STRESS MANAGEMENT ASSIGNMENT

Interview with a working man,working woman,house wife and self.

To do:

● Gather information about their Stressful events and strategies that helped to overcome it.

● And what other strategies if they face it again

● List down the stresses in their day to day life

The subjects of the interview were:

● Working Man-My friend’s father who works as a Software Engineer in one of the leading firms

● Working Woman-My friend’s mother who works as a Professor in a reputated institute

● Home Maker-One of my neighbours

● And also me

I didn’t choose my father and mother(who is also a home maker) as the subjects since I see them
everyday and also to make the interview more interactive,I thought it would be better to choose
someone who I didn’t know personally.

Here is the brief report of the recorded responses from each subjects.

● Working man:

Adults face quite a common problem from everyone’s side, and that is wrong perception.
Every one expect maturity and adulthood from an adult, however this may go unnatural. Probably,
even after getting’ old, they may still be innocent and child from inside.If you are an adult, that
means the child inside you should be dead.

The next issue or problem is the expectations of not doing any mistakes. A single mistake means end
of freedom, pocket money, pride, and what not from everyone. Even though these people too made
mistakes in their life, yet they are intolerant towards a man who is working.
 Time management is a very important thing for all those who are working.Sometimes,it turns out be
stressful.Like you may have to complete a large pile of work within the less specificed time limit or
the so called ‘deadline’.Or you may have an important meeting or so on the same day of your family
gathering,thus ending up disappointing your family.

About one of the stressful events that I had came across in my life,I’ll keep it as common as possible.
If you work, it is likely that job stress will affect you at some point during your career. Whether you
are an employee or an employer, it is important to recognize that stress in the workplace can
contribute to poor health, which can lead to lower productivity, absenteeism, and higher healthcare
costs.I say this because,I too have encountered such a case where I had to spend a lot of money to
take proper treatments and recover back to normal.It was a new thing when I faced this for the first
time so I was not able to do anything.From then on,the only thing I focus on is that,however
stressful the assigned work is,I need to be calm and composed to tackle it in an efficient way.I
hope,by means of the social support, stressed employees can acquire the information and advice on
how to cope with stress in the workplace or how to prevent it. They may also gain emotional
support and encouragement.Last but not the least,doing a job that you enjoy or doing a job(that you
don’t like) in an enjoyable way can help to reduce your stress.

● Working Woman:
I would share my perspective here on few basic points which are not related with work or career but
stem more from GUILT of not doing things up to the expectations that we Indian working
women put on ourselves thanks to the ecosystem we live in. Half of that is created by ourselves,
our MOMs and MILs. After working in profiles of high responsibilities for so many years along
with being mother of 2 boys, I always felt guilty of not being A1 at...

One, home keeping: Though my home would be better kept than thousand others that I would have
visited, I would always mentally compete only with ladies who were homemakers and whose
houses were tidier than mine and tell myself that my house is a shade less as I am working and
can not be picking things or cleaning all the time as others or do not have the time to train or
watch my helpers.

Two, able to cook my self : Though I can cook very well but I do not have in me, to provide my dear ones
all three meals handcooked by me. Somewhere I feel that this criteria alone making huge
difference in declaring you being a bad wife or bad mother gets ingrained in you by Indian MILs
and MOMs wontedly or unwontedly and puts pressure on you.

Three, able to spend time with kids or devote time for their studies when they come back from school:
While I would bend backwards and sit with them for their studies, not caring how tired I was
even if I was returning home at 7-7:30 pm, I feel the difference was actually not being there at
home when they came back from school was only for 30 to 60 min every day (depending on
 winters or summers) that they really needed me around before they went out for playing!
Needless to say that this was compensated several times over on weekends or on holidays, but I
always thought that I was not a great mom and would do anything to change that!

Four, my own health and looks: In terms of time and priorities I had, health and looks always came last
and I attributed this to tough work-life balance and kept adding Kgs year on year! I would look at
some of the friends who managed to remain well maintained & the time they had in hand and
kept giving myself mental stress or excuses!

Fifth, dying friend circle: Alright, virtually had no time for making new friends or keeping in touch with
old school and college friends. In all, a very little circle which I could call mine apart from office
colleagues or husband's friend circle. This is despite having active Facebook and WhatApp
Groups. Frankly never had the time to get associated back and felt terribly bad for the same.

And many other things which I am not putting here.

But by virtue of the small break that I got from my high pressure job, I can say this that all this guilt and
that stress that I had created on myself was unwarranted.

