Mental Breakdowns within a Pandemic

Waiting for outside to open up again

          Outside is closed. Weekly routines has changed. Banks accounts continue to decrease and it seems as though everyone is calling out to the government for welfare. Celebrations cancelled. The weekends has no end and the days of the week are all looking the same. The new reports were already depressing, but now it feels like it's the end of the world. And now I have cabin fever, recurring panic attacks, and depression at the same damn time. What A Fuckin' Time To Be Alive! Death seems more peaceful right about now. In this article, I will discuss how the Coronavirus outbreak and pandemic has affected me mentally and things I've been doing to relieve stress which can possibly help others who are going through something similar.

          I can't tell you how many times I gave myself a mini panic attack since returning back to Maryland and out of self-quarantine. It's crazy that while in Spain, I was completely fine. I believe that since the new reports in Spain were shown majority of the time in Spanish and I'm not fluent in the language, I was easily able to ignore the horrible news. Now that I'm back in the U.S.A. and an English speaking country, I can't avoid the Coronavirus updates and Trump's outlandish performances he puts on almost everyday both the tv screens and on social media. When I was in self-quarantine for seven days, I was only able to watch streaming apps and YouTube on my firestick since I don't have cable in my room. I was oblivious about the news updates.

          I started having mental break downs and mini panic attacks two weeks after arriving back home with my family. If you read my article, International Teaching on Pause, I described a short scenery of me trying to get through one of my depressive states through the use of music and shutting down the noise coming from the tv screen reporting the latest update on the Coronavirus update. That was just one of my depressive states.

          April 12th was the start of me having mini panic attacks. On that day, everything was going well and everything was fine until 3 p.m. when suddenly I felt like one side of my lungs was closing in on me. I drunk a cup of hot tea with a cough and flu mix, lime juice, and honey. I didn't put anymore thought into it until the next day when both sides of my lungs felt like they were closing in. My grandmother even tried to calm me down by letting me know that my allergies were probably reacting badly because of the weird weather the U.S. been having all year and that it's been reported that this was going to be a bad seasonal year for people with allergies. Then the real panicking started to appear. I then feared that I wasn't in the clear from possibly being exposed to the virus since it was now just fifteen days since being back from overseas and New York. I panic that I could possibly get my family sick; which was my biggest concern when it came down to me coming back home so soon. My grandmother and mother was still trying to tell me that it could have just been my allergies coming back with extreme force. I tried to believe them, but my mind wouldn't accept it. I called my doctor's office to get a refill on my allergy medicine the same day. I wasn't taking the medicine for several months before going to Spain because I wasn't having any allergy reactions at the time and in Spain it was the same.

          I ended up calling my doctor the very next morning because I still wasn't feeling well and came in an hour later to get my throat checked. The doctor didn't see anything wrong with them and then gave me antibiotics and steroid drug to stop the swelling of my throat. He even tested me for strap throat. The test came back negative. He then says to me that I should come back on Saturday if my throat had remained the same or if symptoms worsen. If they did, he would give me a test to see if I had the Coronavirus. I took the medicine the doctor prescribed to me for five days along with my allergy medicine, drinking cups of hot tea, lots of water intake, and the vitamins my dad gave me when I first told him about my throat.

          Everyday during the week of April 12 through the18th, I kept the routine up. During the day I felt fine, but around 8 and 9 p.m. I would feel like I was able to have a stroke. By Friday night, I couldn't take it anymore and asked my mom and grandmother if there was a number I could dial to call the ER. My mom said, "No... you'll talk to the doctor tomorrow..." On Saturday, it was determined that I was fine, my allergies were overreacting, and I was giving myself mini panic attacks which was also causing my body more pain.

          The next week was the same week of the release of my last article for April and I came to the realization that I was experiencing depression. I was only able to recognize the signs of depression because I felt similar to the times when I was in a depressive state in the past. When I get in this state of mind, I break down crying, isolate myself from everyone so no one can see me and they start asking questions, and usually sit in a dark room while crying with my hands covering my whole face and saying small prayers between tears.

Praying

Covering my face to catch my tears

         The news reports seem to become more and more depressing everyday even with the small amount of great news they share. People dying from a virus that researchers are still learning about. More and more people are losing their form of incomes, but the bills keep arriving in the mail. Nobody knows when we will really be clear to open outside again and continue some form of normalcy until a vaccine is approve. The government is too worried about the damn economy that many of the governors are willing to open jobs back up quickly, but we aren't close to having an approved vaccine yet. These are depressing times. I wonder what the world did during the Spanish flu outbreak and when did they know when the spreading of the virus was clear enough to let people go back outside freely. I guess we will learn soon enough.

          Until a vaccine is cleared to be given out to the public and we can return to some form of normalcy, I've been participating in certain activities to help me when I feel like I'm about to return back to a depressive state of mind. Those activities has been; focusing on my writing projects, meditating, listening to music, exercising , catching up with friends and family I can't see at the moment, and trying to stay healthy as I can in order to build up my immune system. I also try not to listen too much on the new updates by catching up on shows and movies I haven't had chance to watch until now. By doing these things, I feel relaxed and able to accomplish goals throughout the day.

Meditating and praying

Doing yoga

Stretching the limbs 

Ab workouts

The final stretch after an intense workout

         Have you too been feeling down lately? If so, I personally believe the following activities can help and the reasons why:

1. Turning off the tv when the pandemic outbreak updates is on: You don't need to hear every update because it will just keep you feeling depress, have you diagnosing your self wrongly, and cause you to have a lot of fear 

2. Listening to good feeling music: Sometimes we need to hear the sounds of nature or the ocean instead of listen to hard core rap or pop in order to clear our minds

3.  Exercising: This is a great way to clear you mind and help sweat out the bad energies surrounding you

4. Eating healthy as you can: It has been scientifically proven that eating a lot of carbs and sugary food items can not only cause you to become unhealthy, but can add to depression. Also during this time, it is best to build up your immune system which has been the only real cure so far to fighting off the virus 

5. Connecting with you family and friends via camera if you're not in quarantine together: By connecting with people you would have usually seen and talked to can help create some normalcy and help you understand that you are not alone as the world figure out the next steps for society

6. Meditating: Through focusing on your breathing, you have another way to clear your mind. You can even add some wave or nature sounds to the mix if you find quietness awkward

7. Finding a new hobby or going back to a craft you once didn't have time to explore: Through this time in quarantine, you get a chance to learn what possible things you're good at or going back to the hobbies you once loved to do but life had got in the way

8. Connecting with your faith and beliefs: This is the best time to connect with your spirituality because during these times, we tend to lose our faith and start losing sight in believing that better days are ahead

Did I miss any other ways to relieve stress? What do you do when you get into a depressive state of mind? Let me know in the comment