Welcome to this special episode of uh Speak Life's podcast. Uh my name is Glenn Scrivener, and uh during this time of COVID-19, lots of people are working from home. And uh this is uh a great example of working from home because I'm here with my wife, Emma Scrivener, say hello to the people.
SPEAKER_03Hello to all the people.
SPEAKER_02Um can you talk to us a little bit about growing up, a little bit about some of the anxieties of old that the current crisis has reminded you of?
SPEAKER_03It's quite fresh in my mind. I've written I wrote a blog about it recently because I wasn't I wasn't really sure myself why I was feeling so anxious with the COVID-19 stuff. It was making me feel like um I'd been somewhere before. And where that is was whenever I was um 12 or 13, um I developed an eating disorder, anorexia, but at the same time I also had um obsessive compulsive disorder. Um and for me that was characterized by needing to wash my hands, so a real fear around contamination, a fear around germs. Um I guess growing up at that time, um I grew up in Northern Ireland and the world felt like quite an unsafe place. So um it was it was pretty standard then. We we were at uh not as bad as it had been, but pretty bad time of the troubles in Belfast. Um you had to uh get your bags checked every time you went into a shopping centre. Uh there were police checkpoints in every corner. We everybody knew of someone who had been affected by the troubles. Um a guy that I went out with, um one of my first boyfriends at school, his father had been um killed, he was bank manager uh in a bomb uh from the IRA, and it it just yeah, we heard bombs going off. You could hear explosions, um, and it was just uh it just seemed like a a part of everyday life, but I think it made me feel certainly that the world outside wasn't very safe.
SPEAKER_02Um so that was one of the elements going into it. So Belfast, the troubles, what were some of the other anxieties that were kind of swirling around at that time?
SPEAKER_03So this would have been in the 80s and 90s, and for the first time we were hearing about a disease called AIDS that people knew very little about, and I remember really clearly watching TV ads um about with tombstones and um r red roses and a sort of black and white background, and just saying, you know, essentially be careful, but we didn't know what to be careful for because there were so we we didn't know very much about it. I remember at that time reading a story in the Reader's Digest about um a little boy who had caught AIDS, and it turned out that they found out a while later that it was because his mum had left her purse behind in a public toilet and he'd been looking for it and put his fingers up at the top of the ledge, and uh when he was running his hands along, uh he'd been pricked by an infected needle. But I I I remember people talking at that time of should you take your children out of school? What if someone else is affected? Can you get it by sharing a swimming pool? Can you get it from a toilet seat? Is it something you can get from you know people coughing? Now we know a lot more about it nowadays, and of course, um that all seems that all seems ridiculous. But at the time all we knew was there was this new disease, um, people died from it in horrible ways. We didn't really know how how you got it or how to stop it, and there was no cure. So I remember lying awake at night in my bed thinking, oh, am I gonna get this disease and obsessing about it and worrying about it and thinking, you know, i is it something I can get from touching the wrong thing?
SPEAKER_02And the public health messages, like in in Northern Ireland and in Australia, um, they are pretty brutal, aren't they? In a way that sort of English public health messages are very kind of discreet and kind of there's probably light operetta happening in the background and just, you know, you you're being told, don't be naughty. But in Northern Ireland and in Australia, I've noticed like like drink driving commercials are like horror films. And the these public health announcements. I I remember did did they have one over here where um the Grim Reaper was playing was was playing ten pin bowling and the people with the pins?
SPEAKER_03No, no, no, we don't even remember starting that one.
SPEAKER_02That was that was one from Australia, and and the bowling ball was AIDS, and the Grim Reaper was bowling this ball that was AIDS and knocking down like these ten people at a time.
SPEAKER_03I'm so happy that we didn't have that. Ours were ours were bad enough, but imagine the fallout from that. No, ours were tombstones falling on the ground. Um, and we had other public health things. I remember there was one about not climbing pylons, and there was a we had a little boy who was playing football with his friends, and they threw the football and it got stuck up a pylon, so he climbs up after it, and then you see him electro it's gonna be electrocuted.
SPEAKER_02You just know it's gonna end well.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, electrocuted and felt you just think and my my mum and dad wouldn't let me watch Grange Hill or Neighbours at the time because they thought it was too frightening. Honestly, we weren't allowed to watch soaps, yeah. Um and yet we had all this other stuff that was filtering through for our good.
SPEAKER_02For our for our public health. So so this was another fear. So there's the there's the fear of bombs and guns, there's the fear of an epidemic called AIDS, and lots of other fears going on.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, and uh you know, obviously those are just those are just one part of the story, you know. Sure. Add to that, uh my personality type was always going to be someone who was, you know, I remember feeling anxious from about the age of three, anxious about guarding the um uh sandpit. Um I don't know how many other three-year-olds feel that sense of anxiety and needing to keep it smooth and you know I love that story.
SPEAKER_02You you shooed everyone else out of the sandpit and then policed it and made sure they didn't come and mess up your your your domain.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, yeah. Well, I just you know, I never liked mass. I've never liked mass from the earliest age. Why did you marry me? This is uh well that's a whole new podcast on my hand, you know.
SPEAKER_02Uh that will be episode two. Why did Emma marry Glenn? Well That's what the listeners are thinking anyway. So you anxiety has always been a part of growing up, it's always been a part of your makeup.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, it is. I think it's a big if you slice me open I will bleed anxiety.
SPEAKER_02And some of the ways you started to cope, um, I d what what what came first for you in terms of of mental health?
