One important factor that increases drastically your stress level is the lack of control. Moving abroad can too easily lead to feeling helpless and having few resources to changing our situation.
For example, many spouses follow their husband or wife for a positive career move, but start to feel that they have little control over their live suddenly. They may not have the legal permission to work in the country; they may not be able to retrieve a secure job as they had back home; they may realise their diplomas won't help to find a job there in particular when their jobs involved local regulations: a lawyer can be highly skilled in her country but feel 'worthless' in the new place. They may become financially dependent for the first time in their relationship and feeling diminished and weakened by the situation. They may have a sense they are loosing their identity and feel helpless about it.
Evidence of the terrible effects of helplessness and loss of self-confidence on physical and mental health was provided in a large scale study involving US info rmation for hours, and inattention and mistakes can cost lives.
In the context of a controversy opposing employers and unions, a researcher named Bob Rose was asked to explore if the working conditions of those workers could explain some high rates of health issues. With his colleagues, he observed their psychological and physical conditions at the time of the controversy and was able to find them and test them again 20 years later! In their 30s, some of them were developing blood pressure at an early age, more than in the average population. At age 50, a number of them had developed heart disease, cancer, alcoholism, or depression, again more than in the average population. A powerful finding was that the psychological factors measured when they were 30 year old had a big impact on developing diseases at 50, and more than the other body health indicator (more then for example blood pressure). In fact, the sense of alienation and of abandonment that they felt at 30 was closely related to depression and anxiety 20 years later.
This study, and others that corroborate this type of conclusion, illustrate how the lack of 'feeling in control' play a very important role in influencing the level at which people start to experience stress: when not feeling in control, the same situation feels much more stressful than the same situation when people are experienced and prepared.
In order to feel better, you need to feel (and be!) in control. There is at least one thing you can control: the way you think. It's not about lying to yourself: actually, by changing some ways of thinking, you actually put yourself in a more optimistic mode and you will have much more positive impact on your environment! Overcoming our feeling of being stuck in life is a first step in helping to actually change and get a life which is much more exciting and fun.
The lack of control over situations experienced by expats and migrants can be quite high. In most situations, we are extremely disadvantaged compared to locals, and even with lots of efforts local knowledge is still very difficult to get in full: The difficulty to master the language, accompanied by the frustration that we can't express ourselves precisely and be fully understood; the lack of understanding of some implicit rules in social encounters or at work; the lack of knowledge of institutions, administrations, education system, job market, health system… Those 'holes' in our knowledge can lead to a feeling of helplessness.
Getting your life back. Building a strong identity which will not depend upon the place you are in or the job you have at some point. I'll discuss that in the next postings.
3 comments:
How would you set the priorities when all above mentioned positions are needed alltogether, and desirably- would have been better achieved sometime before the moment? an attempt to combine learning the damnn languge with networking and meeting kids learning needs gas led directly to panic attack.
Hi, thanks for your comment. I recognize this feeling of having so much to do that you can't think where to start. I used to have, not a list but a booklet of things to do!! There is no way to sort it all in a short time. Panick and anxiety make it worse, that's for sure, but anxiety is also a natural reaction to changes. There are several techniques for stress management, because what is needed is to organize the priorities (because you will never do it all or perfect!); but also manage your health, physical health (relaxation!!) and mental health (anger management, manage all the negative feelings, they will always be there but don't let them destroy yourself and your relationships). I hope some of my next postings will help, but also see some books / websites on stress management; it will help you to be stronger and manage priorities (focus on the really important ones and let go your perfectionism in particular). I hope it's helpful, kind regards, C.
Very relevant article for us Catherine.
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