In Part One of our series, Bernadette Festa, Nutrition Coordinator with Alta Bates Comprehensive Cancer Center reveals that “stress reduction techniques and exercise greatly improve your quality of life and how you feel.” Recently, in a roundtable discussion, three experts: Ooi Thye (pronounce We-Tie) Chong, Manager, Complementary and Alternative Medicine, St. Vincent’s CCC; Sameet Kumar, Clinical Psychologist, Mt. Sinai CCC in Florida; and Melissa Panszi-Riebe, LMSW, Senior Social Worker, St. Vincent’s CCC in New York, elaborate on the ways patients as well as caregivers can reduce stress.

JOIN A SUPPORT GROUP
Melissa Panszi-Riebe, St. Vincent’s CCC, points out that “support groups are good environments in which you can verbalize fears or concerns with other people who are going through the same thing. Then you’ll feel you are not going crazy. It’s beneficial to receive that emotional support whether it’s one-on-one or whether it’s in a group.”

FIND TIME FOR PERSONAL ENJOYMENT
“You must find time to do what is interesting to you and incorporate it with your relaxation and stress management” stresses Melissa Panszi-Riebe. “Do things that you want to do whether it’s exercise or it’s reading. It doesn’t have to be everyday but incorporate your favorite form of enjoyment into your daily schedule.”

PRACTICE MEDITATION
“Mediation and breathing exercises are two very strong components of what I call restorative yoga, and are very good ways of relieving stress” expresses Ooi Thye Chong, St. Vincent’s CCC. “A lot of people think it’s difficult to meditate, but it is not really,” she reveals. “If you’ve never done any meditation before, I recommend that you work with a yoga practitioner. I teach patients very simple breathing techniques, and I help them to focus on just the breathing. This is meditation at its most simple form. First inhale then exhale slowly, and follow the breath out and following the breath in with your mind focus solely on the breathing. It is amazing how effective this simple technique is in enhancing the relaxation response. You can also practice ‘active or mindful meditation.’ Listening to music or taking a nice walk are examples of mindful meditation. You don’t have to follow the Buddhists and sit there for ages and ‘ohm’ your way into meditation. With meditation, you are emptying your mind, or just stay with any thoughts that come up.”

PERFORM DEEP BREATHING EXERCISES
“There’s a good way to breathe and a bad way to breathe and most of us breathe through our chest all the time except for when we’re sleeping” opines Dr. Sameet Kumar, Mt. Sinai, CCC. “Normally we use our chest because that’s where are lungs are. What we want to do during diaphragmatic breathing is to allow our belly to do the work. You want to see your belly rise out. As that happens, the lungs naturally drop deeper into the body and air rushes in. It really allows physics to do all the work for you. Anytime I’m instructing people on meditation or helping people to go to sleep at night it really comes back to incorporating diaphragmatic breathing. The reason for that is that it’s extremely portable. You can do it anywhere. The main thing that I have found, and this isn’t just in cancer patients as much as it is in our society, is that we tend to say we’re going to go somewhere and relax, or we’re going to do something relaxing as if relaxation is something we can’t incorporate into our lives. That’s a fallacy, so for me, teaching people how to breathe in a more relaxing way allows them to do what they normally do albeit a little differently.”

ADDITIONAL STRESS RELEASE TIPS
“Focus on the positive things in life,” adds Ooi Thye Chong. “Make a list of things or people that you enjoy. Being surrounded with positive things and people is very uplifting. Sometimes, I recommend therapies like massage, Reiki or acupuncture. The power of touch is very healing and calming. Being a student of Chinese medicine, I know that acupuncture can enhance the quality of sleep and can also relieve stress.”

DR. SAMEET KUMAR’S CLOSING THOUGHTS
“One thing that I’m constantly telling people is that the groups are great and feel good while you’re there, but the most important thing is to have something you do every day to manage stress - whether it’s for five or ten minutes. It’s your sacred time to practice stress management exercises through drawing, meditating or simply doing the deep breathing. Like physical exercise, these stress management exercises don’t really help unless you do them regularly. Finally, you must get stress under control. No matter what role it plays in illness, it just feels better to have a more relaxed lifestyle.”

Click on the following links to learn more about the experts interviewed in Part II of “Your Road to Well-Being”.

Ooi Thye Chong,
Manager, Complementary and Alternative Medicine, St. Vincent’s CCC;

Sameet Kumar,
Clinical Psychologist, Mt. Sinai CCC in Florida

Melissa Panszi-Riebe,
LMSW, Senior Social Worker, St. Vincent’s CCC in New York

If you haven’t already, be sure to read Part I of Your Road to Well-Being.