The COVID-19 pandemic and its impact on mental health

Tyler Sabloff | Senior Forum Editor

The COVID-19 pandemic and its impacts have presented a difficult and confusing challenge to mental health, one I’m not sure exactly how to cope with.

The combination of a loss of structure and complete social isolation have caused serious depressive effects for many. Not having the regular structure of classes and daily obligations, as well as the ability to spend time with friends, has caused a complete upheaval to students’ lives, leaving them lonely and unmotivated. Students who find themselves with multiple pre-recorded classes are especially subject to this loss of structure. The freedom to view lectures at any time can end up being a double-edged sword: the convenience can also end up throwing your entire sense of daily structure out of whack.

For me, the hardest part of all of this has been that anything and everything I had been looking forward to in the near future was ripped away in an instant. As a graduating senior, it feels as if the rug was pulled completely from under my feet. There were so many things I was looking forward to over the next few months—my last wild WILD, senior week, graduation—that were taken away within a matter of days. And my post-graduation plan to volunteer in the presidential race is also now uncertain. My immediate reaction was a near shutdown, a feeling of hopelessness that made me completely unmotivated to really do anything. “What’s the point?” I thought. “What am I working towards at this point?”

The fact that all of this is completely out of our control is one of the scariest and most debilitating aspects of the crisis. Everything escalated in a matter of days, leaving people with whiplash and fear over what comes next.

I guess there is some solace in the fact that this crisis is impacting everyone. I know that my losses are miniscule next to how others are suffering as a result. I did not need to worry about where I would live or how I would get home once campus shut down. I don’t have to worry about affording food because of the loss of work. I feel very fortunate for this and can’t imagine what those who don’t have the same privilege are feeling and suffering as a result of this.

It’s hard to get out of the harmful mentality that COVID-19 has brought on, particularly for those who have chronic mental health struggles. My best advice would be to try and add any bit of normalcy to your life that you can. Stick to attending your classes at their regular time if possible, even if they are pre-recorded. Keep up regular eating habits and sleep schedules. Call, text or video chat your friends so you don’t feel completely isolated from everyone. Do as much as possible to keep control over your life and keep a sense of normalcy. I have a hard time prescribing this bootstrap approach to mental health care, but in these surreal times I’m kind of at a loss for what to do. Just take care of yourself and do as much as you can to maintain what you had before all this started.

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