[EliApple]

Hi everyone,

I have a quick question on coping with stress and I'm hoping some people here could possibly help me out.

Fwiw, I've always been afraid of developing a gut disorder because my brother had one and I feel like his having one has effected my way of perceiving gut disorders.

I also have a lot of stress in my life and have noticed that I tend to store stress in one specific spot in my body during any one specific period of time.

Like, I used to store most of my stress in my shoulders, than it moved to my neck, than my knuckles, and now, because I'm afraid of developing a gut disorder, I can feel it moving to my gut, because I'm always thinking of it.

This may or may not be the case, but regardless, my stomach pains as of the past couple days have been getting progressively more significant and I feel like I'm storing all my stress in my gut now.

Storing stress in my gut means developing a gut disorder, and that'd be pretty difficult, so I'd like to avoid that... Is there any way I could possibly avoid this gut stuff by making a habit out of storing my stress elsewhere? How would I go about doing that? Is this approach effective, or should I approach it by doing something else, like "not thinking about it"?

(Btw, I've actually wondered if this would be classified under more of a somatic problem, but I figured exploring it through the lenses of stress at the root of the problem would be more helpful, haha.)

Thanks!
-Eliapple

[healingme4me]

Here's an article from the archives about ulcers. Hope it helps

http://psychcentral.com/news/archive...trg032906.html

[Crazy Hitch]

Hi EllieApple, thank you for your post.

I understand the challenges of stress which is why I wanted to give a quick response to your thread.

Sometimes I'm at a loss a bit as to how best manage my own stress, so I am far from the one to be giving advice, but I can share with you some articles that I've used in the past that help our overall mental health.

Please feel free to have a quick read of these blogs here on Psychcentral.

I personally find them useful.

My wish for you is that maybe you can get some useful message to take with you?

I hope you find some comfort soon.

Let us know how you go.

Strategies to Reduce Anxiety and Stress | Psych Central - Part 32

Stress Management & Coping with Stress

[EliApple]

Thanks so much for the replies!

I agree, I'm hoping at this point to start finding a way to be able to manage any stress to the point where I don't have to store it anywhere in my body. (Haha, wouldn't that be nice!)

I think it was also helpful for me just taking the time to finally say something, because I've noticed this tends to happen a lot, so just having some sort of basic understanding in this area will at least ease my anxiety of the problem.

Thanks again for taking the time to help,
-Eliapple

[Crazy Hitch]

High 5 to this line EliApple - I wish for this too:

"I'm hoping at this point to start finding a way to be able to manage any stress to the point where I don't have to store it anywhere in my body. (Haha, wouldn't that be nice!)"

Indeed that would be great