SEVEN WAYS TO MANAGE YOUR ANXIETY ABOUT HOW TO MANAGE YOUR CORONAVIRUS ANXIETY
By Adrian Bonenberger
There's a lot of anxiety around coronavirus and the associated quarantine. Luckily, many people and groups are stepping up to help. Unfortunately, the proliferation of advice from various medical institutions competing for influence can itself be a source of anxiety. Below are seven ways to manage your anxiety about evaluating sources of guidance and tips about coronavirus-related anxiety.
1) Don't pay attention to the number of tips offered in a given story. Let's be honest, there aren't that many things one can do to actually manage one's stress over a worldwide pandemic. If a story purports to offer more than nine pieces of advice, chances are it's just going to end up making you more anxious. Accept no more than nine ways to manage your stress per article about managing stress—seven's better, of course (and three is probably best).
2) Read one article at a time. It will be tempting to open as many different pieces as you can and read them simultaneously. This is a mistake! The human brain can only process one thing at a time. Focus on reading a single piece about managing your anxiety about coronavirus or the quarantine, or you will definitely become increasingly anxious. This is natural—you are actually overwhelming yourself. Just read one at a time!
3) It’s not a competition. Sure, your friend already knows a thousand tips for managing anxiety stemming from coronavirus aka COVID-19. Good for them! You don't need to make an exhaustive labor out of tracking down every piece of advice from every medical institution, then delve into (heaven forbid) personal blogs in a desperate attempt to "beat" your friend by knowing more about this terrifying and unprecedented situation. Just thinking about it is making me anxious, so I'm going to stop. You should too! Limit yourself to a few general guidelines and maybe an anecdote or two—enough to have a conversation over the phone, but not so exhaustive that you end up driving yourself nuts. You'll end up driving other people nuts, too. Like your spouse.
4) Call a divorce lawyer. Okay, now is not the time to panic, but... your neurotic obsession with managing your anxiety around coronavirus aka COVID-19 and the quarantine is almost certainly rubbing off on your spouse. They're not sick of you yet, but you can see where this is headed, 12 hours into a pandemic that's sure to last weeks or even months. Your buddy knows a guy who did divorce law in Louisiana for a while. He should know someone. Just to figure out what the damage will be if your spouse decides that your encyclopedic knowledge of how to manage your anxious feelings is grounds for permanent separation.
5) Plot the perfect crime. The divorce lawyer hung up on you after just a few minutes, and you could hear your spouse's phone ringing right after that. They were certain that you'd gone “totally off the deep end with this coronavirus stuff,” and now they want to encourage your spouse to leave you. There's only one thing to do: plan and execute the perfect crime.
First, turn on the gas stove; then, call your eccentric neighbor, who is a heavy smoker and chocaholic. Tell him your spouse made some delicious brownies, and that you have left you a plate of them in the kitchen. Then drive over to your friend's house for an alibi. Tell him you need some tips on how to battle anxiety regarding coronavirus aka COVID-19 and the quarantine.
His nose dulled by years of Kools, your neighbor will smell nothing. Frustrated by his inability to find brownies which are not there, he will light up. The fireball will be seen for miles.
6) My god, what have you done. There's no going back now. You need to get to Canada, and fast. Hit a couple stores for a gun and ammo, and make your way north using back roads. Stay away from highways, and steal some new license plates; they'll have your name out on an APB for sure. When you get close to the border, ditch the car and find a place to cross on foot. You can't think about the past. Now, you must think about the future.
7) You made it! But what's that cough? You're free! Nobody can stop you now, the idiots in the police were too busy dealing with the quarantine to even question you! But somehow you seem to have picked up a cough and a low grade fever—maybe from the gun store? It was probably that guy behind the counter wearing a clever t-shirt about vaccines being a conspiracy. Damn it! After all that, you still got coronavirus aka COVID-19!!!! Time to make your way to the Internet and figure out what to do next... ◊
ADRIAN BONENBERGER is a writer living in Connecticut. His latest book is The Road Ahead, an anthology of fiction about America’s “Forever War.”
This article appears in The American Bystander #15. Buy it here.
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