The upset and worry of Covid are making many of us anxious. So how can you tell if you are just feeling down, or if it’s something more serious? Here are the signs to look out for
It was last week that Halina Rifai resigned from her job. It was a short-term contract she’d taken on about a month ago, working for a call centre, but it was stressful, and meant working long hours at home, leaving her unable to get outside much during the day. Last week, she woke in the middle of the night and had a panic attack. “And then the next morning, I just went: ‘No, that’s it, I’m going out.’” She went for a six-mile walk before work, felt much better, but also knew that she had to make a decision about work. “It’s at this point that I have to weigh up my mental health against finance, and I have to choose my mental health,” she says, though she acknowledges she is lucky that she has another job lined up for early next year.
Rifai, from Glasgow, works in the music industry during non-pandemic times, and also hosts a mental health podcast, A Sonic Hug. At the age of 16, she was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder after growing up in an abusive home, and at 20, she was having panic attacks and had developed agoraphobia. She has had treatment, including long-term talking therapy, which finished earlier this year, but she has learned to manage it largely herself – making sure she watches out for any signs that she is sliding back.
