In this article, the relationship of being diagnosed with a physical disease and/or a general medical health crisis that occurs along with physical diseases, with reference to the current COVID-19 virus epidemic, is discussed.
Humanity, In some periods of history, it has witnessed personal and global abnormal situations. Life has been disrupted and faced with crisis situations due to physical diseases, natural disasters and many different events. The word crisis evokes the most crucial scene of a tense movie. Crisis situations do not end completely or disappear from life; The size, severity and frequency of crises vary.
Psychological crisis may include a loss or radical change that the person has experienced or may experience in his/her relationship with himself or with important people in his life (Goldenberg, 1983). In simple terms, a "crisis" occurs when the stress and tension in a person's life reaches an extraordinary point and this situation begins to harm the person (Greenstone and Leviton, 1993).
Slaiku (1990) defines crisis as follows. :
“A temporary state of upset and disorganization, characterized primarily by the individual's inability to cope with the particular circumstances encountered using habitual problem-solving methods and the potential for radically positive or negative consequences.”
In the definition, it is emphasized that the crisis conditions are "temporary". Psychological crisis situations are instantaneous, impermanent and temporary for most of us.
In the next part of the definition, the state of "being sad" also includes anxiety and depression with their most common reactions. Anxiety, also known as anxiety, is the signal that "informs the body that it should be ready to challenge" in dangerous situations. When natural and necessary anxiety begins to be felt, breathing and heartbeat accelerate, allowing more oxygen to reach the muscles. Thus, the body prepares itself for dangerous situations. Depression, on the other hand, is a decrease in sensitivity to stimuli, a decrease in initiative power and self-confidence, an increase in hopelessness and pessimism. One side of the person is overstimulated and the other side is desensitized. The individual's balance is disrupted. In a crisis period, it is not life, but a life focused on danger.
The "state of disorganization" mentioned in the last part of the definition may also include confusion and weakening of problem-solving skills. In addition, he may have difficulty performing daily actions that he could easily do before. Disorganized state prevents not only the duties and responsibilities, but also the activities that give pleasure and happiness.
What causes or feeds the crisis cannot be explained simply by a specific situation or environmental conditions. This explanation helps to understand the individual's perception of the event and ability to cope with psychological crises rather than the cause-effect relationship. Faced with the same situations, each individual in society exhibits different levels of success and competence in coping with crisis situations.
PHYSICAL DISEASES ALSO WOUND OUR SOUL.
Most medical crises involve psychological and emotional aspects that surround and affect the medical illness.
The first psychological reaction to the current medical crisis may be "denial". Denial directly affects our attitude towards the current medical illness crisis. This view actually makes the person more sensitive and vulnerable. Denial is a coping mechanism we use to alleviate emotional conflicts and associated distress. The coping methods we use routinely are not ready, sufficient and functional for crisis situations. Especially in crises where medical diseases occur, people do not have information or ideas about what to do if they or their relatives are diagnosed. In a situation we encounter for the first time, we may naturally freeze, ignore it, or try to stay away from danger.
Essentially, physical diseases are an important part of life, and no one is immune to serious medical diseases/epidemics. Since it is not possible to prepare for serious medical diseases/epidemics in advance, it is necessary to develop new coping methods in the process. When we deny, we are deprived of the opportunity to develop new coping methods.
Denial is a defense mechanism frequently used by people facing serious illness. Crisis Although denial provides immediate relief against the sudden anxiety and stress pressure brought on by the crisis, it often escalates the crisis to greater dimensions. Ignored situations turn into a bigger medical picture. Recently, we have been facing the COVID-19 virus. This situation is quite unsettling and worrying for most people. In order to cope with this intense anxiety, someone who reassures himself with the thought that "the virus will not infect me, and if it does, nothing will happen to me or my relatives" will not take the precautions recommended by the experts. Measures not taken will negatively affect their own health, and then the well-being of their relatives and society.
