Contagious Disease, Stress & Why Everyone Feels On Edge | Pause on the Headlines

This week on Pause on the Headlines, we’re talking about the return of disease-focused headlines — from Ebola outbreaks to hantavirus stories — and why health scares seem to hit our nervous systems differently now.

Even when risks are statistically low for most people, the emotional impact of these headlines can feel enormous. Why?

Because many of us are still carrying the psychological imprint of collective stress, uncertainty, and hypervigilance from the past several years.

In this episode, we unpack:

• Why contagious disease headlines spread anxiety so quickly
• The psychological aftermath of living through prolonged global stress
• How social media amplifies fear cycles
• Doomscrolling and nervous system exhaustion
• The difference between awareness and panic
• Why people feel emotionally depleted by “breaking news”
• How chronic uncertainty changes the brain
• The cultural shift toward health anxiety and preparedness

We also talk about how modern media ecosystems keep us emotionally activated:

• constant alerts
• worst-case-scenario framing
• survival-focused content
• and the feeling that catastrophe is always one notification away

This episode isn’t about dismissing real health concerns. It’s about understanding the emotional environment we’re all living in — and why so many people feel overwhelmed, exhausted, or perpetually “bracing” for the next thing.

Because sometimes the real story isn’t just the headline itself.

It’s what years of stress have done to the way we experience headlines at all.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Hey everyone, welcome to The Honest Pause. I'm Carol Rothri, actress, intuitive coach, and your co-host for Real Meaningful Conversations.

SPEAKER_00 0:09

And I'm Miriam Tyree, entrepreneur, business strategist, and your partner in navigating life's ups and downs.

SPEAKER_01 0:16

Here we talk about what happens when you hit pause, when we reflect and embrace the messy beauty of life.

SPEAKER_00 0:23

So whether you're here to reflect, recharge, or just have a good laugh, we've got you covered. Let's get started. There's a lot of news, and I know that a lot of our listeners have a lot of feelings around things like seeing all these headlines about Hontavirus and Ebola. And so today we want to take a few minutes to talk about the stress of contagious disease and sort of why people feel a little bit more on edge right now, maybe about seeing this stuff in the news.

SPEAKER_01 1:25

Well, I think um it's just another reminder and it's bringing back I I I've noticed that just you know, talking with people, going for coffee, whatever, the the conversation is all of a sudden going back to do you remember when we it was COVID? Like COVID is coming back into the conversations. The fact, you know, how everything changed. We were I was talking to somebody who was, you know, in New York and and the different shifts, how everything changed. Every single city, every single human being was affected by what happened, you know, students, schools, everything shutting down. It was like the world stopped. Um, and now with like you're saying, and it's true with this, the the Hanta and the um Ebola, it's like, oh my gosh, and it's it's starting to become it's it's happening again, the conversations are happening again. Um, and rightfully so, it makes sense. It's just, and even something is is like the measles, you know. At one time that it was it was eradicated because you know, people were you know going out and being vaccinated, and then that's kind of stopped, and all of a sudden, after years of it being gone, it is coming back again, you know, and it's it's a it's a frightening time. Well, I don't want to go to that place, let's not go to that, but it is definitely a place of concern yet again.

SPEAKER_00 2:49

Absolutely. I think there's a lot of like collective feeling and trauma around the COVID experience. And I think one thing that I want to take a step back is that it's it's it's hard for us to remember this. So I want to take a step back, which is let's take a step back and look at COVID. So COVID lasted a number of years, it started in 2019, you know, there's a debate on as to how long that lasted. And they're of our population, I think the number is like 0.25% of people on the planet passed away. And that's pretty significant. That's millions and millions of people, and I think many people had very different experiences, but I think the thing that I want to take a step back from is that these kind of epidemics and pandemics are not new to human history, and it's hard for many of us who never experienced other pandemics or epidemics and like had to deal with the consequences of those like on a daily basis, or had our lives like so significantly impacted. Like none of us were around when the Spanish flu was around, or you know, the Black Death, or all these plagues that happened throughout human history. Um there's a this is this isn't new to us, but I think that there have been so much like there's a lot of uncertainty and fear, and currently now, whereas in the past this wasn't the same, is we have instant news about all of these things and had all the time, and it's constantly in our face. And so we talk a lot about this is our body reacts before the facts do. So, right, you see this thing, and there are these people who have contivirus on a cruise ship, and we get that like adrenaline of I don't want I don't want this to impact my life. And then you see headlines on Instagram or TikTok that are like what they're not telling you, or doctors are warning, or this could become, and I think it is hard with the amount of information and all of the sources of information that we are getting to know what is true and what is not true, and what to and when to do something about it. Does that make sense?