SPEAKER_03Well, the first thing for me um was anorexia, although I wouldn't have um I didn't know what it was at that time. You know, I remember uh we watched we watched a documentary about Karen Carpenter and and occasionally you'd hear about eating disorders, you know, as being from people very far away, and it it it just didn't really happen to us. But I I felt that I suppose the anxiety that I had and my fears about myself and the world around me, you know, it's the first time that someone close to me died, and I had no answers for that. Um I was pulling away from my parents, but also wanted the safety and security that um they'd always given me. I I was asking, who am I? How do I fit into the world? My body was changing um and my emotions were all over the place, and I I didn't fit in any particular box the way that I used to. You know, when I was younger, I used to go outside and I'd be one of the boys, we'd play football out in the street, uh, and I was um hacker Emma. That was that was my uh I've always had really big feet, and back then that was a real bonus, let me tell you. Um the guys wanted to date me because I was good at football.
SPEAKER_02But you know, you're probably a head taller than them at that stage, you know, 12-year-old boys, 12-year-old girls.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, maybe, maybe, I don't know. But um, yeah, so uh then you know, all of a sudden, almost overnight, you're a woman and you don't do those sorts of things, you don't relate to boys like that anymore. Um, there's a whole new language, a whole new world that you know you've got to be. And I I didn't know what a woman was, um, and I didn't know who I was, let alone what what I was meant to be like. It felt like there was this this spreading, leaking weakness, need, hunger questions in me that could not be contained. And that was the beginning of my anorexia because um I suppose when you're when you're that age, there's not much you can do to control your life, but you can in one sense control your body, and I stumbled upon it like this secret black magic that if you you know if you eat less, if you put less into your body and you exercise more, then you can start to erase some of those um some of the ways that you are spilling out. So if you're a cartoon character and she's suddenly developing breasts and thighs and all the rest, well, you know what? With food, you can start rubbing that back out and you can make the line straight again, and you can turn off, I guess, puberty, turn off some of those wailing sirens all around you and say, No, this is my world, this is the place that I control, and I can rub it out, and there is something I do have control of, and I can't make sense of anything else. I have a hundred questions I can't answer, but here's a question I can answer. Can you can you lose weight? Can you make yourself smaller? Yes, I can. And you know, in a sense, it it pictures this ambivalence of wanting to be smaller, wanting to be hidden, wanting, you know, people not to notice you, wanting to everything to go away, but also at the same time making your body, making yourself a hunger striker, you know, and and shouting out, help, help, help, I need help. I need I need people to make sense of this world. I need people to you know to to see me.
SPEAKER_02But at the same time, it was such a secretive thing and and thriving on secrecy. And so as as in in terms of being a hunger striker, you're you're making this protest with your body, and at the same time, you've got your bayonets fixed and you're keeping people massively at bay.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, of course. Help me, help me. Don't come close, you know, um reach into my world and and take over. Don't you dare take away control, because that's that's who I am.
SPEAKER_02So it does something for you, this self-starvation. It switches off the puberty, it it um it manages your body, it controls your body, it controls your world, it simplifies your life. Now you don't have to worry about a thousand different things, now it's just about calorie counting and and getting enough exercise and and that sort of thing. Um but ironically, as you're trying to control yourself, you become more and more out of control. I wonder if we could move then to obsessive-compulsive disorder, because you you sought help for anorexia, and I guess the help at that stage was not so much psychological as just physical, they kind of force fed you and helped you get the weight up, um, which on the one hand got you out of a dangerous kind of you know, BMI, body mass index, um, but something else kind of popped up in its place. The obsession wasn't now food. What did the obsession become?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, well, uh it was a transference for me. So instead of um obsessing about numbers and calories and things, that way was literally blocked off to me by my family and by um the NHFs. Uh but uh but the feelings that I was having that had um that had triggered all of this in the first place were still there. In fact, they were there a lot stronger than before. And I think this is something that's quite important that we remember if we're dealing with people who are challenging an addiction. Actually, that's when your anxiety becomes much, much higher than before. So you really need to have somewhere that um where the anxiety is going to, an outlet. And I I found that then the obsession for me moved from uh calories to germs and contamination, um, and that had always been sort of a background concern, but now it became something that was it it felt to me really important. So here was another system of control. Um I felt like there were germs all over everything, and again, you know, feeding into this was the the idea of AIDS and um yeah, you know these outside factors, these things you couldn't see that could harm you, um, and you didn't really know how you got it or how you passed it on, but you just knew you didn't want to get it. And so that for me then took the it took its place and where the you know we'd the the scales in our house were locked up and um we had to monitor the amount of exercise that I did and make sure that my mum and dad were watching what I ate. Now we had to lock the cupboards um from soap. Now I was banned from the bathroom and we had to lock the door on there because I was washing my hands over and over and over in my body until that was stopped, you know, 20, 30 times uh in succession, hours and hours and hours at a time. And there was a ritual to, you know, you'd have to do one finger first, then another, then another, wash round, then do your arms, then the rest of your body in a particular order. And if you missed a finger or you did it the wrong way around, you had to start again covering yourself with soap, and then what if you'd missed a bit? Well, then you had to start again with the soap ball over and over, and you it would just it was hours and hours of scrubbing and scrubbing. And have you got the right tile? Uh are you using a clean towel? Where did that one come from? Did you touch something? Did you touch a door or something else by mistake as you did it? Yes, right, okay. Well then stop and do it again. Is this soap working? Well, maybe it's not. And I washed my hands in bleach. Um I washed my body in bleach until you know it was taken away, and my you know, my my fingers were like bloody meat and my my wrists broke apart. Um, they were bleeding all the time, had to have them bandaged up. And you know, I was trying to get my hand on more soap and trying to and the fear was that something terrible would happen to me or the people that I loved if I didn't if