Women are stressed. The economy, political tension, things outside our control – even things we do (or somewhat!) control like life within our homes or at work, we typically take on the stress of the world. All this stress can affect our health, zap our energy and mess with our happiness – pretty serious stuff!

Recent studies indicate that 80% of us feel stressed. They also tell us that women are more stressed than men. In fact 33% of women rank themselves as EXTREMELY stressed. We are STRESSED!

And, we handle stress differently than men. As 4Women.gov says it:

How do women tend to react to stress?

We all deal with stressful things like traffic, arguments with spouses, and job problems. Some researchers think that women handle stress in a unique way: we tend and befriend.

• Tend : women protect and care for their children
• Befriend : women seek out and receive social support

During stress, women tend to care for their children and find support from their female friends. Women’s bodies make chemicals that are believed to promote these responses. One of these chemicals is oxytocin (ahk-see-toe-sin), which has a calming effect during stress. This is the same chemical released during childbirth and found at higher levels in breastfeeding mothers, who are believed to be calmer and more social than women who don’t breastfeed. Women also have the hormone estrogen, which boosts the effects of oxytocin. Men, however, have high levels of testosterone during stress, which blocks the calming effects of oxytocin and causes hostility, withdrawal, and anger.

‘Stuff’ like packing up boxes of belongings, preparing her house to sell it, getting everything from point A to point B.

As we noted in our recent press release on “10 ways for women to reduce stress,” being with our girlfriends is a great way to ‘lighten our emotional load’ and decrease our stress levels. But, we know that girlfriends always have great advice so we’d like your thoughts on …

Our TIP TUESDAY QUESTION:

How do you recommend women reduce their stress level? What do you recommend?

To get us started I did a little research on other stress reduction tips. I can confirm – for me, stress physically and immediately drops when I’m around my girlfriends. Taking a walk with Allison and Colleen, talking with Cath on the phone, having a snack with Barb or a coffee with Katie and Lisa – instand stress relief!

So, now it’s YOUR TURN! Be a friend and share your girlfriend advice for reducing stress.

Related articles: reducing stress for women,10 ways to reduce stress for women,

Technorati tags:women reduce+stress female+friendship stress

Tags: health, Mental health, reduce stress, stress, Stress management, Technorati, Wellness, Women

This entry was posted on Tuesday, October 28th, 2008 at 2:44 pm and is filed under Be a Better FRIEND, Tip Tuesday. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.