Category: Counseling

Our world is facing a severe health issue. The COVID-19 has been rapidly spreading across 185 countries, with more than 2.8 million infections and counting. As confirmed cases continue to rise, leaders around the world implemented extreme measures to help contain the disease. From strict lockdowns, travel bans, and social distancing measures— people’s lives changed abruptly.

As establishments close down, we are suddenly disengaged from society. Forcing to adapt to this new way of life in self-isolation can be challenging. These unexpected events can lead to stress, fear, and anxiety. With our daily routines disrupted, the activities that usually help us destress or relax may be temporarily inaccessible.

The pandemic and how we react to it can vary widely from one person to another. However, we must keep an eye out for ourselves, ensuring that we are managing our life in pandemic through healthy coping mechanisms.

How The Pandemic Can Impact Your Health

The pandemic has put our mental health is at risk, making us prone to stress, anxiety, fear, sadness, and loneliness. As we adapt to our new daily routines, we are at risk of adopting unhealthy coping mechanisms such as lack of physical activity, unhealthy eating habits, increased consumption of tobacco, alcohol, or drugs, and changes in sleeping patterns.

To manage these negative impacts, some people may result in unhealthy coping mechanisms. Dr. Navya Singh, PsyD, said, “Definitely, I can foresee a spike in all these different means of coping instead of engaging in positive coping mechanisms.” It is essential to watch out for these occurrences, especially for those who are recovering or have pre-existing mental and physical health conditions.

Healthy Coping Mechanisms During A Pandemic

As different quarantine measures resulted in the closure of establishments, cancellation of gatherings, and lockdowns, the usual activities that help us cope may no longer be accessible. Doing our hobbies, enjoying leisure and entertainment activities, or even seeing our friends and family may be temporarily not possible.

We must learn how to effectively manage stress, anxiety, and other adverse effects of the pandemic. As our usual coping mechanisms become unavailable, we must keep ourselves in check to avoid getting lured into unhealthy coping mechanisms. We have suggested below some healthy activities which can help you cope.

• Explore New Hobbies And Talents

Being idle at home can leave us with a lot of time on our hands to dwell on negative thoughts. Instead of resulting in unhealthy coping mechanisms, we can use this time to explore new hobbies and talents. It can help us entertain ourselves and even develop some new skills.

• Take Care Of Your Body

Feeling great on the outside can help us manage our stress and anxiety better. Directing your focus on taking care of your body is a healthy coping mechanism. You use this time to prioritize yourself by taking lots of rest and eating healthy. Taking good care of your body can also help you strengthen your immune system to fight off illnesses.

• Exercise And Stay Active

Being confined indoors could leave us with a lot of unreleased physical energy. This energy can be unloaded by exercising and staying active. Exercise is also a great stress reliever as it boosts your endorphins. It can also benefit your physical well-being as it helps improve blood flow and develop your body.

• Go Outdoors Once In A While

Depending on your location and imposed quarantine measures in your area, go outdoors once in a while. Confinement and seeing the same things every day can be detrimental to our well-being. Get some fresh air from your balcony or backyard. Even if you have no reason to go outside as establishments are closed, take a walk around your area if it is permitted.

• Connect With Others

Whether staying in touch with friends and family or connecting to new people – having someone to talk to during life in self-isolation can help you cope with the pandemic, it can also distract yourself from any negative thoughts or urges for unhealthy coping mechanisms. This activity can be both beneficial for you as well as for them, drawing strength from each other.

Despite all else, if you still need guidance and reinforcement to help you move past life’s challenges, you can always reach out to one of the professional counselors at BetterHelp. Their team is ready to work with you 24/7, anytime and anywhere with just one click. Check out their app today.

 

Final Thoughts

Although we temporarily live in self-isolation, coping with the pandemic does not have to be a lonely fight. Technology can help you seek comfort from friends and family, or even connect you to your community around you, forming new relationships. Seeking professional help also remains an option.

