CLARKSVILLE, Ind. — Indiana’s Department of Family and Social Services has launched a new website with free mental health resources for Hoosiers.
Governor Eric Holcomb announced the new site on Monday, calling it ‘imperative’ to recognize how the coronavirus pandemic has impacted mental health.
The site called Be Well Indiana has tips to fight anxiety or depression and resources to reach out to for help. Holcomb says though it's been launched specifically for mental health during the pandemic, it will evolve as a resource beyond the current crisis.
"I think this is a very concise, very well put together site,” said Dr. Jeff Romer with Personal Counseling Service Inc. "I was very impressed with it as a self-help kind of tool and resources that you can have and where to go."
Romer says he has noticed more stress in clients amid the crisis.
“Their sense of anxiety is higher, they may be more prone to the blues,” he said.
Romer calls social distancing amid the coronavirus crisis a way to 'recover together’ but says it’s normal to feel anxious.
"We have the need for social contact, and that's one of the awful things about this time is that it's disrupting something that’s in our neurology,” he said. "Any change in the routine, positive or negative, we get stressed."
In the meantime, Romer says there are a few ways to help control that stress.
"If you get anxious just remember, everything will change, and it will change again,” he said. "If you have a yard, you have a porch, go outside because you're connecting to this world of other living things that's not your four walls."
He recommends keeping a focus on the positives, on things within control, and to be honest about feelings of stress.
"Sometimes just being aware of that, yeah I'm aware I'm anxious, talk to somebody,” he said.
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