I didn't wash in this order. And it wasn't it wasn't just me, it was it was people that I cared about that I would transmit these germs, that um that something would would harm them. And I knew on one level that it wasn't it didn't make sense, and yet on another level, unless the anxiety built up and built up and built up, and the only thing that would relieve it was the washing, was the washing and the cleaning over and over and over. And even though um my parents and other people said, Look, you don't need to do this, I was feeling look, something terrible is going to happen to you if I don't, and I alone have this power to to stop it. And and i I it was unbearable the anxiety, it was unbearable, you know, just building up and building up, and for a moment, you know, for for a brief period of time, maybe for half an hour or five or ten minutes, it would go away the anxiety. If I did the ritual right, if I did it right, and I could just sit and I could just be, and then there was calm, but then it would build up again. And you know, it was I couldn't touch door handles, I couldn't turn on and off the light, particularly around the bathroom. I couldn't go outside. Um, and then I started counting in my head, I started counting my steps, I started counting over and over backwards and forwards, you know. Um when I went outside or saying things over and over in my brain, and that's that's the nature of obsessive-compulsive disorder. It becomes more and more, you add laws, you add rules. Um how did you find freedom from this? To be honest, I'm not really sure. I think um I mean one of one of the things that's used with OCD, it's called exposure therapy. The more you're exposed to your fears and the things that you fear don't come true, um, you're able then to sort of wind down uh these rituals and things. And in in some ways, I guess I was I was pretty lucky at the time um because of the age that I was at, and this in in a similar way with the eating disorder, that other people, grown-ups, were able to take control. So I was physically banned from the bathroom. I was I had people who were watching over me. I couldn't get my hands on soap and I couldn't, you know. And that meant that I had to face up to these fears because I was getting exposure therapy because I was being forced to. And I guess over time then those anxieties um went down. And you know, the the therapy that I was getting in terms of you know, I did start thinking better as you're as you I talked about the whirlpool, and if you lose a lot of weight, your thinking starts breaking down, you become obsessive and paranoid and neurotic. And so as you put weight on, your thinking does start to level out. And I suppose in the same way with the OCD, um, as those things were taken away from me and I didn't die, the the anxiety then started panning out. But of course, you know, I I did throw it into other areas, and it would have been schoolwork for a while, you know. I was bright, um, did well at school, so yeah, threw myself into that.
SPEAKER_02And then um But there were the there were other um issues to throw into the mix, so I guess with we're thinking about anorexia, we're thinking about OCD, anxiety and depression, sort of diagnosed about age 18. Is that sort of like when you went away to university?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, yeah, very much. And but I would have said that the anxiety and the depression were there um preceding the um preceding anorexia and preceding OCD. But I remember talking to people at the time, you know, and I remember them saying, Don't be ridiculous, children don't get depressed, uh, you know, and children don't suffer from anxiety. So it's really something that we are identifying, I think, nowadays, and that's a good thing, which uh you know, whenever I was younger, it just wasn't an option. It was impossible that I could have depression before the age of 18 because you couldn't have it as a child. So, yes, as uh as I got older those things were diagnosed, but they they've always been there. It's just that now people were saying, Okay, now you qualify once you hit you know 18.
SPEAKER_02Right. And for those who want to dig into some of these issues more, um, they can go to Emma's blog, A New Name, which is Emma Scrivener.net, and uh Emma blogs there regularly on all these sorts of issues, and you can get uh Emma's first book, A New Name, which is just a tremendous book. Um an absolutely beautifully written Christian book. But let's let's bring it into the present day because here we are, a global pandemic, and it's all about germs, and they're everywhere. They're on the petrol browsers and they're on the keypads of when you get your groceries and they are.
SPEAKER_03Honey don't I'm actually rocking. I'm actually rocking.
SPEAKER_02You're not though, you're doing you're doing really well. Thanks, son. But um what's it what's it been like? When when did you start to take coronavirus seriously?
SPEAKER_03I think there's a light bulb moment which came for me a couple of weeks ago, and for a lot of people, where up until a certain point I was thinking, well, this is kind of a cold flu thing, but you know, it's alright. If you get it, it's alright. And then you suddenly twig, hang on, this really is not about me. You know, all the odds are, God willing, that if we got it, we'd be okay. But it's not it's not me that I'm worried about, it's everybody else. Right. And I think that pen penny dropped for a lot of us, you know, a few weeks ago one time, and then you go, right, okay, this is something different.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I might be a carrier.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, I might be a and I might not have the symptoms, you know.
SPEAKER_02And yeah, what's that what's that what's that like to feel if you're a very scrupulous person? Because I'm I'm just callous, I don't care, you know. I'm I'm the sort of person who's much more blasé about stuff. But but you you you actually care about people, which is um which is lovely.
SPEAKER_03Um what's it what's it like to Well, okay. Um I've talked a bit about 13-year-old Emma and I've talked about some of her fears and her worries, okay. Now 13-year-old Emma has now grown up into I'm not even gonna tell you my age, but we both know it's it's old. Um, but she's still kind of in there in me. Now, you transplant that girl to where we are today. So she is um scared of germs, and there's a nationwide pandemic. She um is has a terror of running out of things, you know, um, and stockpiles things like soap and toilet roll. And guess what? The shops are running out of soap and toilet roll, quite literally. She's um obsessive and compulsive, and she worries that her actions could harm the people that she loves. Now she's finding out that her cough could quite literally kill granny. She likes the world to feel ordered and she's used to people around her saying it's gonna be okay. You've got this OCD thing, but you know, it'll it'll all work out.
SPEAKER_00Right.
SPEAKER_03And world leaders, the people that she loves, people that she cares about, everyone everywhere is going, you know, in the in The shops where there's the bare shelves and people are you know going a bit crazy over past and all the rest. Everybody is going crazy about this.
SPEAKER_02Right. So in CBT, the cognitive behavioral therapy, they they talk about catastrophizing. Yeah. And one of the one of the great dangers of those with OCD is that they catastrophise everything. But like the media is doing that for us. The media is bringing us the catastrophic possibilities which are becoming more and more like probabilities. So what's that like?
