Mental Health during a Pandemic. Guest Blog by Karen Jeffery.

You may be feeling more anxious than usual at the moment. Perhaps we all are. And maybe that is totally normal as we deal with the unwanted interruption to our normal lives caused by Covid-19. How we deal with these high levels of anxiety has never been more important so I would like to look at some of the defense mechanisms I have seen in my clients, my friends and family and how they are helping us to cope very day.

The first thing which provokes anxiety in humans in general is uncertainty. The pandemic has brought huge amounts of uncertainties to the whole world and there is still, 4 months in, a lack of certainty about many, many things. Initially we did not know what the virus would do to us, whether it would kill many or most of us, how and if we would survive in lockdown and whether our infrastructure would cope. Another raft of uncertainties arrived as lockdown began; what we could and couldn’t do, how far we could go for exercise; and they continue now as we take the first tentative steps to returning to some semblance of normal life. 

How can we cope with the anxiety of uncertainty? Often, we focus on the things we can control, like buying toilet rolls, for example, in the early weeks of the virus. In counselling, this is known as displacement activity: the anxious energy we feel about the virus and wanting to control and stop it is displaced onto another activity that we can control, and that gives us some relief. We can also displace our feelings about the current situation; rage, disappointment, perhaps; onto other people or things, having a row with a partner, shouting at the dog, raging at politicians…

Some people may feel like they want to shut down, to disengage from the news and the daily updates and pretend it is not happening at all. This is a common defense called ‘denial’ and, again, offers temporary relief from the difficult feelings. It is the equivalent of hiding under the table as a child and putting your fingers in your ears, perhaps during a parental argument. Doing activities that challenge us, like making complicated recipes, also help us to avoid reality, if only for a short time.

You might find that you have reverted to early behaviour - or grown-up versions of it - in a type of regression. Maybe you are overeating your favourite foods, biting your nails or chewing on pens. Even cuddling a bear or a hot water bottle at night can be a comfort at times like this.

There may be times in lockdown when you have felt really angry and fed up but have acted like everything is fine and dandy - it’s all great and fabulous and you are positively enjoying every moment. This is called reaction formation and is sometimes a way of denying real feelings, putting them a box and shutting them away.

The last defense mechanism is humour and I am sure you can think of loads of times where you have seen people turning their anger or frustration into jokes or sarcasm, creating or sharing funny memes online. Humour definitely unites us but it can also be an unconscious expression of anxiety, fear or rage. 

Defense mechanisms are normal and healthy and help us cope with emotionally challenging moments and events. They ward off nasty feelings and make us feel more in control when things feel out of control. The only time they become unhealthy is when they completely replace the emotion that is causing them; so we don’t pay any attention to our unconscious feelings of anger and sadness, for example. These true feelings need to be acknowledged. Just sitting quietly for a few moments and allowing the sadness and tears to come, or feeling the anger and punching a pillow, or talking about your feelings with a friend, or a professional therapist or counsellor, will put you in touch with how you really feel inside - and this is more important than ever with the extra anxieties we all currently face.