404: Communicating in Stressful Situations
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How do you handle stressful situations? From acute to chronic, we encounter all sorts of situations in running our business. As a business owner, we’re obligated to not just take care of stressful situations and emergencies, but also communicate and help others through it as well. We break down how to cope with stress in the moment. We give several strategies for effective communication and also how to plan for after the emergency is taken care of.
Main topics:
Knowing yourself
Handling the adrenaline
Be concise
Listen actively
Prepare for afterwards
Main takeaway: Planning isn’t just for the moment of stress/emergency. It’s also for the countless moments afterwards that you have to be ready for.
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A VERY ROUGH TRANSCRIPT OF THE EPISODE
Provided by otter.ai
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
stressful situation, client, body, pet sitters, emergency, stress, situation, talk, pet, dog, business, communicate, moment, listen, phone, happen, process, feelings, brain, communication
SPEAKERS
Meghan, Collin
Meghan 00:03
Hi, I'm Meghan I'm Collin and we are the host of pet sitter confessional and open and honest discussion about life as a pet sitter. Thank you very much to pet sitters associates and our wonderful Patreon members for supporting today's show. If you don't know what a Patreon member is, they contribute a few dollars of their hard earned dog walking and pet sitting money every month. To keep the show going. We now have over 400 episodes and hopefully 400 more. So if you have found value in the show, you can learn what it means to be a Patreon at Pet Sitter confessional.com/support.
Collin 00:36
We know a lot of people listen on all sorts of platforms across the internet's on our website on your favorite podcasting app or, or on YouTube even however, one of these platforms is going away. If you are a dyed in the wool stitcher fanatic, it will be no more very, very soon actually. They're completely getting rid of that app. It's been around for a really long time, but they're shutting the doors because it's not profitable for them any more. So if you are again, if you listen to Stitcher, if you're listening to us on Stitcher right now go download a different podcast app. Well, I think
Meghan 01:08
they're going to be shunting everybody over to Pandora. So if you listen on Pandora, or if you have Pandora, you can also listen there. I know, Apple podcasts and Spotify are the two biggest players. But there's a bunch of other ones out there
Collin 01:20
as well. If you're an Android, you can also obviously listen on Google podcast, I recommend podcast addict. If you are an iOS listener, you can switch over to overcast, which is my personal favorite.
Meghan 01:31
We are also looking forward to our reschedule First Friday meet up this Friday the 21st at 12pm Central Standard Time for our Great Dane members of the Patreon group, we are excited to talk to everyone then one of the questions that we have on our Employee Application is tell us about a stressful situation in your life and how you handled it. That's a question again, from our interview process. And one that gets a lot of very interesting comments back to it. Most people say something like, Oh, I just kind of got busy and worked through it. Or it was really bad for a while and I didn't know what to do. Unfortunately, particularly as business owners, we are going to have stress in this business, right? We take care of living beings that that's that's a stress in and of itself. They are these are family members, these are very important to the client. So there's there's added stress of that, and then all the admin and everything that goes along with running a business. Sometimes it's acute stress that we have just for a very short time. And sometimes it's chronic stress. If we have bad habits or little boundaries in our business, these things can creep up and just cause our shoulders to just droop a little bit more and more every day because of that stress, the stress of running your business every day, then there's the events that happen that take it to a whole nother level. And those are the ones that we want to talk about today. How do you handle these stressful situations? Well,
Collin 02:48
your body has your body has three ways it's fight, flight, or freeze. You're either running away, running towards where your body is standing still
Meghan 02:58
well, and a lot of times we've heard about that in school, we learned about the body and how it adapts to stressful environments situations through these different mechanisms.
Collin 03:09
Yeah, it's purely survival mode, your brain switches to lizard brain and it goes keep me alive. That's all it's thinking about at this point is how do I survive. It's at this point where animals typically will defecate or urinate, their heart rate goes through the roof, their respiratory rate increases, their body temperature actually increases well, all the muscles are tensed and ready to go. But here's the thing, each have a place. And when we're talking about emergency, there's a need for each one of these. I think too often people glorify the fight response as being the one true way of like, if you're not fighting, you're not winning, and you got to fight, fight, fight, fight, fight. But honestly, if someone's in the house, running at me, I'm running away, but I am not standing there to. To fight that person off, I need to flee. Now, the one you wouldn't want to do is freeze in that situation. But sometimes freezing is beneficial if it allows you to take in more information about the situation before you make a judgment call and know what to do. Encountering a stressful situation while performing pet sitting and dog walking visits is unfortunately very likely to happen. Everything from being locked out of a house and not being able to find a cat to a medical emergency or even a lost animal. And while it's never possible to fully prepare, or be in the mindset for every possible situation, there are actually several things that you can do in the moment to stay calm and under control.
