Stress techniques for parents
by Dr. Ann Edworthy

Long-term exposure to stress can not only result in ill health but may impact on family relationships. If you are caring for a disabled child it is therefore crucial that you learn to manage your stress. Your role is often 24/7 and your well-being is of paramount importance to everyone.

A good starting point is to learn to identify signs, which indicate that your stress levels are rising. Some of the most common ones are:
~ loss of concentration;
~ feeling angry;
~ feeling tearful;
~ panic attacks;
~ changes in sleep patterns.

Unfortunately your health also begins to suffer and headaches, stomach problems and nausea are common ailments. The more you worry about your declining health, and how you are going to continue caring for your child, the higher your stress level becomes.

However, it is not all gloom and doom. There are many methods that can be used to develop the skills that will enable us to manage stress. In this article I can only provide some of the different methods and hope that you will be able to obtain further details from your local library or by enrolling at local classes. I am willing to try to help inpiduals and/or support groups wherever possible.

A ‘quick fix’ such as painkillers is not the answer. Stress management techniques, once mastered, will enable you to:
a) function effectively even when under pressure;
b) improve your quality of life; and
c) avoid poor health associated with high, long-term stress.

Let us now turn to some of the techniques which may help.

1. Adopt a healthy lifestyle.
It is a well-known fact that we only pay any real attention to our health when we are ill. Clearly this is too late. We should aim to boost our immune systems to ensure that our bodies are able to cope with any additional pressure without it resulting in ‘stress illnesses’. To achieve this goal we should:
~ eat a balanced diet;
~ take regular exercise. (There is no need to join expensive gyms, walking, or skipping can be equally as good for you);
~ enjoying life – set aside a few hours for something you enjoy doing;
~ try to avoid comfort tricks such as chocolate biscuits, alcohol and caffeine.

2. Adopt the right attitude.
Parents with a disabled child have to communicate with a significant number of ‘professionals’ which, for a number of different reasons, often causes high levels of stress. Try to be assertive. This does not mean being aggressive and insisting you are right but rather, it means you are entitled to your opinion and have the right to be listened to and taken seriously. This can be difficult to begin with, but worth persevering with. Don’t raise your voice, stay calm, but insist on giving your opinion.

3. Be positive.
Positive thinking will not solve everything but it will enable you to see things from a different angle. Decide on your goals and go for them. If you start by thinking you can’t do something, it will become a self-fulfilling prophecy.

4. Learn to relax.
When we are stressed our muscles tense and trigger different reactions – one being headaches. Deep breathing is a simple technique which will help you to relax your muscles and prevent such negative symptoms. Aim to breathe from the diaphragm:
~ place one hand on your upper chest and one just below your breastbone;
~ try to breathe so that only your lover hand is moving;
~ breathe in through your nose and count to three as your abdomen rises;
~ count to three as you breathe out as much air as you can through your nose (your abdomen will fall).
Keep repeating until it feels the natural way to breathe.

5. Progressive muscular relaxation.
This involves relaxing all of the muscles in the body, starting at your feet and working up to your head.
~ Wearing loose clothes, lie on the floor with your arms by your side and feet apart.
~ Concentrate your breathing (as above).
~ Tense the muscles in your feet for five seconds. Relax.
~ Tense your calf, thigh, buttock and stomach muscles for five seconds in turn. Relax for two minutes or so before trying to get up.

6. Time management.
‘There are never enough hours a day’. A lot of our stress comes from trying to do too much. There are fixed number of hours in the day and there is nothing we can do to change this fact. It is better, therefore, to put your efforts into learning to manage your time. Ask yourself:
~ What must I do?
~ What should I do?
~ What can I leave?
There are nearly always tasks that are really not that important and our lives would not suffer if we didn’t do them. We have to have time to relax and recharge our batteries and therefore if that time is not obviously available, we have to make it so.

7. Methods such as yoga and meditation (you will need to join a class)*.
Both of these methods are excellent for reducing stress but you will need to join a class in order to learn the basic principles.

This article aims to show that stress is a serious illness and it is one that is very common. Parents with a disabled child are particularly susceptible and it is hoped that parents will see that whilst they cannot have a direct influence on the level of financial and other support available, they can learn to manage their stress and enhance their lives.

Dr Ann Edworthy is currently being funded by Cerebra to look at stress in parents with a disabled child. She aims to produce one pamphlet which will clearly set out the support services and benefits that are available and how to apply for them. She is also looking at practical ways of helping inpiduals (and support groups) to develop training programmes to help reduce the stress levels. She can be contacted on 01792 481252 or by E-mail on This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it

* Last year the Consumers Association in Health Which? warned that exercise methods, including yoga, sometimes lead to physical injury from inexpert tuition. Their advice was to seek out classes of no more than fifteen people, run by someone trained through the British Wheel of Yoga or a member of the Register of Exercise Professionals (REPS). Source: BBC News, Monday 11 August 2003