Good Stress

By David Spero They say good stress can cause as many problems as bad stress. I don't know, but I'm learning, because a couple of weeks filled with "good" stress are kind of knocking me out. First, is there really such a thing as good stress? "Good" apparently depends on how you respond. According to psychologist Hans Selye, who coined the term "stress," good stress is defined by how one perceives a stressor. Is it a negative threat or a positive challenge? I guess my stresses are positive challenges. The big thing was my mother's 90th birthday. People came in from Atlanta, Washington, Ontario, Oregon, and the Bay Area. It's not a big family. There were only 22 of us, but people came who hadn't seen each other in years, and in some cases had never actually met. Everybody got along great; there was little to no drama. So why was it stressful? Well, there was a banquet dinner, which my brother Daniel organized, and a daytime picnic, which was mostly my responsibility. I worried about that sucker all week. Would there be decent bathrooms? Could we get a good picnic table? Were there enough cars to get people there and back? Would the sun come out, or it would be cold and miserable? I did what research I could, but the park was at Lake Merritt in Oakland, where my Mom lives, and I live in San Francisco. It takes a bus or two and a BART train ride to get there, so it was hard to visit. I tried to get information by phone and on the Web, but people didn't answer, and no Web site ...
Source: Diabetes Self-Management - Category: Diabetes Authors: Source Type: blogs