Meghan 04:34
Often where I go when I get panicked is the adrenaline I feel my blood pressure and my body surge up and I'm kind of jacked. I'm ready. I'm ready to go. I run on that adrenaline but at the same time we still need to function and respond appropriately. I still need to be able to form sentences and coherently address the issue at hand whether it's through talking with somebody else or just figuring out and problem solving. The next thing that needs to happen
Collin 05:01
well, and that's exactly what this whole process is of, we just said that the fight flight or freeze is part of our lizard brain to preserve our bodies, we go pure, instinctual, pure lizard brain to keep ourselves alive, we have a lot of higher functioning things that we have to take care of, in this situation, when we ask how do you handle a situation stressful situation? Where saying, how do you exert control or your intent onto the situation to either resolve it and make it better or get out of there, that takes higher level brain functionality, and the adrenaline, the blood pumping, the increased respiratory rate, all of that clouds and obscures our ability to do that. So we have to in the moment, be able to go, Okay, I feel this, I see this, what do I do now? What's what's my next step.
Meghan 05:46
And the biggest thing for me is taking a deep breath. Yeah, maybe a few depending on how bad the situation is, you know, that deep and controlled breathing from your belly, not just from your chest of the like that the fast but it's just like it's very deep from your gut, it can have an immediate calming effect on your body and mind, I learned a lot about this, when I was pregnant with with our kids of breathing is very important to do it from your entire body, not just your upper portion of your chest and to exhale slowly and deeply as well, because that is a release for your mind of those chemicals. And that those feelings of just okay, I'm letting this go. We know a lot of people count to five. I think I saw that on a movie one time if they counted to five, and then they addressed the situation or they sat in their feelings for five seconds. And then they moved on. And again,
Collin 06:41
what we're doing here is this is a psychological, physiological and physical exertion of control over your body may get you the deep breathing, whenever you get excited that drill in your body is going. And we have to go. Ah, this is changing our physiology of how our body's functioning, it's exerting a physical control, and it's helping our mind slow down. And I'm sure people love that sound. I'm so sorry, people, you can just skip over that. But that's what that's
Meghan 07:14
the second one is grounding techniques. These help you refocus on the present moment reducing those feelings of stress and anxiety, it can be something as simple as identifying, you know that using your senses, identifying five things that you see four things, you can touch three things, you hear two things you can smell, and one thing you can taste, I'm glad they didn't do five things you can taste because that would be very different.
Collin 07:38
What what it's meant to bring you in the moment and in an emergency, this is extremely important. Buy things I see when I see okay, I see the kettle knocked out down with the other trash gotten into I see this chewing over thing. Taste could just be I still taste the coffee in my mouth from this morning. It's to make you physically and mentally present and aware of all of your surroundings. And again, your brain is telling you either run away run towards or stop moving, stop thinking and just hold on. But you are exerting control and going no, I'm going to name five things. I'm a name for that. It allows you to be more present in that situation
Meghan 08:14
well and to actually document what's going on to because in stressful situations, your brain, your body may say run but your mind might say freeze. And so you're trying to come to terms with everything that's going on of okay, I come into a situation where the dog is unresponsive. What do I need to do? Okay, well, my body, my body is saying go to the dog. But my mind is saying ah, it's panicking. It's locking up, I don't know what to do. And so having some of these grounding techniques of oh, okay, well, I five things I can see, I can see that the gums of the dog are pale. Okay, I know that that's a concern.
Collin 08:51
It also may be noting the time of when you walked in. So that's another important factor of later whenever you have to report this emergency or where you have to D decompress from the stressful situation. Just don't know how long the whole thing took maybe a critical piece of information as well.
Meghan 09:06
Another tactic you can use is the mindfulness and meditation again, being present in the moment as much as possible, letting go of any past things that happened or anything in the future of okay, well, last time I walked in, maybe this is the second time that you've had this situation happen where you've come into a dog unresponsive and you know, the last time ended up with the dog dying and and you bring in those past feelings and you try to catastrophize of this current situation. Well, that's going to end up just how it is it was the last time and then a future
Collin 09:35
worry may be thinking about the repercussions of the client being angry at you. Or you may sit there and go oh my goodness, if somebody else finds out that I walked in on this dog and they're like this, I'm never going to have any other visits and like my business is going to crash and so you have to save all of that for later you can observe your thoughts you can go that's a worry. That's a concern. That's a fear. Not for right now. Just for a few minutes. I need to focus on the here and now and Look at the other five senses, the other senses that I'm pulling in, but I'm going to note all these thoughts, focus on the ones that are actually pertinent to helping me get through the situation in this moment. And then process those things later.
