Psychological aftermath during and after the COVID-19 crisis

There are different ways in which the coronavirus crisis can mark us psychologically.

After so many days confined at home, with Easter vacations in between and endless household chores, education, work to be done, change of schedule and new habits acquired in solitude, family and couple in our confinement, it will be time to return to "normality".

I put it between words because psychologically it will not be normality. It will be a long time before we acquire again the habits we had, because the word "contagion" will be marked in our mind, the word "virus" will be present.the word virus will be present. Living a pandemic has activated our state of threat in us, and that is not so easy to forget in days, weeks, months or even several years.

The psychological mark of the COVID-19 crisis

We have lived through a threat, and as such our body has prepared for it. We have been with our sympathetic nervous system working at full speed, in survival mode, with every news item, in every conversation, in every question of your child at home, with every case of infected people, and with thousands of unresolved questions in your head.

Many people ask us about certain symptoms they are having these days; it is normal to have sleep and eating disturbances, to have moments of apathy and a certain level of anxiety, lack of concentration, feelings of loss of control, distancing from your child's body, and even a certain level of anxiety.It is a process that we must go through until we reach an acceptance of what is happening.

Depending on the predisposition of each one of us, we may develop some negative psychological sequelae due to the mark left on us by the situation we are living. For example, frozen grief (in many cases there has not been a farewell to the loved one) or post-traumatic stress, through outbreaks of hypochondria, phobias, OCD (Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder) of cleaning, sleep problems, anxiety, depression...

The psychological effects generated by the coronavirus crisis are very diverse.Therefore, each one of us will deploy our own resources to manage it, some of us innately and others with psychological help.

Possible solutions

To start taking care of ourselves from home it is important to find time to do some kind of relaxation, meditation, Mindfulness, slow and deep breathing ... the key is to work and activate the other nervous system (parasympathetic), which is the one that paralyzes the state of alarm of our body (sympathetic nervous system). This will improve and strengthen our health and our defenses against stress.

Deactivating your internal dialogue so as not to encourage certain thoughts in your head will help you to prevent certain psychological consequences. will help you to prevent certain psychological consequences.

The option of online therapy

Now more than ever, is when online therapy is showing its effectiveness.The possibility of being able to continue having contact with our patients and that new people can have online therapy is very useful.

Now more than ever, it is necessary to prevent possible psychological sequelae during and after confinement. Each one of us will have a psychological imprint of this experience.This will be influenced by how we manage social isolation, uncertainty, emotional control, frustration tolerance, adaptability, psychological flexibility?

Prevention and psychological therapy will help us to have more resources and strategies to overcome this situation without developing certain psychopathologies.