Why Neurological Disorders are Even Harder to Manage During Chaotic Situations

Stress makes everything worse, and that includes neurological disorders. Neurological disorders have been reported in COVID cases, given that COVID attacks the lungs, but it has also been linked to stress on brains. In fact, increasingly reports show that COVID infections can sometimes lead to long-term and perhaps even permanent neurological complications like psychosis, nerve damage, inflammation, strokes, and more. Even those with mild cases of COVID are sometimes reporting this.

Outside of the realm of COVID-caused neurological problems, it’s important to remember that functional neurological disorders are not static. The body is a holistic machine and all parts affect one another—including neurological disorders and stressors. There’s an intersection between the mind and body, or the psychiatric and neurological, that is worth considering. It’s always important to reduce stress for numerous factors including management of neurological disorders.

Management in Crisis

It’s one thing to say stress needs to be managed and quite another to put it into practice. Stress management overall is tougher to get in control of in the midst of a crisis. This trickles down to having trouble managing other facets of the body from the physical to the mental, and that includes neurological disorders. We face the inherent fight, flight, or freeze instinct when we’re confronted with a crisis and that makes it tough to do anything else. Neurological conditions get worse during a crisis because every fiber in our being is warning us and trying to protect us.

However, neurological conditions aren’t alone in exacerbating during crisis. Diseases, from diabetes to cancer, can also worsen in these conditions. Not only are we preoccupied with fight/flight/freeze but we’re also simply not following the self-care and best practices we may have established before a crisis.

Reassessing Self-Care

Humans are not inherently lazy, but we are programmed to some extent to seek out the road of least resistance. Many of us are prone to coming up with and accepting excuses. Ask yourself when the last time you went to the gym was and compare it to your activity a year ago (pre-COVID).

For some people, nothing has changed as they made modifications for home workouts. There are a select few who are actually more committed to working out than ever before. However, a lot of people have put off the level of physical fitness they used to prioritize because we’re in a pandemic.

Is getting in your spin class really important during a pandemic? That’s actually debatable. There are certainly plenty of benefits beyond maintaining a healthy level of fat when you partake in cardio. This same level of putting aside self-care is also affecting those with neurological conditions.

Perhaps a more relatable example is your sleep quality. Are you getting more or less sleep now that we’re in a crisis? What is the quality of the sleep you do get? Are you sleeping too much?

Everyone has a natural amount of sleep they need each night, and eight hours is simply the average, not a universal rule. We know that lack of sleep can negatively affect neurological conditions, and yet many people aren’t following proper sleep hygiene best practices—and who can blame them? You might have a newly full house, be worried about unemployment and paying the bills, or wonder if someone in your family might become infected.

Handling a Crisis

Logistically we know why it’s tougher to manage neurological disorders during a crisis. We simply don’t have the time and energy to do so. However, we do need to prioritize this management even when it’s very difficult. This can happen by seeking out mental health experts, many of whom are available virtually. Recreating and changing your network of support on multiple levels is necessary for almost everyone right now, and that goes for those with neurological concerns.

Some people might be reaching for vices like drugs or alcohol, which have negative affects beyond the “norm” for those with some neurological conditions. If this is you, seeking out drug rehab now can be part of building your support network. Connecting with friends and family (virtually) who help increase your confidence and soothe your worries should be a “must-do” every week. Sit down and assess who’s actively in your network now and what kind of connections you feel you need to build to better it.

The bottom line is that it’s never “easy” to manage a neurological condition no matter how long you’ve been living with it. Obstacles make it even more challenging, and a crisis is a big obstacle. The sooner you act to regain control, the less tertiary disaster you might experience. Putting your health and wellness first is essential, and that will probably require getting outside your comfort zone and taking control over your network and environment. Always remember that help is available if you advocate for yourself.