Managing the Covid-Effect: Anxiety, Headaches & Neck pain
In our current world, anxiety and stress are increasing for many. We are living through a pandemic where we haven’t been allowed to hug or see our loved ones. We may feel like our livesare on hold, with changes made to our travel plans, work goals, or life plans. We aren’t in a normal world, and it is okay to be more anxious or stressed.
This post will offer a collection of strategies accumulated from different websites on how to combat these negative emotions.
Strategies to Activate your Rest & Digest (Parasympathetic) Nervous System
Anxiety can typically cause a person to experience a host of physical (aka “somatic”) symptoms. These often include muscle tension, headaches, backaches, clenched jaw, feeling restless or on edge, and difficultly focusing or sleeping.
This is the body’s attempt to protect us. Our body is in a state of fight-or-flight (sympathetic nervous system drive), which is great for short-term stressful situations to help us adapt and survive, but is not at all helpful for long-term (i.e. more than a few hours!) .
Goals of relaxation skills
1. Learn when and how to use these skills.
2. Learn to breathe in ways that will promote calm and relaxation.
3. Slow down activity in the mind to avoid or learn to better tolerate “racing thoughts.”
4. Increase awareness of tension in the body and improve awareness of the difference between tension and relaxation.
5. Lower general levels of tension and restlessness in the body.
6. Learn to incorporate activities into our lives that are fun and/or make us feel competent.
7. Be calmer in our daily lives by learning to “slow down” and set realistic goals for our time.
Think of relaxation skills like exercise: you are not going to compete in an Iron Man tomorrow. You need to take the time to train your body incrementally just as you need to train your mind through practice.
It will not be a one-time practice and you cured!
Start off by planning
a. find a time (at minimum a few times a week) that you can practice
b. find an activity – either a method listed below or something that works for you
c. work to your own ability to try to reduce some stressors by slowing down the day
d. lastly, take part in activities that bring you joy!
Relaxation Techniques
1. DIAPHRAGMATIC BREATHING
I feel as though everyone has been told at some point to “just breathe,” *cue eye roll here* so let’s start there!
It may seem cliché or ineffective, but there are some wonderful benefits! On one hand, it gives you a moment to slow down and cool off. On the other hand, altering the speed of breathing can tell our brain we are safe and slightly change the body’s anxiety response.
Here is HOW:
1. Sit comfortably in a chair with your feet on the floor. You can lie down if you wish.
2. Fold your hands on your belly.
3. Breathe in slowly and calmly. Fill up the belly with a normal breath. Try not to breathe in too heavily. The hands should move up when you breathe in, as if you are filling up a balloon. Avoid lifting the shoulders as you inhale; rather, breathe into the stomach.
4. Breathe out slowly to the count of “5.” Try to slow down the rate of the exhale. After the exhale, hold for 2-3 seconds before inhaling again.
5. Work to continue to slow down the pace of the breath.
6. Practice this for about 10 minutes.
7. This works best if you practice this two times each day for 10 minutes each time. Try to find a regular time to practice this each day.
If ten minutes, two times a day is too much, then start small! A little is better than nothing. If 10 minutes is too long, start with 1 minute before bed, or when you start to feel anxious. As that becomes easier, start working for longer at 2, then 3, all the way to 10 minutes.
Helpful Tips:
1. The speed of the breath is more important than depth of the breath. Avoid trying to catch” your breath by taking really deep breaths.
2. Don’t use breathing exercises to “get rid of” the anxiety’ use the breath to help get you through a tough situation, or practice it daily to “train in” a slower, calmer breathing style over time.
3. Practice! It takes time to learn how to calm your body using breathing.
Source: https://medicine.umich.edu/sites/default/files/content/downloads/Relaxation-Skills-for-Anxiety.pdf
2. MINDFULNESS EXERCISES OR GUIDED MEDITATION
The goal of mindfulness is to describe experiences objectively and non-judgementally, and to focus on the moment.
With anxiety, we have to look at our negative thoughts for what they are, just thoughts. Below is an exercise to practice mindfulness.
The first time might be difficult, but give it a shot! Another option is following a guided video – some searches you could do on YouTube are guided imagery, guided meditation, or even mindfulness exercise.
Here’s an exercise:
1. Sit quietly with your feet on the floor, or lie down, and relax your body. Begin with some slow, diaphragmatic breathing. Focus your mind on your breath as it flows in and out of your nostrils.
2. As you breathe, notice the tendency of the mind to wander. Instead of trying to focus primarily on the breath, notice what the mind does. It may wander to a worry, or a memory, or to what you plan to do later today. You may notice sensations in your body, such as a pain or itch. You may hear or smell things. Just notice whatever happens and then gently bring yourself back to your breath. You can remind yourself that you will tend to these other things later, and for now you will just spend time paying attention to your breath and to your mind.
