{"id":336,"date":"2023-04-24T17:35:18","date_gmt":"2023-04-24T21:35:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/thriving\/?p=336"},"modified":"2023-04-26T10:10:42","modified_gmt":"2023-04-26T14:10:42","slug":"just-five-minutes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/thriving\/2023\/04\/just-five-minutes\/","title":{"rendered":"Just Five Minutes"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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Last post I wrote a little about grief on top of stress, telling you about what I was learning through the experience of both my parents dying two days apart.  Well, I\u2019m still learning, and I thought I\u2019d pass along what I\u2019m finding. It\u2019s humbling\u2014I\u2019m learning that I may know<\/em> about handling stress, but actually doing<\/em> it is hard.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

As my folks were sick and later when they died I took on a lot of responsibility\u2014coordinating doctors\u2019 visits, hospice care, and then memorial services, closing the estate\u2014all those complicated, sad, and stressful things. People kept asking me how I was doing, to which I always replied \u201cI\u2019m fine, as long as I stay busy.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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But of course, I wasn\u2019t fine. I started to realize this at a pecan production meeting in Berrien County, where Extension had set up free blood pressure screenings. I had my blood pressure taken (mostly to show others how important taking care of your health is) and the nurse looked at me with real concern as she told me my blood pressure was very high\u2014148\/102. I was shocked. But of course, not dealing with stress and just staying busy was making me sick.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It took me a couple of weeks to get to the doctor, where sure enough the nurse told me my blood pressure was 145\/104. Then the doctor came in. He asked about my parents and their passing, about what I was going through and how I was feeling, and was just a sympathetic listener for five or ten minutes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Then he took my blood pressure. It was now 135\/85.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Talking with someone who just listened made a huge difference in just five minutes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I knew that talking with someone could help my stress and therefore my blood pressure\u2014but I hadn\u2019t been willing to take the time and be honest with myself and someone else and talk about my stress and sadness. I was too busy being \u201cfine\u201d and staying busy in order to avoid how I felt. I knew<\/em> better, but I didn\u2019t do<\/em> better.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So, my lesson from all this, that I\u2019m passing on to you, is that talking to someone isn\u2019t just nice\u2014it can be lifesaving<\/em>. Just take five minutes and talk with someone you trust about how you\u2019re doing\u2014stress, sadness, worry, whatever is concerning you. It will lower your stress and improve your health. Just talking with someone for five minutes can really help you thrive on the farm.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Last post I wrote a little about grief on top of stress, telling you about what I was learning through the experience of both my parents dying two days apart.  Well, I\u2019m still learning, and I thought I\u2019d pass along what I\u2019m finding. It\u2019s humbling\u2014I\u2019m learning that I may know about handling stress, but actually […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":217,"featured_media":343,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-336","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/thriving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/336","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/thriving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/thriving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/thriving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/217"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/thriving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=336"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/thriving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/336\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":341,"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/thriving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/336\/revisions\/341"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/thriving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/343"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/thriving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=336"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/thriving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=336"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/site.extension.uga.edu\/thriving\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=336"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}