| ||||||||||||||||||
Did you know you can trade in your old books for an Amazon.co.uk Gift Card to spend on the things you want? Plus, get an extra £5 Gift Certificate when you trade in books worth £10 or more before June 30, 2012. Visit the Books Trade-In Store for more details. |
Frequently Bought Together
Product details
|
More About the Author
Product Description
Product Description
We seem to be living through an epidemic of stress. Thousands of therapists, counsellors and healers are devoted to protecting - and perhaps even saving - us from a disease that they say debilitates, and even kills. Britain alone is host to more than 4 million websites dedicated to the subject, while every year millions of pounds are committed to fighting stress. But are these efforts really combating stress? In this brilliant re-assessment of our understanding of this ailment, Angela Patmore establishes what we do - and do not - know about stress by examining what it actually is. In the Truth About Stress Angela Patmore addresses all aspects of this ever-spreading problem, from the activities of the stress-management community and the huge variety of treatments it offers, to an analysis of the kinds of physical suffering produced by stress. From symptoms to cure, Patmore raises important questions about the way we treat a condition that has become central part of modern living. Its conclusions will cause us to profoundly reappraise the way we understand our own health and well-being.
About the Author
Angela Patmore is a former University of East Anglia research fellow and International Fulbright Scholar. Her first book, Sportsmen Under Stress (1986), was The Times sports books of the year. A former Guardian columnist on the psychology of sport, she writes extensively for newspapers and magazines and has contributed to many television and radio programmes on stress. She also serves on the Metropolitan Police External Experts' stress advisory group under the chairmanship of Commissioner Sir John Stevens. In 1996 she was invited by UEA's Centre for Environmental and Risk Management to review the literature on stress. Her report, Killing the Messenger, served as a catalyst for UK critics and revisionists of the stress management industry from the sciences, medicine, psychology and the arts.
Inside This Book
(Learn More)
Browse and search another edition of this book.
Browse and search another edition of this book.
Suggested Tags from Similar Products(What's this?)Be the first one to add a relevant tag (keyword that's strongly related to this product)
|
Sell a Digital Version of This Book in the Kindle Store
If you are a publisher or author and hold the digital rights to a book, you can sell a digital version of it in our Kindle Store.
Learn more
What Other Items Do Customers Buy After Viewing This Item?
Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
4 of 4 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
It is a shame that the splendid message in the book loses credibility because of the biassed stance of the author, and from focus because of the sheer volume of overly detailed writing.
In a nut shell, as derived from her own interesting personal experience, she advocates the mantra that 'what does not kill you will strengthen you'. And this really is a message to be given a better status as alternative to the overly protective anti-stress/relaxation industry mantras.
But she takes over 300 pages to damn the current stress concepts and management as if everyone can sooner or later deal with any amount of stress. But nervous breakdowns and the overloads that drive parents to shout at children are too readily dismissed as simply variations on the theme of a failure to hang in there. For many, they are very real.
And she fails, even in the final 50 pages where she offers advice rather than damns, simply because she talks of the all powerful panacea of hanging in there with stress, and never mentions the reality of how to handle the intermediate ailments of failing to cope with overload/stress or whatever you might call it. She seems to legitimise a dismissal of stress simply because there is no one fixed definition.
By way of example, after 30 years or so not fearing dogs, I got bitten by one and subsequently feared each dog would do the same. I knew that this was irrational, but it has taken a few years facing these dogs to actually see my instinctive reaction of fear to calm down - and this is with concerted effort to relax and face the fear.
So the revelation she had in her life simply does not always transfer to others the same way - either you get a seismic shift in your reactions to stress, or you have to face the stress and gradually acclimatise. And if it is the latter, then the fallout until you do can be very very very debilitating. And ever so real. Whatever you call it.
But, in summary, we have allowed the powers that be to start prescribing a softly softly approach to too many things. Dealing with stress face in is often much more empowering, as she explains, than it is destructive. You must just hang in there and not run to your doctor or boss if you start to feel un-relaxed.
In a nut shell, as derived from her own interesting personal experience, she advocates the mantra that 'what does not kill you will strengthen you'. And this really is a message to be given a better status as alternative to the overly protective anti-stress/relaxation industry mantras.
