Tips to manage COVID Fatigue

Enough is Enough!

For most of March, I found myself struggling a bit more than usual. Emotionally, my level of irritability was higher than normal, and I found myself in a sustained state of anxiety. Physically, I was frequently tense and had to repeatedly relax my muscles to ease the discomfort. I was also mentally exhausted from doing nothing. Immediately the Psychologist in me began to assess for stressors, as the described symptoms were indicative of stress. When my assessment left me empty-handed, I began looking closely at my environment – people, place, and things and herein I found the cause and labeled its diagnosis. I was suffering from COVID Fatigue.

We are all fatigued!

It has been over a year since the world started on this COVID evolution; changing the way we work, play, and live. However, March 2020 holds personal significance as this was the month when we in the Caribbean began feeling the effects of the pandemic, as the infection rates began to hit closer to home. March 2020 slowly transition from a sense of ‘it’s them’ as we watch media broadcasts of growing concerns internationally, to a sense of ‘it’s us’ as news of loved ones infected or dying abroad were hurled at us. Thereafter a sense of ‘we’ emerged, as globally the world now experienced the same trauma. We are now fatigued. Exhausted from this continued state of uncertainly, feeling unsafe, and importantly stuck in a state of shocked grief. We crave our old normalcy but also fear that we are slowly forgetting what normal looks like. We have spent a year in heighten awareness, traumatized repeatedly by the evolving nature of this virus and we now yearn release from this COVID Fatigue.

The psychology of fatigue

Hockey (2013) presented a dialogue that resonated with me because it captured my thoughts on this phenomenon. Hockey (2013) noted that fatigue is best understood as a process, where a growing problem associated with the continued sustained activity of a task, leads to a gradual reduction in commitment to the continuing task. With this decrement comes many psychological and physiological responses, in particular the ‘feelings of fatigue’ such as those I have experienced this month. The result of this is an emerging sense of indifference, an inability to sustain motivation, and thus commitment to the expected tasks required in this COVID era. In other words, we are all tempted to do away with the recommended safety measures. We miss the embrace of our loved ones, we miss the comfort of our social networks and, I miss wearing makeup.

Dangers of COVID fatigue

Herein lies the dangers of COVID fatigue. We are tempted to become complacent. For many of us with continuing concerns around job, shelter, health, and food security we are fed up and yearn for the peace of knowing that we are safe. The yearning heightens our ‘feelings of fatigue’, causing us to drop our guards. As we battle this COVID fatigue, here is a quick reminder to remain vigilant. Vaccination is not the same as prevention! Do not assume that the safety rules no longer apply.

Tips to manage COVID Fatigue

The following are some tips to manage your fatigue.

1. Listen to your body. Develop awareness of your responses to the ongoing stressors associated with COVID-19. This will allow your response to be adaptive, leading to better choices without compromising your health. 
2. Be creative in your current routine. Sometimes the key to reducing fatigue is to take different approaches to mundane routines. Redesign your approach to work, school, play, and fun.
3. Accept that COVID will be with us for a long time and in so doing, check frequently to ensure that there is a balance in what your mind, body, and soul need to continually cope with it.
4. Disconnect from the pandemic! Sounds hard, but it is possible. Set boundaries on people, places, and things, so you manage your exposure to this ongoing event.
5. Plant seeds of hope by making realistic plans for the future. 

If you continue to struggle with mental, emotional, physical, and spiritual symptoms of fatigue, speak to a professional mental care provider.

Reference

Hockey, R. (2013). The psychology of fatigue: Work, effort and control. Cambridge University Press.