SPEAKER_03Er well you know what it's like. It's absolutely terrifying because you live in the same house as me. And um we have never had a cleaner kitchen in our lives. I'm spritzing everything. It's it is terrifying. It really is terrifying.
SPEAKER_02So there's a fear of germs, there's a fear of disease, of mortality, there's also a fear of running out, the shelves are empty, you know, the carpet is bare at home, you go to the supermarket, the shelves sometimes are bare. Um what what else is there at the moment that is causing fear?
SPEAKER_03I I guess containment as well, being trapped, you know, uh inside your own home, inside a very small space. Um, particularly if you are someone who is uh an introvert, you know, I'm uh I do get energy, I do get strength from being away from people. I like being with people, but I need space and I need particularly silence for me is is a real a real source of being able to recharge. But obviously, um with lots you know with with two young children and a busy house, there's a limit to what you can do. But if you can leave the house and go out and get a walk or a bit of fresh air, you know, you can carve out that bit of of time for yourself. But if you if, for example, you're in lockdown or in isolation, you can. And I think the the constant news bulletins, you know, the updates over and over, and you're you're hearing different things from different countries, and nobody seems to know um what's going on. You know, you're longing for an expert. I just want somebody to come in and say, right, this is what's happening, this is how we're going to sort it. But actually, and understandably, you know, the government um are doing U-turns, and not just our government, many governments, as more information comes out. But it means that every day the situation changes, and um, and you're not able to get into new routines. And I find routines, you know, very helpful. But it's changing all the time. So from a few weeks ago, it was um, okay, if you've got a uh, you know, if you've got symptoms, then you isolate yourself. Then it became then you isolate your family. Then it was um, you know, it was seven days, it was 14 days. It was uh you the it the kids will still go to school providing they're all right. Then it was the kids who are coming home from school, then it's um okay, you can, you know, you can go for some walks and and who knows what it will be next. But it it seems that the world is just shrinking down and down. And I think a core fear, not just uh for me, but for everyone really, is that fear of being alone with yourself. You know, so much of modern society and so much of what we do is to fill the air. We don't want to stop, we don't want to think about things like death and life and you know the deeper questions, and and we all have have fears, I think, around that. And this is forcing us to stop. We cannot be busy, we can't channel ourselves into work or yeah, the normal things that that we that we turn to. We can't find um solace in a lot of the things that we would use for solace, you know, whether that's I don't know, going shopping or um yeah, cinema or cinema or yeah, exactly or clubs, restaurants, yeah, or or going to the gym or whatever. These things um these things uh have been taken away. So people are are being left with themselves. And I think particularly if you are living on your own, you know, that is really frightening because you're talking about proper isolation, you know, and I think there there are different challenges for different people, aren't there? You know, if you're a parent with young children and you've got to be in the house, then that's that's difficult because you know you're they're climbing the walls and you're you're trying to look after them. But at least you've got company, you've got people around you. If you're on your own, it's just you, it's just those walls, and you know, what do you do? Or I don't know, it it brings as well, I think, other tensions to the fore. So think about um, you know, there's a lot of uh people have struggles, don't they, in in their relationships, their family relationships, or or in married relationships, and a large part of the way that we can deal with those or handle them is you get space from one another, but now you're you're together at home, you know, you're there with your family, with your teenage children, with your partner, or you know, the the family member you don't always get on with, and you there's nowhere to go. Um and that, you know, if you think about the the extra stresses people get at Christmas time when everyone's contained in a small space, well, that's something similar. Um, I think that we're they were saying here, let alone the bigger concerns about you know, um, the people that I love, my parents, you know, um, so they're in Ireland and and they are in the the danger bracket, the vulnerable bracket. We can't force them to stay in if they want to go out and go to the shops or whatever, and we can't you can't wrap them in cotton wool, they've got to make those decisions. Um, but it's difficult, doesn't it? Because um we all we all need independence and we're trying to get a balance as well between doing what's right, staying in, staying away, but also trying to keep our mental health going, which might mean going out for a walk just to get some air, you know, that connection with nature, with just the the freshness. If you don't have a garden or if you're living in a flat, you know, how do you get that? Um and so yeah, trying to get that balance between, well, well, you know, or if you've got young children and they are climbing the walls and they need to get out somewhere, well, what can you do? Can you take them out? Can't you take them out? Um yeah.
SPEAKER_02Well, you've you've written a great piece on your blog uh at emascrivener.net uh fighting corona brain. Um and there you you speak about like eight ways of fighting the fear. And I just wonder if you could kind of put flesh on on some of these bones um that you you outline here in the blog. Um let's let's turn a corner from from talking about uh what's difficult, um, let's talk about what helps. And the first thing you said that helps is uh isolate physically, but do not isolate mentally. What do you mean?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, well, it obviously it's imperative at the moment that we do isolate physically. There's no question about that. But it's it's interesting, isn't it? While we're pulling away physically, we need to be reaching out mentally even more than ever before. We all need community, but especially those who have mental health struggles, you know, who are tempted, I think quite often. I know this myself, if I'm finding things difficult um in terms of my mental health, I will back off from people I'll tend to isolate. And that's true of a lot of others. Whereas actually, what we need to be doing is reaching out saying, I'm not doing well, I need help. Look, can you can you help me? Can I talk to you? And particularly as well if you don't want to go into negative um ways of dealing with with behaviours, you know, if you know that you have got particular vulnerabilities, I don't know, towards alcohol or towards uh over exercising or you know, starving yourself or um or OCD or or whatever it is, then you've got to find alternatives that that are alternative ways of of channelling these anxieties, channeling these fears, particularly as some of those other coping mechanisms, for example, you know, unlimited going out for walks or going to the gym or or meeting up people are aren't available to you.
SPEAKER_02So or in the case of alcohol, that it's all too available to you.
SPEAKER_03Well, absolutely, absolutely.
