Tips to cope with COVID-19 Quarantine
From a psychologist:
After having thirty-one sessions
this week with patients where the singular focus was COVID-19 and how to
cope, I decided to consolidate my advice and make a list that I hope is
helpful to all. I can't control a lot of what is going on right now,
but I can contribute this.
Edit: I am
surprised and heartened that this has been shared so widely! People
have asked me to credential myself, so to that end, I am a doctoral
level Psychologist in NYS with a Psy.D. in the specialities of School
and Clinical Psychology.
MENTAL HEALTH WELLNESS TIPS FOR QUARANTINE
1.
Stick to a routine. Go to sleep and wake up at a reasonable time,
write a schedule that is varied and includes time for work as well as
self-care.
2. Dress for the social life you
want, not the social life you have. Get showered and dressed in
comfortable clothes, wash your face, brush your teeth. Take the time to
do a bath or a facial. Put on some bright colors. It is amazing how
our dress can impact our mood.
3. Get out at
least once a day, for at least thirty minutes. If you are concerned of
contact, try first thing in the morning, or later in the evening, and
try less traveled streets and avenues. If you are high risk or living
with those who are high risk, open the windows and blast the fan. It is
amazing how much fresh air can do for spirits.
4.
Find some time to move each day, again daily for at least thirty
minutes. If you don’t feel comfortable going outside, there are many
YouTube videos that offer free movement classes, and if all else fails,
turn on the music and have a dance party!
5.
Reach out to others, you guessed it, at least once daily for thirty
minutes. Try to do FaceTime, Skype, phone calls, texting—connect with
other people to seek and provide support. Don’t forget to do this for
your children as well. Set up virtual playdates with friends daily via
FaceTime, Facebook Messenger Kids, Zoom, etc—your kids miss their
friends, too!
6. Stay hydrated and eat well.
This one may seem obvious, but stress and eating often don’t mix well,
and we find ourselves over-indulging, forgetting to eat, and avoiding
food. Drink plenty of water, eat some good and nutritious foods, and
challenge yourself to learn how to cook something new!
7.
Develop a self-care toolkit. This can look different for everyone. A
lot of successful self-care strategies involve a sensory component
(seven senses: touch, taste, sight, hearing, smell, vestibular
(movement) and proprioceptive (comforting pressure). An idea for each: a
soft blanket or stuffed animal, a hot chocolate, photos of vacations,
comforting music, lavender or eucalyptus oil, a small swing or rocking
chair, a weighted blanket. A journal, an inspirational book, or a
mandala coloring book is wonderful, bubbles to blow or blowing
watercolor on paper through a straw are visually appealing as well as
work on controlled breath. Mint gum, Listerine strips, ginger ale,
frozen Starburst, ice packs, and cold are also good for anxiety
regulation. For children, it is great to help them create a
self-regulation comfort box (often a shoe-box or bin they can decorate)
that they can use on the ready for first-aid when overwhelmed.
8.
Spend extra time playing with children. Children will rarely
communicate how they are feeling, but will often make a bid for
attention and communication through play. Don’t be surprised to see
therapeutic themes of illness, doctor visits, and isolation play
through. Understand that play is cathartic and helpful for children—it
is how they process their world and problem solve, and there’s a lot
they are seeing and experiencing in the now.
9.
Give everyone the benefit of the doubt, and a wide berth. A lot of
cooped up time can bring out the worst in everyone. Each person will
have moments when they will not be at their best. It is important to
move with grace through blowups, to not show up to every argument you
are invited to, and to not hold grudges and continue disagreements.
Everyone is doing the best they can to make it through this.
10.
Everyone find their own retreat space. Space is at a premium,
particularly with city living. It is important that people think
through their own separate space for work and for relaxation. For
children, help them identify a place where they can go to retreat when
stressed. You can make this place cozy by using blankets, pillows,
cushions, scarves, beanbags, tents, and “forts”. It is good to know
that even when we are on top of each other, we have our own special
place to go to be alone.
11. Expect behavioral
issues in children, and respond gently. We are all struggling with
disruption in routine, none more than children, who rely on routines
constructed by others to make them feel safe and to know what comes
next. Expect increased anxiety, worries and fears, nightmares,
difficulty separating or sleeping, testing limits, and meltdowns. Do
not introduce major behavioral plans or consequences at this time—hold
stable and focus on emotional connection.
12.
Focus on safety and attachment. We are going to be living for a bit
with the unprecedented demand of meeting all work deadlines,
homeschooling children, running a sterile household, and making a whole
lot of entertainment in confinement. We can get wrapped up in meeting
expectations in all domains, but we must remember that these are scary
and unpredictable times for children. Focus on strengthening the
connection through time spent following their lead, through physical
touch, through play, through therapeutic books, and via verbal
reassurances that you will be there for them in this time.
