This is the side we are not talking about. This is the side that has been slowly picking away at us for nearly two years. This is the side that's going to leave us with trauma, anxiety and countless other mental health issues for years to come.
We are in a mental health epidemic.
I see it EVERY SINGLE DAY in my social media feeds. We are not ok.
On January 10, 2022 I tested positive for the big C.
I want to share my experience with C not so much from the perspective of the symptoms but from the perspective of isolation and its affects on my mental health.
My oldest son had been sick - vomiting all night - a few days before I was tested. We thought he had caught a GI bug from the outbreak that our preschool had communicated to us about. My husband spent the night in his room to keep tabs on him and attend to his needs - he's 4.5 and was scared. That night, I barely slept.
Every sound had me sitting up in bed wondering if someone else was going to get sick. Once I was awake my mind was racing and I couldn't fall back asleep. If I did doze off, the second my 2 year old moved (who was in bed with me) I was back on high alert. At one point I even woke up drenched in sweat.
This was not normal for me. Is this what insomnia is like?
The next day I felt TERRIBLE but I really thought that it was due to the lack of sleep. I spent the majority of the day on the couch with my oldest son helping him with sips of water and apple juice and deciding what we should watch next on Disney+ or Netflix.
The following day I lost my sense of taste. My first thought was SHIT. My second thought was how am I supposed to get my hands on a test?
We live in a country - Canada - that provided access to free rapid tests in late December 2021 for in-home use, yet we could not get any because the pharmacies have been stripped of them. I chose to pay for a rapid test at a pharmacy so that I could have peace of mind even though all of the guidelines told me not to go if I had symptoms. What else was I supposed to do? I needed to know. I needed to let any close contacts know including my parents, close friends and our childcare providers. When my test was positive I felt reassured that I knew, but also ashamed for not knowing sooner because we had potentially exposed other people.
I also felt the dread of what the next however many days would look like with isolated two young kids at home. I already hadn't left the house in 2 weeks, other than for one appointment, because of the extreme cold temperatures and the fact that I am no longer able to drive. (In case you didn't know, I'm legally blind due to a degenerative eye disorder called Retinitis Pigmentosa). My mental health was already suffering and I worried that it would dip back to the point of depression that I’ve worked so hard to dig out of.
My husband tested positive the next day. Again, we had no access to rapid tests so he paid for a test to confirm because that was our only option. Our province has limited free PCR testing to some very specific populations, had run out of in-home tests and left us with no other options.
Larger increases [of anxiety, loneliness and feelings of depression] among women may reflect that they are often carrying a disproportionate burden, including imbalances in caregiving responsibilities and frontline work.
It blows my mind that mental health isn’t being addressed by mainstream media or the health officials handing out mandates in any form. My kids were sick, I was sick and my husband sick and nobody was allowed to help us. And if you've ever experienced parenting sick children while you yourself was sick, you will understand how challenging this is.
A recent article published on the Center for Addiction and Mental Health's website stated that "adult Canadians are reporting levels of moderate to severe anxiety, loneliness and feelings of depression as high as early in the pandemic" and that "larger increases [of anxiety, loneliness and feelings of depression] among women may reflect that they are often carrying a disproportionate burden, including imbalances in caregiving responsibilities and frontline work". The article urged that "it has never been more important to invest in mental health to prepare our healthcare system for the fall-out from this pandemic.” Friends, it's going to get worse before it gets better. We will be suffering the repercussions of this for years and even decades to come.
I took about a week off of exercise to give my body time to rest and recover. At the same time, this was removing one of my major coping mechanisms for stress, overwhelm and depression. I ended up cancelling all of my clients and classes for a week, which is another key source of my emotional health. I found myself wanting to sleep more so I could avoid my feelings of sadness and crawling into bed as soon as my kids were asleep, or falling asleep along side them. I didn't want to get out of bed in the morning and endure another day of trying to entertain and referee two young children who didn't understand why we couldn't go to the park.The days felt like they were spent breaking up fights between my children and questioning whether or not I should just put on another movie for them so I didn't have to parent. One morning I even sat on my kitchen floor to eat my breakfast one morning to avoid them (I shared about this on Instagram) while they were playing at the kitchen table. By bedtime I was mentally and emotionally drained, unable to source any emotions of joy or happiness.
It's not that I didn't want to enjoy the time with them. It was that I was not emotionally able to. That is what depression can be for me.The inability to see the positive and unable to change the narrative.
My mind also went to the place of "please not again, I've worked so hard to dig myself out of this." My experience with depression began 4.5 years ago when my first son was born, I took an anti-depressant for 2.5 years though my second pregnancy, birth of my second son and throughout the majority of the pandemic. I slowly weaned off the medication during the summer of 2021 (you know, that time when we thought the world was opening up?) and have managed my mental health to the best of my ability though exercise and the fulfillment I experience from coaching women to feel strong and capable in their bodies.
I didn't want to move in what felt like a backwards direction. This fear circulated around in my head for few days. Am I going to need to go back on medication? Can I get though this without it? I'm not sure.
My mood has slowly been improving over the past week - hence my capacity to speak openly about this - with the return of my kids to part-time childcare, seeing my clients and participants regularly again, building back exercise into my days and spending some time outdoors and with people outside of my home.
This is about so much more than the physical symptoms. Our mental and emotional health is being sacrificed. When we as parents are not ok, our kids are directly affected. When we as partners are not ok, our relationships are affected. When we as employees or business owners are not ok, our economies are affected.
The ripple effect is going to be massive. So please, do what you can, and what you need to do to support your physical, mental and emotional health to the best of your ability. If you don't think you can do it on your own, speak to a professional who can.
Because YOU matter.
Comments