SPEAKER_02So you need to you need to talk it out. So so we're being told to lock down, but that doesn't mean shut down emotionally.
SPEAKER_03Absolutely not. I think it means the very opposite. I think it means reach out, reach out emotionally. You know, our emotions I think can feel very dangerous, particularly anxiety or you know, or these fears, these are big feelings that we've got at the moment, big scary feelings that match a really big scary situation. And we need to know that those emotions aren't going to crush us. And part of the way that we I think deal with them is if you think about a a uh a pot with the lid on it and it's bubbling away, if you lift the lid a little and you let some steam out, it won't it won't boil over. And lift lifting the lid off, letting the steam out is a bit like talking to other people, you know. Um it's a way of diffusing some of that tension. Whereas if you keep it in, if you keep it all try and keep it all sealed up, it will it will bubble out, and you know, then you're really yeah, you're re that that that would cause a lot of danger for you, I think.
SPEAKER_02And then you you talk about the same reality, but from the other side of things, really. Um here's a truth for for those who might be caring, um, for those who have uh mental ill health. Uh, second truth, distance physically but reach out practically. What does that mean?
SPEAKER_03Well, um I guess that's what are the ways that we can look after and serve one another at these times, you know. Um we're told to carry one another's burdens, and that's that's absolutely vital more now more than ever before. Um, so I think you know it means checking in with other people on a regular basis, but in different learning different ways of doing it. So where you might have popped in before, maybe now you get on to Skype or you get on to Zoom or you know, you um or yeah, you whatever it is you feel good old-fashioned phone calls. I know that it didn't even occur to me. Um you know, it can be tempting to feel like, well, I'm being a burden and I don't want to I don't want to burden other people. But the point is of the Christian life is that we are designed to be burdens to one another, we're designed to carry and be carried. So it's really vital that um not only are we reaching out to others, but we're looking out for one another too, and I think that's actually a way of protecting our own mental health, you know. I can't there is a danger that I will try and take the whole world on in one go. I'll you know, I'll feel overwhelmed, there's so much need, there's so much that I can't I can't do, and I'll I'll retreat into myself. But if I can put some limits on that, if I can say, okay, there's a limit to what I can do, maybe on a global scale, but what about my next door neighbour? What about a close friend that I know is struggling? I can reach out to them, I can phone them, there are things that I can do to encourage them.
SPEAKER_02So this is this is kind of helping those as well who have mental ill health, you're struggling with anxiety, but here here is a a kind of an opportunity. Can you also reach out? And that that kind of opens out your world when you've been shrinking it down.
SPEAKER_03Well, I I think so. I think um yeah, we you can get lost in yourself, and that's one of the you know, especially if you're struggling, it's very easy to get stuck in your own head and to forget about other people. But actually, when we look at other people, we're reminded, we we put things into perspective, um, and not in a sense of, well, look, you know, it could be so much worse, there are starving children in Africa, which is true, but doesn't really change your mindset. But just in the sense of, okay, this is hard for me at the moment, but what about my other friends at church? What are their struggles? And I think again that's why the communication is so important because as we talk to other people, we're reminded that they're of the positive things that we share, but also the difficulties, and then we can look out for one another. So look out for families who are struggling with childcare, or maybe health workers who are facing endless pressures or endless shifts, you know, and or churches that need extra support during the downturn. Um, it's it's easy to forget what's going on, it's easy to think the grass is greener, but when you're talking to other people, you don't so much. So if you're stuck at home and you're thinking, Well, I wish I was out doing a job, you talk to somebody who's working in the health service and who is run off their feet and you realise, okay, there's good things about being here. And similarly, the person who is working really hard, you know, maybe doing shift work or you know, really tired, just wants to go back home is remindable. There are some positives about being out as well.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah. So the big big message here is isolation is merely physical. And even even like the phrase social distancing, I I've got a problem with because actually we're not we we we ought not to socially distance from one another. We ought to physically distance ourselves from one another, but actually socially, there's never been a a greater time where we need to reach out uh in emotional ways.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Point number three, don't feed your anxieties. What do you mean?
SPEAKER_03Well, we think about what we're going to if we're looking after ourselves physically, and again, you know, that's the front line for this uh coronavirus, is look after yourself physically. So you what you do things like you try and get enough sleep and you watch what you eat, don't you? And you, you know, make sure you're um uh drinking plenty of water and staying warm and all the rest.
SPEAKER_02That's like the doorknobs, that would be bad.
SPEAKER_03Indeed. Um But what about our what about our mental health diet? What are we putting into our brains? And there's so much that's going on, so many news bulletins, so many updates, you know. Um and I think they can be detrimental if we're having them all the time because that's telling us who we are and how we're doing. By all means stay informed, but I think you need to put limits on it. So um maybe you check in with one reputable news source once a day, and then you switch off and instead put in things that are going to be feeding you. So if you're confined at home, here's a great chance to read some of those Christian classics you've always meant to dig out.
SPEAKER_02Because that's that's not that's point number four, isn't it? Eat a healthy mental diet. So instead of eating the junk food of social media that's fueled by fear and outrage, yeah. Instead, what's what's the healthy diet that we can eat?
SPEAKER_03Well, obviously, there's the you know, it's it's getting in the Bible where you can, it's it's praying, it's all of those means of grace, listening to Christian music, um, you know, doing the things, but also things doing things that just feed you generally. Maybe you're somebody who loves to do craft, okay, get stuck into your craft. Maybe you're someone who, you know, um likes to uh get your house sorted out. This is a good time to be doing that without going, you know, too far on it. Um the I guess it's hard though to get the Bible in whenever you're struggling with your mental health. It's hard to focus, it's hard to concentrate. So be creative about that. So one thing that I would do is, you know, reading the Bible stories with my my children, the Jesus Storybook Bible, that is really simple, really basic gospel truths. And when you can't focus on very much, it's great to look at those pictures, to look at the very, very simple bare bones of what it is that we believe. Um or maybe just to pick out one verse that you love. What is that verse? Put it on the wall, carry it around, learn a lot by heart, and when your mind starts wandering, tell yourself that truth again. Um great.