3. Avoid the tendency to try hard to focus on something. Simply allow your mind to wander and then bring yourself back to your breath. Notice the tendency of your experience to change. Imagine that each thought, sensation, emotion— anything— is like a cloud floating through the sky, soon to be replaced by another one.
4. Continue to practice this for about 10 minutes. Depending on your schedule, you can add time to your practice if you want. Practice once or twice a day.
5. Remember that there is no “right” way to do this, other than to notice whatever comes into your consciousness. It is impossible to “fail” at mindfulness—just let your mind wander!
Why should I practice mindfulness?
Trying to “control” the mind is a futile endeavor. In fact, trying to control the mind often makes us feel worse, because we keep failing at it! The first step to any Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) intervention is to stop trying to control the mind through force; only after we do this are we prepared to influence the anxiety using CBT skills.
Mindfulness helps us practice observing but not reacting to anxiety and other emotions. We learn to accept or tolerate these emotions, rather than trying to eradicate them.
Mindfulness helps to retrain the brain; by not reacting to the anxiety and not trying to fix it, we communicate to the amygdala that it is not dangerous. This is one way to work on addressing the “fear of fear.
When we stop and pay attention to the present moment, we listen to our anxiety “alarm.” If we give it time and keep from “fueling” the anxiety, the body can eventually learn that it does not need this alarm any longer, so it can turn it off.
Source: https://medicine.umich.edu/sites/default/files/content/downloads/Relaxation-Skills-for-Anxiety.pdf
3. PROGRESSIVE MUSCLE RELAXATION (PMR)
The idea is to reduce muscle tension consciously so that we can reduce how anxious we feel. PMR is to learn to release muscle tension in the muscles through daily exercises. This communicates calm and safety to our body, reducing the body’s need to activate the fight-or-flight response.
Here’s an exercise:
To get a taste of this, try tensing the muscles of the arms by “flexing” your biceps.
Tense your biceps hard enough to feel significant tension for between 5 and 7 seconds.
Now let go, dropping your arm to your side. Feel the difference between the tension you just felt and the relaxation that is coming over your arm now.
You may notice the feeling of blood flowing to the arm, and a feeling of warmth.
PMR involves doing this with each group of muscles in the body, as a regularly practiced exercise that takes effect over a period of time.
Source: https://medicine.umich.edu/sites/default/files/content/downloads/Relaxation-Skills-for-Anxiety.pdf
4. EXERCISE
Everyone has different fitness and ability levels. It is important to find an activity that you enjoy and can commit to whether that be cardio, weight lifting, yoga, or forest walking.
Exercise has many benefits:
Engaging in exercise diverts you from the very thing you are anxious about.
Moving your body decreases muscle tension, lowering the body’s contribution to feeling anxious.
Getting your heart rate up changes brain chemistry, increasing the availability of important anti-anxiety neurochemicals, including serotonin and gamma aminobutyric acid (GABA).
Exercise activates frontal regions of the brain responsible for executive function, which helps control the amygdala, our reacting system to real or imagined threats to our survival.
Exercising regularly builds up resources that bolster resilience against stormy emotions.
For weight-lifting, there are many excellent gyms around town. However, if that feels like a big leap to start, you can begin at home with online workouts of any intensity and any length. A personal favourite and a great way to support local is support the Coast Fitness Team by watching some of their videos that are up on YouTube!
For yoga, a wonderful online resource is doyogawithme.com, they have a huge selection of videos for people of all skill levels.
Finally, if you are one who doesn’t like the sound of an indoor workout, try and get out in nature. Unplug, take a hike, walk a pet, or ride a bike.
There is something called Forest Bathing, which originated from Japan in 1982– the idea is you go out and use all five senses, with no phone. It has been proven. It is recommended that you go out for two hours. However, everyone is busy, so even just 15 minutes is great! It was introduced as a preventative medicine for the immune system, cardiovascular system, depression and anxiety, inflammation and other prevalent health problems.
5. SELF-CARE
Do something you love: take a bath, play some of your favourite tunes and dance around the house, read your favourite book, or take some time to curl up and watch that show that you can’t stop thinking about.
Be easy on yourself and remember that some days it’s okay to kick back and think about nothing. A day off every now and then is important. On days when all else fails, go back to something that makes you feel comfortable.
For additional information and more in-depth material, check out the source links to the reference materials below:
https://www.cnet.com/health/forest-bathing-what-it-is-how-to-do-it/
https://medicine.umich.edu/sites/default/files/content/downloads/Relaxation-Skills-for-Anxiety.pdf
https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/can-exercise-help-treat-anxiety-2019102418096
By: Lauren Mander