By Susan Powell
For The Cordova Times
“Although the world is full of suffering, it is also full of the overcoming of it.” -Helen Keller
The human psyche likes a sense of control, predictability and familiarity in our daily lives to keep us feeling grounded and safe. The rapid changes imposed by the COVID-19 pandemic present challenges to these aspects of our mental and emotional stability.
Most all of us are experiencing stress in these uncertain times. Stress is an emotional, mental and physical response to an external circumstance, with symptoms including exhaustion, sleep disruption, digestive problems, irritability, anger and muscle tension. Our fight-or-flight response kicks in when we perceive danger. With the threat of the virus to ourselves, our loved ones and our community, it is natural for this fight-or-flight state to activate. In a nutshell, our bodies release stress hormones that set off physical responses to protect us: our heart rate increases, blood pressure rises, breathing quickens and muscles tense. This is helpful with short-term immediate threats. However, when activated for a prolonged time, these physical responses mess with sleep, make it hard to relax, can cloud our thinking and make us emotionally reactive. Many of us are now living with extended fight-or-flight and stress activation and our normal ways of coping may not be readily available.
The good news is there are things we can do to shift gears into the opposing “rest and digest” response system and tap into our inner reservoirs of resilience, even in these times of social distancing and stay-at-home mandates.
- Breathe. Nothing slows the stress response like deep breaths from the belly.
- Maintain or create daily routines. This brings a sense of comfort and familiarity, of knowing what to expect. For example, walk your dog every morning or eat lunch around the same time every day. This creates some solid ground where we can plant our feet and stay grounded. As an added bonus, we might connect with some gratitude for things we had previously taken for granted.
- Read the news and interact with social media intentionally. Stick to trusted news sources and limit your time engaging with them. Strike a balance between staying informed and bombarding yourself with information that spikes fear and anxiety. Checking the news one to two times a day for a limited time may work well. If you notice the stress response activating, listen to your physical cues and put it away for a while.
- Be active. Movement and exercise are some of the best ways to prevent or counteract the harmful effects of stress. Hike. Take walks. Stretch. Do yoga. Do at-home HIIT workouts. Find free online exercise classes.
- Stay connected. We are collective creatures and, especially in these times of social distancing, we need connection. According to trauma expert Dr. Bessel van der Kolk, “the synchrony and the rhythms between faces and voices keep us feeling alive.” Share your experience with others. Video chat. Talk on the phone. Online game with friends. Cuddle your pets. If you live with others, have meals together, play games, make music.
- Focus on things you can control. You can control the steps you take to keep yourself and others safe. What you pay attention to grows, so instead of focusing on things you can’t control, focus on things you can.
- Know we’re all in this together. From the global community to our small community of Cordova, this pandemic affects each one of us. It is normal to feel scared, angry, stressed, tired, sad, anxious, disappointed, or any other emotion. You’re not alone in this. That person whose Facebook comment upset you or that decision-maker you disagree with is also likely experiencing these feelings. If we connect with a sense of common humanity, that we’re all navigating threats to our health and security and trying to adapt to unprecedented uncertainty the best we know how, we can cultivate the resilience that lives within us individually and communally so that suffering may turn into the overcoming of suffering.
Susan Powell is a behavioral health clinician with Ilanka Community Health Center.