SPEAKER_02Eat a healthy mental diet. Um, and then point number five you've got is be practical.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, so things like if you're on medication, for example, check that you are able to get enough, you know, don't don't leave it to the last minute to um order or or ask someone to pick it up for you. You know, if you're working from home, try and build in new routines. Um and don't sit in your pajamas all day. You know, even if you even if you there's nothing on the agenda, put some things in. Get up. Um and a friend of mine actually was telling me the other day, she says, I'm gonna wear a dress every single day. I'm in isolation. She says, I never wear a dress normally. I'm always, you know, in casual. But it's that mindset, isn't it, of there's something to get up for. There's a you know, this is life, but just in a different, in a different way.
SPEAKER_02And some people can find changes in routine extremely difficult. Umce they're in a routine, that's great. They're they're motoring. But in the change of gears between one routine and another, how can we help people to to practically make that transition?
SPEAKER_03I I'd love to have an easy answer for that, um, because I'd be putting it into place myself. But I think the first thing is is just to recognise that everybody finds it hard. You're not somehow strange or weird for for finding this difficult. But then I suppose this is a way that you can help somebody else, isn't it? To break down their day for them into smaller chunks. So the whole day feels overwhelming, the whole let alone the whole week, let alone the whole month. But if you take it look step by step, then it becomes more manageable. So to sit down with someone and say, okay, this is the time you're gonna get up at, and here's what you're gonna do at breakfast time, here's what you're gonna have for breakfast, if that's helpful for them, you know. Then uh in the morning, you're gonna have some time to do to work in the garden, or you're gonna have some time to do catch up on a few emails, or whatever it is. Uh maybe you want to do a bit of housework, maybe you want to check in, maybe there's a time when you will phone someone that you uh you care about. Maybe there's a a time when you will sit down and watch something that you know on TV that you really enjoy that you find familiar or comforting, but just to block those things out to help someone so that it becomes more manageable, and then you develop new routines and you get a more of a sense of safety and security with those.
SPEAKER_02And a sense of of moving from rest to work to rest again.
SPEAKER_03I think so, yeah. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02And what is it that demarcates those different areas of your life?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, and making sure that that's all, you know, it's it's all encompassed by by scripture and by a knowledge of the Lord's the Lord's control, the Lord's hand in it as well. So you're not just kind of saying, okay, well, knock yourself out on six series or whatever it is on Netflix, but again, trying to be, you know, just just think, okay, at the beginning of the day, is it a good idea to open up your phone and go onto Twitter and check the news, or might it be more helpful to look at, you know, just even if it's just one verse that's gonna give you uh a different way of looking at the day, a different way of looking at the world? Because that that can change the whole tenor of the day, can't it? You know, what I read first thing, what I what I look at, what I'm putting in, you know, I wake up naturally, I feel like, oh, I'm gonna stay in bed all day, this is horrendous, let alone if I'm hearing Piers Morgan or whoever it is in Good Morning Britain. You know, but if even if I'm just even if I just have an audio bible and somebody reading me, like David Suchet reading me a portion of scripture, go to the gospel stories, go to the things that the books that you love, go to the Psalms, go to don't try and make this is not the time to be setting yourself extra challenges in terms of your Bible reading.
SPEAKER_02There's something else I'm trying to remember that you've said in the past that's been really helpful about uh a bank, a bank of a coping bank? A coping bank. What is a coping bank?
SPEAKER_03Well, a coping bank is it's it's often used in treating eating disorders. So um it's really a list of things that you can do that are alternatives that are healthier ways of dealing with stress than you might be tempted to fall into otherwise. So for example, I run a bath. If you've got a pet, give your pet a stroke, you know, do some deep breathing, um, get out of jigsaw, phone a friend, um, have a list that's on your your fridge or by your phone that has three people that you know you can phone or talk to. So, you know, I'll try Jenny. If Jenny's not in, I'll try Craig. If Craig's not in, then I'll Why are you calling Craig?
SPEAKER_00Who's Craig?
SPEAKER_03These are all hypothetical. And in fact, I was thinking of Craig's. This is what causes stress for me. Yes, well, there we are. Craig from namers. Yeah, and that was years and anyway. Craig McLaughlin. We're just gonna stop.
SPEAKER_02Hey Mona, that guy.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, I was thinking crocodile shoes, but that's Jimmy Neal. And yeah, anyway.
SPEAKER_02Yes, so yes, call people, but not Craig. Yes.
SPEAKER_03Well, yes, whatever works, whatever works for you. Or even helplines, you know. It might be that um you need to have a a list of of people on you know, helplines that you can phone, and these are available. And if you if you can't get through to anybody else, well there's an opportunity to this is brilliant.
