How To Nurture An Anxious, Depressed Mind Out Of Lockdown
Lockdown has been tough, even for those insta-famous people who seemingly spent it mastering the art of yoga and becoming fluent in Chinese. However, I am in no way shaming these people but simply stating that not all of us had the same approach to lockdown, and that is alright. What I mean by ‘approach’ is that I find it perfectly okay if you couldn’t get out of bed some days, or if all you did was binge a whole lot of shows on Netflix (kudos if you managed to be bothered to watch it online with people, it’s more than most).
Well done to everybody who survived lockdown. You have made it, despite sometimes not feeling like you could if you develop your hobby into a small business. Well done. And, by the way, this is a great post by FATJOE if you want to develop a content marketing strategy for 2021 to continue and develop what you have built. Suppose you made home improvements. Well done. Suppose you are sitting here having survived. Well done. I see you, and believe me, I know it wasn’t easy.
Anxiety in Lockdown
Just about everybody suffered anxious thoughts in lockdown, or, indeed, during the pandemic as a whole. When will this end? Can I go shopping and be safe, too? Have I got enough toilet roll to last me? Okay, the last one was a slight dig at panic-buyers, but not knowing how long we were going to be locked down was still such extreme anxiety for so many people, if not everyone, at one moment in time.
For some people already suffering from anxiety before the pandemic, especially social anxiety, locking down offered a means of safety; no interaction, no parties, no meals out. However, after the novelty wore off, and zoom calls were a necessity to stay afloat, we all became to a certain degree socially anxious creatures, not wanting to go outside in fear of coming across a person that you would have to speak to or even share eye contact with.
If you had a generalised anxiety disorder rather than social anxiety, you were affected too. Your mind no longer had stimuli to work with and produce worries, so it looked to everything around you to worry about; people you hadn’t spoken to in a while, family members you were locked down with. It made our environment claustrophobic and near impossible to live in.
But, facing the world again is something we can all do together. Especially with an anxious mind, we need to learn to listen more to what we are feeling and when we need a break. If a social situation is too much, we need to know not to force ourselves to persevere because it is what we are used to. If one coffee catch-up is enough for a week, then well done to you! Listening and becoming more in tune with our bodies is how we can get through this. But no one is alone and needs to feel guilty for leaving something you aren’t ready for yet.
Depression in lockdown
Again, depressive thoughts are something everybody probably experienced during lockdown to some degree. What is the point? Where is my life going? I have no friends. No one cares about me. Even for a fleeting second, or during a film, everyone thought something like this at least once.
For people with depression, though, these thoughts might have existed and manifested into every single minute of their day- telling people that they will never amount to anything, become anything, or be anyone after being alone for so long only increased these thoughts, often making people not get out of bed for days, or not find a reason to smile.
Coming out of lockdown, however, there is hope. Allow yourself these days off, these days to sit and reflect and wind down. Let yourself feel how you are feeling, and don’t apologise for it or cover it up. The world has taught us to ask how we are constantly feeling (for example, the obligatory answer of “yeah good thanks” to “how are you?” when we feel rubbish or have had a terrible day). But what if, together, we don’t? Will more people be in touch with themselves and realise when they need a break? Will there be more self-aware people in the world who can not go to social events by simply saying “sorry, I don’t feel like it right now” without lying? Who knows. But it is a place to start. Once we start apologising for being who we are and feeling how we feel, it is only true when lockdown is over, and the new world can begin.
Keeping structure
Many people often found that, during the pandemic, having a structure is what kept them going. Even something as little as a to-do list for that day was enough to give them hope. Maintaining and keeping up this routine was often what gave people a sense of purpose to their day, or, indeed, lives. In a way, this purpose had such an impact on reducing anxiety, as it offered a distraction from what was going on elsewhere in the world. This routine building was also a great way to reduce depressive thoughts and help people with depression function and keep going. Having something to do distracted and gave people a reason to carry on, even if it was catalysed by ‘hang the washing out or ‘bake cookies.’
Amid these lists, I found that doing yoga or art was necessary to my mental health. Taking ten or more minutes out of the day to do something for me, checking how I felt, was more than beneficial. At the start of lockdown, I didn’t see the point at all of ‘mindfulness,’ but now it is a necessary part of my routine.
So, coming out of lockdown, make sure to include these tasks that make you feel good. Make sure to carve time out for yourself, whether to sit and write down your thoughts, draw, paint, or meditate. Also, it is worth thinking about what it was in lockdown that made you most happy. When were you at your happiest? When were you at your most calm? When did you feel most like yourself? Who were you with? Where were you? Was it on your daily walk? Was it when you facetimed your friend? Was it when you sat down with a cup of tea and read a book? Do this post-lockdown! Go on that walk, still, find time to sit down and have a cup of tea. There are so many things that we all learned about ourselves during lockdown that we must continue to do after it is over. We focussed on what made us happy and what made us tick in the months we were alone, so let’s make sure that doesn’t go to waste and you still find ways to explore yourself and make you happy as you deserve to be.
Ways To Deal With Anxious or Depressive Thoughts
There are so many ways to help deal with intrusive thoughts. No matter how much you believe them to be true, there are ways in which to debunk them and get them out of your life for good. Often, people struggle to live in the moment, and that is all intrusive thoughts are sometimes- anxiety about the past or the future in which we cannot change and so obsess over. Here are a few ways you can stop for a second and try and get rid of the intrusive thoughts:
- Breathing- this may sound like an obvious one, but it does work. Breathe in for 4 seconds, hold it for 4 seconds, and then breathe out for 8 seconds; you have caught yourself in that moment he thought could have spiralled. Stopping allows you to get perspective and to live in the present.
- Take your thoughts to Court- if you are anxious about something that has happened or may happen, begin to find evidence for and against this thought. What evidence do you have that this person doesn’t like you? What evidence do you have against this? When you compile a list, often, you realise our thoughts have no ground.
Conclusion
So many people suffered from their mental health during the pandemic and continue to suffer as we meander out of it. For people with anxiety and depression or anxious or depressive thoughts, there is hope in maintaining a safe place inside your head as you begin to enter the world again. By keeping our structures, listening more to our bodies, and finding ways to stay in the moment, the anxious and depressed generation can thrive.
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