Joyce Fegan: Where’s your head at in a post-pandemic world?

Many people are experiencing a starkly different set of feelings with spikes in anxiety and depression

Body Coach Joe Wicks on stage at WellFest; home workouts with Wicks were one of the early tropes of lockdown. Picture: Marc O’Sullivan

In the world of pregnancy and parenthood there’s that trite phrase “nine months in, nine months out”, the inference being that parents should be “away in a hack” in the same amount of time as it took to grow the baby. There’s a similar, but much more scientific formula, for Covid and post traumatic stress.

“Studies on post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) suggest that it takes one-third of the duration of the trauma to recover from it so it will take many people between six and eight months to find their feet again,” said Dr Paul D’Alton, head of the psychology department at St Vincent’s University Hospital, back in February when restrictions were lifted in Ireland.