“Mental Health”

 

            In March of 2020, I participated in the Psychological Impact and Coping During Covid-19 research study done by The COVID Research Team, Ferkauf Graduate School of Psychology at Yeshiva University. The detailed questionnaire asked about changes in sleep, eating, concentration, and mood. I completed one month, three month, and six month follow-ups that continued to monitor my personal response to the pandemic.

            This drill focused my attention onto the resilience caregiving gave to our family. With Huntington’s disease, we’d already survived tending to a horrendously devastating disease. We’d already experienced pulling in our lives to a tight circle that relied on finding positivity and grace in handling Mom’s long, slow death. Caregivers don’t leave their homes that often. Visitors dwindle down once friends realize that the news never gets better. Caring for Mom honed my coping strategies for isolation and uncertainty.

            My mental health advantage took a battering when the flaws of friends and family members pushed to the foreground. Some people refused to wear masks, stay home or social distance. They continued their proclamations of individual rights through vaccine rejection. A few have become seriously ill with Long COVID symptoms. Several died. They refuse to follow their own doctor’s suggestion spouting that they know better than the medical community.

            Their attitudes broke my heart. Their declarations that their own needs outweigh the health of a community made me realize that we lack common ground. They closed their minds to anything I offered by demeaning me and my well-documented sources.

            These relationships forced me to add a layer of mental health checks to my interactions with other people. My high tolerance for toxic family and friends shifted because of the pandemic. My own mental health required no contact with those who spew propaganda. My own mental health compelled me to nurture friends and family who show a level of empathy, grace, and community in their lives.

 

Copyright 2022 Elizabeth Abrams Chapman

                       

“Assimilate and Accommodate”

 

            Early on in the COVID-19 shutdown, I participated in the COVID Research Team, Ferkauf Graduate School of Psychology at Yeshiva University study. The initial in-depth survey covered many different aspects of how I handle life events that predated COVID-19’s initial impact. A month later, another survey appeared in my email for me to relate the continuing impact of the virus on my life. This follow-up delved into changes in my personal behavioral patterns, variations in our economic status, and even differences in how much I thought about the virus as it rolled through our country. Another survey appeared at the three month mark and asked very fine-tuned questions about more specific aspects of my life and family as we continue on this uncharted path.

            The researchers probe various qualities on how I process problems and manage the different world in which we all now live. The psychologist that I am, I appreciate the multileveled purity of each questionnaire. When I participate in each response, I take my time. Usually able to block out music or television in the background, these surveys require focused attention to each weighed response. I want my answers to be accurate and true to honestly represent my experiences with COVID-19 as it impacts my life and the lives of family and friends.

            Taking part in this study reminded me of the importance of critical thinking. For some of us, being able to assimilate and accommodate information comes naturally. Back in early January, my curiosity led me to reading about SARS-CoV-2 in several journals. I began tracking the virus using data provided by different sites and finally began using www.worldometers.com for daily information. I understood early on that COVID-19 would develop into a nightmare because it’s easily transmitted, infects many asymptomatically, and has a mild or moderate impact on most of its hosts. That type of virus lulls people into falsely believing it is “no big deal” when in reality (because it’s so easily transmitted from person-to-person), it will do exactly as nature designed it to do. During the past nine months, I’ve continued to hunt down peer reviewed research to enable me to make educated decisions about our daily life.

            Some of those choices will have long-term impacts. I quit my part-time job as a substitute teacher. Returning into a classroom doesn’t make sense. If I contracted COVID-19, I could end up seriously ill and possibly hospitalized, which would result in enormous bills from employment with a job that pays $12.50 an hour! I will NEVER go anywhere without wearing a mask until there’s a vaccine in place. Because we have a “designated shopper” for groceries, I haven’t entered a store since March. At first there wasn’t data on how long COVID-19 remained on surfaces. I disinfected everything that came into the house: groceries, take-out containers, mail, shoes. More data has allowed me to shift to a more relaxed approach. I no longer drown our mail with Lysol spray! I don’t feel anxious. I don’t battle depression. Instead, I have confidence that science will do what it does best. My choices over the next year to eighteen months will come from gathering information provided through reliable research.

            In the meantime, I await the next installment of the survey on how COVID-19 has touched my life. I can report that twelve of my in-laws (who don’t follow science) have been infected. I can state that my husband’s department will work remotely even after the pandemic (amazing how some companies are finding that option really can work), and I can state with confidence that for me, knowledge is power.

 Copyright 2020 Elizabeth Abrams Chapman

https://www.amazon.com/Golden-Bracelet-Elizabeth-Abrams-Chapman-ebook/dp/B076JR8N26