The Shame Around Stress and Therapy: How Therapy Goes Beyond Coping Skills
For many women over 40, stress feels like a constant companion—woven into the fabric of daily life. It can show up subtly, like tension in your shoulders or jaw, or in more overt ways, such as migraines or stomach upset. You might find it hard to relax, unwind, or step away from the things causing stress.
And when something else piles on—a family conflict, work deadline, or health issue—it might feel like there’s no room left to cope. The frustration grows: “Why can’t I handle this? I used to be able to deal with things better.”
For some women, the confusion is compounded by the fact that coping skills they’ve relied on in the past don’t seem to work anymore. While some coping skills may help manage stress in the short term, they don’t always address what’s causing the stress in the first place. That’s where the value of doing the deeper work comes in.
Coping Skills vs. Digging Into the Roots
Think of your stress like a garden overtaken by weeds. Coping skills are like trimming the weeds at the surface—they make the garden look better temporarily. But the weeds keep coming back because their roots remain intact.
Therapy, on the other hand, is like digging into the soil to address those weeds at their roots. It’s not always easy work—it takes patience, care, and sometimes getting your hands dirty—but the results are lasting.
Stress often has emotional roots that coping skills may not be fully effective in managing. It might be tied to unresolved experiences, family dynamics, or ingrained negative beliefs about who you are as a person. These emotional roots can trigger an automatic stress response, making it difficult for the logical part of your mind to stay in control.
That’s why simply trying to “power through” or rely on surface-level strategies might leave you feeling frustrated or like you’re spinning your wheels.
Why Coping Skills Aren’t Always Enough
Coping skills have their place. They’re like tools in a toolbox, and being most helpful when practiced on a consistent basis. But not all coping skills are created equal. Some, like mindfulness or exercise, can help regulate stress in healthy ways. Others, like avoidance or overworking, may provide temporary relief but ultimately add to the problem.
When stress keeps coming back or feels overwhelming, it’s often because the emotional mind—where past experiences and unresolved emotions live—takes over. This emotional override can make logical, task-oriented solutions feel ineffective.
That’s where therapy bridges the gap between managing stress and truly understanding it.
What Therapy Can Offer
Therapy doesn’t just help you cope—it helps you understand your stress on a deeper level and make meaningful changes. Through therapy, you can:
Identify the roots of your stress: Understand the underlying emotional triggers or patterns that may be contributing to your stress.
Process past experiences: Address unresolved events or dynamics that keep showing up in your stress response.
Explore healthier coping strategies: Learn tools that don’t just manage stress but help you respond to it in ways that align with your values.
Rediscover your self-worth: Therapy creates a space to cultivate self-compassion and reconnect with your sense of value and peace.
This kind of deeper work isn’t about weakness—it’s about strength. It’s about having the courage to examine what’s beneath the surface so you can create lasting change.
The Shame Around Stress and Therapy
For many women, societal messages make it even harder to address stress. You might have been taught that talking about your problems is “weak” or that not asking for help is a sign of strength. Stress becomes a badge of honor, proof that you’re handling everything.
But stress isn’t a sign of failure—it’s a sign that your mind and body need care. Therapy provides a space where you can let go of those expectations and begin to focus on you.
Takeaways for Exploring the Roots of Stress
If this resonates, here are a few questions to reflect on:
What patterns or situations in my life consistently create stress?
How have my current coping strategies served me—and where do they fall short?
What would it feel like to approach stress in a different way that feels more aligned with who I am now?
These reflections can be the start of connecting the dots between your stress and its deeper roots.
Why Therapy?
Therapy is about more than managing stress—it’s about uncovering and healing what’s beneath it. It’s not about “fixing” you, but about helping you understand yourself more deeply, so you can respond to life with clarity and self-compassion.
If you’ve been feeling like your stress is unmanageable or that coping skills alone aren’t cutting it, therapy could be the next step in your journey.