COVID-19 & CBT: How to Improve Your Mental Health

The coronavirus pandemic has resulted in many changes to our lives in the last few weeks, leaving many of us facing a varied array of emotions.

Whether it be growing fears over contracting coronavirus itself, cabin fever from being stuck at home day in day out, or a feeling of paranoia from self-isolating, it’s imperative to focus on our mental health and concentrate on our wellbeing over the coming weeks.

The lockdown has forced many of us to change our routines and plans, ultimately knocking our minds into an unfamiliar frequency. In light of this, it’s important to move with the changing times and reprogram our minds to ensure we can deal with anything that comes our way – a similar concept to that used within cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) treatment programs.

The principles of CBT work on the premise of altering people’s attitudes and behaviour, changing how someone responds to and deals with an emotional problem. This is particularly relevant when it comes to dealing with the mental repercussions of self-isolating; by recognising and understanding our own cognitive processes, we can alleviate the feeling of stress currently being felt throughout the nation.

Recognising The Changes in Your Routine

With our daily routines and timetables being disturbed, it can be easy to pay too much attention to our body’s defence mechanisms by worrying and panicking. However, by taking the time to recognise how our routines are being changed, this can help us to process these changes in a very different way.

Redefine your own routine and find methods that suit the adaption in a way which benefits you personally. Don’t let the lockdown take away control of your routine – set new goals and milestones to take back control of your day.

Understanding The Effects on Brain Processing

We all have an inherent ‘fight or flight’ mechanism that floods the brain with adrenaline as a primitive biological response. However, the coronavirus outbreak doesn’t warrant this type of response, since neither taking on or running away from the virus are viable options.

In other words, there is no correct response to combat this pandemic and it is therefore entirely up to you how you decide to respond to it.

Creating Healthy Coping Mechanisms

Through reflecting, recognising and reacting to our new environments we can start to slow down our bodies’ innate need to respond, giving us time to decide on new ways to combat stress that suit you as an individual.

Try and concentrate on things you already know alleviate stress; set a routine, get a good night’s rest and, where possible, bathe in natural light. Keep your brain active with various tasks, puzzles or games, and undertake mindfulness techniques. Create achievable goals, keep active and develop a new fitness routine.

By changing the way your brain processes events such as COVID-19, you can reduce some of the anxiety this could be causing. Re-align your thoughts and re-examine your attitude towards the situation before adapting your behaviour in a way that feels healthy and productive.

Our qualified therapists here at KlearMinds can offer expert support to provide a more in-depth understanding of how CBT can help with the challenge of maintaining mental wellbeing during self-isolation. For more information, please do not hesitate to contact us today or visit our online counselling page.