As isolation drags on, people find ways to cope

As we reach the two-month mark of New York’s COVID-19 shutdown, people are feeling the stress of self-isolation and worry.

“Much of why it’s so stressful and anxiety-producing is the uncertainty around it and the unfamiliarity,” said Karla Vermeulen, deputy director of The Institute for Disaster Mental Health at SUNY New Paltz, where she’s also an associate professor of psychology. “We don’t know what to expect, and we're having to adapt to all of these changes, and none of them have been good changes.”

In this pandemic, there’s no real perspective of when it will end, or what “normal” will look like at that point.

“In a traditional disaster,” Vermeulen said, “you know when it’s over, and you know if you’ve been impacted.”

With socializing, exercise and other common stress relievers limited by pandemic rules, people are finding new ways to cope.

For the Hoffman family, one strategy is raising money for charity, accomplished by selling home-fermented kombucha from a stand in front of their home on Maple Avenue in Goshen.

“It was my wife’s idea,” said Michael Hoffman, a urologist who’s still going to work. “I was a little skeptical at first.”

Corbett Hoffman and their kids, 9-year-old Shepard and Ivy, who just turned 5, set up the stand (masked and using social distancing) on May 4, and made $170, which they donated to the charity No Kid Hungry (www.nokidhungry.org), Hoffman said. On Mother’s Day, they made $240 for the charity, and they hope to keep giving.

“The family is definitely starved for social interaction,” Hoffman said, and this has provided a little outlet. He’s also been baking sourdough bread and sharing it with family and friends.

Lynn Zabatcha said she’s “a young 63,” widowed, has no kids or siblings, and her best friends are far away.

“The uncertainty and loneliness are the most difficult parts of this sordid affair,” Zabatcha said.

But she has her little Dachshund mix, Winnie. She talks to friends over the phone, and checks with her neighbors to see if they need anything when she occasionally ventures out of their 55-plus apartment building in downtown Goshen to go to CVS or to the nearby Roccoroma Italian deli, which carries fresh fruits, vegetables and entrees.

“But mostly I look out my window and watch my neighbors' family members bringing supplies,” she said.

In Westbrookville, Pastor Kevin Mulqueen is making sure those who are looking to faith for support and comfort can still turn to the Westbrookville Community Chapel to connect with each other. Since Palm Sunday, Mulqueen has been using Facebook Live and Zoom to host virtual services at the United Methodist chapel. Attendance is up, he said.

Mulqueen planned a special memorial service recently from the sister church in Ellenville where he’s also pastor, and will hold another on May 23 from Westbrookville.

“In this pandemic, people who have lost a loved one don’t have an opportunity to grieve the way they did before,” Mulqueen said.

Vermeulen said many people are experiencing “a sense of life being suspended.” “There are all these kinds of smaller losses,” she said, missed milestones such as graduations or birthdays or Mother’s Day visits.

We may all be dealing with post-traumatic stress reactions,” Vermeulen said, differentiating that from the more severe and longer-term post traumatic stress disorder. “The natural process for most people is toward recovery and adjustment. People generally are pretty resilient.”

Some number of people will have a harder time, she said, whether because they’ve gone through more stress, have fewer resources or are less resilient. In a natural disaster such as a hurricane, about five percent of survivors will develop PTSD, she said, and a higher percentage for, say, a mass shooting. It’s not clear how many people will come out of COVID-19 with PTSD or ongoing anxiety or depression, she said.

People are still seeking out ways to cope.

For Josette Longstreet, who owns The Switch Inn in Middletown with her husband, Ron Longstreet, they decided to renovate the tavern.

“We just took this opportunity to do all the things we never did because we didn’t want to close,” Longstreet said. They’ve fixed the roof and they’re working on the decks, so they can have outdoor socially distanced dining. They’ve painted, they’ve redone the floors and the bar. They’re putting up a tin ceiling, and they restored the original 1874 wood. As much as they can, they’ve hired their bar staff to help with renovations.

They want to be ready to reopen with a splash as soon as they’re allowed, she said, and that Middletown’s downtown revitalization picks up where it left off.

The philosophy, Longstreet said, is “keep busy, and keep positive.”

Kriste King of New Windsor, Jerica Johnson of Wappingers Falls and Kristin Tamburo of Maybrook have taken a sort of chaotic good, random-acts-of-kindness strategy: They just started up The Wine Fairies of the Hudson Valley, a Facebook group in which members deliver spur-of-the-moment care packages to their fellow members. King and Johnson got the idea from friends down south, where this phenomenon has taken off, and started the local group just days ago, adding Tamburo as an administrator. In 48 hours, they amassed 1,300 members in Orange, Ulster, Sullivan, Dutchess, Rockland, Westchester and Greene counties. Members are posting pictures and videos of deliveries - sometimes in costume.

“Everyone is so unhappy and uncertain and confused about what’s going on,” and this can take their minds off it, Johnson said.

“Just a way to sprinkle a little fairy dust in our community,” Tamburo said.

“It’s just a way to let them know we’re thinking about them. They’re not alone,” King said.

People are quickly forming friendships and bonds, King said.

“Even in the dark times, we have,” she said, “we can still be nice and uplift each other.”

hyakin@th-record.com