- Many people are feeling anxiety as the coronavirus pandemic worsens.
- But Megan Bruneau, a New York therapist, explained why you shouldn't feel bad about your coronavirus anxiety.
- Part of overcoming anxiety is recognizing the specific causes of it, preparing as best you can, and practicing self-care.
- View more episodes of Business Insider Today on Facebook.
It's common to feel anxiety during a crisis like the coronavirus pandemic.
Between rising infection counts, the plummeting economy, and social distancing measures that have upended life for many Americans, you might be more anxious than ever.
You have nothing to be ashamed of, says Megan Bruneau, a therapist from New York City.
In fact, it's crucial that you don't judge yourself for your coronavirus anxiety, she told Business Insider Today.
"One of the things we tend to do with any uncomfortable emotion, whether it's anxiety or sadness or loneliness, is we judge ourselves, and then we end up feeling anxiety for feeling anxious, or shame for feeling anxious or depressed or whatever it is," Bruneau said.
"In this case, we want to be able to sort of take pause, recognize that we're feeling anxious, and make some space for that anxiety and actually practice what we call self-compassion in response to that. Those are real, valid, warranted fears."
Part of overcoming anxiety is recognizing the underlying causes of the feeling - not just to "catastrophize and ruminate," as she said, but actually identifying the things you're uncertain about.
"What am I most scared about?" she said. "Is it my health? Is it my parents' or a loved one's health? Is it my job? You know, is it the markets? And then start to really understand, OK, what do I need right now?"
When it comes to the unfolding pandemic, one of the contributing factors to our anxiety is our lack of total information, Bruneau said.
In the United States, for example, a shortage of coronavirus testing kits has led to what experts believe is a significant undercount in the actual number of cases in the country.
"We don't have enough information to really be able to assess how productive our anxiety is," Bruneau said. "We want to find somewhere between alarmism and nonchalance, and we don't know where that is because we don't have enough information and there is a large degree of misinformation."
To mitigate your anxiety, she recommends checking reputable news sources for updates - but only at a few designated times of day.
And she also recommended taking various measures to help you feel prepared. That could include stocking up on non-perishable food items, social distancing, and washing your hands frequently, but also practicing self-care like exercising, eating healthfully, and getting enough sleep.
These measures can help you feel some sense of control.
"If that seems to serve you and help lower your anxiety in a situation, then by all means do it," she said. "When it comes to coping with uncertainty and sitting with uncertainty, self-care of course is super important."