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Pandemic Template
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2020-07-05
'All ears'
HIST30060 This illustration represents the importance of reaching out to people in times of need. I chose this because it was sent to me by my sister as I suffer from severe Obsessive Compulsive Disorder (OCD) and during COVID my mental health measurably deteriorated. -
2020-10-19
Everything is not ok
This mom has two preschool aged kids. One of them is not even a year old. She’s feeling alone, depressed and overwhelmed. Unfortunately those feeling are not unique to moms of small kids but COVID has heightened them. Social distancing means no daycare for her oldest and no in home help either. She feels alone because she is alone. After I saw her post on ig I got her permission to share her story. I felt like it was so important because every mother has had these days, weeks, months of “bad” feelings. Mental health is not something new moms pay much attention to since they have a new baby (and usually other kids) to care for. Moms are expected to give everything to their children and for their children. Sadly, society hardly ever pours back into these empty moms. This picture shines a light on the realities of motherhood and how COVID has made our lives more difficult. -
2020-10-16
Stress and hair loss
I’ve felt a lot more stressed since my daughter started school this fall. I’ve also noticed that when I take a shower, hair washes out with each wash. Losing some hair seems normal, but it’s felt like a lot of hair lately, or at least a lot more hair than should fall out. It’s a really subjective measurement, but let’s just say it’s more than normal based on the past 15 years. I’ve been wondering if I should just shave my whole head and start over? Not in a midlife crisis sort of way, but just to start over with healthy hair and more vitamins. I was on FB reading posts in a mom group I’m in. This particular group is for moms who had babies in 2018. I read a post today that talked about stress and hair loss, and I thought…yes…I’m going through something similar. I’m losing hair every day, but I can’t even stop to deal with it, because honestly, I don’t want to deal with one.more.thing. I’d rather just ignore this thing and hope it goes away. -
2020-10-09
covid, religion & public life reflection assignment
I wrote almost four times the required wordcount as a general reflection on this time period in my life & what it's been like balancing work problems and academics and bad mental health this year and these past couple months for this round of classes. I had some tension I needed to get off my chest, apparently, but I survived this first half of the fall. It is draining to be faced with at least a handful of people every day who radiate contempt for your safety or the dozens who behave carelessly, repeatedly, carelessly or the few who make obstacles of themselves to prove a point. It is draining to not be alone all year and yet pretend, by and large, that all is mostly well, all year -
0000-08-01
Life Still Goes on
Although the pandemic temporarily placed a hold on what everyone could do, the pandemic didn’t place a hold on everyone’s life. The pandemic started in March around spring break of the Spring semester of 2020. Due to the pandemic I had to make a choice to stay in Phoenix and continue working and going to school or leave everything move back home. I made the decision to move home and start over. I was fortunate enough to get a job in these hard times which took up a lot of my time and distracted me from what was about to come. In August I had to make the decision of moving back to Phoenix for school or stay home and do school completely online. Although most of my classes are online anyways and this seems like a very small issue it was very draining for me. After many trips to Phoenix, many tears, and many panic attacks I made the decision to move. Due to the last-minute move and the stress that came with it I began to second guess the decision I had made. Every day I try to convince myself that it was the right decision and that I am doing good considering the situation we are all in. I also feel as though my mental health has been rapidly decreasing. With that being said, I know I am not the only one that feels as though the combination of no human interaction and online school that isn’t teaching us anything has caused mental health issues to increase. A good friend of mine created a group of classmates at the University of Arizona and composed a letter to the President, after being asked in a class how they were doing, explaining how bad they were doing. They received no response; it was a very good concept but not enough to make a difference. -
2020-09-22
Professor Shares Anonymous Student Anxieties
A professor shared student's anxieties about the Fall 2020 semester. Most of the responses show the toll the pandemic has taken on student's mental health. Another common theme is that many students face a multitude of difficulties when it comes to online school. Whether it's finding the motivation to go to class or how a student's home-life creates a toxic environment for online learning. -
2020-06-12
Fur Friend to the Rescue
2020 has not been the best year... for anyone probably. Wildfires, pandemic, riots, protests, poor economy, all things that bring stress to people. People handle and deal with stress in different ways; some turn to their pets. Your pet doesn't know anything about what's going on with the world, they just know you are their human and they love you. They are always willing and excited to give you a cuddle and be near you. Every day you come home, they are super excited to see you, and sometimes, that can make a terrible day so much better. This is a photo of Maya the Papaya, aka Jellybean! She is my moms dog and is the super cuddly-est dog and is always so. super. excited. to be near you! -
2020-09-18
Golfing During COVID
I first became uneasy about the coronavirus when the US government started to make mandates about what businesses were to close, the limits of crowds, and when they made wearing a face mask in public mandatory. At first, I did not notice a significant difference in everyday life. The biggest change for me was moving out of my dorm room at Duquesne University and going home where I would complete the rest of the semester online. It was a very different experience in the sense I never would have thought that I would be completing my first full year of college education at home. With that being said, I got very used to attending class and completing work virtually. Moreover, as time went on, I realized at the time that the biggest change, the weirdest aspect of the pandemic was that almost every business was closed (except for the essential businesses) or at the very least open for only a few hours out of the day and there were many restrictions on the amount of people allowed in a given building at any time. For the first three or four weeks of quarantine, I struggled to find activities to do while I wasn’t in a Zoom session or doing homework. That was the worst part for me because I am someone who loves to be doing something all the time. It is hard for me to sit around inside all day not doing much. So, when May 1st came around, the government allowed golf courses to open in Pennsylvania. I have always enjoyed golfing in my free time even in the years prior to this pandemic. But when golf was allowed to open back up in PA, I began to golf more and more as it was one of the few activities that I could enjoy. Golf is not a sport where someone would come into contact with very many people in general so, I began golf quite frequently as it was a perfect way for me to ‘de-stress’ from being cooped up in my house attending zoom calls and doing homework problems for what seemed like one long day that didn’t really end. That brings me to my next point which was that pandemic life took a toll on my mental health. Waking up every day knowing that I was strongly encouraged to stay at home and if, in the case I did leave the house, I had to keep my distance from other people. To me, it felt like pandemic life was a very cyclical way of living which lacked variance. It was the same thing every day for weeks on end. Just that state-of-mind was probably the largest toll that pandemic had on my life. Fortunately, though, it seems as though we are through the worst parts of the coronavirus pandemic. I am seeing more and more businesses re-open which is encouraging. And hopefully we can continue being safe in order to get over the virus and back to normal life. -
2020-06-10
Pets and their effect during the pandemic
