ROB MURRAY: I’m speaking with Dr. Kendra Barrick from the Bow Valley Primary Care Network. This is a really tough time for a lot of people. Mental health is really on the forefront.

DR. KENDRA BARRICK: It’s been a tough year, and then we add the cool temperatures, the inability to go somewhere warm, see family and loved ones. It is a very challenging time.

RM: What are mental health resiliency efforts that you do personally?

KB: I’m a big fan of natural endorphins through exercise, but that’s not something that’s possible for everyone, so we always have to have other ideas. What we put into our body helps how we feel, so getting some healthy nutrients in our body, regular meals, a lot of water, fruits, veggies. We should be reaching out to others and touching base, whether that’s family or friends, we should have our support network. Stress reduction is always important, especially when we can’t control things in this pandemic, and one strategy for dealing with stress is not enough. For example, if I’m having a bad day I listen to loud punk music, but some days I don’t find that helps me. If I’ve had a stressful day I need to have more strategies, more tools in my tool belt to reduce that.

RM: Do you have any kind of daily routines that you do?

KB: I like that term ‘routine’ because sometimes for people it’s just hard to get out of bed. We see it’s cold. We see it dark. We’re not motivated. Maybe we’re not working and it’s hard to start the day; we want to stay in our jammies. I’d encourage everyone to challenge themselves to creating a five step routine, because you can show yourself that you can succeed each day by completing five steps. For example, that might be to make yourself a coffee, go sit down at the kitchen table with the newspaper or the online newspaper, have a warm shower. It’s five things that you do every morning that you get to control and that you get to succeed at.

RM: Do you have any other general tips for mental health right now?

KB: I think it’s really important to talk about it. The stigma around mental health is substantial. Remember, you have your friends, your support network, you have your family physician, you have all the resources that are available in the Bow Valley. Don’t be afraid to reach out to your medical clinic, your family doctor, or a nurse. You can visit the Bow Valley PCN website for a large list of all those resources. If you’re in a really big crisis you can always walk into one of our hospitals and the teams there would love to help you out.

Filed under: Mental Health