Stress

[#1]

I guess we are all subject to various degrees of stress throughout our lives but a recent news report on climate change said we needed to be concerned about it but not too come across to strongly in providing information on the possible outcome of taking little action in case we frightened younger people.

But is it a good thing to be over protective of information we give to young people, if we do this are they not likely to have greater problems as they get older when faced with personal problems that cause stress.

Sadly the suicide rate in young people is on the increase and it could be that reducing stress levels may lower this but I would think the opposite might be true and failure to deal with some stressful things may well be one reason for the increase ?

What do you think.

Please keep this topic serious.

[#2]

I saw an article years ago that said everyone is subject to stress at certain times but it is the way they deal with it that makes the outcome good or bad.  As humans we need a bit of stress to keep us going,  but as I always believe ' a calm sea never made a good sailor' - stress used to be getting thumped by the school bully or losing your job, now it may be not getting enough 'likes' on facebook or not having the proper tatoos, yes stress is different things to different people.

[#3]

'Educators' claim that exams are too stressful.  In the last century young men would be in trenches being constantly shelled, that's STRESS!  Even more recently we have young soldiers posted to Afghanistan and Iraq who live in constant fear or being blown up.  I think I'd rather have a tough exam paper.

[#4]

Not an easy subject to discuss and not easy to separate stress from depression both of which we hear so much about these days among the younger generation.

When I look back at what my own time wars and conflicts apart, I personally find it very difficult to understand what the heck they have to worry about, and how strange this post should appear on the same day I was discussing this subject with the Mrs. 

We'd been talking about her sister's three now middle-aged children all of whom are on medication for depression... caused by stress.  Not immune from getting visits from that black dog ourselves of course, but most of us just shake it off and get on with what we have to do treating it as part of life and as wotsup puts it so well with his calm seas example.

Easy to brush it off as being of no consequence from the perspective of a 'no real worries' retirement' but I do puzzle over why youngsters are stressed to the point of suicide. 

[#5]

Wondered how long it would be before boomers piped up with the our generation had it worse [-Censored-]s, and what a shock at who it was. Not

https://twitter.com/supermathskid/status/1172794487963312128?s=19

[#6]

Where are they saying that here, why should it not be said, and please, tell us all why today's youngsters are so stressed and depressed that they are committing suicide like never before according to the media. 

Can't wait for your wisdom and for once, some contribution to a discussion.

Over to you and oh, try and keep it civil. 

[#7]

@Minivanman 

Major contributing factors are..

1. Social media - Facebook, Twitter etc.. having been a school Governor for a while I have seen the damage it's doing, especially to young people, and girls in particular. Aggressive bullying at school and work is no longer restricted to face-to-face, it's on every interface that young people, in particular, use. They can't escape it. Avoiding using it makes them outcasts.

2. The absolutely appalling lack of mental health support provisions. "Care in the Community" has lead to a dramatic reduction in medical care for mental health problems, to the point where people are waiting years, literally, (and I can personally vouch for that with one of my relatives) for any kind of analysis and treatment. There are next to none medical professionals dedicated to that in this country, and I suspect most other countries across the World.

We followed the US with a change in style of mental health provision years ago and we are reaping what they are also experiencing.

[#8]

@nozzer 

Thank you.

So in a nutshell, modern society.

I wonder if @DaveyH and @ffox  would agree?

[#9]

@Minivanman 

Same as foxes and rabbits really. Things change, and something will get you in the end, in this case the way other people behave.

It's become increasingly easy for people to abuse others from a distance in an anonymous way. Twitter users are especially prone to it. Coupled with aggression, it feels unbearable sometimes, or so I'm told. I avoid suchlike as the plague.

[#10]

I suppose what puzzles me is your view on care in the community and lack of mental health support as it assumes if I reading it right that it was there before and has now been removed.

Sorry to now go all baby boomer, but it was not something our generation had. We did however have bullying and we did have stress - but we also had more family support so...

Nothing like having a leaflet through your door advising you what to do in the event of a nuclear war! 

[#11]

---

@nozzer wrote:

@Minivanman 

Major contributing factors are..

1. Social media - Facebook, Twitter etc.. having been a school Governor for a while I have seen the damage it's doing, especially to young people, and girls in particular. Aggressive bullying at school and work is no longer restricted to face-to-face, it's on every interface that young people, in particular, use. They can't escape it. Avoiding using it makes them outcasts.

2. The absolutely appalling lack of mental health support provisions. "Care in the Community" has lead to a dramatic reduction in medical care for mental health problems, to the point where people are waiting years, literally, (and I can personally vouch for that with one of my relatives) for any kind of analysis and treatment. There are next to none medical professionals dedicated to that in this country, and I suspect most other countries across the World.

We followed the US with a change in style of mental health provision years ago and we are reaping what they are also experiencing.

---

@nozzer 

Fully agree with the points you make in part 1 Above.

Part 2 is correct to some degree but not totally accurate, if you look at how we treated the mentally ill in the past we simply locked them up in asylums, out of sight and out of mind as far as most people were concerned.

True the government moved on to community care and that appeared to be a more humane way to help people but services got swamped with the 'worried well' if you check out the % of the population on tranquilisers sleeping pills and the rest who are demanding the services of mental health professionals it's no wonder there is a long waiting list.

This is a guess but I suspect we have more councillors and various therapists these days than we have ever had.

Personally I think services should be more concentrated on the more severly mentally ill who seem to have been forgotten and left to fend for themselves sleeping on the streets or kept in prison due to their behaviour.

More work could be done in schools to make children aware of problems they face and teach them skills to deal with these problems ,, the key is prevention rather than curing.

[#12]

IMHO people are now available 24/7 because of modern technology, and looking at computers and phones way into the wee small hours does not help.  Too much caffeine ( Coca-Cola Red Bull etc.) and too much mental stimulation and not enough physical exercise all lead to bad outcomes.  As part of their company rules VW ( and maybe other companies ) has made it a no-no for employees to be contacted outside company hours by managers etc. to try and improve work / life balance. As for stress of modern exams don't get me started.  how can so many now get A++ and why is there a large bump in results at C+ and then a hole below it ? something fishy going on, and our education system has changed so that passing an exam no longer means you know the subject very well..........

[#13]

A number of people in asylums were admitted for being gay, unmarried mothers etc.  Thankfully this doesn't happen any longer.

I wonder whether the compulsion amongst many parents to ensure their offspring are occupied every waking minute contributes to the stress they perceive.  If you go to school, do your homework, have swimming on monday, karate on tuesday, and so on, there is little time left to be truly creative or just relax.  Add to that the compulsion to check your phone every few minutes and life becomes just a long list of repetitive tasks/activities with no end in sight.

[#14]

Interesting points there @Jonpe and maybe we did the same and especially with doing well at school and encouraging them to go to University. I certainly think that the only one of mine to see the bigger picture was daughter number three who had no intention of going into further education or getting bogged down with the stress of exams, and then the stress of that student loan.  

Now she's a happy stop-at-home mum of four with no worries other than those we all had at that age, and good for her. 

[#15]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-derbyshire-49726011

Whilst social anxiety is not all that uncommon, and one has to feel sorry for a youngster who is so badly affected by it that he hardly ever attends school, there now seems to be a 'medical condition' called school refusal.  Soon it will have a Latin name, and there will be a day called International School Refusal Day.