Time to address our anxiety pandemic

Ask anyone, and the worst thing about a job interview, a speech, or even a needle in the arm, is the anxiety that precedes it. 

We don’t cope well when something horrible is on the horizon. 

Today we’re watching a slow-moving tsunami that’s still about a hundred miles away. On the one hand, it’s good we have the time to prepare; but on the other, the wait can be excruciating. Especially when there's nothing more we can do about it. We’ve bought all the toilet paper we possibly can. 

Now there’s nothing left to do but to adhere to asocial distancing, the things not to do to avoid clinical depression: Stay home. Don’t congregate. Isolate. 

This leaves us with nothing better to do than watch the news (not recommended) or search the internet for the most riveting conspiracy theories (also not recommended). You'll be overcome by a sense of doom in hours. 

It surprised me how quickly I succumbed. At first I thought I was immune. I’m a relatively fit 40-something-year-old. That’s right, I’m in my prime (don’t laugh).  

Then one morning a couple weeks ago, while walking to the shop to get my car, I felt as close to having a panic attack as I’ve ever had. 

Perhaps it was the empty downtown streets on a weekday. Perhaps it was the steady barrage of COVID-19 news I had been consuming for the past two weeks. Perhaps it was the change in societal norms. I don’t like it when people start acting weird, moving across the street to avoid me on the sidewalk. What do I have, leprosy? 

Don’t get me wrong, I like social distancing. In fact, I prefer social distancing. Shopping in half-empty grocery stores is ideal for a person like me, whose blood pressure rises by a factor of how many people are within a five metre radius (it’s an interesting equation). 

But I can’t deny that the prevailing coronavirus dread was having an impact on my psyche. 

I had to withdraw from the news. I had to become ignorant of what was going on. For a news junkie, this was very hard, and I still have relapses. But do I really need to know how many people died in Italy today? 

A recent poll indicates that I’m not alone. The coronavirus is having a major impact on the mental health of 20% of Americans. I’m sure it’s the same across the globe. If we're not careful, it will only get worse. 

I’m fortunate that I still have a job, but the angst must be mounting for those laid off. People in the service industry, including small business owners, must be dreading the financial impact. Others who are in debt, one pay cheque away from insolvency, may feel particularly helpless. 

We live in a wealthy country, where the government can play an over-sized role in coming to our aid, but our resolve to get through this will be tested.  

In this golden age of humankind, we tend to lack coping skills for major life disruptions. We ride the good times without thinking bad days will ever come. Then when something hits, we’re somehow lost, the anchors in our lives (our job, our things) no longer keeping us hinged. 

Of course we’re more resilient than we think. My 97-year-old grandma lived through the Great Depression, World War II, and six kids – yet somehow her generation has been the least prone to depression of all of us. I just talked to her on the phone, where she laughed and made jokes, as she typically does. This is a woman who broke her arm in December, got transferred to a nursing home miles away from her friends, and is now confined to a small room, alone. But she was laughing. 

She's living proof that we can survive this. 

So give up the news for a while. Take this opportunity to do something different. Enjoy the solitude (if you can). Reach out to people, by phone or other means, and don’t forget, you’re not alone. The whole world is going through this, and technology-wise, we couldn’t be in a better position to weather the isolation. 

As a collective, we may even grow stronger from it. When the day comes (and it will) when we can all act normal again, we’ll feel like we’ve just escaped from prison. I have no real experience with that, but I can imagine. 

Life is relative. We only feel the way we do today because of how we felt yesterday, and the day before. Bottom line: Life is still good; it may get tough, but it will be bearable.  

A few months from now, it will be even better.