Student FAQs: 5 Tips To Defeat Stress

It’s mid Ramadan and I am enjoying my vacations like anything. You don’t really need an escape from Karachi, but the unbearable heat, usual water faults, entire city electrical shutdowns around your Iftar and Suhoor times- always make you think otherwise.

My undergrad life has ended and I’m making the most of it. I’m currently binge watching some shows just to see what the hype is all about. Not experimenting in the kitchen at all, but I do have like tones of recipes pinned and saved on almost every social media site there is. Hard to believe that I am actually procrastinating on my vacations as well.

I’m also thinking about more content for the blog. You will be seeing me focus myself and my blog posts more towards my career. There will be more dental posts, some study tips, time management hacks, and more for students and peers, all of that very soon. You may see some regular, more organized stuff on this very random blog.

As for today I will be talking about a frequent problem that I, as well as many other people who go to dental school- or any other field of higher studies- face throughout the years, chronic stress. An alarmingly frequent problem that is always overlooked as nothing important or even mildly disturbing.

When I was surfing the internet about different problems in dental healthcare, my google predictions kept showing me suggestions like dental student stress, dental students depression, dental dropouts. It wasn't long till I got uneasy realizing that this dilemma was so common yet still a puzzle and mystery that isn't addressed.

 So, having been through dental school and the struggles that come free with the admission into it, I have faced my share of troubles too. I learnt quite a bit on how to cope with them. Here are some tips on how to reduce and cope with stress and keep yourself going throughout!

1.  Tackle things one at a time

Things get worse when you try to multitask in stress. So divide your time slots. Give each important task it appropriate time. And let your mind give its undivided attention towards each thing. What I normally do is make a short timetable and assign specific days, or hours from a day- to different tasks. It makes it easier for me to stick to it, and keeps me on track.

2.  Treat yourself after accomplishing a task

This is an insanely helpful tip. Reward yourself after every completed errand. It could be a sweet treat, a YouTube break, a stretch to make sure your body parts aren’t completely rusty, a nap- anything. I like to listen to some music, a relaxing and motivating playlist which I play when I feel saturated or when I’ve pulled off something difficult. I just lay my head back, pop in my earphones, and zone out for 10 minutes.

One of the songs I love to listen to in such times is this.

3.  Stay hydrated

Oh, the wonders a full glass of water can do. I never believed it either, but staying hydrated really helps and refreshes you inside out. Keeps you up and not tired. Half the problems with your body functions are because you aren't drinking enough water. If that’s not your fix, you can keep hydrated with juices and smoothies too. The fear of stress induced pimples has got me to stick to at least 5 glasses of water per day.

4.  Never bash yourself and compare with other colleagues

The worse thing that you as a struggling and thriving student can do is compare yourself to others. Always remember, everyone learns and adapts at a different pace. It never means that you are any less. Everyone is different and everyone is unique. I have had trouble in the past year when studies got the best of me. The tougher clinical subjects were becoming a hassle, but I picked myself up and made my own pace at which I was comfortable- and was back on track.

Check out how managed myself in exams when the time was short and things were uneasy, right here.

5.  Don’t be afraid to reach out for help

Stress, anxiety and depression are mental states that become devastatingly painful if not dealt with. Never be afraid to ask a friend for help and guidance, or for a rant session. As a student, I struggled with orthodontics a lot. The year was coming to an end and I couldn’t grasp the basics. My questions were silly and dumb but I still went on and questioned every concept until I understood. Don’t be afraid or ashamed to go to your teachers for extra help on even the most basic of topics. Your teachers have a treasure of knowledge and it’s their job to integrate every bit of that into you.

And that’s it. The basics to handle stress in this small post. Stress and anxiety management are things that cannot be dealt with in a single post, but this was a small attempt to ease some of the weight that it gets on everyone. Hope it helps!