SPEAKER_02All great uh practical tips. And then in your last three points, um, you talk about three things to remember, three things to remember really about uh the gospel. And the first one is remember, Jesus does not self-isolate.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. Well, pandemics don't catch God off guard. You know, over and over in the Bible we read about plagues of all kinds, sicknesses, things like leprosy of all kinds that don't have a cure, that lead to people being isolated and you know, um pushed away from their own community. Um and we see the Lord acting in and through even these things. And in the same way, he's he is at work even now. You know, the king of heaven is not practicing social distancing, he is reaching out to us. So, you know, I think about a passage, for example, from uh from Matthew 8, where Jesus comes to a leper and everyone else is backed off him. You know, this is someone who, if he touches you, you're contaminated and there's no cure. You just you never see people, not for any particular period, but for the rest of your life. But Jesus is not afraid. You know, the man says to Jesus, Look, are you willing? If you're willing, you can make me clean. And Jesus reaches out to him in so many ways. He he reaches out verbally, he says, I am willing. He reaches out physically, he touches him, he touches the man. This is incredible. And instead of the man's contamination spreading to Jesus, Jesus spreads his cleanness. You know, it's a wonderful picture, isn't it? Of the God who reaches out and meets people in their need, whatever it is we're facing. Um, and he leads us back into community as well, you know, by restoring the man with leprosy, he restored him to community to other people, and we can reach out to other people as well. We're part of community. We we might not be together physically, but we are together in so many other ways, and we're united not only to the Lord Jesus who is with us, but to his people, um, and he reaches us right now. I've been reading a bit of um an amazing book by Richard Sibbs called The Bruised Reed, which is just wonderful. I'd really I'd commend it to um anyone who hasn't read it, and he makes a number of different points. One of them is that it's a holy despair in ourselves is the ground of true hope. Wow. And that is what we're finding at the moment, isn't it? A despair, a holy despair in ourselves.
SPEAKER_02Okay, yeah, holy despair. So it's not it's not just self-hatred.
SPEAKER_03No, and it's not just everything is terrible, the words all go into pot, you know, goodness me, what's happening?
SPEAKER_02It's and it's not self-harm, right? It's not self-contempt, it's a holy despair.
SPEAKER_03It's a holy despair, which means seeing your own seeing your own sin and coming, I guess, you know, in a personal way to the Lord Jesus, which is how he always deals with everybody, you know, the leper being one example, and saying, Lord, oh man, I have really been I have really taken you for granted, I you know, and I I'm sorry. And that but in and then you see real hope because then the Lord lifts you up, doesn't he? You know, and we see this in history time and time again that in times of persecution, you know, um the the the church grows, you know. Again, Sib says we take deeper root by shaking, and that's what's happening just now. We're being we're being shaken. But isn't there's so many opportunities here for us, you know. The church is developing new ways of reaching out, um and in social media, for example, which is something that's you know really popular with young people, which is also a real section of the church that's been overlooked that we're trying to you know that we're trying to to grab hold of. Um so there are many ways in which the Lord is at work in all of this, but primarily I think He is He is a God who isn't sitting up in the cloud, he's a God who makes Himself one of us, who is broken for us, and He comes down to us in our mess and in our sickness and our sin and our suffering and says, I want to be with you where you are and I want to carry that for you. That's the Lord that we have, and that's the Lord who is walking with us now.
SPEAKER_02Um a fellow uh a lecturer that we both had at uh at Oak Hill Theological College, David Field, um, he's always saying, God shows up to you disguised as your life circumstances.
SPEAKER_01It's a great line.
SPEAKER_02God shows up to you disguised as your life circumstances, and we always think that our life circumstances are distracting us from what we should really be doing. And certainly, you know, coronavirus is a detour, isn't it? Um and it's not a detour, it's God showing up to you, you know, wrapped in all these circumstances and saying, you know, it's an intensification of everything, it's an intensification of our mortality, it's an intensification of um our fragility.
SPEAKER_03And a revealing of what was always there. You know, it's not in some ways, you know, we're all gonna die, but we're able to forget about it, aren't we, whenever we're so busy? But we've we've had this veil kind of pulled across, and it's really changing the way that we think about things and our priorities. Um, you know, I think even just a couple of weeks ago, reading in magazines, what are the five new skincare creams that are gonna change you this spring? And I, you know, you look at that this week and you go, What? Yeah, right. What? And yet it it really puts things, it really puts things into perspective. Um yeah.
SPEAKER_02John Bear is a um a theologian, Orthodox, um, Eastern Orthodox theologian um uh who has some really fascinating things to say um about our mortality, and he he says the reason the the biggest obstacle to the gospel going forward in the modern world is that nobody sees death anymore. And it's that idea that you know our our elderly, we we shove them off into nursing homes, they die alone, and nobody sees death anymore. And it's the it's the biggest you know, if we are perishing, and if that is the context of Christ the resurrection coming into our world, um then to the degree that we don't see the sinking sand of our mortality is the degree to which you know we won't see the need for the rock either. Um so is this another way in which um the Lord is at work, the Lord is reaching out. So remember, point number six, Jesus does not self-isolate. Um point number seven, you say remember prayer is powerful.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, and I need to remind myself of this, because it's one of those things we always say, isn't it? Oh, I wish I could do more, all I can do is pray. Well, that is massive. Um and our I guess our worries are really unarticulated prayers, aren't they?
SPEAKER_02Okay, tell me what that means.
SPEAKER_03Well, if we if we put words to them, then we can send them to the Lord, but you kind of gotta let it's like posting a letter. You've got to let go of it. Then God will take it for you. You know, if you're hanging on to that letter, it's not gonna go anywhere.
SPEAKER_02And that's what that's what worry is. Worry is a letter that I've written, but kind of to myself, I guess.
SPEAKER_03It's like Yeah, that I'm plugging, I'm rereading. I am rereading over and over and over.
SPEAKER_02But you're treating yourself as though the one who's gonna you're you're the one who's gonna solve your problems. Yeah. Dear me, I'm going to, you know. Yeah. And then it's like, dear me. Absolutely. So instead so instead of clutching your petitions to yourself and treating yourself like the answerer of your own anxieties, you pray them, you send them off.
SPEAKER_03And in all of this, uh in prayer, as with everything else we've been talking about, I think it's uh the acknowledgement of our dependence, isn't it? Because Jesus comes to broken people, but the qualification is that you recognise that you're broken, you know, and and prayer is that recognition, I cannot fix this by myself. You know, think about Paul saying, Don't be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and petition with thanksgiving. And isn't that interesting with thanksgiving?
