Lesson video

Welcome to the fourth lesson in this unit on mental wellbeing, where we will be developing our understanding about everyday stressors and triggers in adult life.

I'm Mrs. Harris and in this lesson we're going to be exploring what stresses are and how to adopt helpful lifestyle traits.

For this lesson you will need an exercise book or paper and a pen.

This is what our lesson is going to look like today.

You should already have completed the intro quiz.

I'm now going to recap our previous lesson.

We looked at panic disorder and panic attacks.

We know these are at the far end of the anxiety continuum and we may not all experience these in our life but need to be aware in order to support others.

In this lesson, we are going to examine more everyday stressors that are challenges we could face more often in our life.

Once we have identified these everyday stressors we will look at how to adapt helpful lifestyle traits that would negate some of these stressors.

And at the end of the lesson, there will be an exit quiz for you to reflect on what we have learned.

Here are our keywords for this lesson.

Daily stressors refer to the challenges of day-to-day living and include both predictable challenges such as caring for a child or commuting between work and home as well as unexpected events such as a malfunctioning home appliance, an unexpected work deadline or a traffic jam.

Lifestyle traits are choices we make over the way we live our life, such as how much sleep we get, whether we plan ahead or leave everything to the last minute.

Whether we eat healthily or not.

Get regular exercise or not.

Choose to have a child, children or not.

And at what age we do this.

This lesson we'll be looking at ways we can negate everyday stressors.

How we can learn to cope with them and also how we can make choices about our lifestyle traits that reduce the impact of the stressors we will inevitably face.

This is your task.

What does being a successful person mean? Think about what might make an adult feel that they are successful in life.

What might they have achieved in order to make them successful? What would make you feel successful as an adult? Pause the video to complete this task and then resume once you are finished.

Do your answers match mine? Many would say that having a job you enjoy means you have made it.

It isn't all about the money you earn.

Is that what necessarily mean you enjoy what you do? But job satisfaction is a great thing to have.

I should say at this point that this doesn't always happen right away.

You may have a variety of jobs until you settle into a career you find fulfilling.

Confidence is a subjective trait, but to me it means being happy in your own skin and links to the next point about being happy.

Because being content is a sign of a successful person.

As it means they may have put less pressure on themselves in terms of achieving that perceived perfect life.

Being in control of time is a successful lifestyle trait, as it can enable someone to be able to change plans due to unexpected circumstances and work into their arrangements.

Eating a healthy diet and getting regular exercise have been proved to support positive mental health and surely positive mental health is something we all aspire to.

Managing stress and having good coping strategies is surely again another successful attribute to have.

And finally being satisfied and happy with your family life, whatever that looks like, is also a successful goal to have.

Remember that stressors are expected or unexpected challenges we face in everyday life.

We are now going to look at how we can identify those, that way, we are better equipped to use our coping strategies and ensure we can still be successful as possible in our adult life.

These are all examples of stressors.

Anyone could face every day and throughout their adult life.

All or most of these will happen to most people at some point in their life and are totally normal challenges.

It may be difficult to imagine yourself going through some of these issues in the future, at your current age but there may also be some of you who have already faced some of these challenges already in your own personal life.

What I would like you to do is pick between three and five of these stressors that you would find the most challenging.

I would like you to write them down in order of challenge, with the most stressful one at the top and then work your way down from there.

You may wish to pause the video while you have a look at these challenges.

So just to recap, this is your task.

Which three stressors would you find the most challenging? In our previous lesson, we talked about the importance of taking time to reflect on our worries and problems. This next activity encourages more of this good practise.

I would like you to look at your list of stressors and explain your reasoning behind them.

Focus on both why you ranked them in that particular order and also why you would find them challenging situations.

Pause the video to complete this task and then resume when you are finished.

John is someone you may have met before in previous lessons.

I would like you to imagine that he is now an adult.

John was going out with Izzy at age 16 and she became pregnant.

