On Monday night I was fortunate enough to evaluate my close
friend and college roommate experience a stressful tirade stemmed from
procrastinating. It was 12:30 am. and he was about to quite doing his art
homework and watch TV and mess around on his computer when he
realized had a paper due to next day for his 8:00 class that he was suppose to
have done research for previously. Of course, no research had been done
and I could see him begin the initial signs of stress immediately. He began
to say "Oh my god, oh my god, that paper is due tomorrow.....I am never
going to be able to finish it. His frantic "Oh my gods" and getting up out of
his chair pacing back and forth would definitely be the alarm stage of stress.
He quickly went over to his stack of books and papers and frantically flipped
through them looking for the class syllabus which stated the exact guidelines
of the homework assignment. He couldn't find it, so his stress signs become
more strong and visible. He began to swear because he couldn't find the
paper telling him what to do. When he did find it, he turned around and I
could see that he had begun to sweat and his face was red/flushed. He had
become a person who was overwhelmed or overtaxed in his ability to cope
or react with the situation, or stressed. He fell onto his bed saying he
couldn't take this and he was just going to go to bed, there is no way he can
do it. This helplessness and giving up was another sign of the stress, which I
observed. His stressor was finding out that he had a paper due that he forgot
about and didn't believe he could complete with the time available to do so.
He was also showing other symptoms of stress by being very edgy for the
rest of the evening and jumpy. He demanded complete silence, TV off and
no talking. When he finally began to type, he was typing at a very fast...