A psychologist who services western NSW is encouraging everyone to take simple steps to ensure their physical and mental health are as strong as ever during COVID-19.
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Tanya Forster, who is the director of the Macquarie Health Collective said no-one could have prepared nor predicted for the global pandemic that is COVID-19.
"Who would have thought that in 2020 we would be facing one of Australia's biggest public health issues in Australian medical history, it's incomprehensible that we're dealing with something like that....," she said.
"It's not something you can adequately prepare for anyway, it's such an unusual situation so people don't really have the internal resources to manage something like this because we never thought we would have to."
The psychologist said she has yet to find a person who doesn't have some degree of worry about what's going on.
"It's front of mind for everyone, plenty of patients that are coming in, whether to access psychologists, GPS, dietitians, it doesn't matter the service, anxiety is running high and everyone is talking about it," she explained.
"So every healthcare provider is currently having to provide support in that way."
Ms Forster said because we don't know how long this will last for, we all need to look after ourselves so when it does end we are in a much healthier position.
"Let's say as an example if this goes on for another three, six or 12 months, imagine if we're not taking care of our physical and mental health for that duration. Six months later what situation is our mind and body in?," she said.
"If we have a chronic health condition and we're not really doing what we need to do to take care of it then six months down the track our health will be in a much worse place.
"Or even for the average person who doesn't have a chronic health condition, if we're just not taking care of ourselves and again six months down the track we're really not going to be feeling great."
Ms Forster said we need to do everything we can now to nurture ourselves, and while it looks different for everybody, it is achievable.
"It might be still seeing your GP or psychologist, talking to a dietitian or at home just going for a walk..., eating nice meals, or maintaining our self care," she explained.
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