Through Covid-19, we’ve gotten used to being cooped up in our homes with minimal contact with people. We’ve distanced ourselves by burying ourselves in work, spending time only with the people we’re living with, all the while being a bit hesitant to try out new virtual means of connection.
While this change has been forced on us, it’s also resulted in an unhealthy amount of emotional isolation for some. Loneliness starts building up, as a result, and some of the signs of this are:
Struggling to connect with people
Being removed from people who we were used to seeing almost daily could leave us fraught, wondering whether we could maintain the same levels of attachment. There may be a disconnect when you try to reach out and the effort isn’t reciprocated. On the other hand, sometimes others might try reaching out and we might find it hard to reciprocate.
Closing off ourselves from others
Loneliness can make us feel like we are not wanted, or that people don’t care about us. We may sometimes lead with that assumption and feel the need to beat them to it by closing ourselves off first. This way, there would be no added pain to deal with and we come out of it the ‘winner’. This kind of defence usually leaves no victors as we neither have the peace of mind nor do we have the connections we long for.
Declining quality of relationships
We might feel that our relationships are slowly beginning to lose the quality they had before. Close or best friends start to become just ‘friends’, the ones we keep at a distance and the casual friends are demoted to just acquaintances.
Seeking relief through self-medication/ self-harm
Self-harm may be an outlet we think that we have for the pain we feel within, or we may believe this is the only way we can make someone care for us. This way of dealing with pain could put us at serious risk. We may not notice subtle signs of self-medication at first but if we turn too frequently to alcohol or drugs, and usually when there are accompanied feelings of sadness or distress, we may need to consider that this has turned into an unhealthy coping style.
Feelings of low self-worth
As we look to find answers to not having people to turn to in our times of happiness or distress, we may look inward and come to the thought that there’s probably something wrong with us. We might feel like we’re not good enough which spirals downwards into feeling unworthy of attention.