How to recover from long term extreme stress ?

[AliceMay55]

In the last 5 years, we’ve been through 1 house sale, 2 international moves, 1 house buy and lost all our life savings (failed business).

DH and I have decent jobs and we have a beautiful house (big mortgage, which we could have paid off if we didn’t lose all our money). We are in early 40s, so still ok to recover financially.

Stress is completely wearing me out. I keep looking back and thinking what if. Extremely anxious and worried all the time. How do I recover from this and look ahead? I’ve been through CBT, it helped a bit.
Keen to hear from people who’ve been through very stressful times and managed to heal.

I do a lot of restorative yoga, sound baths, relaxation sessions of various kinds. Fresh air. Eat well. I have on going stress and this helps me a lot

Yes I have been through a very extended period of stress.

It takes time to recover. Be patient. Respect the stress, accept the stress but reassure yourself it'll improve with time.

Hill walking, or countryside generally. The sky, the birds, the trees do not care about my troubles, they carry on regardless, and I find that rather comforting.

Playing a musical instrument is the one thing I'm actually any good at. I'd not played for many many years. A kind old friend reached out to me just after I'd been made bankrupt and got me playing again, my life kind of spiralled upwards from that point. They say music is very healing, it certainly was for me.

Is there anything like that you could take up again?

Otherwise a lot of it is just keep plodding on, you can't change the past and what's happened but you can plan for the future and how you're going to make the best of what you have.

Self care. Literally cherish yourself.

And possibly medication.

What you mustn't do is ignore it, power on, muscle through. You need to be looked after, so you can heal rather than merely exist.

I'm a big fan of "this too shall pass". I know it probably sounds trite and unhelpful but it is really true.
I've been in a similar situation to the one you're in and while it was very difficult at the time it was OK in the end and the stress actually melted away fairly quickly once the problem did.

Take deep breaths, it reminds your body you're not in fight or flight mode right now. Try to appreciate the little happy moments, a cup of tea, sitting in the sun. Your body needs to rest and heal and that takes time and patience. You've been through a lot of stress and survived. You're not the same as before or as carefree but that's life for you and you'll be able to find peace again step by step.

I've had a stressful 13 years, it's been one thing after another over and over.

For 2023 I've decided to pare back all my commitments, not go 'above and beyond' at work like I usually do, prioritise relaxing and quiet time with my DC. I allow myself whole days at a time of doing pretty much nothing except making a nice meal and pottering about. I started by keeping Christmas simple, just a beautiful tree and a nice clean & tidy house.

It's important not to overload yourself. Just breathe, eat, sleep and restore yourself. Oh and I watch lots of comedy! Laughter really is a brilliant stress reliever.

Meditation - I did a TM course

Anything that helps me stay in the moment is helpful. Meditation, going for a walk, being in nature, exercise, drawing etc etc. The list is long. But it does take time and it helps to be realistic about that.

I also found this book really helpful. It’s a practical book with advice about nutrition, sleep etc & suggestions for techniques to help you recover/cope.

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Challenging-Anxious-Brain-practical-overcoming/dp/B08QFCR9H8/ref=cm_cr_arp_d_product_top?ie=UTF8

I've had a similarly stressful period of life... My body reacts differently to stress now - I get physical symptoms which I never used to before...
To manage that, I've recognised I need to avoid stress - I work 3 days per week, WFH, flexitime. I gave up a volunteering role because that ended up causing stress. I think just being very aware of what causes me stress and consciously avoiding those situations helps.
I also try and spend time alone in mountains, where I don't have to worry about anyone/anything but me.

But also - give it time... I was suicidal in 2017 and it's been a long road (with potholes) back. But it's so worth it.. good luck x

Thanks all. Very helpful.

Making things worse is my job. It’s a stressful role, so moving jobs won’t help much. Luckily, we have some quiet periods, so it’s probably fine on the whole.

Sorry to drip feed, I was initially reluctant to share too much incase someone identifies, but fcuk it! So the business we started did quite well . We had an offer from someone wanting to buy it, we decided not to sell. We’d have sold at a bit more. But once covid hit, it was all downhill from there. We had to close it down and by the time we paid all the suppliers etc, we lost pretty much everything we put in. I keep coming back to “what if we sold” all the time. I really don’t know how to get over it. The intense anxiety (or grief) is so bad, I can feel it in my heart/chest IYKWIM.