We live in a truly challenging time. It will test our resilience, but hopefully, we all come out of it better. We must remember that unhealthy coping mechanisms will not help us cope in the long run as it can be detrimental to our overall health.

Are you having difficulty in dealing with your addiction to alcohol? Do you find it convenient to keep on drinking liquors so you could get over a sad experience in your life? Can you see yourself being dependent on the intake of alcohol? If you answered yes to all these, then there is a high possibility that you have an alcohol addiction. 

Continue reading Alcohol Addiction And Online Therapy

Addiction can affect anybody, no matter how old or young, and counseling is a necessary step to recovering from it. Proper counseling addresses its underlying causes and prevents these triggers from causing a relapse.

Teens And Substance Abuse

Teenagers can fall into addiction. Their decision-making capabilities are misguided and easily affected by herd mentality. When they’re troubled or simply curious, teens tend to get high or drunk as a form of escapism from life. Unfortunately, those one-time tries may develop into frequent usage or intake. Later on, they may develop a severe addiction to alcohol, drugs, and other harmful chemical substances.

Although binge-drinking and drug abuse rates among adolescents have lowered in the past year, teens need proper counseling for the treatment to become successful. Compared to their adult counterparts suffering from any form of addiction, adolescents rely heavily on therapy. Medications are more prominent in adults.

Recovery Process

Professionals recommend a rigorous process of achieving sobriety. It starts with good old-fashioned detox. In this step, the expert helps the patient clear his or her body of the substances. Depending on the intake and quantity of the substance, the body expels the substances within days. Severe cases involve medical detox interventions in an in-patient setting.

Since therapy is more effective than medications for young people, professionals turn to talk therapy and teen drug counseling to help the child. Here are a few substance abuse counseling tips for adolescents.

Cognitive Behavior Therapy

Cognitive behavior therapy (CBT) is a technique that helps patients control their emotions and reactions. Professionals uncover the leading causes of a patient’s excessive usage. The CBT approach entails anticipating risky situations and managing a patient’s responses. Through avoidance or self-control tactics, patients can apply these coping strategies and prevent a relapse.

Dialectical Behavior Therapy

Patients who are comfortable with sharing their emotions are better off with Dialectical Behavior Therapy. By accepting uncomfortable feelings, thoughts, and behaviors, patients can overcome these. They can also release their pent-up emotions through exercises like breathing and muscle relaxation and yoga.

Because addiction is closely associated with mental health, dialectical behavior therapy can also help patients entertaining thoughts of suicide. This therapy helps patients control these self-destructive urges and encourages healthy change.

Family-Based Therapy

In family-based therapy, professionals emphasize the family’s role in a teen’s substance abuse. They encourage therapy sessions with the family present because families have a long-lasting influence on a young person’s life.

During these sessions, concerned parties work towards addressing issues that may have triggered this addictive behavior. It uncovers the deep wounds of the patient and unveils stories behind these wounds. For example, when the patient was still young, a parent might be a drunkard and this unpleasant memory imprinted on the young. In other cases, the family may not necessarily refer to blood-relatives, but any person playing a supportive long-term role in the patient’s life.

Recreational Therapy

Also known as therapeutic recreation or TR, recreational therapy is a method engaging rehab patients in active leisure activities. Among these activities are sports, arts and crafts, and games. This technique allows both the mind and the body to develop healthy habits and build social relationships. Recreational therapy aids patients in discovering positive traits about themselves. The goal of recreational therapy is to improve health and boost self-worth and self-esteem.

There are many other techniques counselors can choose from when helping out troubled teens. They should not be treated as helpless cases, for there is always the road to recovery. With the help of reliable counselors, young lives can be saved one therapy session at a time.

Teachers are the mentors of learners when it comes to learning, but they can also be of help in stabilizing a student’s mental health. Teacher and student relationship happens inside the classroom and goes for hours in a day. Fact is, some kids see their teachers more often than their actual parents who were busy working. Thus, as teachers, you also need to “check” their mentalhealth conditions just like how you check their papers and tests.

Continue reading Mental Health Support Tips For Teachers