stress and Some Startling Statistics

Stress is on the rise as we enter the new year and a new decade. Indeed, I learned some startling statistics as I was putting together a presentation on stress and stress management last weekend.

To hear more about those startling statistics, listen in.

To watch the Facebook presentation, click here:  https://www.facebook.com/kitty.boitnott/videos/10156961199070745/UzpfSTU1NjUzMDc0NDoxMDE1Njk2MTI5MjcwMDc0NQ/

To download a free eBook on stress management, click here:  http://teachersintransition.com/ebook

And to download a cheat sheet of stress management strategies, click here:  https://kittyboitnott.lpages.co/cheat-sheet-on-stress-management/

And if you aren't sure if your stress level is high enough to be concerned about, download this free stress assessment tool:  https://kittyboitnott.lpages.co/stress-assessment/

For information from Kitty, reach out to her at kittyboitnott@gmail.com.

Transcript

Kitty Boitnott: 0:01

Are you a teacher who's feeling stressed out and overwhelmed? Do you worry that you're feeling symptoms of burnout or are you sure you've already gotten there? Have you started to dream of doing some other kind of job or perhaps pursuing a whole different career, but you don't know what else you're even qualified to do? You don't know how to start a job search. You just feel stuck. If that sounds like you, I promise you're not alone. My name is Kitty Boitnott. I'm a career transition and job search coach and I specialize in helping burnt out teachers just like you deal not only with the stress and overwhelm of your day-to-day job, but to consider what other careers might be out there waiting for you. Join me for"Teachers in Transition." In some episodes I'll be speaking to stress management techniques and how you can manage your stress on a day to day basis. In other episodes I'll be talking about career transition. What tools do you need to be successful in a job search when you're moving from one career into a totally different track? These are questions that you need answers to and I can help you find those answers. My name is Kitty Boitnott. Welcome to"Teachers in Transition." Welcome back to Episode 42 of"Teachers in Transition." I am excited that you're here. My name is Kitty Boitnott, the founder of"Teachers in Transition" and the owner of Boitnott Coaching LLC, and this week, I'm going to talk about some stress statistics. Uh, just this weekend, I offered a presentation for a friend and colleague, coach colleague on the issue of stress and how we need to perhaps tackle it in 2020, and a little different way from the way we've approached it in the past. We are in a period in our history that is creating more and more stress for more and more people. And it's across the board and it's every demographic is experiencing an increased level of stress in their lives. But the teachers that I work with are increasingly calling me with very specific stress-related ailments, illnesses and symptoms that are being created by the extra stress that they feel on the job. Just this week, I've talked to someone who was in the emergency room a few days ago. She thought she was having a heart attack, and as it turned out, she wasn't, but(thank goodness), but while she was there was so discombobulated and stressed that, uh, therefore a little while the folks in ER thought maybe she had had a stroke, it turned out it was mostly anxiety, uh, maybe, uh, a partial or complete panic attack. And the precipitating event had been something that happened at work. So, as I was preparing to do this presentation for my colleague, uh, the, the event was called the" A New Year, A New You, a Virtual Vendors Show" where my colleague gathered together probably 20 plus coaches, consultants, health professionals, uh, wellness coaches, folks who are experts in some area around health and wellness and being the best you, you can be. And my contribution was a workshop on stress management as I was preparing, I've done stress management workshops over the years, um, for teachers and busy professionals. But it had been a little while since I offered my last one. So I decided to do some research and and see if I could update some of the statistics. And I was actually startled at the new statistics that I found. Some of them have stayed the same, but some of them, frankly, were quite, um, quite distressing. So for example, and this just blows my mind: 83% of American workers have reported suffering stress as the result of something at work. A work related stress, 83%. I mean, that means only 17% ar en't f a iling w ork related stress. What in the heck is going on? In the United States businesses are losing up to 300,$300 billion a year as a r esult of workplace stress. You'd think they'd be trying to do something about it, don't you think? I mean, and this is, this is b usinesses, but it also includes I'm sure teachers and other professionals who work in nonprofits an d, and organizations where the stress level is just as high. Stress is causing around a million workers a day to call in sick depression has led to$51 billion in cost due to absenteeism. And$26 billion a year in treatment costs. Work related stress has caused 120,000 deaths a year and is resulting in$190 billion in healthcare costs annually. 