eustress
physical, mental, or emotional tension that is caused by something positive or is psychologically or physically beneficial: When stress enhances function, such as when you’re lifting weights or accomplishing a challenging task, it could be considered eustress.
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Nick’s footsteps were slow and plodding as he entered the apartment. He let his briefcase fall without even bothering to put it away. He would handle that later if Kelly didn’t. He didn’t even bother to change his clothes, or even take his shoes off, before flopping on the couch. And then he did exactly nothing.
He did not even turn the TV on. He simply sat there with vacant eyes. A small, distant part of him said that he should do something. But that part was easy to ignore. His entire body felt heavy, like he was made of lead. He vaguely heard footsteps coming from the bathroom.
“Oh hey, you’re back.” Kelly said.
Nick slowly turned to look at his girlfriend. She was dressed like she had come back from the gym. Not that that was a surprise.
“I just got back myself.” She said, confirming his guess. “Seems to be happening a lot, huh? I guess we’ve just synched up our schedules now. Oh hey, maybe we should do that on purpose. You know, come back at the same time and all that.”
Nick did not say anything. He just slowly blinked. Kelly frowned at the sight.
“Oh dear, something’s wrong.” She came and joined him on the couch. “What’s up? Bad day at work?”
It was a monumental effort to speak. “Something like that.”
“Want to tell me about it?”
“Nah.”
“Oh come on. It’s one of the many things I’m here for.”
Nick let out a non-committal grunt. Kelly poked his side. He groaned. She repeated the poke.
“Another guy left.” He said. His voice sounded flat, even to his own ear. “They put all his work on me. Again. I told them I couldn’t. I told them it was too much. But they don’t listen. They never listen. And now I’m here doing five people’s jobs. And…and I…I just…I can’t. Can’t keep doing all this work. Can’t tell my bosses about it. Can’t even afford to leave. I…Kelly, I feel like I’m about to break.”
Kelly slid in closer to him and placed an arm around his shoulders. She was quite solid. In a way that alone was comforting. Nick didn’t have the energy to do anything else but sit there. She seemed perfectly fine letting him. They remained like that for almost a minute before she said anything.
“I’m pretty bad at giving advice, especially about job stuff. I mean, my job is just to do stuff at the gym. So yeah, I’m not going to try and tell you what to do professionally. But I will ask if you want to try going to the gym with me one of these days. A good workout is a surprisingly effective method of stress relief.”
Nick slowly looked at her and blinked equally slowly. “Oh yeah. Because when I come home from work, completely exhausted and stressed out from over working, doing something hard and strenuous is exactly what I want to do.”
“Hey, don’t knock it ‘til you try it. I read online in a bunch of different places that there’s more than one kind of stress. I don’t remember the exact terms, so I’m probably about to butcher all this stuff, but there’s roughly two big categories of stress. Good stress and bad stress. Bad stress is what you’re going through at work. I don’t need to tell you much about that, because you’re living it. But good stress? That comes from things that feel bad in the moment, but end up benefiting you. Like working out. While you’re doing it, it’s hard, sweaty and can even hurt. But at the end of the day, it has all kinds of benefits. There’s even good stress for mental stuff, which I guess would be, like, solving worthwhile problems or talking to someone about your problems. They can suck, be really hard to do and feel like they’d make things worse. But once it’s all over, they leave you better off than before.”
Nick let out a long, slow breath. This conversation definitely was not what he wanted to be doing right now. But he had heard that talking about problems could help, so maybe there was something to what she was saying. Maybe it would be worth giving it a try.
“Okay, fine.” He said. “I’ll try it out. Just don’t expect me to keep up with you.”
“Obviously. And not today. We’ll go on Saturday. I’ll start you off nice and light. Just get you used to everything and see how it all works out.”
“Uh-huh.” Nick was not sure if she knew what “light” meant. He had seen the videos she posted of her workouts. They hurt just to watch.
“But for now? Just take a few deep breaths. We can watch something dumb and just chill. Maybe order some take out?”
“Yeah. That sounds about right.”
It would not make things better, but for now, he could at least pretend to forget about work. And maybe a bit of exercise would do him good. If he did not have a complete mental breakdown before the weekend came anyway.
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Remember to take care of yourself. Mentally and physically.
Now I just have to remind myself to do that myself.
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