On the brighter side, we both now have well paying jobs. So we are ok, but I worry about retirement. If we sold the business on time, we could have invested the money for retirement, paid off our house and happily spent all we earn on a good lifestyle and charity. We are having to save hard right now for retirement - starting from ground zero again.

I don’t know how to even get over this and look forward.

In the last 13 years we have done 4 house move, one international move, had 3 children, buried one child after a tragic accident. 5 job changes between us I think, including one of us setting up a business.
I don’t think of it as an extended stress period, and am a pretty happy and relatively unstressed.

It’s not a game of ‘gotcha’- the thing that jumps out at me from your post is that your haven’t come to terms with the loss of the money and the business failing. The rest is all just life/ noise.

Coming to terms with a big thing like that, that doesn’t reallly make sense is hard. I’d imagine similar to coming to terms with losing a child. You want there to be a reason and for it to make sense - so you can kid yourself that you won’t be caught out again.

and some things don’t make sense. You made a good decision not to sell but got unlucky, covid happened and here we are. The what ifs don’t help- and are crazy making.

What does help is baby steps. Brush your teeth. Have your breakfast. Go for lots of walks outside. Take it slow. Play music. Exercise. Wait for it to pass. Know that it will, and one day you will wake up and think ‘oh, yesterday I had a moment of not being anxious’. And the next day it will be a bit longer. And a bit longer.

All the best

Ah, the "what if's"

If you've ever been on a boat did you stand at the stern and look at the churning, unhappy water behind you or go up front and marvel at the smooth, untouched water that's ahead of you?

That's your choice now. Accept what's gone, and what lessons you've learned that will help you deal with the future, or spend your future in the past.

It's possibly a trite saying but your record for getting through difficult days currently stands at 100%. Keep it that way.

I can't help with the what ifs, I hope other posters can.

For me, the key things are:

Setting my life up so I am not adding unnecessary stress - so I have cut back ony volunteering; I don't do anything regular at the moment.

Added things that care for me - so for me that's exercise, getting out into the countryside, sauna/steam room, as well as things like seeing friends.

Think less. Thinking more doesn't seem to do me much good, better to spend as much time as possible living - if not in the now, at least not in the past. That's aided by all those things above, but also reading books and not worrying if they are good books or bad books - just letting myself escape.

I've also taken a role that while initially stressful while I worked out what I was doing, is now much less stressful and means I'm able to switch off when I stop working. I managed a diagonal move, so I didn't even have to take a pay cut to do that.

I see your point about living in the present. I have 2 young children. All this stress and non-stop thinking has made parenting just another chore. I even forgot how to spend quality time with them (6yr old twins - DS and DD - how blessed and lucky should I feel!)

I would try to accept you made the wrong decision and face up to the negative feelings. It was not your fault, you could not have known, but it turns out you made the wrong decision. You have got to live with it forever and in time you will move past it but of course it feels shit.

I suggest actively feeling the upset every day for about twenty minutes - write down the regret, draw the regret, draw the anger, whatever - and then decide to use the day to do something positive with my children, or in my job, or in my home.

You can't just move past bad feelings, or think yourself out of them, they have to be felt and then eventually they fade away.

I've not long come out of a period of intense, continual and heightened stress. Mapping it with my GP, it was about 8 YEARS of ongoing stress. I've ended up with CFS/Fibro as a direct result.

This last year (since I became ill) I've been working on recovering:
I go swimming.
I listen to my body and rest when I need to, actually, I try to rest before I need to.
I do kind things for myself, nice meals, paint my nails, read a good book.
I like to get out in the fresh air and listen to the birds.
Meditation helps, I use guided meditations on YouTube because my brain won't stay quiet long enough for silent meditation.
I stay away from caffeine (been on decaf coffee for years), ie fizzy drinks.

I've found tho, that my body and brain react to normal or little stressors as if it was that massively stressful time again. So I have to literally centre myself, three "square" breaths and remind myself that I am living in THIS moment.

I'm currently working through healing from long term stress over the past 3/4 years. Not house moves and money matters like yourself but multiple close family health issues followed by deaths, other family members sudden deaths and also the reveal that many of the people around me I thought would support me in life have simply walked out.
By the sounds of it you are grieving a life that could have been, so similar in ways I feel I am greiving.

