How do you deal with Stress?

- Going for a long walk by myself.  Usually I listen to music and/or take my camera along.
- Playing with dogs, just for fun, not training just playing.
- Going shopping.  I love to shop, so I don't have to buy anything, I just like to walk around and look.
- Going to the gym and tumbling on the trampolines.  I competed gymnastics, which is always full of pressure, so for fun/relief I like to just "mess around" on the trampolines.

First I scream into a pillow.....then I pull myself together and go for a long walk with my dogs, or shopping, a long drive with loud heavy rock music.....usually after that I fall into this "I don't give a crap" attitude.

Depending on what the stressor is, depends on what I do.  If its normal day to day stress, I don't do anything.  I just try to get it off my mind.  If its DH & I have a major arguement I'll go for a drive and be blaring some kind of music.  But the driving has to be highway type driving, not this stop and go stuff you do in the city.  OH!  Just thought of another one, play cards with a friend.

Xeph:  take a yoga class!  Tai Chi, a nice hike near a river or a lake. 
 
Even better idea:  find a nice open field in a park, throw down a blanket and lie on your back and look at the clouds. 

I love to walk and also hike with Willow.  I've got a book of all the places to go around my area and we try a new one on weekends. 
 
Or, her and I will get in the car like Thelma and Louise and just drive, drive, drive. . .

ORIGINAL: willowchow

I love to walk and also hike with Willow.  I've got a book of all the places to go around my area and we try a new one on weekends. 

Or, her and I will get in the car like Thelma and Louise and just drive, drive, drive. . .

 
Hopefully like the alternate ending![]

ORIGINAL: Bullymom

My hubby looks at girls like that all the time.[&o]  I know that no matter how hard I try, I'll never look like them and it really hurts my feelings.  When we first me, I wore a size 8-9 pants and even then, he said that I still needed to lose weight.[:'(]  I want to be that size again but how can I when he is sooo negative about my weight?  I'm a stress eater.  I get stressed and I pig out.  My metabolism sucks and I have no clue what I can take/do to fix that.  Sniff Sniff.  I wish there was a magic lamp and genie around so I could wish myself to look like I used to

 
It's a myth that skinnier people have better metabolisms!  It must be true cos I seed it on the telly.  They did these experiments with different sized ladies to prove it.  In the same programme they also showed that pureeing your meal into a soup keeps you fuller for longer and that a calcium rich diet helps you lose weight because the calcium kind of holds and carries any fat through so you excrete it at the other end instead of it being processed and stored by your body.  True.  And interesting.
 
Don't be so hard on yourself.  What other outlets for stress have you tried.... that would be key methinks... that way you can stick to only eating when you are hungry and that's bound to make a huge difference.
 
In answer to the OP, normally [sm=floating.gif][sm=censored.gif] [sm=blush.gif] but at the moment, a good cry, a cuddle, a hot bath with lavender oil in it and when all else fails, a really good SWEAR.  Clears the blood and makes you feel tons better.... although not in earshot of any little ones obviously, although then you can have fun making up NEW swear words that aren't swear words but sound like them..... Billy Connelly stylee.

In answer to the OP, normally [sm=floating.gif][sm=censored.gif] [sm=blush.gif]

See and that's...um...kind of my normal stress reliever[sm=blush.gif]  But I have no viable males available to me at present, and I'm not the kind of girl that can just go out have a few[sm=drinking47.gif] and go at it (sometimes I wish I was...I'd feel so much better)..

Ed's suggestion is surprisingly appealing to me.  Heck, I could do that at the local park and not worry about anybody seeing me (like I said...extremely self concious...I don't even eat in front of people I don't know, even if I'm absolutely sick with hunger).
 

a cuddle

I got four hours of Canadian snugglies yesterday, and I left his place feeling a little better...if not a little lusty[8|]
 
Canada is good for such things, but sometimes I wish he were good for "the other thing" too.[8D]

Xeph--Why isn't he?  I saw the picture, he's a cute one.  And, he likes dogs!

We've been friends since the 7th grade.  We got closer my senior year of high school (I told him things I wouldn't tell anybody else).  I don't know WHY it happened or HOW it happened, he just kinda...became my Will to his Grace (no, he's not gay).

