This was the lead in for a story Dr. Richard Besser (ABC news) did about a week ago. This topic was in the news because former President Clinton had a heart issue at the time. So the report started with the explanation that because stress can lead to increased blood pressure it can be a contributing factor to strokes. Also stress can cause memory loss. Apparently when stress hormones spike it damages brain cells which impairs your ability to remember.
However the interesting part was the strategies he reported that doctors at Duke University have created for their heart patients. I've thought about this a quite a bit this week. According to the Duke doctors they have advised their patients to ask themselves 3 questions when they feel they are getting angry and/or stressed about a situation:
- Is this important?
- Is it reasonable for me to be angry?
- Can I modify the situation?
If the answer to any one of these questions is No you need to find a coping method to move on. For instance concentrating on something else, breathing, walking away, etc.
This is not the example given in this segment but one John came up with when we were talking about this report was ...a tree falls on your house. The answer to the 1st question would be yes for most people. Very possibly yes for #2 as well, but for the 3rd question has to be no.
This kind of advice also reminded me of a podcast from Babies and Moms (and Shelly's motto) which was "get used to it, get over it and get on with it."
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