COVID-19: Mental Health Resources

4 min readMar 30, 2020

Monday, March 30, 2020 — It’s 2:18 AM

In about five hours, another grueling week starts at the home office where we fight tooth and nail like most other companies to survive this pandemic. I can’t sleep. I also don’t feel great. I just kicked what could have been COVID, but I don’t know and can’t get tested, and feel another cold could be coming on — a sore throat. Am I getting COVID now? 97.7F, so far so good.

I read earlier “yesterday” that someone I know lost someone close to them to COVID, he was 50. Gutted. My mind is racing between my wife, my parents, her parents, and my more extended family and friends. I hope everyone stays safe or quickly recovers.

I feel a slight tightening in my chest. It’s anxiety. I never get anxiety — I never get anxiety. Funny. I guess I get anxiety during pandemics.

I know it’s a bad idea, but I check the news. A German finance minister has committed suicide as the coronavirus hits. “Click”.

“His main concern was whether he could manage to fulfill the huge expectations of the population, especially in terms of financial aid. For him, there was clearly no way out. He was disappointed, and so he had to leave us. That has shocked us, has shocked me.” Sad.

Search for “coronavirus mental health” on Google. Sure enough, there’s content, a lot of it, mostly from news outlets and blogs looking for additional eyeballs. I look through a couple of these and file them away as glorified listicles. How is this supposed to help anyone? I wonder. It’s not. Not really, at least. The CDC has a COVID-19 mental health website as well. It’s ok, better than nothing, I suppose.

The world right now is in a pretty fucked up place; we’re all going through incredibly challenging times, some more than others, it’s taxing. At least it’s not war.

It’s about 2:44 am now, and tomorrow is going to suck.

No two ways about it, but I can’t get the German guy and his family out of my head. Is there anything or anyone that could have helped him, I wonder? Looking for mental health resources during COVID19, I don’t find many. I spent some time putting that together:

Suicide Prevention Hotline:

The Lifeline provides 24/7, free and confidential support for people in distress, suicide prevention, and crisis resources for you or your loved ones, as well as best practices for professionals.

Anxiety:

To get free confidential, 24/7 support for anxiety, text “HOME” to the Crisis Text Line which is 741741. Learn more
Science-based strategies for coping with COVID anxiety
Guided editation (23 minutes) for dealing with anxiety
Headspace Mediation App
Insight Timer Mindfulness Sounds

Panic

This article shares specifics about mental health and panic associated with COVID-19. Read article

Social Distancing

Coping mentally with social distancing, isolation and quarantine (4 page flyer from SAMHSA)

Staying Mentally Healthy

Stress (from Attorneys)

This article provides tips on managing stress levels in the office.
Coping with Stress (4-page flyer from SAMHSA)

Substance Use Resources

AA
AA — Online
AA COVID-19 Informational Page
Al-Anon
Al-Anon — Online
IDAA
In the Rooms
In The Rooms: An Online Addiction Recovery Community AA, NA, Dual Diagnosis, SAA (sex addiction), CPA (chronic pain)
NA — Online
NA Online Meetings “Addicts helping Addicts Recover”
NA COVID-19 Informational Page
Online Support Group meetings
Recovery Dharma: “Healing from Addiction with Buddhist Practice”, daily meetings via computer, smartphone or dial-in
Smart Recovery
Author Brian Cuban’s blog “The Addicted Lawyer” offers guidance and options for recovery meetings.
Importance of seeking help for mental health and substance use disorders — Fear Not: Speaking Out to End Stigma (three-minute video)

IF YOU KNOW OF MORE MENTAL HEALTH RESOURCES — PLEASE LET ME KNOW, ESPECIALLY WHERE PEOPLE CAN SPEAK TO SOMEONE, OR THERE’S SOME FORM OF FEEDBACK MECHANISM AND I WILL ADD TO THIS LIST > jace.grebski@originate.com

Doing our part

I think it’s important we all do our part. If you have a sewing machine, I know a number of friends making face masks. If you’re in any way affiliated with tech, NY has a SWAT team and problems for you to solve. I’m not sure if the list is being updated, but COVID Solutions has a small directory of services and Tech: NYC has this guide.

At Originate we’re refashioning our tools to help with mental health.

On our end, we’ll been rolling out a tool that lets companies, government, and groups easily get a sense of people’s mental health. It’s currently in engineering and should be ready within 1–2 weeks. We’ll let everyone know via our newsletter, site, and this blog. So please follow if you’re interested in it and we’ll update you as soon as we know.