Meghan 10:11
When you are in a stressful situation. Something else that may help is some physical activity. Now, if you're in a true emergency where you need to transport the patch, or you've come into some other situation about the home, the home is on fire or something. Obviously, physical activity would not be the best in this scenario, because it is an emergency. But when you have a little bit of space and time, and you are still stressed out about an event, taking a little jog or taking a walk around a block is helpful that that physical movement or some stretching, that physical movement is going to help clear your mind and reduce the feelings of stress. Because your body and mind are focusing on something else other than the activity at hand. Well in
Collin 10:48
it in that stressful situation. A lot of times our bodies are required to move, runs the dog, pick up the dog run to the car, driving in the car, carrying in the dog making phone calls, texting, working on all this stuff, you're physically moving. And so that actually as a process of helping you focus on the activities that you're doing now, after the fact sometimes when that activity goes away, you have some trouble coping with it. If it's a less emergency situation where maybe you walk in and the vase has been cracked over and it's spilled on the floor, and it's shattered into a billion and a half pieces. That's pretty stressful, especially if you know if it's very costly,
Meghan 11:24
or February a family heirloom, or there's a million pieces on the floor that you have to clean up. After after
Collin 11:29
you've taken a breath. After you've done your thought your senses thing after you've thought about this mindfulness, you may sit there and jog in place or pace in the room a little bit if you start to because at that point, you will have a mismatch of your body elevates itself with rapid breathing, rapid blood pumping all these things muscles tensing. If you have a release for that, it can actually make more stress and strain and a lot more make the stressful situation even worse for you. So I have giving you a quick outlet, and then going into dressing situation can can be very beneficial.
Meghan 12:02
Another thing that I learned while birthing are humans, were the positive affirmations that can be really helpful, you know, they I can do this, my body was made for this, I am tough enough, I am strong enough, I know my business well enough to do these things, it can really boost your confidence and help you manage that stress more effectively. Because as a business owner, you have the obligation of communicating with your clients about what is going on. So if your brain cannot properly process and coherently think of sentences and form sentences, you are not going to be able to effectively run your business when you need to for as far as communication with your clients. Because let's say you walk in and you find a pet motionless on the floor. Well, you can't communicate effectively if you're an emotional mess. So those above steps that we just talked about are going to help,
Collin 12:51
they're going to help you get in the mindset to now take over control and handle that situation much more effectively. Obviously, again, every single detail of a stressful situation is very unique. We're trying to tackle this at a broad level of how can we prepare mentally and physically for these in the moment, what can we do. And now as you said, begun, communication is usually a very close second two things that when in a stressful situation is you have to communicate either to a client to an employee to another staff member to an ER of that to a neighbor, you have to talk to somebody about this. So what are some ways to communicate well, in a stressful situation or in an emergency, the first one is to maintain composure, it is essential to remain calm to effectively communicate the situation. The only way that we can remain calm is if we have worked through the previous five steps. This is where that big breath comes in. Take one, maybe two, maybe 10 Whatever it is. But the other part of this step is to at this stage, when we are when we are communicating, then we are trying to maintain composure. Before you make that phone call before you go and talk to somebody, you need to expect to be hit by a wave of emotion. Especially if you have to communicate to a client a bad situation, you know, they are going to have a big emotion, you know, they're going to be enraged, you know that they are going to be immediately crying and hurt and deeply wounded. So don't get caught off guard when it happens. Expect that response from them so that when you're talking to them on the phone, and it happens, you are able to continue to communicate effectively to them through those emotions that they are having.
