Separated by our shared experiences

Blog by Kim Melendy

The 4th Wave of COVID: A Mental Health Crisis

Over the last two years, the pandemic has not only been an ongoing epidemiological crisis, but also a psychological crisis that will linger long after we return to a new normal.  A transformative shift in our collective conscious fueled by collective trauma and ambiguous loss has occurred around the world resulting in what is being called the 4th wave of COVID, a crisis of mental health.   During the height of the pandemic and continuing over the past year, our entire country has experienced what can only be described as a collective trauma.  We were coping together, but separately, throughout the quarantine and lockdowns.    Isolated together and yearning for connections that we took for granted in the past, we gained a newfound respect for all the connections that before COVID wouldn’t get a second thought. Then we felt a profound sense of loss as those connections faded and some even completely disappeared. However, we didn’t just lose the people; we lost the places too.  Those safe places, the places that gave our life structure and meaning.  As we return to normalcy, we are afraid to trust again - are those people, events, and places we once knew still safe?  We ask ourselves is my memory accurate, does reality match my inner perspective of what I lost?  Can what we lost be recaptured, relearning how to live, to reconnect with our friends, with family, and with the places we lost?  

Uniqueness amongst similarity

As we collectively begin to cope with the new normal of post pandemic life, another different wave is now upon us.  Prior to the pandemic, the rates of mental illness rose steadily in the US year over year, but now post-pandemic, the rates have exploded across all population groups.  Not only are we experiencing this explosion due to the costs incurred to our mental health during the pandemic, but also the mounting shift in mental health awareness in the last few years has been accelerated by the pandemic.  For many, the collective trauma of the pandemic sent us flocking to our social media where we found solace in the connections and in supporting each other through the difficult times.  We feel more secure than ever to talk about our struggles with mental health and to offer support to those we know are experiencing mental health issues.   We have experienced a unique group experience; we were experiencing the same isolation, fear, and uncertainty together.  Some of us coped by openly sharing deeply emotional and painful thoughts that in the past would have been brushed off. But now people are more supportive due to this collectively traumatic and slow-moving event.  The views on mental health and mental health treatment are changing dramatically and quickly due to this shift in mental health awareness.  Discussing mental health is now a new conversation that we can all engage in together.

Looming concerns

The emerging transformative discussions around mental health post-COVID can be seen as positive progress for us as a society.  However, this new wave of mental health demand has become a massive strain on an already weakened mental health system in the US.  Per a survey conducted by the APA in October 2021, waitlists are longer than ever and demand is outpacing availability for over 72% of their respondents.  Prospective clients are reaching out for help in navigating their struggles in this post-pandemic new normal yet the overload to both public agency and private practice clinicians in our mental health system force them to be turned away.  The ever present and growing demand for mental health services is not going away, and the implications of not addressing it could be detrimental for many people in our country and around the world.  Mental health struggles and the consequences affect not only us the individual, but also our family, community and institutions that surround us.  We cannot as a country allow our people to become hopeless in the face of this adversity.  We cannot hope to fully heal and recover from the pandemic while only addressing the medical need.  It is imperative that we tackle mental health simultaneously and with an equal amount of fervency and resources.  

My POV

As a graduate counseling student and current private practice intern, the prospect of entering a profession that is evolving and growing so quickly is exciting and at the same time extremely daunting.  The majority of my first client contacts have included a conversation regarding counselor availability, and the prospective clients’ experiences and past inability to find someone, anyone, with openings.  The relief I hear in their voices when I explain that I’m an intern and can offer open availability, brings me a sense of happiness for them that they found me; and in the same moment I am disheartened knowing there are so many others in my community who will be forced to continue searching.  Coming out of the last two years with my own experiences, it’s my goal as a counselor to use my practice to assist my clients with emerging from these difficult times with a new sense of awareness of themselves and of each other.  I’ll be encouraging my clients to seek positive influences in their lives as we return to our new normal and to extend that positivity into the community, in hopes that they will be healing themselves and their community along the way. 

Helpful Tips

If you, or someone you know, are struggling through this transition back to normal and have been unsuccessful in finding a counselor or services.  There are resources in the community and online that you can connect with to help with coping and bringing positive viewpoints into your life.  You can also share with others in your network who could also be struggling.

• Perform an audit of who and what organizations you follow on social media.  Are these connections adding to your life or is the content causing unneeded stress?  

• Seek out individuals and organizations that are producing social media content and providing support that you need at this moment.  This not only will improve your social media experience but also increase the reach of content providers making a difference in your community when you like and/or share posts.

• Reach out to your network for recommendations for digital support groups, this could be on Facebook, Discord or other social media platforms.

• Use these connections to network and be the first to know when a contact is offering counseling openings, forming new support groups, and/or other mental health resources you can take advantage of in the community.

• In the New Year, Total Wellness 365 will be resuming the support group called Women’s Wellness Circles.  This is an opportunity to build connections with other women that have been through similar experiences the last couple of years.  

Getting the ball rolling on building those connections and networks is the first step to healing and for our community to heal together.

A big thank you to our Counselor intern Kimberly Melendy for writing this information blog on how the mental health crisis is impacting our communities and her unique perspective. She can be reached by contacting the office.