I've had feelings for him before, but they weren't returned, so I just shrugged it off.  I know I'll always have feelings for him, but I squash them, because I'm not what he wants, and he's too important to me to ruin that.

I have never felt as emotionally or physically comfortable with someone as I do with Craig.  I can relax, and just be me.  He has this uncanny ability to adapt to my moods, and he knows when to speak and when to keep quiet, he let's me touch and play with his fingers and his face (it's how I soothe my nerves) and he doesn't say boo about it.

Yesterday we were laying together on his couch *points upward at first picture in her NDR pics thread* and watching Drumline.  I was feeling a bit uncomfortable and antsy, and without saying anything, he just shifted, and curled tighter, and held me a little closer.  He just knows.

We say a lot to each other without ever speaking, we convey emotions with looks and touches.  It's extremely foreign and odd to me, to be able to comfortably interact with somebody in such a manner.  I love him, and he knows I do (I'm not IN love with him..I won't allow myself to be, but I do love him).  I told him once over IM that I loved him, and I was quite surprised when he said "I love you too."

I can't say it out loud...it scares me.  Everybody else I've said "I love you" too, it was a knee jerk reaction.  I said it because they expected it, and it scares me to know that with him, I mean it.  I've never felt platonic love for anybody, and I've been trying very hard to quantify my feelings about that, because it just doesn't make sense to me.

This weekend was the first time he's actually come home since winter, and he said on Friday he wasn't doing anything, so we could spend the day together.  And we did.  I even cooked him lunch (I had a major freakout about that...but he seemed wholly pleased with the resulting food ^_^).

I was supposed to go down to Madison to see him last Sunday, but money has been extremely tight, and I couldn't go.  Not to mention I had a bit of an emergency with another friend of mine, so by the time I would have gotten down there, he would have been gone to meetings already (he's a college housefellow).  He actually seemed a bit disappointed xD  He's started asking me when I'm coming to visit (NOBODY asks me when I'm coming to visit o.o).

I asked him if he honestly thought I'd pass up time with him if I didn't have to.  "...No."  "Smart man, Canada."

And before any of you go getting ideas, I know there's another girl he's interested in.  How do I know?  He told me so :-p

And yes...he is cute.  He's extremely attractive.  And he loves his dog (you should have seen him with Lacey yesterday).  And he loves my dogs (you should have seen him in the yard with Strauss and Buddy xD).  Girls just keep focusing on what he isn't instead of what he is, and I just want to smack them.

Even better idea: find a nice open field in a park, throw down a blanket and lie on your back and look at the clouds.

Ed, I LOVE that idea!  I go to the park sometimes and lay under a big shady tree and  just stare up at the leaves blowing in the wind and the clouds passing by...

Xeph- maybe just go and spend a few hours at a park and relax with a book, music or nothing at all.. but enjoy the sights and sounds...

My hubby looks at girls like that all the time.

Bullymom.. don't beat yourself up. DO what you can do to be healthy, but certainly do not stress over who your husband looks at.. even if you were 100 pound waif, with a perfect rack, incredible abs and a$$ so lean and tight you could bounce quarters off of it.... he would STILL look at other women []

That is JUST men.. I honestly think it is genetic and they can't help it.. when I see my DH looking at a woman I say "she is HOT huh?... I would do her too"[]
 

Here are some of my favorites:
I like to drive and listen to R. Carlos Nakai CD's.
Burn some sage and take a nice hot bath.
Walk through farmland (We have one that belongs to the local land trust, just around the corner.  Dogs are allowed on leash, so it's nice - a mix of fields and woods.)
Sit on a milking stool outside my horse's stall and tell him my woes.  (I like him - he always agrees with me, plus he has the sweetest hay breath.  That alone makes you feel better.  And, there's even something soothing about horse sweat - honest.)

I write.  For me it's the best way to rid myself of anxiety, stress and just icky feelings.  I think it's because if i write exactly what I'm feeling, then I'm not harboring them inside me.  

I blog a lot more than I used to (Livejournal/myspace), but things I really want to write I tend to..not, because they're strange...and a little dirty, and people have been known to snoop through my stuff.
 
And then I get an earful >.<

I clean when I'm stressed. Whether it's tidying and organizing, doing laundry, or vacuuming. It gives me a chance to clear my head, and as a bonus, it's productive!