Let's have a look at his current situation.

John is 19.

He has an apprenticeship as an electrical engineer and works four days a week with one day at college.

John enjoys his apprenticeship and hopes to start his own business once he is qualified, although he is currently on a low wage and knows he needs to save.

He has a three-year-old daughter with his ex-partner and has to contribute to her upkeep and help out with childcare.

He still lives with his dad at home.

His dad has struggled with alcohol dependency since he splits up with John's mom.

John would like to know more about his mom but they have lost contact since she left.

John has a good circle of friends and likes to socialise with them at the weekends when he is not looking after his daughter, This is your task.

What everyday stressors might be affecting John? You may need to have another look at the previous scenario.

Make a list of the stressors you can spot.

Pause the video to complete this task and then resume when you are finished.

Let's see how you got on.

Do your answers match mine? John needs to support himself and his daughter on a low wage.

This will increase as he gets older and becomes qualified but it may well be putting financial pressure on him.

John is an adult living with his father.

It could be that there are no extra bedrooms and this could put pressure on his family situation, when his daughter comes to stay.

We don't know if it was an amicable split with his ex partner.

So there could be pressures in that relationship that adds stress to John's life.

When someone is dependent on alcohol that quite often has an impact on their wider family.

So that may be affecting John's mental health and wellbeing.

Another stressor that could be affecting John's mental health is the lack of relationship he has with his mom.

The lack of connection he feels in that area of his life, coupled with the issues with his dad may be putting additional pressure on his everyday life.

John has quite a few demands on his time and these needs to be managed in order to reduce his everyday stress.

Chelsea is someone you may also have met in previous lessons.

I would like you to imagine that she is now an adult.

Chelsea is 18.

She is at college studying for A levels in Psychology, Sociology and English.

There are lots of key studies to learn for her subjects but she is really pleased with her subject choices.

Chelsea was quite anxious when she was at school but is learning to use her coping strategies a lot more effectively now she's a little older.

Some of Chelsea's friends have started using drugs as an escape mechanism from the amount of work they have to do.

Chelsea socialises with them some of the time but also has a part-time job at a local cafe.

She has a happy home life with her parents, who are both female and they will be moving house in the next month or so.

So, this is your task.

What everyday stressors might be affecting Chelsea? You may need to have another look at the previous scenario.

Make a list of the stressors you can spot.

Pause the video to complete this task and then resume when you are finished.

Let's see how you got on.

Do your answers match mine? So Chelsea is studying for three A levels with a lot of content in terms of key studies and she-- and she has a part-time job.

That puts a lot of demand on her time and this needs to be managed.

Chelsea suffered with anxiety at school and there was always a possibility at times of high stress that her coping mechanisms might be harder to utilise.

If Chelsea's friends are using drugs, and are part of her close friends, this increases the probability that she might be tempted when she is at a low point in terms of her resilience.

Moving house is one of the most stressful activities that you will encounter in your adult life.

It's stressful if you're involved in organising the logistics of it and also on settling in terms of moving from where you used to consider as home and trying to make the next place feel homely.

It sounds like Chelsea has a stable home life.

So this should help to negate this stressor.

We will be investigating this idea of negating stressors later on in this lesson.

Moving somewhere new can also be challenging in terms of fitting into a new community.

And this is going to take some time for Chelsea and her parents.

Remember that lifestyle traits are the behaviours, interests and opinions of an individual.

We are now going to look at how we can identify those.

That way we can negate potential stressors in our adult life.

Let's recap for a moment.

Lifestyle traits cannot be changed.

Is this true or false? Did you get it right? It is false.

Lifestyle traits can be changed with a little bit of determination and focus.

These are all examples of lifestyle traits.

Which would you consider to be helpful in helping to negate some of the everyday stressors we have identified previously in this lesson? If you are up for a challenge, have a think.

Do you adopt any of these currently? You may wish to pause the video at this point to make your decision.