During the pandemic, to help deal with the new stresses my family decided to adopt a cat from a family friend. This animal actually helped to relieve some of the newfound issues that quarantine has brought on (fear, loneliness, etc.) . I feel this photograph is important because it shows a valuable tool that can help people to better make it through quarantine. It also helps to showcase the struggle I am going through in quarantine and what has helped to keep me going. -
2020-08-13
In my room
This written material tells about a personal narrative of a Covid-19 PUM [Persons Under Monitoring] -
2020-05-14
Pandemic-Induced Anxiety
"Prescriptions for anti-anxiety medications increased a full 34 percent in one month between February and March this year according to an Express Scripts report." This article describes the impact of the pandemic on individual's mental health and was written by a senior journalism student following a beat developed and thought about in terms of the "local" in a journalism course at Pratt Institute that was upended by the pandemic. -
2020-06-01
Pandemic
Staying at home locked up is very odd. It takes a toll on your mental health because you are not able to see your friends or anyone outside your immediate family. It is hard to connect with others and you will see the other side of most people's personalities. Letting yourself be who you are is very important. Taking time to do what you love (if possible) is a great way to let out steam. Workouts and staying fit as well as movies and video games are good ways to spend time. The pandemic of 2020 will always be remembered, likely not fondly. -
05/02/2020
"This Too Shall Pass"
This sign from a local Wichita counseling firm reflects the enormous psychological burden that the pandemic has placed upon people's mental health, with lockdowns, job loss, financial uncertainty, and fear of the future fueling depression and anxiety among many in both the USA and the world. #NortheasternJOTPY -
2020-05-03
Current COVID Situation
College student's experience during the COVID-19 pandemic -
04/03/2020
Lima te escucha
Municipality of Lima makes a psychological service available to residents called "Lima Hears you." The Objective is to help with social isolation and mental health. -
2020-03-18
Self-Care Planning
"The weeks and months ahead will be challenging, but that doesn’t mean they have to be miserable. Knowing what social distancing and (voluntary) self-quarantine may entail is a great first step to being prepared and setting yourself up for a (possibly even) personally rewarding response to these trying times." The following piece of media describes various strategies to employ during the pandemic, ensuring that your mental, physical, and emotional needs and stresses are managed and tended to. [This was added by the curator.] -
2022-03-21
Logistics in the COVID Era
Logistics and Transportation have seen dramatic changes since the beginning of the pandemic, and as such, my life has drastically changed as well. When the pandemic started, I worked for a trucking company that had grown into a major corporation. With all of the uncertainty in the world, I decided to bet on myself and leave that job to start my own company. This is how my life has changed since then, and what a typical day in my world looks like now, which is much different than it looked at the beginning of 2020. I wake up at 6 am and grab my laptop, I then log in to my load boards and post the loads I have to work on for the day. 90% of my business is done over email, so I am able to get my work started before I even start to get ready for the day. I then have time to talk with my wife as we get ready, answering emails as we go. When 8 am rolls around, I wake up my two sons, ages 8 and 1. We have family time in the morning, eating breakfast and watching the news before my wife heads off to her Law School. I then take my boys to their respective schools and drop them off for the day. At this point, if I have any errands to run I usually try to knock those out. I then head home and start bidding on new loads for the days to come. And since most of my work is done over email, I am able to knock any household chores out that need to be done for the day. When lunch rolls around I like to meet my wife for a quick bite some days, and other days I eat a simple lunch at home. I am usually able to wrap up most of my business by 3:30 pm and head to pick up my 1-year-old son from his school. When we get back home, we meet my 8-year-old son as he is getting off the school bus around 4:15. We have some father/sons time, and my wife usually arrives back home around 5:30 pm. Once we have dinner, I then get to work on whatever schoolwork or reading I need to do, and then a little more family time before bed. Since the pandemic forced/allowed me to take on this new opportunity, I am able to see my family much more than I did when I was spending 50+ hours per week in an office, with another 5 hours spent commuting. The pandemic has been awful for a lot of reasons, but as a silver lining, I hope that we have learned how to be more efficient with our time and to realize that the bulk of our waking hours do not necessarily need to be spent in an office when we can accomplish the same amount or more remotely, while greatly increasing our mental health. -
2022-02-25
The Fall of Covid
This flower represents the growth I have attained and hope. While the petals represent the things I felt like I lost during Covid. I think it is important for people to see how Covid affected everyone. This may open their eyes or give them something to relate to. -
2020-03-22
reverse life
Since the quarantine, my life has been completely turned upside down. I wake up later, eat irregularly, and am also much lazier. At that time, I was really lonely. I don't communicate with anyone and I don't want to do anything, I just lie in bed scrolling through my phone and playing games. I study superficially and have no interest in it at all. After a while, my sleep was completely reversed. I sleep during the day and stay awake at night. Every time I wake up I sit at the table and play games until morning, forgetting to eat and study. I have lost a lot of weight since then. Only when I play games do I feel happy because I get to meet my friends online. I got to know a lot of new people, even though we don't talk much now, but the time we spent together was really meaningful to me. Although I really enjoyed the quarantine, it also made me feel very weak. My lazy life ended when I went back to school but it took me a lot of time to get back to my normal life. I feel more positive and my life becomes more meaningful when the quarantine is over. -
2020-05-30
POV: Graduating during 2020
I graduated high school in the year 2020, right when Covid-19 was growing at a rapid rate, and the world was on a lockdown. March 13, 2020 was the last day of high school for me, but I didn’t know it at the time, no one did. Senior year was supposed to be me and my friends’ last year together before we all went our separate ways for college, but the only way I could see them was social distancing in a parking lot or on face time. My mental health began to plummet, I was never one to be home, I was always out of the house. Just the isolation, not seeing your closest friends, not having anywhere to go outside the house, and doing the same boring stuff every day was so frustrating because there was nothing you could do to change that because the rest of the world was doing it too and it just was how it was. I never got to go to prom, something that was supposed to be the best night in all of high school. Events that we have been looking forward to all our lives were being taken away from us, including graduation. It felt weird to be celebrating me graduating, since we weren’t even really having school. I tried to be optimistic, I mean I worked so hard for 18 years to get to this point in my life. My high school decided to do a drive-thru graduation, where I stayed in the car and was handed my diploma, not with all the teachers or friends who helped me get there, but I was grateful to have my family. I never got to shake my principal’s hand, had people cheering for me, or able to stand with my friends and throw my cap in the air. My graduation party was the following week and held outdoors, and I was excited to see close family and friends. However, 2 days before my event that I was already kind of sad about how many important people weren’t going to be there, my extended family contracted covid. My extended family was as close as my immediate family to me, my aunt was my baby-sitter growing up, and they were unable to make it. I was crushed and crying for days leading up to it and even after, it just wasn’t the same without them. It’s sad writing this, something that I spent my whole life working forward to just ripped away. It was a true test of character, adaptability, and mentality. This was the lowest point in my life, all thanks to Covid-19. -
2020-03-01
The Hardest Year Yet.
