We must learn how to unlock the strength to survive and keep sane
TEN days after the country turned on its axis and the novelty value of social distancing and self-isolation has well and truly dissipated. The upbeat memes and cheerful videos, passed along on WhatsApp groups, are now getting stale. Our making the best of St Patrick’s Day, the volunteerism and random acts of kindness have lost the power to stir in us feelings of admiration or patriotic pride.
Even the surreal and eerie silence that envelops public places like St Stephen’s Green in Dublin or the beaches and scenic walks to which we gravitate in droves, as if hushed human congregation will act as a talisman against misfortune, is becoming tired.
The doom-laden blanket of silence is like the handiwork of a repressive political regime that we might see in the cinema, of people for whom terror is second nature and where the joy of life is, if not snuffed out, then indefinitely put on hold.
As one dull day turns into another so that we can no longer tell Thursday from Friday, the reality of our new normal, of our being imprisoned in a fake and unnatural world, while trying to cope with a poisonous virus seeping through the fabric of our lives sinks in.
Covid-19 may have began like a bolt out of the blue, a unique and unprecedented health emergency but it has rapidly turned into a literal prison sentence with no end in sight. If we are suddenly feeling floored or depressed by the chain of events, it is not surprising.
‘People can put up with a lot of uncertainty and hardship if they can see light at the end of the tunnel,’ says work psychologist Patricia Murray of the Health and Safety Authority.
‘When something new happens like the coronavirus it gives a stimulus to life, we get an adrenaline rush. Cortisol, a hormone released in the body when we are stressed makes us physiologically pumped. But after a finite number of days we expect things to revert to normality, or stability.
‘In the next few days people will start getting emails telling them that their summer flight has been cancelled or that a work meeting is off. That may be the moment when this crisis is actualised, when the illusion of excitement is shattered and we realise that not only is something negative unfolding but we also don’t know much about it. We can float along for days but we have to land eventually and we will land into a state of long-term temporary that humans are not made for.’
The psychological toll of the longterm isolation necessary to combat the spread of corona can be predicted from psychological and sociological studies. The longer it continues, the greater the risk of depression and of a spike in suicides by the most vulnerable.
We are a sociable species and creatures of habit. Our society is consumerist and rich and we expect a level of personal freedom and material comfort, unparalleled in human history.
The tables have been turned on us in that respect; our certainties have been washed away, temporarily we hope, as we face into the dreaded unknown.
Whatever our situation, we must now deal with extraordinary and unforeseen circumstances.
The average worker who spends most of their life outside their home is now cooped up with their loved ones or their flatmates for the foreseeable future.
‘Working from home can be a very positive thing, it can make life more enjoyable and productive but if it’s foisted on you in the middle of a global pandemic and in a climate of fear, there are definite challenges,’ explains Ms Murray.
When people are under stress, their neurosis and foibles are amplified.
‘If someone has borderline obsessive compulsive disorder, those traits are accentuated. If they are perfectionists about their work they will be doubly so,’ she says.
This may be manageable in normal times but today, running parallel if not overlapping with our work life, is family life which has also been plunged into a cauldron of tension and chaos. Young children, removed from their creche or playschool, need to be amused and reassured. Teenagers missing their friends and their activities must settle for socialising remotely while students, cut adrift from their moorings, have college life condensed into streamed seminars and study.
Even if we discount health and money worries, it is an abnormally narrow existence, bristling with potential for conflict and frustration. Cabin fever rears its ugly head during prolonged periods of confinement, causing anxiety, restlessness and irritability. On the streets, in shops and in parks we are being extra polite to one another during the pandemic.
Our civility is welcome but it can create another layer of stress for families in that the domestic sphere becomes the only arena where anger and frustration is defused.
‘In any shared setting, whether it’s home or office, there is competition for resources like space, heat, light. Individuals also have different sensitivity to noise and to their environment while we all have difference expectations of home,’ says Ms Murray about the potential for endless bickering.
Would devising house rules for the duration of the crisis help families or groups function better?
‘It might help those who like order but there will be members in the group or family who will resist and resent rules and who will want to break them.’
Those who live on their own face a lonely frontier and a different set of challenges, while the elderly knowing the significance of Covid-19 for them suffer the dread of seeing many of their generation wiped out, without even the consolation of a funeral.
We need strategies to cope with these extreme circumstances.
‘Psychologists disagree about whether compartmentalising life is a good idea.
‘There is a school of thought that says it’s a form of denial but I think it has benefits. In the weeks ahead, people will have to become expert at parsing their worries. If their job security or their income is out of their control, they will have to try and park that worry.’
Psychologist Niamh Fitzpatrick, author of Tell Me The Truth About Loss, has some online tips about dealing with the new normal.
‘In this crisis, we have time to think, to wonder, what life will be like in weeks or months,’ she writes. ‘I notice that this time to anticipate adds to the trauma, it provides space for anxiety to grow.
‘My advice: whatever you do, in terms of focus, stay in the present. Make plans to adjust and adapt as required. But don’t give anticipation permission to enter your cognitive world. It only brings layers of distress to an already distressing situation.
‘When your mind wanders to the “what if?” scenarios (it will)… Shift your focus for example to the rituals of daily living, or to calling a loved one. The shift in focus from what is useful to what is not, will not magically make this all okay. But it will make for a more tolerable place inside your head.’
Psychologist Tony Bates also advises practical action as a survival skill.
‘Set one or two goals each day, especially if you are housebound. Focusing on simple goals brings structure to your day. This helps you feel you have some control over your life,’ he writes in his online
‘We will land into a stage of long-term temporary’
‘There will be those in the group or family who will want to break rules’