I say that because by being at home you do not improve on any of those ratings that you give to
yourself. While I thought that I would do all those things if I ever left my job or had more time
with home based job, I did not see myself doing anything extra to keep my home more tidier
than before or to cook all by myself or spend any extra time with kids or making new friends or
even on health. Though some of them started well but all that extra time went to either to
internet or to TV or reading eventually. Over years of working, you change intrinsically
somewhere and don't do necessarily the things for which you put stress on yourself.

So my advise to all working women would be -CHILL out and SEEK HELP from husband /family / outside
or helpers with out GUILT, ACCEPT whatever limited you CAN do and VALUE that yourself and
make sure that people around you value that too ! After all, it is not easy for anyone to work 15-
18 hrs day after day for years and lifetimes. Your purpose is to offer what you have to the world,
and have a good life in return.

● Home Maker:
It is a general belief in many cultures that the role of women is to build and maintain the homely
affairs like task of fetching water, cooking and rearing children. In the traditional society, women’s role
was naturally limited to the family. Since she was the bearer of children, she was fully occupied
with her duties as a mother and homemaker. This was no small feat, since the
traditional household may be described as both a production and a consumption unit. Man’s
responsibility was to provide the household with raw materials, which were then converted by
the woman into consumable products or conditions by means of rudimentary methods
and tools.A women,as a home maker,has to face a lot of stresses everyday.Though people who work say
that the stresses faced by them are no near to the stresses of a home maker,the sad truth is that
they aren’t aware of the stresses faced by us.We are no inferior to those who are working.We
too face difficulties that are equally important as the ones faced by the working people and the
pressure is real.The stresses that a homemaker faces is in terms of both physical as well as
mental health.We are the ones who need to work for all 365 without any leave or
so.Even,during the festival seasons,when all working people get a few days off,that is the time
when we had to do overtime.I never say never to things that my children ask me,it maybe
food,teaching or whatever it is.It is really tough to do the household chores of 5-6 persons single
handedly.By doing so,body pain,head ache,cramps and we get many more as freebies.But a
single little appreciation from the family members serve as an effective solution for all the
problems and also encourages and motivates us in a positive way.Addressing about the mental
stress,most of time I would be lonely at my home,and always have a thought whether knowingly
or unknowingly,what if I do a recipe that is disliked by everyone or worry if a favourite recipe
turn out well.These may seem silly,but it matters a lot as our world is small when compared to
others.There a also a lot to add when viewed from the health point of view.

Coming to a situation where I felt stressed out,I was easily able to overcome it as I had a very caring
husband and really lovely children.Whenever I face any stress related to physical or mental
health I never hesitate to share it with my family and they are so concerned about me in every
aspect that they never fail to understand me.Of course,there were times when we had
fights,but we never allow our ego to come into play and would be back to normal as soon as
possible by consoling each other.Before ending,I would like to say something,this is not only
applicable for home makers like me but also to almost everyone:”Family plays a major role in all
of lives,and a caring and lovely family can help to overcome stress at any point of time.”

● Self:

As a student,the main and foremost stress that I faced was the assignments and
examinations.When it comes to the board examination,the struggle was real.I realized that
‘Time’ is an indispensable element and managing it effectively makes you master anything you
want.But,mastering Time Management is not a piece of cake.After failing to do so in my 11 th
grade,I understood the consequences.From then on,I practiced to do things on the appropriate
timings.Secondly,as every student would feel right now,ONLINE CLASSES stood as a reason for
my stress in the beginning.Then I accepted the reality and tried to figure the other side of it and
the positive impacts it had on me.By doing so,to be frank,I started enjoying online classes and
now got used to it as well.

About a stressful event that I encountered,I would like to share about the last year of my
schooling.During my 12th grade,I was so careless inspite of teachers warning me about the vast
syllabus and was always roaming out of the class,participating in co-curricular events and
stuffs.Though I made use of the time efficiently in a way,my academics were going from bad to
worse.Though I figured it out and realized it lately,I didn’t waste any time after that.I prepared
vigorously in the last 3 months,like a have never done before.Those 3 months,I didn’t face any
mental stress as I was already prepared for everything.Though I had tough times in those
preparation phase,I came to know all of that was worth after the results were out.

But,that would be the first and last time I do such a thing.Now,I realized that,whatever the thing
maybe consistently revising the portions everyday would yield same colorful results but with a
really great amount of reduced stress.

Submitted by,

Sundhar Sreenivas.J.R,

1st Year,B.Sc Pychology.