The mental impact of COVID-19 and how to cope

 Corona virus obviously has created a global state of uncertainty I think we're gonna be having a mental health crisis now covid 19 can be characterized as a pandemic normality as it was before will not come back full-on until we get a vaccine for this it's important to recognize both the immediate and the long-term impacts that this pandemic can have on people's mental health there are different phases of mental health distress that one experiences at different points in a pandemic the other differences that probably distinguish it from other disasters would be the level of self isolation as a foe distancing travel restrictions . chuckling I'm a psychiatrist and vice president at the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health  starts with a fever and feels like the flu a mystery illness known as severe acute respiratory syndrome or SARS during SARS we saw kind of initial rates of general psychological distress that exceeded amounts that we would normally expect emergence of depression anxiety early on and in individuals that were involved we also seen persistence of some of those symptoms after SARS if we go to other disasters like 9/11 for example it's a kind of disaster that was abrupt I think it's different in the sense of what we're seeing right now those who are closest to it who had losses who were involved as first responders were more likely to suffer post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms depression anxiety distress and we do have studies that are decades later that still show that there are some residual effects for some individuals and I suspect that for many people they're gonna need support beyond covid 19  looking after your mental health is of course as important as taking care of your physical health the most common things we're going to notice are gonna be tied to anxiety and mood disorders hi my name is dr. Raymond of drama and I'm a clinical and consulting psychologist with an expert on anxiety and trauma two here my top tips on how to cope number one and this is the biggest one of all stay in contact with other people the biggest thing that we are missing is contact with with us the people that we care about our co-workers a good old-fashioned phone call being in touch with social media is number one number two we want to manage the amount of coming in we need to be informed the World Health Organization is now calling the global corona virus outbreak a pandemic the news is tough the predictions blunt but we don't need to be inundated with a lot of information so limit your access to the news set a time where you can actually touch base and find out what you need to and it carry on with your regular day number three have a regular routine as close as possible it won't be what you're used to I said routine as much as you can and so my next point is ultimately about learning to be okay with things not  being perfect we have to revisit what it needs to be professional we won't be as productive we want to have this balance between you know being active and busy but not overdoing it to the point that we're stressing ourselves out behind that need to be productive is this fear but somehow our sense of self-worth is tied to producing a lot what matters most is that we get through this with a sound state of mind and a healthy statof well-being we need to change our thoughts from the what-if to the now what that gives us 

some sense of control but more were able 

to write them down that will give us greater control over things instead of just looping them through in our heads and if our anxiety gets to a physical level of panic and that might be the case for many people watch how we breathe what we might not be realizing it is our body might be prepping for an alarm system start to breathe from your nose in a calm and relaxed way there's a lot of videos on YouTube on relaxed breathing that's also a good way to stay calm  and last but not least there's a lot of mental health providers who are providing phone consultation or video consultation except that there's a lot of organizations around around the world actually that are now producing free access to health resources about how to manage mental health needs time look for them follow those tips that's one of the best things you can do

May 28, 2021

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