March 2020 A week before the world shut down, I was enjoying spring break in the Bahamas still joking about covid 19. By the next Friday, I was preparing for the worst year of my life, and I did not know it yet. In two weeks, I lost the rest of senior year, prom, graduation, my stepmom was diagnosed with a rare autoimmune disorder which made it impossible to visit my dad, faced the fear of my mom working with covid every day despite having an autoimmune disorder herself. I could have never predicted that my entire life would fall apart so quickly. I was mad that I ever took it for granted. I dreamed my entire life what my graduation night would look like, and I never pictured graduating in our local drive-in movie theater. I carried the guilt every day of not wanting to go out or choosing to do something else instead of seeing my dad. I wished I could go back and take any opportunity given to me. At this point, I still had hope that the nightmare would end by Easter of that year, but it seemed like it would go on forever. I was scared. I was scared that my mom would catch covid and not be able to fight it. I was scared my stepmom would not get better. Everything was so unknown I found myself fearing the future. I spent months doing absolutely nothing every single day. I was so upset I could not even bring myself to get out of bed to eat. All I wanted to do was sleep. I could not get more bad news if I was asleep. Every morning I woke up I felt like there was just more bad news and I honestly did not want to know what it was anymore. Waking up every day to more life-altering news with no end in sight was exhausting. I now believe that this has forever changed my life in both ways. I do not take things for granted anymore because I quickly learned how quickly they can be taken away. I have learned to always look for the light at the end of the tunnel because even if it feels like it will never end it will. The most important thing I learned was that life is like a wave, there are highs and lows, but you need to learn how to rise again. I have included a picture of the walking trail in my area. This trail was an escape from the scares of the world. I would often take long walks on this trail to calm the anxieties of the future. It was a chance to leave the house and almost forget what was happening in the world. -
2021-12-05
Five Pandemic 2021 Edition by Sebastian Delgado, dps
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2020-06-19
Is Working Remote A Blessing Or Burden? Weighing The Pros And Cons
This article discusses the pros and cons of changes to productivity caused by the shift to teleworking during the pandemic in countries around the globe. Major themes are mental health and work-life balance. -
2020-04
Clean Hands and Empty Spirits
This story is a small snapshot into how I felt mentally, and smelled, heard, and touched physically during April 2020. It talks about how the smells and noises around me at the time contributed to my worsening mental state and the feeling of hopelessness. This is important to me because it was this time that I learned that I am mentally stronger than I think and that I can get through rough patches with the help of my husband. It was not a fun experience, but I grew from it. -
2021-04-24
Quarantine expiriences
For the last three or so years I have been deeply interested in photography. I enjoy photographing people and cars, though during the pandemic I have had less of a chance to go out and photograph people, that’s why I thought this would be a good chance for me to get back into the hobby and share some shots I had already captured during the pandemic. These photos have meaning behind them that remind me of all the parts of my life over the last year. A primary source is any document about a subject that was created by someone who was at the event or took part in whatever the subject is. The portfolio that I created is a primary source as it documents the first hand experiences I had while in the pandemic. It has the highs and the lows, and shows an account of one person's life in the United States of America during Covid-19. My experiences in the Pandemic were very mixed. Some parts stayed the same, some better, and some worse. Before Covid I had a small group of friends that I hung out with and when all the stay at home orders began I was able to still see them sometimes, and I never went out much so I had a very similar routine. Though one thing that I lost was car meets and races. Not only did mask ordinances make meets harder to plan but Eau Claire also began cracking down on car meets more and more. It was really tough missing out on the fun cameroudery of car meets. I work at a car audio shop and one great positive of the pandemic is that because of relief checks the shop has been constantly booked for the last 6-8 months. Another positive has been going on late night adventures with my friends. We are constantly repairing something or upgrading our cars and so when we get done it is usually late and in the last year we have begun to do fun things late at night when we get done with the daily project. The first photographs I chose was a representation of the many small businesses in the area that have been closed due to rough times during the pandemic. Many great local businesses have struggled to stay open or failed even failed to do so. The photo was taken at a storage facility for signs of businesses that have closed down in the last year or two. The photographs of cars are meant to represent the many new late night adventures that me and my friends have had during the pandemic. These trips were one of the main things that helped me cope with the pandemic and hold on to normal life just a little bit. The photo of the room is of my childhood room at my parents house. During this fall at UWEC I got a call from the school informing me I had possibly come into contact with someone and I had to quarantine for two weeks. At this same time my father contracted COVID and this meant that I was confined to this one room for my two weeks of waiting. The room became my very own jail cell, after just a few days and it was very difficult for me to pay attention in school during my quarantine. It was one of the roughest my mental health has been in my life -
2020-03-30
quarantine puppy
My family ended up adopting a puppy right at the start of quarantine in March. This led to two things, first a source of joy and distraction while stuck at home, and two, a puppy with a LOT of separation anxiety. I am a person who struggles greatly with mental health and I can say with much confidence that quarantine would have been extremely difficult had it not been for my dog. My dog is actually now in the process of being trained to be a therapy dog for schools and I am happy to have been the first person she could help. I think there is something to be aid however about getting a dog during a pandemic. They get really confused now when their humans are no longer home very moment of the day, and I suppose I feel thee same way to some extent. -
2021-02-03
How does the pandemic affect children?
This link discusses if experts are really worried about if the development of toddlers is important or are there bigger issues. A fact stated in this text says " that 60% of teenagers say they’re lonely to deeply troubling federal data that revealed a 24% jump in mental health-related emergency room visits among 5- to 11-year-olds." This is a very concerning matter as children as young as 5-11 should be living a healthy life mentally and physically as those are the prime time of their growth and development. It goes on to talk about how these prime timed years of a child's life affect how he is as an adult. Certain aspects that small roles in a child's life may unknowingly affect it as it grows. -
2021-02-16
Recreation During Covid
This is the creative project I've been working on in Minecraft to handle the stress of attending grad school during the Covid19 pandemic. Minecraft and other video games have been sources of stress release and social interaction since forced isolation/quarantine and restrictions on social gathering has resulted in more people playing games and joining online communities for the needed social interaction for the maintenance of their mental health. -
2021-01-17
Entering 2021
2020 was rough. I don’t want 2021 to be a repeat. This is my hope for 2021. This is what I hope to accomplish this year to keep myself motivated. -
2021-01-07
Covid-19
