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Opening up to mental health: Digital communities help deal with 'pandemic blues'
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Sharing is caring: Ubah Stigma (change stigma) is one mental health community that is using public education to combat local stigmas against mental health. (Courtesy of Ubah Stigma) (Personal collection/Courtesy of Ubah Stigma)
M
em>Mental health communities and their volunteers are reaching out across the archipelago to help people deal with their psychological and emotional impacts from the pandemic.
For those with mental health problems, the stresses of the pandemic have done nothing but excalibrated those issues. While those who did not, might start experiencing it.
Rini Hapsari Santosa, a psychologist from the University of Indonesia Psychological Assessment and Intervention Institute (LAIPSI), said that almost everyone had experienced anxiety during the pandemic, not only because of the constant fear of infection but also lingering financial woes.
"For people who are dealing directly with the pandemic, such as patients and health workers, it is a matter of life and death. They experience burnout – physical and mental exhaustion," she said.
According to psychologist Arina Megumi Budiani, the sources of anxiety can vary according to age group. People in the learning age group (5-20s), for example, might feel apprehensive or even depressed because they have trouble with online learning, compounded by the fact that they cannot socialize as usual.
On the other hand, people in the working age group (20s-50s) can experience anxiety from financial problems that could be caused by layoffs and reduced income. Their mental health can also be affected by work from home (WFH) issues as well as the limited stress relief options available to them as a result of social restrictions.
Arina explains that people with families might also experience problems at home, such as family conflicts that occur because of an increase in household chores that creates additional stress for everyone. Meanwhile, elderly people might be more emotionally sensitive because their children and relatives aren’t able to visit them as often. Worse, they might be unable to visit at all.
