74 - Do Lockdowns Cause Suicide?

It is late October 2021, Melbourne is emerging from a 77 day lockdown and we’ve just earned the dubious title of most locked down city in the world. Throughout, this difficult situation has been made harder by constant media and political pressure to end lockdowns, often with the argument that lockdowns cause suicide.

We wanted to dig into this properly and find out from the data whether this actually was the case? In this episode we take a look at suicide statistics in four Western countries, talk through the factors that can lead to suicide and provide some tips for how to respond if you or someone you care about is feeling suicidal.

Supports (for Australian listeners):

• If you are in immediate danger: 000

• For crisis support 24/7: Lifeline 13 11 14 or
  Suicide call back service (24 hour phone & online support): 1300 659 467
  or online www.suicidecallbackservice.org.au

• To access local crisis team support, call your state’s contact number: https://www.healthdirect.gov.au/crisis-management

• To access private psychologists: see a GP for a mental health care plan or contact local private practices. Your GP may know of local clinics with availability or shorter wait times.

  Research and data:

• Australian Institute of Health and Welfare data: https://www.aihw.gov.au/suicide-self-harm-monitoring/data/suspected-deaths-by-suicide/data-from-suicide-registers

• Victorian coroner’s court data: https://www.coronerscourt.vic.gov.au/sites/default/files/2021-01/Coroners%20Court%20Monthly%20Suicide%20Data%20Report%20-%20December%202020.pdf

• NZ coroner: https://coronialservices.justice.govt.nz/assets/Documents/Publications/Chief-Coroner-Suicide-Stats-2020-Media-Release.pdf

• NZ symptoms: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34313158/

• UK suicide rates: https://www.ons.gov.uk/releases/deathsfromsuicidethatoccurredinenglandandwalesbetweenaprilandjuly2020

• US suicide minorities: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33290944/

• US suicide data: https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle/2775359

• America’s health rankings (data from all states): https://www.americashealthrankings.org/explore/annual/measure/Suicide/state/ALL?edition-year=2020

62 - Schadenfreude: Is it ok to feel like this?

This week, in the wake of President Trump being diagnosed with COVID-19, the world has been going through a collective emotional experience. People who ordinarily wouldn’t relish in the misfortunes of others are feeling a pleasurable twinge of schadenfreude. We noticed people talking about how guilty they’ve felt so we wanted to pull apart this complex emotion in the two shrinks way: What is it? Why do we experience it? And is it really ok to feel like this?

As always, to wrap up we finish with Things We Came Across: why narcissists aren’t wearing masks and odd things that have happened in interviews.

We learnt about schadenfreude in:

• Schadenfreude: Understanding Pleasure at the Misfortune of Others: www.cambridge.org/9781107017504 

• The relationship between schadenfreude & sadism: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0191886916300071

• Schadenfreude & ingroup outgroup bias:
  http://www.people.fas.harvard.edu/~banaji/research/publications/articles/2017_Lehr_GPIR.pdf

• Integrating multiple perspectives on schadenfreude: https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11031-012-9331-4

TWCA

Why narcissists aren’t wearing masks & how to approach them: https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/wellness/narcissism-mask-covid-psychology/2020/09/25/d3de1b32-fe9c-11ea-9ceb-061d646d9c67_story.html 

59 - Healthcare workers’ challenges during COVID-19

How are health care workers coping during COVID? On our final episode of the COVID series, we take a look at the issues facing healthcare workers. For the first time in many workers’ careers, we’re dealing with an issue that impacts everyone, including ourselves. Tune in for a discussion about issues like coping under crisis conditions, providing mental health treatment remotely, and what happens when your personal values or worries are different to those you treat.

As always, to wrap up we finish with a lighter chat about things we came across - what we’ll miss from lock down and how we knew we’d been in lock down too long.

Special thanks to the doctors who helped us prepare for this episode by sharing their experiences and concerns: Dr Eric Levi (@DrEricLevi), Dr Vyom Sharma (@drvyom), Dr Andy Tagg (@andrewjtagg) and Dr Lachie Hayes.

58 - Mental health issues during COVID-19: ADHD, OCD, PTSD, Depression, Eating Disorders, Substance Use, Family Issues

Feeling like your mental health is suffering during COVID-19? Finding that your attention is worse, you’ve started restricting your eating again or are having more compulsions? Then this episode is for you.

We chat about first steps to getting back on track when symptoms flare up during COVID including: ADHD, OCD, depression, eating disorders and PTSD/trauma. We also brainstorm ways of dealing with family conflict, drug and alcohol use, and parental guilt.

To wrap things up, we finish with what we’ll miss about lockdown and when we knew we’d been in lockdown a little too long.

Resources mentioned in the show:

• Two shrinks pod COVID page: www.twoshrinkspod.com/coping-with-covid

• Bessel van der Kolk & trauma during COVID: https://www.besselvanderkolk.com/blog/how-we-can-nurture-our-mental-health-during-the-covid-19-pandemic

• Dr Karen Treisman resource page (for people of all ages, links to ways to manage your mental health & trauma responses to COVID): http://www.safehandsthinkingminds.co.uk/covid-anxiety-stress-resources-links/

• Free online CBT programs:

  • https://moodgym.com.au/

  • https://mindspot.org.au/

  • https://thiswayup.org.au/how-we-can-help/courses/
    (free during COVID-19)