But she takes over 300 pages to damn the current stress concepts and management as if everyone can sooner or later deal with any amount of stress. But nervous breakdowns and the overloads that drive parents to shout at children are too readily dismissed as simply variations on the theme of a failure to hang in there. For many, they are very real.
And she fails, even in the final 50 pages where she offers advice rather than damns, simply because she talks of the all powerful panacea of hanging in there with stress, and never mentions the reality of how to handle the intermediate ailments of failing to cope with overload/stress or whatever you might call it. She seems to legitimise a dismissal of stress simply because there is no one fixed definition.
By way of example, after 30 years or so not fearing dogs, I got bitten by one and subsequently feared each dog would do the same. I knew that this was irrational, but it has taken a few years facing these dogs to actually see my instinctive reaction of fear to calm down - and this is with concerted effort to relax and face the fear.
So the revelation she had in her life simply does not always transfer to others the same way - either you get a seismic shift in your reactions to stress, or you have to face the stress and gradually acclimatise. And if it is the latter, then the fallout until you do can be very very very debilitating. And ever so real. Whatever you call it.
But, in summary, we have allowed the powers that be to start prescribing a softly softly approach to too many things. Dealing with stress face in is often much more empowering, as she explains, than it is destructive. You must just hang in there and not run to your doctor or boss if you start to feel un-relaxed.
5 of 6 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I would recommend this book to everyone. It explains why many people (the majority?) are very sceptical about stress, stress absences, the benefits of wholesale stress counselling and is very thought provoking. Many times I start a book and leave it halfway through-this one I couldn't put down-it was easily readable and complex issues were explained to the layman with clarity and without being patronising.
I felt however that there was one major disappointment but perhaps I was missing the point. At times I felt the author was dealing in semantics i.e. that all the conditions do exist but because they couldn't be lumped together as "stress" they were criticised but not addressed. The author is clearly a highly intelligent, qualified, experienced and knowledgable person and therefore it was a pity that although the book was over 400 pages, less than 50 addressed how to deal with "stress" conditions whether or not they should properly be classed as anxiety, phobias etc. I would have loved to have heard from the author what she thought were beneficial, effective methods of treatment for conditions which do exist even though they cannot be lumped into "stress".
But I repeat, an excellent, readable book.
I felt however that there was one major disappointment but perhaps I was missing the point. At times I felt the author was dealing in semantics i.e. that all the conditions do exist but because they couldn't be lumped together as "stress" they were criticised but not addressed. The author is clearly a highly intelligent, qualified, experienced and knowledgable person and therefore it was a pity that although the book was over 400 pages, less than 50 addressed how to deal with "stress" conditions whether or not they should properly be classed as anxiety, phobias etc. I would have loved to have heard from the author what she thought were beneficial, effective methods of treatment for conditions which do exist even though they cannot be lumped into "stress".
But I repeat, an excellent, readable book.
1 of 2 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
I found this book to be an extremely interesting read, although at times I had to reread elements several times to get the point of what the writer was implying; perhaps due to her writing style. This book opens up "a can of worms" within the stress management industry as it highlights the term that stress is now (more than ever before),used common place in everyday language and has been medicalized, which has helped develop the concept of stress phobia globally. And that there are millions of stress management websites offering stress management, with the primary concern being that unqualified people are capitalizing on this phenomenon (and possibly doing more harm than good). Whilst I did not agree with all information and criticism of past and present research, I did however, agree with most of the contents and main points made (as above and more). A final point was that during a resent holiday abroad, I left my (half read), book on a coach trip and the very first thing I did on arrival back to the UK was to buy another; I just had to finish it. Its one of those books you have to read again; packed with research literature and great debate/argument, which has galvanised my present thoughts on the subject in view of reappraisal; I thoroughly enjoyed it!!
Would you like to see more reviews about this item?
Was this review helpful?
Let us know
Listmania!
Look for similar items by category
Look for similar items by subject
Feedback
- Would you like to update product info or give feedback on images?
- I am the Author, and I want to comment on my book.
- I am the Publisher, and I want to comment on this book.
|