55% of Americans say they are stressed at some time during the day. Americans are apparently among the most stressed out populations in the world. Over half of American pop Americans are expressing stress sometime during the day. And on a scale of one to 10 Americans are rating their stress at 4.9. Women are more stressed than men. Their--women are on average reporting their stress at a rate of 5.1 on a scale of 10 well, men are all the way down at 4.4 which is still too high. 66% of Americans say they're losing sleep due to work stress. 16% have actually quit their job because of stress, and 63% say they are ready to quit their job because of stress. Now, if these statistics are true and I have no reason to doubt them, we are in a crisis! People are, and this is perhaps more than part of the reason, more than I'm more of a explanation of why so many Americans are now addicted to opioids, are addicted to alcohol, are seeking escapism through a variety of unhealthy behaviors, and that's contributing to the increased death rate that is attributed to stress. Now, I think these are alarming statistics, but what I think is even more alarming is that we aren't doing enough for ourselves to get a hold of it to, to, to get, um, to get to the point of feeling like we've got some control, some sense of being able to relieve and manage our stress. And so what I'm urging you to do is to examine your own life, determine what you think might think about on a scale of one to 10, how stressed are you today? If you're at a five or above, Oh my gosh, you need to start taking care of yourself. I've said it before, I'll say it again. Self-care is not selfish. If you aren't taking care of yourself, you are not in a position to take care of anybody else. And that's whether you're a parent, a child of an aging parent who needs you, a sibling of a another sibling who is in a position of needing your assistance or a teacher or--think of all the other professions where if you are at your optimum best, you aren't able to do your best for other people. Nurses, doctors, any caregiver. I mean, teachers are certainly not the only ones who feel stressed out. Apparently nationally across the board, we're feeling stressed out. So the first step is to recognize your own stress, to be willing to admit that you are stressed out. Sometimes people are so wrapped up in their stress that they're not even aware of it. They just think that this is a normal way to live. It isn't. If you, if you aren't working in some activity each day that helps you to relax and to feel more in tune with yourself and makes you happy, then you're out you're out of whack. You're, you're out of your, out of balance with yourself. If you're constantly in fight or flight mode, if you constantly feel like you're struggling to make it through the day, then it's time to make some changes in your life. Now in my eBook and in my presentations and my cheat sheet, which I've offered in the past and I will offer again today because this is too critically important to to not share...In, in each of those resources I offer that there are different things that we can do each day that don't cost anything and don't take up a lot of time. They can help you to start to feel some relief from your stress and to help you manage it proactively and effectively so that you build a sense of resilience and and and create a sense of control in your life and less like you're hanging on by your fingernails trying to make it through the day. Staying hydrated, eating for nutrition, not instead of lots of, we liked, we liked to eat the sugary foods, the high fat foods because they actually do comfort us. When we eat something that's got a lot of sugar in it or as high fat. It actually increases our dopamine level. The dopamine hormone increases...it causes us to feel a sense of calm and satisfaction at least momentarily. So if you feel drawn to the vending machine, it's partly because your dopamine level was low and you, you're looking for a hit your body, your brain is looking for a hit of dopamine. But you can manage your dopamine level by taking care of yourself in other ways, including getting the sleep that you need and to the extent that you can leave off the sugary, high fat foods, because that quick hit of dopamine that you get when you, when you eat those sugary foods that hit is temporary and you'll sink down even lower in the next 30 to 45 minutes and then you'll be back in the same cycle. So try to leave off the sugary foods if you can, or at least started, start cutting back on them and instead eat foods that are high in minerals and nutrients, whole foods, whole fresh fruits, whole fresh vegetables, grains, whole grains. Get the sleep that you need. The average adult needs six and a half to eight hours of sleep, and some need less than that, but others need more than that. So you need to adjust your bedtime and go to bed at an hour. That will allow you, if you were to sleep through the entire night, would allow you to get the number of hours that you need in order to be productive, to wake up feeling refreshed. And if you have an a habit or a tendency to wake up in the middle of the night somewhere between one and three, that means there's something going on. If there's something that is troubling you, it's causing you to wake up, or perhaps you're having a digestive issue, or I've even heard that sometimes our liver function, um, happens to, to wake us up in the middle of the night. So do what you can to try to sleep through the night without that interruption. One thing you can do is to leave off alcohol in the evening before going to bed. It might help you to go to sleep, but it will only wake you up in the middle of the night. And you'll have trouble going back to sleep because alcohol