Depressed due to isolation and civil liberty restrictions

Tangney · ‎26-05-2020

Does anyone feel their depression worsening because they are not afraid of the virus and don't agree with the lock down? I can't stand the isolation and hate the restrictions on my freedoms. I was isolated before this started and now it's worse. I feel that the isolation will actually kill me if it goes on for much longer and I am spiralling downwards. This is made worse by the fact that the reasons for the lock down are no longer in existence. I know that on 1 June things will get better, but it seems like a lifetime away just now. Isolation is used as a form of torture in some countries and solitary confinement is a punishment. I feel that this is being imposed on me, even though I haven't committed any crime. Some people cope better than others with these sorts of conditions. You tube videos, baking cakes, and knowing that flowers will eventually bloom doesn't make any difference. It would be nice to know if there are others who feel the same way. If anyone else out there thinks the same, please post a response.

Sophie_M · ‎28-06-2020

Hi Moonstruck,

We're sorry to hear how much you are struggling during this time. We empathise with how difficult it is to be away from friends and family. Please know that our community is here to support you and we will get through this. If you feel it might be useful, we'd encourage you to visit our Coronavirus Mental Wellbeing Support Service. The website will be regularly updated with information, advice and strategies to help you manage your wellbeing and mental health during this time.
Please feel free to keep us updated on what you are doing to cope during this time. As restrictions begin to ease we hope that you will be able to have your friends and family supporting you in person as we understand would be important at this time.

golden82 · ‎28-06-2020

Hi Moon, Tangney, and all;

I have also not been posting much either - It takes a lot to build up the courage to air how I feel - and a lot of mental energy to think about my struggles...much easier to try suppress them . But I have been spiraling from an already low starting point.

Thanks for your concerns Tangney - I guess I answered already - not doing well at all. I really feel for you and your valid frustrations. Thank you for the references to listen to. I will have a listen. I have had almost no human interaction since hospital in February (and as someone pointed out to me - this is not true interaction because those people are paid to be there). I have been on the helplines daily but with mixed outcomes - luck of the draw really. How are things going for you?

I hear you Moon regarding not being able to see your family when you need them most. That must be incredibly difficult. I know it is not the same - but are you able to Skype or Zoom so you can at least see their faces? Are you able to 'pencil in' a date to see your children?

I agree with your last post of nothing good coming from Covid. I am so sick of all the sickly sweet comments floating around the net about all the good we can take from it. I would rather not have my head in the sand and instead as painful as it is live in the reality of how life is. And I find your and Tangney's raw and honest posts of how it affects you to be refreshing as that is how it is. It sucks and so many are affected...

As we have talked about on here the fallout for mental health - mine is holding on (just) day to day - But even someone who seemed to have it all Steve Bing is reported to have found the isolation to have been too much for his mental health. That is how I am too - I have a roof over my head - but no connection. And whilst I am a bit worried to catch the virus as I have anorexia and complications - I am so much more affected by this never-ending isolation and deteriorating mental state.

I look forward to reading your posts as they help me accept it is tough - and not try to sugarcoat it all. Above all though I hope you both and everyone stays okay.

lunastone · ‎28-06-2020

Hi, all,

I am new here. I have been reading through the main thread "coping during the coronavirus outbreak" and think this is probably a more appropriate thread for me. I have had situational depression from time to time. It is starting to creep back with covid restriction. It is hard to talk about it as i have such a different opinions even with my partner. I hope you don't mind me venting.

Let's just say that I was all pro with the lockdown at the beginning of March. If anything, i actually felt that our stat govt wasn't acting quick enough but taking it slow in stages. My work arrangement has been very flexible but that seems to go out the window with covid. All the sudden, we were required to be seen in the office because govt hadn't shut everything down. I commute with public transport so that was a huge risk. I was in distressed....when everything finally shut, WFH didn't work out that well with a young kid at home and i was expecting to have the same efficiency. More weekly meetings with the line manager (why not before covid?). Yes, childcare was not closed but i didn't want to risk it. I argued with my partner so much because of the carer duty and stress with the job. I broke down several time alone.