My first memory of Covid-19 was in late December of 2019. I was sitting on my couch watching TV when I heard my dad in the other room talking to my mom about how the new "coronavirus" desiese was getting worse in China. I was shocked at first about what he was talking about, so I went into the next room to ask him what was going on. He explained to me how there was an epidemic going on in China, and how some people have died. It all seemed very new and since it was all the way in China I wasn't very concerned with it other than thinking that it must be scary for residents of China. Fast forward a few weeks when we get back to school, lots of kids in the hallways were making jokes about the disease that was spreading, and were saying things like, "Don't forget to use hand sanitizer cuz of corona." Up until mid march the jokes kept on running, and the epidemic in China became more and more of a big deal. Until the night before march 14, 2020 everything was still a joke, and the rumor of us doing online school from home was still a running joke. But on the night of march 13 we all got an email telling us that we'd be doing virtual school from home for the next two weeks. The following Monday we started online school, and we all thought it would just be for two weeks. I was up in my room all day, and we only got short breaks in between classes. The first week everyone seemed to enjoy it was we had to use zoom calls for our class periods. The second week of school everyone including myself started not liking the idea of virtual school as much. Even though we got to sleep in later, people were sick of sitting at a desk almost all day long. Soon enough they extended our time we would be doing school from home because of a pandemic for longer. The coronavirus had spread to the U.S. and most people rarely left the house except to go to the grocery store because everything was closed. Whenever my mom or dad would go to the store they would wear a mask and gloves to make sure they didn't catch any germs. Lots of other people did the same. By this time almost the entire country was in lockdown. It had grown into a full-blown pandemic; other countries like Italy we also bombarded with the panic of Covid-19. Everything was a complete disaster just by mid-april. I had no idea when we would be going back to school, or when things would return to normal. I still don't as a matter of fact. by this time I thought we'd go back in may, but we didn't. In the first couple weeks of may, just a few days before my 13th birthday, everyone at this point hated online school, it was dreaded by children across the country. This gradually got worse and worse, teenagers' mental heath was tanking by a landslide. Quarantine was now taking over my life completely. Most days I would sit in my room the entire day even on weekends since we couldn't go anywhere. Throughout June was probably the worst moth for my metal heath, and I think many others would agree. Saying we were bored would be an understatement; I wasn't depressed much like a quite a few of my other friends ,as far as I'm concerned, but it felt like all of our happiness and livelihood had been taken from us since what we started lockdown. Soon after, in July things started to open up again, the cases for covid-19 were getting lower(which was good), and people basically assumed quarantine was over. The nest month since things were opening up previously we all thought we would go back to school, but a few days before school was supposed to start we were informed that we wouldn't be going back, and we had to continue with online school. I was extremely disappointed, and I thought hopefully we'd go back by at least October. The following months through Christmas break we stayed in online school, and almost nothing happened. I spent my days the exact same as the day before I would sit in my room do school and then look on my phone or listen to music(mostly One Direction, The Beatles, and 80's music). My life became dark, boring, and quiet. By this time everyone was so fed up with quarantine, since we had been in lockdown for the past 9 months. Even Christmas felt different this year; usually I'm super excited and this year I almost didn't even care about the holiday's and I can't explain why. I'm currently writing this on January 7, 2021 at 9:05 pm. We've luckily gone back to school yesterday for the first time in ten months. There are plenty of safety precautions to make sure none of us get sick like: wearing a mask, social distancing( staying 6 feet away from people), and there are even certain ways to we have to walk around hallways and the campus to keep us in order. I can already feel a change in myself since we went back yesterday. It already feels like things are getting better now that we don't have to do virtual school with zoom calls for classes. I'm also really glad I get to see my friends, and hopefully make some new ones. If there's anything I've learned from being a part of the current pandemic it's that you can't give up or give in to other things going on with the world or even within your own life. No matter how tuff things you have to remember who you are and what you want to be. If anyone in the distant future is reading this I want them to know that, and how lucky they are to be apart of something as wonderful as life can be. I found myself more often than never longing for the past hoping for answers, only to find out the past is inside all of us, and even when the hardships of reality kick in you have to remember how amazing it is to get to experience something as rare and beautiful as life is. So don't take things for granted and appreciate every moment because you'll never know when something as mind-boggling as a world-wide pandemic will happen to you. Long story short never give up on your hopes and fantasies; it might just be the thing you'll need the most. -
2020-12-15
Life through Photographs during COVID19
Coronavirus hit me as a senior in high school. It began as an exciting two-week spring break and then continued to alter my life and everyone else's with no end in sight. I acknowledge that I was lucky in the ways coronavirus affected me as I did not lose my job, any loved ones, and was lucky enough to stay healthy along with my family. However, coronavirus and its related restrictions did hit me in ways I never would have imagined. It started with the loss of graduation, the loss of closure at the end of my senior year, worsening mental health, and questioning everything that was to come of my future. I had a plan: a plan to graduate along with 400 other students, a plan to travel in the summer, and a plan to go to college. These plans that seemed so certain were all uprooted instantly. Instead, graduating high school seemed like a formality, not a celebration, college at UW seemed so uncertain and financially difficult that I questioned attending, and traveling became a walk to the park. In the first few months I found myself sinking into a depression, my body and brain shutting down. I felt lost. As time passed, I began to find purpose and to find enjoyment in little things I never would have months prior. In the first few months, I found myself trapped in my house with little interaction, falling into a rut of depression and anxiety. I slowly began to find enjoyment in small things that got me out of my head. About a month into isolation I found myself scrolling through years of photos and videos reminiscing on my pre-covid, pre-mask, and pre-isolation self. I instantly began to print these old pictures creating photo journals and I made several slideshows of photos I had taken or found throughout my life. I created a video of my senior year of highschool full of photos and videos portraying the amazing times I was able to be a part of. I watched myself grow in these photos along with some of my closest friends and family. At first, these old photos made me sad, made me feel so alone, and then the photos made me appreciate everything I have been a part of. Looking back on the past, I realized how much I took these moments for granted. The small things such as going to restaurants, attending school in person, playing sports, etc. While looking back at the many adventures, I appreciated every photograph, every laugh, every cry. I realized how important the small things were. This is when I discovered my love for photographs, collaging, and slideshows. Creating these photo journals and slideshows gave me a reason to get out of bed and made me feel like I had a life in a time like it felt like I was completely lost. I had a five-month summer ahead of me, the longest break from school I have had since I was five years old. These photographs allowed me to spend time and energy on something that distracted me from reality. Slowly, the reminiscing and creation of these collages of my pre-covid life led to a sense of longing, a longing to be rid of this pandemic. I then found a job and instead of dreading a shift, I looked forward to it as it gave me a sense of purpose. I would document my coworkers who soon became some of my closest friends. I took photos of us at the break, spilling mop water on the floor, and going on drives to buy us all coffee. I then used the photographs to document the time I was in instead of the time I had once lived in. As restrictions started to lift I began to see my friends again but not in the same way. We would sit in our cars in parking lots, at parks six feet apart, or wearing masks on each other's front yards. I photographed all of this. I made videos of us blasting music as we sat in our cars not being able to hug or embrace each other. I wonder how these photos will age. These moments I have captured are of unimaginable times. I will view these in years looking back as the best and worst times of my life. Slowly I was able to create my social bubble of work, family, and a few friends. ll of these people became my support system, my family. Through these last few months, I and those around me have gone through more than I have experienced with anyone else. This includes loss of employment, loss of income, loss of family members, and loss of mental health. I started to create collages and photo journals to give to those around me. When sharing these pictures with those around me it brought smiles to our faces as we reminisced about our memories together or laughed at the altered world we live in today. I found that when I got to my darkest points I found solace in my photos and the sharing of these photos. Later in quarantine during July a few of my friends and I decided we were going to explore Oregon in every aspect we could. We hiked beautiful mountains, swam in the lakes, went to the beach, and watercolored in parks. I documented all of this along the way. Now instead of looking back on what I missed pre-COVID, I look at what I found during COVID. I found my family, my escape, myself. I found that I have captured more memories during these last nine months than at any other time. I have done more for myself and with those around me than I ever have. These photos and videos have been my way of illustrating the positive effects of this pandemic in my life. A couple of years ago I may have looked at these photos and videos and thought why masks? Why social distance? Why so much time spent with my family inside? Now, they bring a smile to my face. Yes, COVID19 has taken many things but it has given me many things as well. And one day I hope to show what it gave me through my photos. -
