HOW’S YOUR BUCKET DOING?

Ever find that some days you can deal with more stuff than on other days? Have you ever noticed that sometimes when you’ve tried something to help yourself some of those things end up making you even more stressed?

We each have a capacity for stress (a bucket) and when we reach that capacity (the bucket is full) this is when we might show signs of stress or become unwell.

Zubin and Spring (1977) talked about a Stress Vulnerability model which means that we are vulnerable to stress, we can be more vulnerable at times than others and there are things that contribute to our vulnerability. If we have had a good night’s sleep, eaten, got people we can turn to, been educated on subjects like the effects of certain things on the body etc then we have a pretty decent sized bucket. Other’s who have poor sleep pattern, don’t have support, lack the knowledge around self-care etc might have a smaller bucket so it takes less stress to cause a reaction/for them to become unwell.

So, what’s a good way of getting something out of that bucket that doesn’t end up pouring more stress in? Alcohol (and there’s no judgement here) can seem like a good way to tip a bit of stress out of the bucket but it can end up contributing as it generally means poor sleep which means we’re maybe less able to deal with things if we’re tired on top of whatever else is making its way into that bucket. It might that doing something you enjoy (but that isn’t going to top that bucket back up), something to distract yourself to give you a break from the stress or just letting it out in a safe way

and yep – I am once again advocating listening to angry angry screamy music and head banging as way to release some of that stress – might lessen that bucket.