13.
Lower expectations and practice radical self-acceptance. This idea is
connected with #12. We are doing too many things in this moment, under
fear and stress. This does not make a formula for excellence. Instead,
give yourself what psychologists call “radical self acceptance”:
accepting everything about yourself, your current situation, and your
life without question, blame, or pushback. You cannot fail at
this—there is no roadmap, no precedent for this, and we are all truly
doing the best we can in an impossible situation.
14.
Limit social media and COVID conversation, especially around children.
One can find tons of information on COVID-19 to consume, and it changes
minute to minute. The information is often sensationalized, negatively
skewed, and alarmist. Find a few trusted sources that you can check in
with consistently, limit it to a few times a day, and set a time limit
for yourself on how much you consume (again 30 minutes tops, 2-3 times
daily). Keep news and alarming conversations out of earshot from
children—they see and hear everything, and can become very frightened by
what they hear.
15. Notice the good in the
world, the helpers. There is a lot of scary, negative, and overwhelming
information to take in regarding this pandemic. There are also a ton
of stories of people sacrificing, donating, and supporting one another
in miraculous ways. It is important to counter-balance the heavy
information with the hopeful information.
16.
Help others. Find ways, big and small, to give back to others.
Support restaurants, offer to grocery shop, check in with elderly
neighbors, write psychological wellness tips for others—helping others
gives us a sense of agency when things seem out of control.
17.
Find something you can control, and control the heck out of it. In
moments of big uncertainty and overwhelm, control your little corner of
the world. Organize your bookshelf, purge your closet, put together
that furniture, group your toys. It helps to anchor and ground us when
the bigger things are chaotic.
18. Find a
long-term project to dive into. Now is the time to learn how to play
the keyboard, put together a huge jigsaw puzzle, start a 15 hour game of
Risk, paint a picture, read the Harry Potter series, binge watch an
8-season show, crochet a blanket, solve a Rubic cube, or develop a new
town in Animal Crossing. Find something that will keep you busy,
distracted, and engaged to take breaks from what is going on in the
outside world.
19. Engage in repetitive
movements and left-right movements. Research has shown that repetitive
movement (knitting, coloring, painting, clay sculpting, jump roping etc)
especially left-right movement (running, drumming, skating, hopping)
can be effective at self-soothing and maintaining self-regulation in
moments of distress.
20. Find an expressive art
and go for it. Our emotional brain is very receptive to the creative
arts, and it is a direct portal for release of feeling. Find something
that is creative (sculpting, drawing, dancing, music, singing, playing)
and give it your all. See how relieved you can feel. It is a very
effective way of helping kids to emote and communicate as well!
21.
Find lightness and humor in each day. There is a lot to be worried
about, and with good reason. Counterbalance this heaviness with
something funny each day: cat videos on YouTube, a stand-up show on
Netflix, a funny movie—we all need a little comedic relief in our day,
every day.
22. Reach out for help—your team is
there for you. If you have a therapist or psychiatrist, they are
available to you, even at a distance. Keep up your medications and your
therapy sessions the best you can. If you are having difficulty
coping, seek out help for the first time. There are mental health
people on the ready to help you through this crisis. Your children’s
teachers and related service providers will do anything within their
power to help, especially for those parents tasked with the difficult
task of being a whole treatment team to their child with special
challenges. Seek support groups of fellow home-schoolers, parents, and
neighbors to feel connected. There is help and support out there, any
time of the day—although we are physically distant, we can always
connect virtually.
23. “Chunk” your quarantine,
take it moment by moment. We have no road map for this. We don’t know
what this will look like in 1 day, 1 week, or 1 month from now. Often,
when I work with patients who have anxiety around overwhelming issues, I
suggest that they engage in a strategy called “chunking”—focusing on
whatever bite-sized piece of a challenge that feels manageable. Whether
that be 5 minutes, a day, or a week at a time—find what feels doable
for you, and set a time stamp for how far ahead in the future you will
let yourself worry. Take each chunk one at a time, and move through
stress in pieces.
24. Remind yourself daily
that this is temporary. It seems in the midst of this quarantine that
it will never end. It is terrifying to think of the road stretching
ahead of us. Please take time to remind yourself that although this is
very scary and difficult, and will go on for an undetermined amount of
time, it is a season of life and it will pass. We will return to feeling
free, safe, busy, and connected in the days ahead.
25.
Find the lesson. This whole crisis can seem sad, senseless, and at
times, avoidable. When psychologists work with trauma, a key feature to
helping someone work through said trauma is to help them find their
agency, the potential positive outcomes they can effect, the meaning and
construction that can come out of destruction. What can each of us
learn here, in big and small ways, from this crisis? What needs to
change in ourselves, our homes, our communities, our nation, and our
world?
T