2020-10-08
Life Indoors
Taking classes at a university online for the 7-8 months has been a new experience that is new for a lot of people. Both professors and students alike are learning how to switch over to an online environment, and I think it is hard on everyone. But I am personally trying to make the most of it, even if I end up sleeping through my first lecture sometimes. I think it is important to document what the schooling or work life is like during this time because it is something we have not seen before. Spending the majority of my time at home, I have begun to rekindle past hobbies that I have had. I chose to submit a picture of the things I have crocheted because they were challenging in that I hadn't ever tried to make little characters or animals before this pandemic. I took the picture while on a video call with my friends because ever since this summer, we have chatted or video called to keep in touch with each other and "hangout," even if we have to be physically apart. This times online have been very meaningful to me and crucial in my survival of these times, because I tend to get very lonely and I know many people are struggling with mental health. My mental health is doing pretty okay despite everything going on, and I thank my friends for being there to talk and just have fun and take my mind off of everything challenging going on. -
0202-10-08
Time to Slow Down and Reflect
What I have learned the most through COVID 19 is how much hate there is in the world. I am a miniscule piece of this planet and if I can strive and share a positive attitude, I would want that for everyone else. Life isn’t perfect, but we can try to be more respectful, caring, and understanding of others. This time of quarantine has really shown me how much I needed to slow down. Slow down and really reflect and meditate what is truly important to me now, and what is important to me and for my future. The hate that we focus on in our society comes from years and years of hurt and hatred. But it’s time for a change; it’s time for us to learn about each other and get to a point where we can all respectfully understand each other. You can never understand what everyone is going through, but they go through it every single day. It’s important to make sure others aren’t alone, and that healing takes time. The constant grind that we live going to work, being social, going to school, and traveling gets tiresome and the quality time of it all gets drowned by the stress and drama. We can use this time of quarantine to stop and realize what truly is important for our health: mental, physical, and spiritual. -
2020-08-23
Creativity In Solitude
Being in quarantine meant two things for me. First, my summer job as a camp counselor was shut down. Second, I was legally required to stay home. In short, I have way too much time on my hands. I have always struggled to find motivation, even for my hobbies or passions. But having so much time to spend helped me push myself to delve deeper into art, which I have been doing since I was a kid. My mental health improved with each origami or drawing, because not only did I feel productive and accomplished, but I also was finally bringing myself to pursue my hobby. Furthermore, with a close family friend of mine being treated in a hospital out of state, I have been able to write her letters accompanied by a small drawing or paper animal. Each week I make a new origami and drawing/painting, and each week she gets to open up a new set of trinkets to hang on her wall. I feel like I am doing right by me, but by her also. The mental health of the general public has taken a nosedive since the Pandemic began, so it helps me to know I am doing something useful to improve myself and others. -
2020-08-09
How food keep me from Alcoholism
struggling with alcoholism I found a outlet in cooking, this post shares some of the things that I have made over the last few mouths. I wanted to showcase some positive notes of this pandemic and how it has brought mental wellness to the forefront. -
2020-06-19
PANDEMIC WOES
We are all going though the same pandemic but our difficulties and struggles are different. I think that it is just as important to highlight these differences so that people don't feel like they're alone in battling this pandemic. -
2020-06-11
Don't stereotype. Ever.
COVID-19, BLM Notes June 11, 2020 It's hard to put my thoughts in words. The news and social media are swirling in a constant maelstrom of things that seem like they should be false. Yet they're not. In the middle of the BLM and COVID-19 crisis, President Trump announced that he would be holding his first rally since Covid-19 in Tulsa Oklahoma. It will be on the anniversary of the massacre of the black community in Tulsa by the KKK. It also is a holiday marking the end of slavery in the US. This can go so wrong. 1968 Democratic Convention wrong. With semi-automatic weapons wrong. I'm sure supporters can make the argument that Trump is planning to make a speech that will help heal wounds. I hope that is the case. I sincerely doubt it. Even if it is, his administration has to understand the tinderbox they are laying fuel for. I simply don't understand. Additionally, COVID-19 cases are on the rise as states begin to reopen. So many people gathering for rallies and protests will up the ante even more. 😔😔 I'm angry about seeing my former law enforcement community painted with the same hostile brush that should be pointed at the bad cops and unions that protect them. It's damn tough to be a cop, even in a small community like mine. I still bear some scars. Cops are underpaid for the shit they have deal with. Mental health services may be offered if a department is large enough, but it would go on ones permanent record. Mental health is still stigmatized, so why would a cop want treatment for depression on their records? When Ron and I were dating, I had to undergo, on separate occasions, a herpes test and two AIDS tests. Imagine the fun that it is to tell my new boyfriend that kissing isn't allowed because I may have gotten herpes after giving mouth to mouth to someone I just cut down. (His response : If you have it, I already have it, so it doesn't matter. You marry a guy like that. I did). Then we had a another suicide. We didn't wear gloves back then. I'm sure we had them in the trunk but it would be wimpy to wear them. I got blood on my hands. Then the coroner found the suicide note. AIDS. I'm a nail biter. I had hang nails down to my knuckles. I went to Springfield for my tests because I didn't dare have it done in my community. AIDS was a very dirty word back then. I'm a chatterbox. The phlebotomist and I would be joking and laughing until they saw what the draw was for. A cold chill over took the room as they loudly triple gloved. Snap, snap, snap...... glaring at me. I was a junkie or a prostitute. Once I explained, they were so kind and emphatic. That's when I decided to try and treat everybody with kindness and respect. I don't know their back story and what led them to be in the position they are in. Be an asshole to me and I can be one right back but you get more peas with honey. Turns out, it wasn't AIDS. False positives were common back in the early days. Strangely enough, these aren't calls that bug me. That's what cop do. There's only one that eats at me and I'll unpack that some other time. I'm still processing the ghosts of that one. I bring them up because this is the kind of emotional crap cops deal with. Every single god damn day we clean up humanities mess. Yet there are people who want to vilify the entire law enforcement community, a community that includes people like me. I remember comforting a two year old toddler at another suicide. Mom thought the sitter would show up before the child woke up. She didn't. I'm holding this little girl who spent the morning putting popsicles on her dead diabetic mother's chest to get her to wake up. 36 years later I remember exactly where I standing, trying to comfort that poor child as I tried to process what was going on. So, as you shout to defund the police and tear down every single police agency that has ever represented you, think of me as a young adult from the age of 22 to 24, holding that child, wondering if I was going to die from AIDS, almost getting herpes from a corpse. I still had almost five years to go. I'm the people you are denigrating. I'm proud of the work I did. If you're looking for the bad, that's all you're going to see. Be cautious in the wording of any negative comments you might leave. I'm not much in the mood to keep my peas on my knife. -
2020-04-22
Before Coronavirus, Theatre Was My Salvation. Where Do I Turn Now?
1. Due to COVID-19 fears, theaters on Broadway and across the country have shut down. Legendary actor and director, Joel Grey reveals the mental health strain this loss has caused for himself and so many in his position, including the loss of work and the community he relied on for support and companionship. Joel Grey writes "Because of the coronavirus, we’re facing a future that sure feels more tenuous and fragile than ever. Projects have been canceled, milestones have already been missed, and all the shows have gone dark. These are hard times, for sure, and in hard times I, like so many others, have always turned to the theater for comfort. Where do we turn now? This tragedy has been made that much more devastating by having to face the nightmare without the laughter, tears and sense of community that a night in the theater delivers." -
2020-06-18
Is Another Public Health Crisis Brewing Beneath the COVID-19 Pandemic?
