Calm down, it's only stress.

This month I want to talk about a subject that, as a crash test dummy, you might think I would know nothing about--stress. After all, how stressful can it be just sitting in a car every day, being propelled into a stationary object at 60mph? Right?

Well, you'd be surprised about just

For a start, stress is one of the biggest causes of illness among UK workers with around five million of you feeling "very" or "extremely" stressed by your work. This has led to stress costing British business in the region of 3.7bn [pounds sterling] in lost revenue every year.

You would think then that something would be done to stem the haemorrhaging tide of workers flooding to their local GPs to report that they are too sick to work because of stress. Sadly, you would be wrong.

The Health and Safety Executive is beginning to issue notices to companies--the West Dorset Hospital Trust was the first to be issued with such a notice--ordering them to take action to prevent work-related stress and it seems that the trend is set to continue.

After all, with workers now expected to take on greater roles, heavier workloads and increasing responsibility without any financial compensation, is it any wonder that Britain is suffering? Especially when it's so transparent that everyone here is working longer hours and taking less holidays than workers in other European countries. No wonder then that the French always appear so relaxed and the Italians so cool. As for the potentially suicidal Scandinavians, even they seem to have cooled down and are happy to just get on with life without Abba!

In the UK we are still trying to cope with stress and perhaps compounding matters by not wanting to talk about it. After all, that's the British way: "Mustn't grumble," you say, as the world around you crumbles into dust.

The only time that people are willing to talk about stress is when they are trying to sue the backside off of the company that gave them it in the first place!

Of course, for drivers, stress is an everyday nightmare. If you're not being tailgated, the chances are that you are behind someone who refuses to leave the middle lane of the motorway despite the fact that there's not another vehicle in sight for miles.

Then there are the drivers who are obviously suffering from IMF--Indicator Memory Failure--leaving no clue as to which way they are likely to turn. Or the drivers who, although they are perfectly capable of manoeuvring and giving way at a 'normal' sized roundabout, have a complete lack of understanding when they stumble across a mini one!

And of course there are the increasing number of myopic Neanderthals who insist on driving with their foglights on even though they haven't seen a patch of fog since they reached puberty--some time last year.

No wonder then that drivers suffer from stress!

According to the experts, the top causes for stress include unemployment or fear of losing your job, financial worries and relationship problems (moving house, having a baby, death and retirement are also in there). If you consider that, in today's economic and social climate, many people are fearful of losing their job and that just about everyone has financial and relationship worries, is it any wonder that businesses are losing billions every year through staff being ill because of stress?

The answer is not simple. You could employ more staff to ease the pressure, offer more money to ease those financial burdens or create more free time so that relationships can be worked on. As for driver-related stress, better roads with less traffic would be the obvious solution.

In a Utopian dreamworld we would have all these things--and a lot more besides, hopefully! But in the real world, and particularly in Britain in the 21st century, we don't and we're not likely to see them in the near future either.

The only sensible answer is to work out your frustrations in the gym, in the swimming pool or on the pitch through some hard physical effort.

For me, I get my frustration out as I scream like a girl while hurtling towards that stationary object at 60mph. Well, what did you expect?!