As soon as covid is under control here in WA, i sent the kid back part time. That helps a lot at home and life is back to semi-normal, which i appreciated the effort that we undertook here in Australia. However, as the time goes by, I start to get angry with govt and people responses. I pretty much agree with a lot of what y'all have said on this thread now. e.g. There is no health reason to suggest that WA border should close to SA and NT. It is just cruel to separate family -- i have know a few who has asked for permission, volunteer for quarantine and yet denied. The lengthy closure of border has depressed me even more as a frequent traveler especially now knowing no foreseeable future of oversea traveling. I only just bounced back from depression last year with frequent interaction with oversea colleagues and seeing family. Look, i am not going to jump on the flight and be that "selfish" person as everyone calls it. It is taking the freedom out of me as an adult to decide the risk is my main issue. We eliminate it then what? Covid will be with us for a long time. A friend passed away all the sudden few weeks ago and immediate oversea family couldn't come over. I couldn't attend the funeral because of limit. This makes me feel so sad.

quirkywords · ‎28-06-2020

Lunastone,

Welcome to the forum and thanks for sharing your story. It is difficult for many and hard when families are

separated.

Goldeneye82 I am sorry you are struggling.

It is hard and tough and not everybody learnt how to make sour dough while knitting and making a video.

golden82 · ‎02-07-2020

Hi Quirky,

Thank you for your kind thoughts. I have read many of your posts and you are so supportive of everyone even though you have been through a rough trot yourself. Good on you for being so strong.

Today was a tough day for me as my wonderful dietitian retired - she has been my best (only) real support. Whilst I am happy for her - I am sad to see her go 😞 Just another thing falling apart this year...

Moonstruck · ‎04-07-2020

Hi golden82 and shout out "Hello o o o"...to Tangney too. Remember that phrase that was dragged out on TV every few minutes...I think one Ad had one "celebrity" after the other all saying "We're all in this together"...

I thought at the time, how ridiculous. Of course we weren't "all in this together" and if I heard the phrase again I'd go crazy..how gullible do they really think we all are? Well, a helluva lot of folk believed it anyway.

Has anyone heard it much lately? I wonder how the people in Victoria must feel if they hear that phrase parroted by all the celebs at the moment....or have they stopped saying it now? I hope so.

Love to all, especially in Victoria.........x

Tangney · ‎06-07-2020

Hi everyone. First, I want to say to all Victorians, as someone who lives in NSW, I am sorry. I don't agree with our borders being closed to any other Australian citizens. In support of Moonstruck's remarks, the "We're all in this together" mantra has a very hollow ring to it, to say the least. I can't believe what's being done to the public housing tennants in Melbourne. They have been placed under house arrest. It's false imprisonment. On a different note, I heard on Channel 7 news last night that in 2019, over 900 people died from the flu and 300,000 were hospitalised because of flu. 300,000 people!!!! I've heard a number of figures being thrown about regarding the 2019 flu from a number of sources and almost universally the number of deaths are said to be 900 plus. If the figures regarding the number of hospitalisations are correct, last year should have been the year to shut the place down, if overwhelming our health system is really the concern. Why doesn't anyone stand up for the 900 plus that were allowed to die without any action being taken? Didn't they have friends and families? What's the difference? For those that think we've never been in this situation before, I strongly disagree. It's only the disproportionate actions being taken that are unheard of. There is no way that this virus is anywhere near the scale of the Spanish flu, when they didn't have the medical technology that we have today, and 20 million people around the world are said to have died. A simple perusal of history will show that most of what we are being told about this is only part of a story and some of it is actually dishonest. I agree with Moonstruck and I'm also very upset. During the the plague of the 1700's in Britain, whole streets were sealed off and people were simply left there to die. Those who don't remember history are doomed to repeat it.

