Mental Health in Lockdown
*About and during the March Covid-19 Lockdown of 2020*
It is hard sometimes to do the right thing to take care of your Mental Health in Lockdown. Staying at home and not seeing loved ones or friends is hard. Not going to restaurants, pubs or the gym is hard.
However, it’s up to all of us to ‘do the right thing’ in these strange times. There have been frustrating times in my past which I wanted share, with the hope you may find some common ground.
How do you do the right thing?
During both my pregnancies, I could not do the high intensity cardio exercise I normally love and crave! I switched instead to a weekly aqua-aerobics class. Initially, I found it quite easy and boring. It slowly became harder and harder to get out of the water due to the size of my bump. I dealt with my own mental frustrations by telling myself ‘It is better than nothing’, ‘its safe for me and the baby’, ‘it’s not for forever’.
It’s not forever.
I did feel better for doing the gentler exercise. The weightlessness of the water was certainly welcomed as the bump grew to resemble a watermelon! I appreciated my waist and ‘normal’ exercise even more after I had given birth.
I found the same mentality can be applied to a physical injury. Or my own mental health journey. Small positive steps are all we can do in the current situation. Here are some tips that may help:
5 Tips to help with your Mental Health in Lockdown:
- Routine – Even if it just your normal morning things of getting dressed and having breakfast, it can help your mood positively.
- Regular exercise – If you can’t run, walk. Try some of the online classes available now. Use things you already have in the home – tin cans can make great dumbbells. You may surprise yourself.
- Keep writing – Journaling or keeping a gratitude diary can be hugely helpful. You can get all those annoying, angry and uncomfortable thoughts out of your mind.
- Stay in touch – Call your friends, family, gym friends, school-run mums etc. In fact anyone who you would normally talk to. Teach parents or older people how to use video-calling or write them letters or notes.
- Find time to relax – You don’t have to come out of this ‘lockdown’ with a new skill or 3 to show how productive you’ve been. Take the time to do what YOU need to do to get through the day. Meditation, yoga, warm baths, reading, watching a movie etc. Anything like this which perhaps you didn’t have time for before.
Let me know your ways of coping. I’m sure they will help me to do the ‘right thing’