Meghan 14:31
Well I know that unless it is genuinely your fault, like you left the door wide open and the cat or dog escaped like unless it is your fault. The emotions that the client has are nine times out of 10 not directly directed at you. So try not to take those personally if if the dog was in distress and needed to be taken to the emergency vet, the client who's probably on the other side of the world or in a different country. They may start crying because this is their family member however know that You did nothing wrong. And so the crying is not because they are upset with what how you acted or what you did. When you are communicating about a situation clearly state the problem at hand be precise about what it is that the facts and the knowledge and the observations that you have. For example, you could say our staff arrived and Baxter was unresponsive in the dining room. That's good. But if you're calling for help or backup for for emergency services, you should start your call with I'm here at XYZ client and their dog is unresponsive. I need assistance getting him to the car as soon as possible. This is their address,
Collin 15:37
clearly stating exactly what the problem is, and the need that you have. Because people are gonna have a lot of questions, and they're always going to know, what's my role? How do I help? What do I need to do, you also need to be concise, especially in emergencies, it's important to convey critical information quickly, something like we attempted CPR to no effect and are transporting him to the ER right now, we will update you once we arrive. If you start by saying something like, well, I noticed he wasn't moving at first. And that freaked me out. So I went over to him and tried pushing on him, but nothing happened. So I set my bag down and started to do CPR on him, blah, blah, blah. It's too much wasted information. It's too much. It's word vomit on that person at that time. And sometimes people turn into talking machines when they're stressed out. It just happens to people because our brain is racing, our hearts racing, our lungs are racing, and we're just things are coming out of us. So before you have to communicate anything, and you may have to do it multiple times throughout the entirety of the situation, if somebody reaches out to you for information, or if you have to communicate new information to somebody take a massive breath. And like you said, Megan, count to five, these five seconds of reflection will save you countless minutes of endless talking and back and forth, and will allow you to focus your thoughts in that moment.
Meghan 16:55
Because then it's critical to listen, they always say God gave us two ears and one mouth, right. So we're supposed to listen more than we talk, whether it's instructions from management or a client that has concerns, understanding their perspective is essential. If the client says, do whatever you can to save him,
Collin 17:13
but you have to listen to their response, they may have a solution on hand they have, they may have emergency medications, they may have an inhaler, or a neighbor that is going to be coming over to help you.
Meghan 17:22
And then it's very important to repeat the directions of what you are supposed to do back to them, whether it's a client, whether it's an emergency responder, whoever it is, repeat those directions, because your brain is going to remember those better than if you're just in a fight or flight mode, not really listening and trying to do many tasks at the same time. But if you take a moment, repeat, okay, you said for me to do XYZ, I am going to do XYZ next
Collin 17:51
Yep. Because you're going to be very distracted, there could be a lot of things going on, you're worried maybe your mind starts to wander to those future thoughts of the client repercussions coming down on you. And somebody goes, Did you understand that, you know what, so that allows you to stay more present in the moment. And remember, the client isn't just a person that you are reporting to and sending data to, they are an active partner in this process as well,
Meghan 18:15
because it's their home, it's their pet they have agency and how this process should go. So keeping them in the loop every step of the way, is going to help them feel more comfortable when they are away. And then
Collin 18:27
as always show empathy in stressful situations, especially those involving pets. Showing an understanding that you have can help alleviate a lot of stress that others may have, and allow you to be seen as well, saying something like I can't believe this is happening either. But rest assured we're doing everything we can we'll update you in the next 20 minutes.
Meghan 18:46
What can make some emergencies a little bit easier to deal with is when you have a pet sitters associates as pet care professionals, your clients trust you to care for their furry family members. And that's why pet sitters Associates is here to help for over 20 years they have provided 1000s of members with quality pet care insurance. Because you work in the pet care industry. You can take your career to the next level with flexible coverage options, client connections and complete freedom in running your business. Learn why pet sitters Associates is the perfect fit for you and get a free quote at Pet said llc.com. You can get a discount when joining by clicking membership petsitter confessional and using the discount code confessional when you go to check out check out the benefits of membership and insurance once again at Pet said llc.com. Emergency Communication is tough. You have to decide your own style. You have to talk to your body and say, Okay, what do you do in a stressful situation? And how can we overcome this? A key part of this is to determine set communication frequencies is it going to be every 15 minutes every 30 every hour, or just when you have new information to give to the client. Depending on the situation you'll need to lengthen or shorten that frequency. But don't keep constant line of never ending back and forth messages. It's going to stress you out. It's going to elevate your cortisol levels it's going to elevate client as well, because they, they, they want to know now what exactly is happening every two minutes, you will be distracted, the client will be overwhelmed, nobody will be happy in that situation. So it's good on your part to set the expectations of we will update you it will come it is going to happen. And as we will do it in about this frequency.
