Interview with Elena Almodóvar: the psychological effects of the new normality

Psychologist Elena Almodóvar explains how the new normal affects people mentally.

The end of the months of confinement due to the first wave of the coronavirus pandemic has meant, for many people, a great relief after a time in which freedoms had been significantly curtailed. Paradoxically, however, for others the entry into the so-called "new normal" has been a great relief. the entry into the so-called "new normal" has in itself been a new challenge to which one must to which it is necessary to know how to adapt.

To better understand this mental and social phenomenon, on this occasion we we interviewed psychologist Elena Almodóvar, an expert in problems of this type.expert in the problems of emotional and behavioral type.

Elena Almodóvar: a professional perspective on the psychological effects of the new normality.

Elena Almodóvar Antón is a health psychologist with a practice in Madrid and more than 15 years of professional experience attending patients. In this interview she talks to us about the psychological impact that the return to the streets after the months of State of Alarm has had on many people, in the context called "new normality".

One might expect that moving from a context of confinement to one of greater freedom of movement is always positive, because it allows you to do more things. Isn't that always the case?

Not necessarily. Each person's interpretation of a change depends on several factors such as: personality, expectations towards the new situation, beliefs and fears about the new situation, emotional state, previous experiences, age, health and medical conditions, work and family situation, etc.

What psychological disorders are most frequent in situations such as the first months of 2020 in Western countries?

The situation we have lived and are currently living is new and changing. This implies a continuous need to adapt, generating anxiety and stress. There is also the invisible threat of COVID-19.

On the other hand, despite being subjected to permanent over-information, this information is often contradictory or unclear, which often causes confusion and a high level of uncertainty that we need to control in some way. How each of us reacts to it is something that again depends on each person.

There are those who deny the danger, trying to live as if we had returned to the situation before the pandemic, which entails risky situations for their own health and that of others, and there are those who take the need for control to the extreme and develop different phobias or fears in order to avoid contagion. Some examples of the latter would be: fear of leaving home (agoraphobia), excessive cleaning and disinfection (OCD), fear of social relationships or seeing people as a threat (social phobia), etc.

As a psychologist, do you think it is common that even in the new normal many people suffer at the prospect of having to return to confinement? The first months of the pandemic may have been traumatic for thousands of families.

Yes, it is a fairly common and to some extent logical fear that I think almost all of us have to a greater or lesser extent. The degree to which this fear appears and how it affects our daily lives varies significantly from one person to another depending on various factors such as those indicated above and some others, such as: the experience lived by each person during the confinement, their work and economic situation, their personal and family situation, etc.

Indeed, many people have developed Post Traumatic Stress Disorder as a consequence of the pandemic and confinement. The greater the trauma, the greater the fear of recurrence and the psychological impact on the person or family.

And for those who have developed, for example, anxiety disorders during the weeks of confinement, is it common for the disorder to fade on its own with the entry into the new normal? A new life context may come hand in hand with a new way of living life, breaking with the old.

Rather than fading away, it is usually denied or masked, in the false belief that "we are back to business as usual and nothing has happened here". It is not possible to generalize, since not all of us have been affected by the situation in the same way externally, there are people who have been much more affected than others. And internally, the same, depending on the factors we were talking about before.

But despite these differences, we are talking about a phenomenon with a worldwide impact and that has meant a before and after in our way of life, which requires a process of adaptation, and it is logical that it generates a certain level of discomfort. However, if the impact we have suffered has been significant enough to provoke an anxiety disorder, it is because there was previously something that, although it may have gone unnoticed, the pandemic and the confinement have uncovered.

It is possible that the disorder disappears apparently when the situation that has caused the problem to surface disappears, but that something is still there and can awaken again if something external happens that we do not like or we feel threatened.

A new context forces us to adapt to it and leave behind the old, but to learn to live differently and break with what was there before we need to assimilate this change, which requires time and make changes internally.

What can psychology do to help these people through psychotherapy?

First of all, it is essential to find out what this social phenomenon has meant and means for that particular person, i.e., what fears and beliefs have been awakened. How he/she has faced the pandemic, the State of Alarm and, afterwards, the new normality. What have been their strategies to adapt to the situation, i.e., the resources they have implemented, the way they have responded and are currently responding to the situation.

Once all this has been evaluated, we work on these fears, modifying dysfunctional beliefs and strengthening existing resources or providing new tools to assimilate, accept and adapt to the new situation.

And finally, what, if anything, do you think this pandemic is teaching us about mental health?

I think the pandemic has taught us many things. But perhaps among the most obvious is the importance of not only physical health but also mental health, and the social need to strengthen health coverage at both levels, because if we don't have health, we don't have anything. From my point of view and that of more and more health professionals, both are equally important and most of the time they go together more often than we think.