I too find myself dwelling on the "what it's". It used to be a lot more frequently but now when I notice I am dwelling on them I try and change my focus to something I enjoy instead, even something as silly as signing a nursery rhyme over and over again in my head. Anything to stop the overwhelming obsession that can happen when a "What if" gets stuck on a downward spiral.
However it's not healthy long term to hide the what ifs all the time. So I do think on them, but only when I make the concise decision to, not when they pop into my head.
The all consuming "What ifs" have gotten less and less frequent for me, I now probably get a couple a week now. Where as about a year ago I'd have a good 8-12 a day, most days.
Hours lost to basically being consumed by hysterical tears multiple times a week. It was awful. I'm now able to actively think about a lot of what ifs without tears now, which is a massive improvement I feel.

Things I've found help longer term, and make me feel more stable:
Focusing on the future, and what realistic things I want from it. From redecorating the hallway to theoretically planning a sky diving trip(I always chicken out of booking it!).

Enjoy the little things in life as often as you can. Look for them, notice them, stand back and smile at them.
From enjoying the rainbow sparkle of sunlight coming through a cracked bus shelter as I wait for the bus to cuddling up on the sofa with my pet on a stormy night. I try and take a photo of each of these things when I acknowledge them. Save them all in a photo diary album so I can look back at all my "Little enjoyments" when I'm having a bad day.

Going for a walk every single day, no matter what the weather is doing. Sometimes it might be a 15min walk around the block. Other times it might be a 4hr wander in a forest I got lost in. The fresh air and exercise do wonders for both mind and body.

@AliceMay55 Is this extended stress or are you burnt out? I was in a 5 year role where I thought I was just stressed but it took a holiday with a friend and a very dodgy experience to realise I was broken not just stressed. (Admittedly I’m ND so that obviously gives me a predisposition to stress/depression/burnout etc.)

I found EMDR helpful to get me out of fight/flight mode really useful.

I also had a blood test and found I was low on some B vitamins and iron which didn’t help.

I then hunted out something that gave me joy and a feeling of success/progress and something that made me aware of my body. At one point this was literally a video game and an inflatable mat that simulated some yoga type stretches.

And as other said I ruthless ditched anything not of value to me. I did this by listing everything that was external required of me - shopping, seeing my parents, going to work, sending birthday cards, organising a Christmas party… everything! Basically if it wasn’t me eating/drinking, me going to the loo, my basic hygiene and me keeping warm or me seeing doctor when I’m poorly etc it was on the list to be reviewed. The list was huge!

Then I went through it and either got rid of it because it left me feeling negative/drained /bad.

Bext was kept it because I have to, such as work because I need money, laundry because public nudity isn’t always welcome. With this list I really kept it to the essentials and outsourced it if I could. (One friend and I swapped ironing which I like doing for sorting and taking out my bins/recycling which I hate doing. She would drop her ironing round, do my bins and recycling and then have a coffee and she would take the previous load of ironing away all done.)

The last category was things that brought me joy and brought benefit to my life. With this one I looked at how I did these thing and made sure I did them as often as felt good but also in the most efficient way. It really helped me prioritise myself but not feel I was abandoning family and friends but everything was within comfortable boundaries. Also it allowed me to rebalance relationships so I didn’t feel taken advantage of or like I was taking advantage.

Also if there were things I really wanted to do but just couldn’t commit right now I made a note so in the future when I was well enough to do more I could pick something.

It wasn’t/isn’t easy and I can forget and stray into old bad habits but I still have my crazy colourful spider charts that I sometimes look at to get back on track.

Meditation has helped me.

DH and I have also had a rough few years. Bereavement, multiple redundancies, birth of two children with some health conditions, difficult house move and sale. Now renovation issues with new home plus usual struggles of children being off school a lot and trying to work.

You didn't mention the pandemic itself, which has been a huge stress on us all.

I'm doing regular yoga and trying to remember that we've managed to get through each hurdle thrown at us, albeit though we've lost a little something of ourselves with it all, but we keep going until a period of stability allows us to open up and grow again.

Reading with interest

That’s interesting the PP who said that their body reacts physically now.

I have had an extremely stressful time for nearly a decade, due to the serious illness of one of my children amongst other things, and I have found that mentally I am much more resilient and feel I’m coping well but I get physical symptoms of stress. I was worried something was seriously wrong but all physical causes have been ruled out, it’s just chronic stress!

What helps:
exercise- running especially
breathing techniques
talking about it
trying to accept that you need to give yourself a break