Stress treatment
Feeling stressed and burntout?
Although it is normal to experience mild anxiety many individuals suffer from debilitating anxiety that impacts on all elements of their lives.
In order for us to have a good mental health, we need to have a balance in life - a balance between work, rest, play and exercise. However, there are only so many hours in the day, days in the week and weeks in the year. When we are juggling a multitude of things that need to be done - perhaps our work places unrealistic expectations on what we should achieve in the time given, or perhaps we are trying to juggle work, family life, demands from children or older parents, friends and exercise with little time left for rest or activities we may enjoy. If life becomes too unbalanced, stress increases. Chronic stress involves high levels of cortisol (the stress hormone) over long periods of time and eventually we experience burnout because the body and mind have finally had enough. ​
​
We can help you to understand your stress and burnout and provide you with strategies to improve your quality of life.
​
Symptoms of stress and burnout include:
-
Feeling anxious, nervous or on edge.
-
Breathlessness or short of breath.
-
Racing, worrisome thoughts.
-
Difficulty relaxing and feeling restless.
-
Sleep can be affected - laying awake with racing thoughts.
-
Feeling tired all the time with little energy to do things.
-
Irritability or feeling you have little capacity to cope with everyday things?
-
Perhaps you find you are not able to concentrate on things because your mind is full of worrying thoughts.
-
Is there a sense of dread for the future? As if something awful might happen.​​​
Treatment for Stress and Burnout
Therapy can include elements of the following:
Understanding your stress
Developing an understanding of the different elements to your stress: including physical, thinking and behaviour elements.
Understanding the physical element of stress
Learning to recognise and manage physical stress reactions.
Understanding the thinking element of stress
Developing an understanding of how our thoughts can impact on stress and how to manage and control unhelpful thoughts.
Understanding how what we do impacts on stress levels
Looking at our behaviours and how they increase/decrease stress reactions. During this session we develop an understanding of how to manage our time to reduce stress. Examples: If I reduce the amount of time I spend at work, does this increase or decrease my output? If I take some time for myself does this increase or decrease my stress? If I say ‘no’ what happens?
​
We will look at what we do and how that increases or decreases our stress. More specifically, we will look at how we can test out our beliefs to see if they are true. For example, ‘If I reduce the amount of times I check my work, does that make a difference to the quality of my work? If I leave work on time twice per week, does my boss comment on this? If I challenge the idea that I must work all the time to stay on top of things, what would that look like?
​
Discovering what we value: many people with stress talk about a feeling of being in a hamster wheel with little time for what matters. This session will look at what matters for you: is it relationships? Other interests? Exercising? Spending time with friends? We will discuss a plan to include those things more in your life and see how that impacts on stress levels.
The importance of sleep, exercise and diet.
The importance of the basics: sleep, exercise and diet. During this session we will discuss a basic sleep routine and strategies to manage sleep problems. We will look at the importance of exercise and diet on our stress reactions and mood.
​
As psychologists, we can work with you to look at all of the different things that may be influencing your problem - this could be related to your history or things in your current life and we will provide you with understanding and strategies to help you back on to the path towards feeling better.
​
Our team can provide Cognitive Behavioural Therapy, Psychotherapy, or other therapies such as ACT, CFT, EMDR, CAT, Psychodynamic. Existential and Integrative Psychotherapy. Be in touch if you are not sure what you need or what you are looking for and we will match you with the right therapist for your problem.
​
Meet The Team
At Dr Stuart Psychologists, all of our psychologists have extensive training to doctoral level and decades of experience in their field of expertise. You will be matched with a psychologist that has the knowledge and skill to help you understand and overcome your problem - not just in the short term but for good.