An article from the Canadian Journal of Public Health that discusses the risk of substance abuse problems becoming worse across Canada due to the trauma and stress of the pandemic. -
2021-04-04
News Article: How a local response to COVID-19 helped slow deaths on the White Mountain Apache nation
By Amanda Morris of the Arizona Republic: When someone on the Fort Apache Indian Reservation receives a confirmed diagnosis of COVID-19, health care workers from the Whiteriver Indian Hospital jump into action. They personally visit the individual's home to test other household members, perform health evaluations on everyone there and trace any other potential contacts at risk for COVID-19 exposure. Health care workers in the community say that could be one reason why, even though the rate of confirmed COVID-19 cases among White Mountain Apache tribal members is nearly triple the state's rate, the death rate is much lower and continues to fall. Over 90% of COVID-19 cases in the White Mountain community are investigated within 24 hours of testing, according to Ryan Close, the director of the Department of Preventative Medicine at the Whiteriver hospital, which is the only hospital on the 1.67 million-acre reservation. "I feel like what we did made a huge difference," Close said. "We evaluated and admitted people aggressively and early. The tribe deserves an incredible amount of credit for mobilizing staff ... to make this response possible, because at some point it would have been very difficult to maintain without their considerable help." The quick response may have also helped the tribe turn the tide against rapid community spread of the virus, which scientists say could have been fueled by a single variant found only in the White Mountain tribal communities. The variant carried a mutation in the spike protein, which scientist theorize could have made it spread more rapidly than other strains of the virus. The number of confirmed COVID-19 cases among White Mountain Apache tribal members accounts for 24% to 28% of their population, according to Close, but the cumulative death rate among known cases is only 1.2%. By comparison, the statewide rate of infection was 11.5% with a 2% death rate among known cases. And over the winter, Close said the rate for the tribe dropped even lower, to about 0.5%. In a community with a high number of individuals with underlying health conditions, the low death rate and work of the tribe has been "remarkable," said David Engelthaler, director of the Translational Genomics Research Institute's infectious disease division in Flagstaff. The death rate also stands out as unusually low when compared with death rates in other Indigenous communities. Indigenous populations have been disproportionally affected by the pandemic. CDC data shows that Indigenous people are 3.5 more likely to be diagnosed with COVID-19 and almost twice as likely to die from COVID-19 than white people. Close credits a proactive strategy to combat COVID-19 that involved rapid contact tracing, in-person health evaluations and frequent outreach to high-risk COVID-19-positive individuals as well as early treatment with monoclonal antibodies and other antiviral therapies. Volunteers and health workers from the White Mountain Apache community were on the Whiteriver hospital's contact tracing team and high-risk COVID-19 outreach team, which Close said helped the team connect better with the people and work faster. One essential part of the team are the tribe's community health representatives, or CHRs, who are members of the community that serve as a cultural bridge between patients and medical establishments. JT Nashio, director of the Community Health Representatives for the tribe, said the "visceral connection" that CHRs have to the community helps them bring cultural awareness to the way questions are asked for contact tracing, which makes the process more effective and allows officials to better distribute information. "On top of that, quite simply, they know how to get around. It’s a big reservation and not all homes are easy to find," Nashio said. "But when you’ve lived here your whole life, you know where to find people. That became invaluable during the tracing and testing push during case surges." Virus mutation may have made it more transmissible When COVID-19 hit the White Mountain Apache nation, it spread rapidly. The community's first documented case was on April 1, 2020, from someone who had likely recently visited the Phoenix area, unknowingly caught COVID-19 and returned, according to Engelthaler. Within the first few weeks, Close said the community experienced a handful of deaths. "We soon had incidence rates that were skyrocketing. Case counts were going up very, very quickly," Close said. It's unclear why the disease spread so rapidly in the community, but the initial strain of COVID-19 that hit the community carried a mutation that Engelthaler believes could have made it more transmissible. "They were seeing the virus just rip through and have an 80 to 90 to 100 percent attack rate," he said. TGen partnered with the tribe and the U.S. Indian Health Services early on to provide tests to diagnose a case of COVID-19 and provide genetic analysis of the virus from each case. It showed one strain of the virus circulating in the tribal community that wasn't present anywhere else in the state. "This virus moved much faster than anything else we were seeing in Arizona at the time," Engelthaler said. "So we actually believe that we had one of these variant strains in Arizona that was causing very large numbers of cases, but it was secluded and maintained really only in that tribal population." The mutation, called the H245Y mutation, occurred in the spike of the virus, which Englethaler said is a "very sensitive" part of the virus where mutations can have a significant impact. Because of the low death rate, Engelthaler said TGen researchers would like to investigate the mutated strain of coronavirus seen among tribal members to see if it is also associated with a lower fatality rate. He acknowledged that other strains of the virus have since entered the community and that the actions of health care workers in the community and at the Whiteriver hospital is also responsible for the lower death rates. 'The earlier you treat an illness, the better' Close's biggest concern was that an outbreak would cause a "tsunami" of sick COVID-19 patients that would run the risk of overwhelming the Whiteriver hospital, which does not have an intensive care unit. Any patients that require intensive care need to be transported to other hospitals in the state. "We're a small hospital, we cannot take a wave of all very acute patients because there aren't enough ventilators in the hospital," Close said. "There aren't enough helicopters in the state to transport people out from our facility to a higher level of care." Within the first few weeks, Close said the community experienced a handful of deaths, and patients who had the poorest outcomes were the ones who self-presented at the hospital — often meaning they waited until they felt sick enough to go to the hospital. "People don't always bring themselves in early enough," Close said. "The earlier you treat an illness, the better." In response to this phenomenon, the hospital started a high-risk outreach program the third week of April. Health care workers regularly visited the homes of anyone who tested positive for COVID-19 and was at high risk for a poor outcome. Close recalls multiple days when he evaluated patients and found their oxygen levels dangerously low, even though they felt fine. It's a condition associated with COVID-19 known as "silent hypoxia," or "happy hypoxia." "They had no sense that they were even ill. They went on to get pretty sick in the hospital, but they survived and you can't help but think to yourself, 'Yeah, that's a life saved,'" Close said. "That person, if they had stayed home another day or another two days would not have done as well. They would have ended up on a ventilator or something." The Arizona Republic previously reported that the effects of the high-risk outreach program and contact tracing led to a fatality rate among tribal members of 1.6% last June, which was less than the state's rate of 2.5% and country's at 2.7% at the time. But the effect of the outreach program became even more pronounced over the winter, as the tribe and health workers gained access to monoclonal antibody treatments, according to Close. He said the high-risk outreach team started referring patients for antibody treatment in December as part of their protocol after the therapy received emergency use approval from the Food and Drug Administration. Hospital staff at the Whiteriver hospital then administered the antibody treatment. "We give that to people who are asymptomatic or mildly ill to prevent hospitalization," Close said. "The evidence currently suggests that reduces the risk that they're going to get sicker and get hospitalized and reduces the risk that they're going to die." Though there's no data proving the antibody treatments made a difference, Close said that after health care workers started using them, the community's COVID-19 death rate fell to 0.5%. Hospital workers also gave antiviral therapies, such as remdesivir, to patients early and often. "We probably overtreated some people," he said. "But the good news is it definitely led to significant reductions