lunastone · ‎06-07-2020

@Tangney : i have been reading your posts here. Hello everyone else. As my first post has said, I was all OK with the restrictions etc. But now, I truly think that we are overdoing it here in Australia. Eliminating the virus was never a plan. Great, we did it here in WA, then what? Are we going to be in this bubble for how long while the rest of the world has no plan to eliminate it. I try not to compare it with the flu as every media/people keep telling me that it isn't a flu. Like you said, there are more death for other tragic event (such as suicide and car accident). I talked to my american friend and they are very envy of us right now but i dont' think it is a fair comparison. My europe friend is planning their trip seeing the family across the border. They say that people learn to live with the virus without damaging the economy. They wont' be flying. They would avoid crowded holiday places for now. Yes, they are concern but they will try to minimize whatever they could and live on their life. I guess my main issue is the restriction that's imposed on us. It takes the choice out of us. I do have elderly family who live oversea and i do care about them. i know some of my friend's parents are willing to take the risk seeing the grandchildren after a long while. They are just lonely. No one ever asks if that's what they want.

Tangney · ‎06-07-2020

Hi Lunastone, I agree wholeheartedly with you. I've written before about how the elderly are being treated as they they can't make good decisions for themselves. I know a lot of elderly people who are very offended by the way they are being portrayed. I also agree with you about the restrictions on personal freedom/choice for what seems to be a small number of cases compared with others diseases (eg. cancer) and tragedies (car accidents and suicides). No-one is calling for a ban on the car, for example. More people are actually driving due to fears about public transport, which is statistically more risky than the Covid 19. I also agree 100 percent with you about the international experience. I wonder if Australia's isolation from the rest of the world contributes to the over reaction and fear. I, like you, have contact with people in other countries and they are not panicking as people here are, even though they have many more cases and different health systems, some being user pays. I feel that the impacts of these restrictions are not being felt by those making the decisions and it seems that they don't seem to have a grasp on what many people's lives are really like. There isn't much point in living if society and economies have been destroyed. There also seems to be an extreme fear of mortality that I didn't know was so widespread before this happened. I suppose we are relatively lucky in being in NSW and WA, which have both been freer than many others, but with the closure of the NSW/Vic border today, I'm really worried that nothing will ever be enough for some people until the number of cases is zero and that the message that we need to learn to live with this is not being made loudly enough. If eradication is now the goal, we will never regain all of our freedoms.

golden82 · ‎07-07-2020

I also feel sorry for the people of Vic - and a little concerned for all our states as some people have been sneaking around whilst waiting for results of testing and/or with positive test results and should have been isolating. It is all so crazy.

I feel so angry that all this media attention is on these towers and news reports so emotive such as 'hard lockdowns' in reference to the 5 days - what a joke!!. The whole past 4 months or so have been hard for most of us. And we just got 'lockdowns'. And these residents get given free rent, bonus money and food parcels and medicines etc inc alcohol...for 5 days! It makes me angry - my mental health and isolation has plummeted over these months of lockdowns - but I wasn't afforded these sorts of things. I am not saying that I should have been - but some of these people are ranting and raving complaining and attacking the workers whilst being given so much assistance! Assistance that they should be grateful for as so many of us are suffering silently. People everywhere have lost jobs, businesses, homes, state of wellbeing - but we are the invisible ones - because it is not a news headline that appeals to the masses of 'do-good', non-thinking for themselves news watchers. They are very selective in who they have empathy for. It makes me mad - but at the same time it is laughable.

It is all such a mess - here and overseas. Chaos everywhere with people carrying on knocking down statues, getting violent, selling out of toilet paper etc (again), economically, an overload on the mental health support now and in the future - all of this negatively affected for years, probably generations. I can't see any good coming out of any of this and do not like the Australia, or world we live in.

I agree with the points about the flu and our medical system. There are many stats out there now about how overblown this has been. And how the mean age of death from 'Covid' is well above the average life expectancy. I put it in " " because there are a multitude of other conditions contributing to the deaths and it all gets labelled as Covid. More media scare...

But it works, here I am angry, but also slightly scared and confused and just so over this new world we live in. It looks like there may be more to come yet with news of China pig scare with a new form of Covid. It feels like all this is never-ending and just a series of lockdowns and 'new normals' - which along with 'all in this together' I agree in that I am sick of hearing