These are all examples of helpful lifestyle traits.

Does your lit-- list match mine? Eating healthily, getting good quality sleep and taking regular exercise are all beneficial for both our physical and mental health.

Remember that in a previous lesson, we talked about how important it was to look after both of these things.

Looking after our mental health is one of the best things we can do when trying to negate everyday stressors.

Sharing our worries by talking to others, whether it be friends, our GP or other trusted adults, is a way of negating the escalation of problems into ones we feel out of our depth to manage.

It also helps to challenge unhelpful thoughts.

Managing our time effectively and splitting up tasks into more manageable chunks, reduces the stress we may feel and allow us to be able to take more breaks thereby negating everyday stress.

Now using contraception allows us to have control over our lives and make decisions that could have consequences for the rest of our lives only when we are ready.

Trying to remain positive in your life is a great lifestyle trait and trying to jot down resist and be grateful, like the gratitude journal we talked about in our last lesson or good things that have happened is a good way to do this.

So, let's look at John's scenario again.

In a moment you will choose between John and Chelsea in an independent task.

So to recap.

John is 19.

He has an apprenticeship as an electrical engineer and works four days a week with one day at college.

John enjoys his apprenticeship and hopes to start his own business once he's qualified.

Although he's currently on a low wage and knows he needs to save.

He has a three-year-old daughter with his ex partner and has to contribute to her upkeep and help out with childcare.

He still lives at home with this dad.

His dad has struggled with alcohol dependency since he split up with John's mom.

John would like to know more about his mom but they have lost contact since she left.

John has a good circle of friends and likes to socialise with them at the weekends when he's not looking after his daughter.

So may be that you look at this scenario for the next task or you might find it more interesting or engaging to look at Chelsea's scenario.

So let's have another look at that.

So Chelsea is 18.

She's at college studying for A levels in Psychology, Sociology and English.

There are lots of key studies to learn for her subjects but she is really pleased with her subject choices.

Chelsea was quite anxious when she was at school but is learning to use her coping strategies a lot more effectively now she is a little older.

Some of Chelsea's friends have started using drugs as an escape mechanism from the amount of work they have to do.

Chelsea socialises with them some of the time, but also has a part-time job at a local cafe.

She has a happy home life with her parents who are both female and they'll be moving house in the next month or so.

This is your task.

What helpful lifestyle traits could you suggest for either John or Chelsea? You may need to have another look at the scenarios on the previous two slides.

Choose one.

Make a list of your suggestions in your book or on your piece of paper.

Pause the video to complete this task and then resume when you are finished.

What's helpful lifestyle traits might you suggest to John and Chelsea? What did you suggest for John? Did any of them match mine? John has a potentially stressful situation at home with his dad.

John should find someone he can trust and share his worries with.

Eating healthily and getting regular exercise would benefit anyone in adulthood.

He has a lifelong commitment to his daughter, so it's his worth working on his relationship with his ex partner, in order to negate any potential stressors there.

His GP might also be able to signpost him to counselling options that could help him to deal with his feelings about his mother.

I'm sure you might have other suggestions for him too.

If you chose Chelsea, what did you suggest for her? Did any of them much mine? Chelsea has a lot going on in her life in terms of workload.

So working on a plan to manage your time would be a good starting point.

Talking to both her parents and college tutors would maybe negate some of the potential stressors she faces and they might also have suggestions for her time management.

If her friends are using drugs and she worries that this might become a potential issue for her, then a possible friendship group change might be an idea.

Again, eating healthily and exercising is always a great lifestyle trait to adopt.

That brings us to the end of our lesson on everyday stressors and triggers in adult life.

Before you go and complete your exit quiz, I'd like to thank you for engaging with the tasks and ask you to reflect on your life and situation.

What are three lifestyle traits might you plan to adopt in adulthood and why? I look forward to carrying on our learning in the next lesson, in this unit.