Anxiety in times of COVID: taking care of mental health, a pillar to combat it

A year ago, the WHO (World Health Organization) declared COVID-19 a pandemic. In 365 days a lot of unusual things have happened. Care and rules that were not part of the imaginary were incorporated into daily life.

Human relationships were transformed into something different, from then on the links are maintained with other means. Many professions have been valued and it was revealed how vulnerable human beings are. But... Has a dimension of the importance of mental health been taken?

The subjects are made up of a physical and mental apparatus that work in a complementary way. It is necessary to attend to both in order to be in good condition and thus face destabilizing events like this one..

• Related article: "Types of Anxiety Disorders and their characteristics"

Anxiety problems in the pandemic months

Psychoanalysis states that the subject is psychic and social; he enters the world through a family that welcomes him, protects him and gives him the keys to inhabit life. Therefore, the subject needs others to be able to live, develop, grow, exchange.

Taking into account the above and the current state of semi-confinement or mobility and the possibility of restricted encounters (and with a year in tow of these limitations), it is clear that anxiety states multiply.

Two issues must be addressed: on the one hand, loneliness as an unsatisfactory situation, although almost obligatory in some circumstances; and the coarctation of ties (meetings, encounters, etc.). Both issues trigger scenarios that must be managed in order not to get sick.

It should be noted that the reduction in stress It is a perfect ally for the preservation of our health. Anxiety states subject the body to lower defenses and make it more sensitive to physical illnesses. Therefore, it is essential to have a state of mind that supports the immune system. With psychoanalysis it is possible to work on this path, producing a new subject that strips away those issues that cause discomfort, modifying words, phrases, mechanisms.

There is a global reality in the world of 2021 that cannot be managed at the individual level, it is larger than the subject. However, a change can occur in each one that will have an effective impact on that reality. And that is the only way for that reality to change, by modifying the positioning itself. Waiting for the “storm to pass” is the least productive idea.

Each one chooses which path to take and all are valid, the question will be given by the desire that he commands, by the overdetermination of each one. They are all ways of enjoying and, although it often sounds contradictory or difficult to understand, in suffering (in the symptom, anxiety, phobia, etc.) there is also enjoyment. Nothing really is wasted, but something more or less healthy for you is done. A product (health) or another (symptom) is generated; all are ways to resolve a psychic conflict.

However, if you wait for "everything to pass" to resume "life" the opportunity to discover things to do is wasted, new things to learn, new ways of doing. The opportunity to add a way of enjoyment is being missed and the pain for this lost time can generate a disease.

The defense mechanisms of displeasure

Pain and fear are defense mechanisms that human beings have in dangerous situations; Likewise, without a certain anguish the desire is not achieved. That's why you have to put anxiety to work.

The key will be to become the subject of your own life instead of a spectator, to take that leap. That is the only change that can be made, modify the position. Transforming the psychic reality will be the one that allows modifying the material reality. It is about learning to substitute, knowing how to add, adding ways of doing and not fighting with this situation (which we cannot control beyond ourselves).

The best way to do this work and to achieve a healthy mental health, which allows to unfold the subject's full potential by putting himself in charge of his life, will be to psychoanalyze himself. Through an element as fundamental as analytical listening, the subject will be able to decompress these words said to those who do not correspond, those silences shouted and he will be able to speak with speak.

At the moment the need to feel heard is the most urgent demand. The problem is that many times you talk to the wrong person. In consultation with a psychoanalyst, the patient feels listened to without prejudice, without judgment. He knows that the analyst will not take sides or tell him what to do or not do. And that is why, because the analyst is neither scared, nor impatient, nor upset, that the patient will be able to speak to him freely about whatever he wishes.

From the moment the patient can put words to what happens to him, he begins to improve. Because words build the subject, is crossed by them. If he cannot speak, if he cannot put into words what is distressing, he makes him ill. To speak is to begin to heal.