Virus Wars – Attack of the Trolls

So its been a while since I spoke, and its been a strange time. Lockdown happened then unhappened, we got back to work and then cases rose and we are back in semi lockdown. Who knows where we will go next? The government are trying to do God knows what, while the country gallops towards a mental health and stress fuelled melt down. Funny old world.

Working from home has become a thing, giving people more time to rant and rave on social media disagreeing with friends and strangers alike. Suddenly everyone is an expert on pandemics and science, if only they could work together maybe we can beat all this. In my clinic I am seeing more people suffering with aches and pains, primarily brought on by poor posture from sitting at an incorrectly set up desk but more importantly due to the ever increasing stress and worry for the whole situation. Whilst plenty of people are trying to pretend everything is fine, we all know its far from fine and we have no idea where it will end. However maybe those people have something. Someone said to me today that a situations is only bad if you think it is, and this got me thinking.

How good or bad something is, is purely dependant on how we react to it. Stress and anxiety is your brains way of dealing with something that it doesnt know how to deal with. Each morning we get up and the situation outside is the same, we cant change it and we cant fix it,(yet) but we can choose how we react to it. We can panic, we can cry, we can have a meltdown on social media, we can share our opinions and rant, or we can accept that we cant change it and do what might just keep us safe until those with considerably more knowledge and experience in these things can come up with something better.

Of course this is an unpopular opinion and I should not let the government dictate what I should or shouldnt do because its my life and they dont have my best interests at heart. On the other hand I have little to no experience of viruses and how they spread, nor do I have access to expensive and complicated computer models giving me more data than I know what to do with. Whichever side of the debate you sit, if its making you stressed or scared or unhappy, perhaps its time to rethink.

I have always tried to concentrate on the situations I can control and not worry about the ones I cant, but thats not always been possible. I’m still worried about the situation, I’m worried about how it will affect my business, about how it will affect my friends and family, about the long term effects on humanity as a whole, but mostly I’m concerned about the effect it will have on our mental health. I’m already seeing more and more people in the clinic suffering with stress, and I’m seeing friends on social media who are clearly scared despite pretending to be rebels. So what’s the solution?

The simple answer is, who knows? Someone somewhere is working on a solution to the virus, and plenty of other people are working on how we survive as a nation, but how we react to it all is down to us. Whilst its all very noble to take the wider view and try to work out how humanity copes, unless you have all the information or several years experience in a scientific environment your solution is always going to be sadly lacking. So the thing we need to do is start at home, work on how you deal with this and how your family copes before taking the wider view. As I have said, at my clinic we have been treating more and more people suffering with stress and anxiety in these uncertain times so maybe thats where you should start. We offer plenty of relaxation treatments including massage, reiki, reflexology, indian head massage, meditation and mindfulness, and we are not the only ones. Touch therapy has a huge impact on mental health and has been proved time and again to help with stress levels. Do some research, see what is available locally.

So dear friends, readers and random strangers who ended up here after pressing the wrong button, my advice is to deal with the stress in your head first, then deal with the stresses of your friends and family. Then finally when you are in a better place maybe get to work on that vaccine.

Until next time…..

S 🙂