Mental Health During Covid-19

My Covid-19 Story

For many months now we have learned to adapt to our new way of life. I find myself getting excited when I find a cute new mask, or a new thing opens up like a movie theater. The Corona Virus has changed our entire life in many ways. It is easy to think that its effects don't effect us, but indeed it does. 

I am a college student and luckily we were able to return, with some restrictions. Every class requires a mask, everything you enter a building you must wear a mask. If you are hanging around someone that test positive for the virus, you have to go into two weeks of isolation. We live in fear that one day we will get a call saying we must pack up our things and isolate alone. 

As weeks went by on campus the cases began to grow. The school began to get very scared that the virus would take over and send us home. My fear grew as well, until 4 days ago. I was headed to visit with my older sister, she is pregnant. To take every precaution, I went to a clinic and took rapid Covid-19 test to confirm that I do no have the virus so it is safe to be around my sister. I took my test and within 20 minutes, I received a call explaining I had tested positive for Covid-19. I was in complete shock, I had no symptoms and was expecting a negative result. 

As soon as I got off the phone with the doctor, I called my mom. I was hysterical, crying because the corona virus guilt was setting in. I began to panic and asked myself these questions. How did this happen? Who gave this to me? The worst question, who have I given this to? I began to have flashes of every person I had been in contact with. From my panic I nearly ran off the road on my way back to school.

When I got back to my house, I sat in the driveway. My roommates and I spoke from other ends of the driveway. Shortly after Student Life at my school called me, they told me to pack a bag and head to a hotel that was 20 minutes away. I was going through the motions, feeling in a daze. On my way to the hotel, word had gotten out that I had test positive and everyone I knew was calling nd texting me telling me to NOT put their names on the close contact list that we must fill out in order to keep theirs from spreading. I began to cry, everyone seemed so angry with me for contracting this virus. I felt more alone than ever. I got to my room and it was time to make my list of close contacts. 

I was honest, brutally honest. Within minutes some of my very closest friends called me, yelling at me. They were so angry that they had to go into quarantine. I felt worse than them, my stomach hurt. All night I was throwing up from the stress and guilt I was feeling. I had just put 8 of my closest friends into a 2 week lonely quarantine. 

It had been four days and still one friend will not speak with me. They are so angry at me for what they are having to go through and I could not understand more. I know it sucks so much, but I could not let the virus spread on the account of me. Luckily all my friends that were close contacts test negative to the virus. It was my first relief of this horrible nightmare. 

Now I am in my 3rd day of a 10 day lockdown in a hotel. We can not leave our rooms, I have not had a breath of fresh air in over 60 hours. The food everyday is the same, we get to choose between 4 options everyday. I am not ungrateful for the care at all but it is getting harder everyday doing the same thing. This will be a hard journey and I am trying to keep my mentality positive. In the hotel room you have a lot of down time to think abut yourself. My thoughts have started to haunt me. I have a lot of time to think about myself and all my choices. 

The virus is weird, sometimes I feel fine and sometimes I feel like a bus had just hit me. I have my sense of taste and smell, I pray they do n to leave me! I have the worst pains in my chest, if I do anything strenuous I become out of breath and tired. I hope I recover soon. I am thankful I did not spread this virus to anyone. 

I wanted to write this story to talk about keeping our mental health strong during these weird times. We are serrated from the people we love and out world had changed completely. This pandemic is not easy to navigate through. For some people, they haven't seen their families and friends in a very long time. For example my boyfriend plays professional soccer for the New England Revolution and they are very strict, they get tested twice a week and are not allowed to have visitors of any sort. Therefore I have been unable to see my boyfriend since April. That has taken a toll on myself for sure. My friends boyfriend plays professional also but in Iceland, due to the travel banes she is unable to see her boyfriend as well. 

This virus effects people in so many ways, from not being able to seeing our loved ones, not having a normal school life and not being able to have human contact like we use to. So many people are living in fear. We must stay positive during this time, it is the only thing we have left. I keep telling myself that as I keep pushing through day of complete isolation. I am trying to stay positive and productive. I hope that people will continue you check them and monitor themselves during such strong times. With all the hardships going on we need to lean on each other even if we can physically lean to the touch. We need to keep all our neighbors healthy and strong during such a time where our mental strength is put to the test. I am hoping that through all the pain and guilt I continue to experience during this period of isolation I can remain strong. 

It has been tough feeling alone, sad, scared and guilty. I hope after I come out of this isolation I can help others who will go through this. We can read all we want from the CDC but nothing will prepare you for packing up you things and going into complete isolation for 10 day in a matter of 45 minutes. I hope that others can have a positive outlook and find pockets of peace throughout their long days. I hope that we can beat this virus, we can be better than it together. This virus has taken way to many lives and we can not let it take more on the account of mental health. We need to check in on our friends, we need to ask them if they are okay instead of asking them to not put them on their close contact list. We need to be their for each other and not place blame on those who get the virus. We need to come together and take the corona virus down as a community. We need to help each other and most importantly we need to love each other during these dark times.