It is seen that individuals who are directly or indirectly affected by medical diseases become intensely worried. Their main concerns are about security and perception of control. In this context, the person has not tested the coping systems that existed before being affected by a medical disease/epidemic. So we must say that people can never prepare themselves for such a situation. In addition, the "real stress factors" that are evident in patients whose financial situations, family structures and relationships are negatively affected due to health problems cannot be ignored. Situations related to medical illness can sever a person's ties with his family, cause a psychological imbalance, as in all uncertain situations, and disrupt the person's daily life due to physical limitations. Psychology literature speaks of medical illness disabling a person's coping systems. The intense pressure of the medical crisis causes the individual to deteriorate physically and mentally. Until a medical diagnosis is made, the coping systems that a person has learned throughout his life and the healthy self-perception he has formed begin to disintegrate with the difficulties encountered.
In infectious medical diseases, even if the person's lack of diagnosis does not directly constitute a crisis, the nature, severity of the social crisis and the situational difficulties experienced. Symptoms of existing medical disease may be observed due to Or, the existing symptoms may increase in the diagnosed person, depending on the nature of the crisis, its severity, and the situational difficulties experienced. (Sore throat, fatigue, runny nose, difficulty breathing) �k etc.)
How can symptoms increase depending on the situation experienced?
All issues surrounding specific medical diseases present depending on the circumstances It increases the level of anxiety and stress that accompanies the disease.
So how do the levels of anxiety and stress begin to increase?
The most important feature of crisis periods is that they are uncertain. Therefore, the period when people need to feel safe and control the most is during crisis periods.
Uncertain situations are inherently unsettling. In order to eliminate the discomfort of anxiety, efforts are made to make the uncertain obvious. The danger faced in crisis situations is unknown, and the practical way to be ready for the unknown danger is to "always be ready for the worst case." Because being ready for the worst means being ready for all possibilities. Our mental processes primarily motivate and enable preparation with negative or even maladaptive assumptions. In this part, "danger" and "danger in our minds" are often confused. Negative outcomes related to medical illness are perceived as “what will happen” rather than as a possibility. The most disastrous scenario is designed in order to be ready for situations that "will happen". Action takes place not according to the existing situation, but according to the scenarios shaped in our minds. The scenarios drawn are based on ideas rather than information. Due to the person's incomplete knowledge of his/her own medical conditions, he/she fills in the unknown areas with the tendency to "fill in the blanks". Someone who tends to interpret the course of events more negatively in general in other parts of life also develops more negative interpretations when it comes to “filling in the blanks” regarding medical illness. These negative comments and scenarios further reduce the coping ability of the person who is not already prepared for psychological crisis situations.
When the coping strategies of people in a medical health crisis do not yield the results they expected, people often relapse. They lose hope because of the feeling of "failure". Naturally, they tend not to see the positive possibilities of the situation they are in.
Research shows that people who cope better with physical health problems It has been proven that there are people who have functional emotional, thought and behavioral systems before physical health problems. Moreover, it has been shown that functional emotional, thought and behavioral systems also improve and increase their ability to resolve the crisis in medical crisis situations.
Early psychological intervention for people in a medical health crisis usually gives the best results. However, the fact that many people are generally in a panic state and do not approach mental health treatment positively in the initial stages of the disease after their diagnosis makes it difficult to provide early psychological intervention. If crisis intervention can be done early, relatively better physical and psychological well-being in the early stages of the disease allows the use of more effective coping strategies. Early intervention in the crisis also prevents or reduces the formation of negative thoughts about the disease, the disease and the treatment process.
He suggests that a purely negative perception of the disease will trigger a crisis and this will cause or increase the symptoms of the existing disease (Baum and Posluszyn 1999). Long after a person has recovered, the crisis brought on by medical illness can turn into a vicious cycle and complicate the recovery process. This is especially true when a person has a medical condition that has symptoms similar to those of anxiety and stress. (Dattilio and Castaldo, 2001).
Up to this part of the article, the nature of the medical illness crisis and its course have been explained. Then “what can be done in a medical illness crisis?” The question comes to mind. The answer lies within the flow of the crisis. If we understand, we have the opportunity to intervene in the things we understand. In summary from this context;
How can we realize our mental processes and what can we do?
1- Denial: First of all, it is necessary to distinguish between the denial process that exists due to the nature of the medical illness crisis and the denial that exists based on the discomfort of the person's crisis.
2 -Incompatible/discordant assumptions: Our mind easily fills in the unknown/unknown parts in its own way
Read: 0