in mortality." Lessons for the future Close believes the different programs were so successful because health care workers were often able to test, trace, diagnose and treat individuals all in the same day — a feat he said was only possible because of how closely integrated hospital workers and community health workers were. "There were no barriers in communication between the public health arm of our response and the clinical care arm of our response," Close said. "It's really a case for an integrated health care system." As the tribe emerges from the pandemic and tribal members get vaccinated against the virus, Close said the hospital may start exploring other health conditions where it can use the high-risk outreach team, which is already trained and experienced in clinical evaluations. "The goal is to take what we've learned from COVID and now apply it to things that are not COVID-related," Close said. Another valuable lesson Close hopes to carry forward is how much of a difference visiting residents in their homes can make and how important building trusting relationships with the community is. Nashio said going door to door to trace and monitor COVID-19 cases was a natural step for CHRs, who had already gone door to door in the past for other community health campaigns. "We know firsthand how difficult it can be to not only connect with patients over the phone but communicate effectively over the phone," Nashio said. "When the community sees their CHRs coming to their door, it helps decrease the stigma of the disease." In addition to performing checkup evaluations and providing information, Nashio said CHRs can also provide food, medical supplies, cleaning supplies or services like grocery shopping and running basic errands. Not every tribal member has reliable internet or phone service, nor access to transportation, so Close said going door to door can be a good way to reach, and help, everyone. "Meeting patients where they are is invaluable," Close said. Amanda Morris covers all things bioscience, which includes health care, technology, new research and the environment. Send her tips, story ideas, or dog memes at amorris@gannett.com and follow her on Twitter @amandamomorris for the latest bioscience updates. Independent coverage of bioscience in Arizona is supported by a grant from the Flinn Foundation. -
2020-12-10
My pandemic mental condition
During pandemic, I was in the online English Bridge program of my university. The amount of assignments were a lot, and all I did during the pandemic was just waking up at 5am, eating break fast, going to class on zoom, eating lunch, doing assignments, eating dinner, and sleep. I could not even going grocery store to buy food or snacks because I could not finish assignments unless I just kept studying. Thus, in my room, I was alone and studying without any joy. My family supported me a lot for my study but I felt that only I was doing what I wanted (study), whereas my family was just working and doing domestic affairs. I was so depressed because if I was not existed, I did not let my family work so hard. I wanted to disappear at the time. -
2022-03-24
High Functioning Autism during a Pandemic
For those that are somewhat familiar with autism, one might believe the pandemic was perfect for someone like me. People were encouraged not to speak to each other in person, everyone had to keep a distance, and masks were everywhere to conceal the face. These things, for me, were what I dreaded. I had a pretty good routine going before the pandemic. I had just graduated college with my bachelor degree and was getting used to being married. I was also caring for my grandma as one of my first jobs. I got to get up every morning, earn money, and make sure my husband was well cared for. My husband and I would go places for date nights and we would sometimes do spontaneous things like midnight grocery shopping for ice cream. Things were just carefree. Then a few months into our marriage, things changed a lot (more for me than for my husband). I enjoyed going to church in person for both my spiritual needs and for the social aspects it gave me. Once March 2020 happened, I couldn't go to church in person. Church was online and it became harder for me to get into it and actually concentrate. I then just stopped going altogether for a while because I wanted to have that human connection I was missing. Eventually, I was able to go to church again, but I had to wear a mask. I dealt with it even though I didn't like it. It was sad to see so many people's faces covered by cloth. It made it feel like I couldn't connect to people as well. My social skills aren't terrible if everyone wears a mask, but I'm more likely to miss certain cues or tell when someone is joking. I focus on the mouth a lot when people talk, so not getting to see mouths was bothersome. Other elements of my life changed, and autism made it worse for me in some ways. Due to my older habits of wanting to go places more often, the stay-at-home orders that occurred at the very beginning made me feel like a prisoner and that I couldn't choose things for myself as often. This increased my anxiety a lot, to a point of a mental breakdown. My husband was luckily very understanding of my issues, so I was eventually able to recover once I gave myself more work to occupy my time with. Of all the COVID rules I had to follow, social distancing was one of the easiest things for me, but only in a few ways. I was fine with talking in person from a distance, as I already do that naturally, but I was not okay with having to talk to people more often through online video like Zoom. Zoom feels so unnatural because seeing people through video is not the same as seeing them in person. I didn't have to do it very often, but I was greatly unhappy at the annual family Christmas celebration in 2020 was all on Zoom. It didn't feel as festive as I would have wished. Autism in general has made COVID much harder to deal with, and sometimes I think that if I didn't have it that I could have adjusted better to the abrupt changes COVID brought into my life. I did learn some things though. I learned that I need a set routine to get things done, and that if I have a problem, I shouldn't feel afraid to be more honest about it. With my husband having had to work from home due to COVID, both of us have had to work on better communication skills. I don't think everything I've learned from this experience has been bad, but it's also not something I want to go through again. -
2020
More Time
I am submitting some personal thoughts that I’ve had while sitting at home during the pandemic. Before my life was constantly moving with school and work and friends and being out and about and when the pandemic hit it slowed everything down. With less time commuting between school I had more time at home to complete assignments to complete housework and still have time left over. I had time to think. I myself am an over thinker so when the pandemic hit and I found myself with all of this time all I could do his thing over and over and over again and play one scenario in my head 1000 times. And then I will go to sleep and I would wake up and think about the next thing over and over again. This pandemic gave me time to really dig within myself and find the things I don’t want to change because I had the time to think and organize. This also brought me into a bit of a dark place because with all this time to think I then began to look back at my experiences and even though they are lessons some of them are filled with regret and fear and anger and that brought me to a dark place. It also allowed me to grow and show me what I can do better, what I can incorporate in my daily life and how to be a better person for me. Even though it was as if the world was on pause my life said play. With all this time I could reorganize and re-prioritize myself and list out my goals and accomplish things that I haven’t had a chance to. It also allowed me to take an extra minute to look at how I’m treating myself and I thought let’s take some more time for personal care let’s take some more time for mental care to make sure that I am OK. Because I was granted more time. -
2021-02-04
It Looks Like Its Not Just Me
I came across this article about how many people are "hitting the wall" with COVID fatigue, and it helped me realize that my current state is not unique. Lately, I have been feeling the cumulative effects of the isolation that the pandemic has created. I feel less physically healthy, and mentally as well. Frankly, I do not think I am as mentally sharp as I was a year ago. It is at least comforting to know that I am not alone in this. There is also now hope that the pandemic will end and that life will return to some degree of its former normality, but it seems clear that this will take some time. -
2020-10-10
Unorganized Mind
As a mom of a 17 month old the pandemic had me unprepared for what was to come. My mind went into fight or flight mode. I had to get food for my family, enough household goods to last us during quarantine or potential lock down. The first 3 months I had to learn how to work from home, be a wife, plan activities for my son and have me time. Well its October and me time has yet to be here. Planning my days became harder and harder as I was constantly in meetings, while my son screamed for attention in the background. The day that daycare opened I was terrified but relieved at the same time because I had someone to look after my son. It has gotten better but I do fight some moments of anxiety. My mental health took a turn for the worse as I had to seek out help. I am thankful to my husband, family and daycare workers. -