SPEAKER_02Two little words that we always forget.
SPEAKER_03Present your request to God, and the peace of God which transcends all understanding will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus. And isn't that interesting? Our hearts and our minds, and there's a battleground there, it's not just in our bodies, it is in our hearts, it is in our minds. We need that peace. Um, but everything in everything with prayer and petition with thanksgiving, and that that is vital too. You know, what are the things at the moment that we can be thankful for? What are the things that are going on? There's a lot to be frightened of. There is a lot to be thankful for, right? Not least that we can we've got communities, we've got things like social media where we can encourage and bless one another.
SPEAKER_02We've got access to our Bibles, you know, uh so much that I st I still think it's the case that not a no child under 10 years old has died of of coronavirus. I you know, what what a mercy. What a mercy that our children um aren't aren't being targeted by this. But there's lots to lots to give thanks for, and that's at the heart of these prayers.
SPEAKER_03That's right, and to pray as well for you know, again, praying for others as well, obviously. So praying, Lord, please help people working in the vaccine, please help those who are working in the health services, you know, praying for those who are vulnerable and their loved ones, um just lifting each other in your own. Yeah, so every time you panic about it and you think, oh, you know, okay, Lord, help the people who are stacking the shelves, you know. Every everybody, every element of it, and then letting that go. Letting that go. And a good exercise sometimes to do is to literally write it on a bit of paper and then scrumple it up and put it in the bin, pray it, and then throw it away physically. You know, that that can be helpful.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, great. So prayer is powerful. And then eighth and finally, remember the future is bright.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, well, we're we're seeing in the papers at the minute the Chinese government have released images of um intensive care doctors from Wuhan taking off their masks and clocking off for the last time.
SPEAKER_02It's a great, it's a great image because they're in the sunshine and they're kind of smiling underneath it. It's clearly propaganda.
SPEAKER_03Like, well, yes, almost certainly propaganda, but what are these images tapping into? Well, they're tapping into the sense that and the hope that the sun comes out after the storm. You know, I guess we are we are trying to hang on to that at the moment in many ways. But the but what are we telling ourselves? You know, are we saying, Oh, it's gonna get better? Is it someone like Boris who is saying, Well, look, hopefully we can turn this around in 12 weeks? Whereas actually then you've got a lot of other people who are going, don't know about that, you know.
SPEAKER_02And uh who do you trust on that?
SPEAKER_03What do we trust on it? Well, we trust God's word, and here we've got a really trustworthy source. Um that and here's the headline you know, there's a day of liberation and celebration, and it is gonna come because it's already been guaranteed by Christ. He has taken on already our greatest enemies, he's already taken on death, he's already taken on sickness, he's taken on sin and disease, and he has conquered them. You know, he has come through these things and he brings us through with them.
SPEAKER_02Because that that that's what's so powerful about the Wuhan image is that you know, okay, let's let's let's believe the propaganda. Let's believe it that you know they have gone through their horror and they've come out the other side and they're in the sunshine and they're smiling, and there's freedom, right? Um and when you look to the risen Christ, you see someone who has gone through the ultimate storm, through the ultimate horror, and has come out the other side and he promises to get us through. You know, it's it's it's that it's that sense that it's not the sense, you know, it it's you know, in Psalm 23, you know, yeah, either I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, um, it's not I walk around the valley of the shadow of death, and it's not I'm beamed up out of the valley of the shadow of death. It's but but that through, you know, we will get to the other side of those very frightening graphs.
SPEAKER_03Um and that we have to do it, that that is the way of the gospel. The way of the gospel is cross and resurrection. Um and this is you know Easter. Yeah, it it is. It's always it's always the path of suffering, it's always the path of brokenness through which we we find life, you know. So Proverbs, I'm thinking about, you know, there's a way that seems right to a man, but in the end it leads to death. And while we're comfortable and while we don't we don't realize what's going on, even if it is a lovely life, what what happens at the end of it? It leads to death. Whereas, you know, even when you're if you die to yourself, the person who dies themselves will find life and life to the full.
SPEAKER_02I've never put those two things together. That's that's really good. Yeah, there's a way that seems right, it ends in death. Jesus says, come and die, and you'll live.
SPEAKER_03Absolutely, and you will really live.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_03And doesn't that feel it feels like well it is, it's literal physical death that we're facing at the moment, but it's also emotional, mental, a million different tiny deaths to the people we thought we were, to the society we thought we were in, to the things that we thought we were in control of, to our routines, to everything about ourselves. We have gotta die. We're dying too. Right. But there's a resurrection on the other side because Jesus promises it, and he is with us in this.
SPEAKER_02Through the valley of the shadow, out into feasting joy. And you've got that great verse from 1 Peter 5. Give it to us. Go on, what's what's the great verse from 1 Peter 5?
SPEAKER_03And after you have suffered for a little while, the God of all grace who called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself perfect, confirm, strengthen, and establish you.
SPEAKER_02Wow. Wow. On the other side of a lot of pain and a lot of struggle, and there is no way around, there's no way of being beamed out, but through it, in Christ, who is with us as the Good Shepherd, out we come. And there will be a time when we'll look back on 2020 and we'll say, I don't know how we got through, but somehow Jesus got us through.
SPEAKER_03Amen. Amen.
SPEAKER_02Well, we hope that's um been helpful to you guys as ways of fighting corona brain, um, that the peace of God, which passes all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. And because prayer is at the heart of that, why don't why don't I finish with a prayer? Let's pray. Heavenly Father, we ask that in the midst of our fears you would help us to pray them. And we pray that as we put our burdens onto the shoulders of the Lord Jesus, that he will carry them and that we will know him carrying those burdens, we will know him carrying us through this valley and out into your wonderful future. Lord, help us as we walk through this time to be people of faith and hope and love because we ask in Jesus' name. Amen.