Collin 20:21
Yep. And it's in its you're going to be checking in regardless of anything new, better or worse is happening they know to expect, however, you're gonna get in touch with them. And that's the other part of this. What's your communication style, how we communicate? In what method will you communicate, communicate over text over phone through your software over email carrier pigeon, I, personally, I prefer an initial contact we made over the phone to alert to them exactly the situation and our plan to handle it. And then we'll inform the owner of both how often to expect updates and what method future communications will come from. Because we're trying to give them as much peace of mind as possible. They need to know if we're going to get a phone call, what does a phone call me versus a text message with text messages mean versus an email? Or Should this come through the app? Do they have their alerts or notifications set turned to turn on so they know what to be looking for. And they may disagree with you at this stage, they go no, please call me with each update. You need to be okay with them, calling them for the updates and not texting them. And then be prepared for that wave of emotion that they're going to have on the other end or additional questions that they may have? Well, the
Meghan 21:27
real power here is to have a plan ahead of time, you cannot plan for everything. You cannot plan for most emergencies, but at least having something written down that you can refer back to. And maybe the client as well, if it's in your policies of during an emergency. This is how I'm going to communicate is going to set you up for success, stress and emergencies are made worse when we don't have a plan when we don't have the right gear or equipment or training. So it's important to stay up on that pet first aid and CPR by taking it as frequently as you can and having good supplies in your car as well. That pet first aid kit in your car is going to help save you keep your phone charged have a battery pack wick because when your phone dies, when you've taken hundreds of pictures of pets every day, and you use your phone constantly have that battery pack saved.
Collin 22:13
And while we talk about the dangers of being on autopilot for normal visits for your normal dog walk through your routines in stressful and emergency situations going on autopilot to some extent can actually be very helpful. Because your brain is going haywire. There's a lot of things going on. So you need to read. That's why you need to rehearse and practice your skills for CPR. Practice these things that you have in place so that you don't have to think about is it 20 compressions? Was it 13? Where's my card? How do I do this? What do I do? And this goes down to rehearsing your communication strategies, practice the situation with a friend sit and see what 15 minute intervals actually feels like. Practice phrases over the phone with someone listening so that you're emotionally ready to have to say the phrase something like, I'm sorry, Baxter didn't make it. Practice driving to the emergency that you don't want the first time that you need it to be the first time you're looking it up on the map? Or know what traffic flow is? Is it the second laughter? Is that the one way entrance that they have to have to go around back? Where is their door? How do you get in, it's also really easy just to type the wrong thing. When you're shaking, and you're rushing and you miss the six and we're supposed to be a three or whatever it is. Practice these skills, some of these skills to the extent that you can go on autopilot in those extreme situations when you're stressed. Yes, there's other things that we have to account for where we don't want to be so on autopilot that we miss the vomit on the floor or we miss the other thing that might catch fire or we miss these other things in these stressful situations. But the skills that you have need to be honed to the extent that you can perform them under duress. And under optimal situations, because that's the thing, when you take a CPR class, you're doing it, you're well fed, you've had your coffee, it's nice outside, you're you've got a little bit of time on your hands, and you're just kind of going through the motions, when you need those skills is whenever thing is blowing up and things are hitting the fan. And that's not you can't train in one situation and expect to perform optimally in a different situation. So have those practice well and understand your own capacities and limitations in them as well.
Meghan 24:20
Yeah, because the time for freaking out is not when you're in the situation. It's after you know art and more has that saying I give you permission to freak out later. Have the two to three friends that you can talk to about this. Maybe even have the phone number of a counselor already in your phone. Prepare for the quiet after the stress. It's the most uncomfortable thing to sit with your feelings to potentially have the regrets that Oh, I could have done something different. I could have saved the dog or cat or I could have prevented the fight from happening or I could have locked the door and extra time or you know your body. Your body is riding high on endorphins. Your blood is pumping and it feels like you just ran a marathon And then suddenly, it all goes away. So what are you going to do when the quiet happens? How are you going to process those feelings and sit with them but not solc? Because we don't want to be doing that either. We want to acknowledge the feelings, say their name, say yes, I have these feelings of sadness, or remorse or whatever it is, and then move on from those once you have processed them.
Collin 25:24
And this goes to the planning, the planning continues, right? Do you have a backup? Who can take over for a few days while you recover? Do you have a contingency plan? If you have a major event, a major emergency happen? Not just most of us think, oh, I need to plan for emergency where I get a flat tire or my house burns down or I'm sick or I can't? Are you going to be able to go through an extremely stressful situation, an extreme emergency, and then show up the next day continuing with visits ready to go in the same condition and inaptitude as before? Most likely not. Now, some people may use that as an opportunity to continue to the healing process of investing themselves back and working their way through the emotions without actually addressing them. But what is going to be best for you only you know that but have those plans placed because planning isn't just for the moment of the stress of the emergency of that extreme situation. It's also for the countless moments afterwards that you have to be ready for.
Meghan 26:20
We would love to know how you handle stressful situations. I'm sure it's different than what we've described here. But how does it work for you and your business? You can let us know at feedback at petsitter confessional.com. Thank you for listening to this today. And also thank you to pet sitters associates and our Patreon members for supporting today's show and we will talk with you next time. Bye
