Stressed? Don’t Do This!

I know what I do when I'm stressed. I reach for chocolate. In any form. Or comfort food like macaroni and cheese. But the experts say that's not a good idea, for obvious reasons. In fact, there are a lot of things we do when we're stressed that the experts say we shouldn't do. Here are a few more no-no's.

Make big decisions. It might be tempting to pack up and move, quit your job or break up with your best friend when you find yourself in a stressful situation. But we have a harder time controlling urges in these conditions. So take a deep breath, and hold off on those big ideas!

Drown your sorrows. Bad move. I know that glass of wine, or a mango margarita sounds good, but while alcohol blocks production of cortisol, the body’s stress response, it prolongs anxiety by suspending the body’s natural coping mechanisms.

Skip the morning coffee. Makes sense, right? Wrong, according to experts. So long as you’re female. When women collaborated with other women under nerve-racking conditions they performed better when they drank about three cups of caffeinated coffee (compared to decaf). Meanwhile, coffee-drinking male groups performed worse under pressure.