is a stimulant. So avoid anything with caffeine in it and avoid alcohol before bedtime. Be sure you get some exercise each week. That can help to raise your endorphins, which is another one of the hormones that is a feel good hormone. So some cardio each week and some weight training each week. Your heart and lungs benefit from the cardio. Your muscles and bones benefit from the weight training. So work in some exercise some activity each week, a few days each week. Be sure to incorporate some kind of meditation or prayer practice, even if it's just for a few minutes to help you to feel more grounded in your day and to feel reconnected with your higher power. Sometimes we have to just recognize that whatever's happening in our lives that are, that has got us so stressed out. It's bigger than we are. We need to just sort of hand it off. It's out of my hands. It's in your hands. You, you deal with it, Higher Power. Don't forget to breathe. It's important that we breathe periodically through the day deep inhales, all the way down to our diaphragm. Breathing out, slowly. Doing that can help to relieve the tension in our shoulders and neck. Don't forget to have fun. I mentioned that earlier. You need to do something each day that just makes you happy. No other reason to do it. It makes it makes you happy. Now, I'm not talking about grabbing a candy bar at the vending machine that might make you feel happy momentarily. But do something knit, cross-stitch, read. Go for a run if that's what it is for you. Whatever it is for you, make yourself happy. And then finally, this isn't an additional bonus strategy. Unplug a few minutes every day. We are so addicted to our phones, our tablets, our computers. I mean, you're listening to me on a device right now. If you're listening to the podcast or you're watching me on YouTube, on a computer or a tablet or the phone. So I don't want you to unplug at the moment. I want you to hear this message, but I do encourage you to lay off of Facebook. Take a break from Twitter. Don't get so lost in Pinterest that you lose track of time. There are so many. I think about the things we did before we had our devices, and how much more relaxed we were. So the devices are nice to have but they can create extra stress for us. The bottom line is you're the only person who can be in charge of you. You're responsible for your health, your wellbeing, what you do, the habits that you've developed, the habits that you want to create in this new year, new decade, 2020 so if you feel like you fall into any of those statistics that I shared earlier, the 55% Americans who feel stress at some point every day, it's time to do something about that because other statistics which are equally alarming are that 43% of Americans are suffering from some stress-related ailment: diabetes, some kinds o f, some forms of cancer, cardiovascular disease, gastrointestinal issues, high blood pressure. Those are all stress-related ailments that we go to see our doctors about that we're often on medication for. And then even more alarming is that 75 to 90% of all visits to our primary care physicians are related to some stress-related complaint: headaches, gastrointestinal issues, sleeplessness, anxiety. So, take charge of you. Make you your project for this year and set some manageable goals for yourself. You don't have to incorporate all seven or eight, uh, including the unplug all of those strategies into your life all at once. Pick one. The easiest one may be would be to drink the recommended amount of water that you need every day. That would go a long way toward helping your brain and your body function more effectively. If you're a teacher and you and you're going, u h-uh, I can't drink all that water c ause then I'd have to go to the bathroom all day and I can't leave my kids. Then start thinking in terms of getting the sleep that you need or eating for better nutrition. Do one thing for yourself that may go a long way toward helping you manage your stress more effectively and proactively. Each one of us has a responsibility to take care of ourselves so that we're in a position to help others. If you want to be helpful to other people, you need to be taking care of yourself. So, remember, self-care is not selfish. That's it for today. Hope you got something from that message. If you would be willing to offer a recommendation or review a comment on the podcast or the YouTube channel, please feel free to subscribe and tell your friends about"Teachers in Transition." I'm increasingly hearing from teachers who are listening to the podcast or me on YouTube and they tell me that they're getting something positive from these messages. So, if you feel that way, please share with your friends. And uh, let me know if you have any questions, email me at Kitty Boitnott at, at Gmail or reach out to me through teachers in transition.com enjoy your week. I'll be back next week. So there you have it, an episode of"Teachers in Transition." I hope you enjoyed the information and I hope you'll plan to come back. Please subscribe to"Teachers in Transition" so that you can be alerted of future episodes. And let me know if you have any questions or topics that you would like me to specifically cover in a future episode. I'm more than happy to help with individual questions as well. So email me at KittyBoitnott@BoitnottCoaching.com. If you are interested in finding a new career or just enjoying your life more, this is the place to start. Hi, I'm Kitty Boitnott and this is"Teachers in Transition."