2020-04-17
Life In Isolation: The Coronavirus... Julian Adorney
A virtual exhibition by the Evansville Museum of Art, History and Science -
2020-05-15
My COVID-19 Experience
My name is Kylan Ritchie. I am a fourteen-year-old freshman from a small town near Clarksville, Tennessee. I am homeschooled due to the fact that I am a professional actress. COVID-19 did not have any effect on my school however, it has had a temporary effect on my job. I normally have a summer acting job but, due to COVID-19, I will be spending my summer at home. During my time in quarantine, which started on March 18th, I have learned various things about myself, my friends, and my family. Personally, I have learned that when I set my mind to something, in this circumstance, that was school, I can achieve a lot more than I believed. I learned that I am a procrastinator and that is something that I am attempting to fix. Also, I have learned that I do, in fact, have the mental stability to stay locked away in my house for long periods of time. My situation is different in comparison to my friends because of my father and grandmother. My dad has a heart condition and will be turning sixty this year and consequently, he has a higher chance of getting the virus and it being life threatening. Likewise, my grandmother has severe asthma and has an even higher chance of dying if she were to catch the virus. Because of this, I have been strictly following the Center for Disease Control (CDC) guidelines to shelter in place as well as the Tennessee government’s stay at home order. Although, it has been fairly difficult because my friends and family have not followed the same guidelines that I have been following. Many of my friends have not been social distancing at all after Tennessee’s government decided to lift its stay at home order. A few of my friends have found that seeing their boyfriends or girlfriends, seeing other friends, or going out to eat is more important than social distancing or quarantining. Some states have begun lifting their stay at home orders and have seen a spike in cases and deaths. In my home state of Tennessee specifically, phase one of reopening has begun. After the reopening began, there was a 130 percent increase in cases in Tennessee. In the U.S. according to recent updates, by May 14, 2020, there has been a total of 1.47 million confirmed cases with 88,144 deaths across the U.S. and it is rising every day. The amount of deaths correlating with COVID-19 has now surpassed the American death toll of both WWI and the Vietnam War. The sad thing is, the death toll and infection rate continues to climb however, many state governments have decided to open everything up once more, massive amounts of citizens are refusing to wear protection while out in public, and violence has begun between mask wearers and non-mask wearers. When we look back in America’s history, we can see how America was able to overcome various epidemics going back to the smallpox breakout from 1633-1634 that killed 70 percent of the Native American population. In the beginning, America never truly quarantined as many families in the 14th century had done during the Black Plague, also known as the Black Death, outbreak. One of the first mentions of quarantine due to an illness in America was during the yellow fever outbreak. After attempting to have state and local governments handle the containment of the illness with zero success, Congress passed the federal quarantine legislation in 1878. This did not conflict with the states’ rights, it showed that the federal government was ready to involve itself in the quarantine activities of America. The legislation gave the Surgeon General the ability to, “[m]ake and enforce such regulations as in his judgment are necessary to prevent the introduction, transmission, or spread of communicable diseases from foreign countries into the States or possessions, or from one State or possession into any other State of possession.” Many epidemics in the U.S. such as the Spanish flu epidemic of 1918 and the diphtheria epidemic of 1921-1925 have given me hope due to the fact that, in the end, a vaccine was created and licensed in order to lower the chance of America having another wave of that disease. For example, the Spanish flu, though it was horrible, and many people died from it, ended with the very first flu vaccine that would later stop millions of people from being infected. I believe that COVID-19, as of May 15, 2020, is far from over. There are still many waves to come unless people begin to quarantine and take precautions, or a vaccine is created. History shows that, in most cases, it takes a great deal of time to create a vaccine for diseases of this capacity. For this reason, I believe that many government related actions could be taken in order to prevent further spreading of the virus. In the end, I have decided to follow the advice of scientist and doctors who are seeing firsthand, what this virus is made of, what it does to a person’s body, and how it spreads. -
2020-04-26
The Awakening
The awakening of the collective; mind, body, soul and the beginning of the end of industrial society - a New World Order I was living and working casually at a children's outdoor education centre one day I was sitting on my sofa the next I was on the street. Week 1 - all casuals laid off Week 2 - All full-time staff cut back to half hours Week 3 - all staff living on centre given eviction within 72 hours Week 4 - homelessness and couch surfing Week 5 - Self Isolation & Family Week 6 - Family Feuds & Domestic Violence Week 7 - A run in with Police whilst living out of my Car Week 8 - My own place new beginnings Although life has thrown many curveballs I struggle with mental illness and addiction - now the world knows how it is to feel in social isolation - depressed, alone, unmotivated, unwanted, uninspired and ironically for those of us who have lived with mental illness our entire lives are no longer alone in our suffering. I shaved my head to symbolise being reborn into a new world order - one of hope, health, compassion and understanding with the soul & spirit being central to our livelihood. -
2020-07-27
Going to College During COVID-19: Tips for College Students and Their Parents
In this interview with infectious disease specialist Cynthia Snider and clinical psychologist David Gutterman, they outline some tips for navigating college during the COVID-19 pandemic. The pair outlines important issues like wearing a mask, social distancing, and proper hygiene. This interview also touches on the anxiety and uneasy feelings both parents and students are feeling going back to a crowded campus. All in all, it’s important to listen to oneself and keep a line of open communication, as well as stay safe and stay healthy. If everyone follows these guidelines, these two experts feel that universities should be able to allow students safely. -
0000-04-24
Finding Inspiration in Community While Apart
At the beginning of March 2020, everything was going wonderfully for me personally, but also within my dance community. I grew up training intensely in several different styles of dance. But after three years of focusing my training specifically on Hip Hop, I had grown tremendously, developed stronger confidence in myself and a trust in my body, was engaging more actively in the overall Arizona Hip Hop community, and was on track to become President of my team for the upcoming school year. I had also organized a trip out of town with my team and a showcase to be held at the end of the year at a beautiful venue. However, as COVID-19 struck, all off those plans for the team, as well as all our weekly classes, practices and rehearsals were cancelled. Suddenly my most effective social, physical, and mental outlets were no longer available. I was going through my own significant struggles because of the pandemic, but I also became worried about what these changes would mean for the relationships and dance lives of everyone on my team. However, as true athletes and artists do, we found a way to reinvigorate ourselves and be there for each other. We decided to meet over zoom at least once a week to check in, talk about our experiences, and most importantly, find a way to dance together, remotely. . I was given the unique opportunity to listen and understand how collective times of crisis had affected my friends of various faiths and identities. The zoom call pictured is one where several of us met virtually to learn choreography from one of our teammates. This choreography would later be filmed in our individual locations and cut together to create a cohesive video. Throughout the pandemic, I have heard countless stories of creative people who lost their drive and inspiration in stress and defeat. However, I have also read and lived the stories of adjustment and perseverance. Being part of a community, whether it be rooted in art, academia, or religion, drives individuals to contribute. The dance community specifically has been devastated through lack of space to gather, learn, and perform. But it has also learned to utilize technology and been reminded of what we had taken for granted.