SPEAKER_01 5:33

It does, but again, I mean, what what is it you can do? What is it we can do right now? That's the thing. Um, but yeah, everybody is going to be riding that edge of well, what's going to happen? And even wasn't there something where the ship was trying to dock? They were trying to take care of and and and I understand, you know, the country's saying that's not happening. You're not this is not happening, you're not bringing it here. So they in turn had to bring, you know, the medical um people to the ship. It's a scary thing. Oh, I got goosebumps because it just brings back that memory again where it does, it goes into that frenzy thing. And you nailed it, the fact that there's so much that hits hits the you know the social media right away and it it starts it. That that frenzy starts up again. So, how do we combat that? Like, what do you do, right?

SPEAKER_00 6:25

Well, I think firstly, it's very easy to start living in these hypothetical situations in the futures, right? So we all have choice. Do you want to get a news notification on your phone and push alerts and the social media commentary? Do you want to have that like constant, I guess you could call it like a chronic vigilance of like being on alert? But I think my opinion, and everybody has to figure out what works for them, is it is important to be informed about situations, but not overstimulated and unable to take a step back. So if it were me, my advice that I give myself is you know, stop compulsively checking and pick one or two trusted news sources where you can say, okay, I trust this news source. It is, you know, one that I has proven to be accurate and will provide me the information I need to know as it affects me. Um, because I think there can be a dangerous side of being like, I'm just not gonna look at anything or the news or not be informed about anything. And and to a certain extent, I think like it is our duty and our responsibility to like be informed about the things that could affect us. So I think my advice is try not to look at all the things on social media and look at it too much, but find a few sources of trusted information and make sure you're educated and informed in a you know healthy way. Now, I can be terrible about this because I studied this stuff in school, and so I'm like, oh, I'm really interested and I want to look into all of it. But I think unfortunately the truth is there's a lot that we just don't know. And that I think is also what's scary is we know some things about the hauntivirus, but you know, the the strain that infects humans, we don't actually know a lot about. And with what's going on with Ebola, I get and I think it's like we we don't know a lot about these things. And I think overall what we have to understand as people is you know, our planet has a lot of people on it, and we have a lot of people and we have a lot of animals, and diseases happen. And I think that diseases are going to continue to happen like they have throughout human history. And my advice is be informed about what you could be affected by and what you couldn't be affected by, right? Understand what the risks are to you personally, talk to your medical provider or you know, see what, you know, I have a lot of clients who are very concerned about ticks this season, and ticks are oh, it's gonna be it's a there they are saying be aware, like keep get your dogs, your cats, whatever your outdoor animals take care of that situation because yeah, it's it is going to be a really big tick season for sure.

SPEAKER_01 9:44

But what do you do? Like you keep your animals inside. It's like we have to keep living, it's like you you be informed, don't go to that alarm. We don't need to go there, be be informed, do what you can, but live your life. You have to live your life, exactly.

SPEAKER_00 9:59

And there's uh at a certain point, there there is only so much you can do or prevent. We cannot control every outcome of every situation, and so I think it's again my advice to people in general is like really understand like what are your risk factors, really understand how could these things personally affect you? And is there an actual like threat or concern that you need to be aware of? Um, you know, do you live in an area that has a lot of ticks? Okay, how do you handle that? Talk to your doctor and your local news source. Um, you know, are you going to Congo or not right now? Um, you know, were you sitting next to the person who got Hontavirus on the cruise ship, right? There are reliable sources of information out there that can help you understand are you at risk for these things or are you not? And you know, being informed matters, public health matters, awareness matters, but there is a difference between that and constant emotional navigation, like activation.

SPEAKER_01 11:11

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 11:13

Um I think it I think we're in this day and age where breaking news can become a lifestyle.

SPEAKER_01 11:22

And that is so spot on. Oh my gosh, you nailed it.

SPEAKER_00 11:28

I mean, everything's breaking breaking news. This this horrible thing in Garden Grove, you know, this chemical spill or potential chemical spill. You know, it's like there's this constant, I just want breaking news about like puppies and horses sometimes, right? Um I think we were carrying a lot of stress because COVID was really challenging. It was challenging for me.

SPEAKER_01 11:54

It was horrible. It was a horrible time for everybody.

SPEAKER_00 11:57

I'm sure it's gonna be in my daughter's textbooks of like, and she's gonna ask, like, she's gonna read what's this about, mom? COVID? What did you do? I'm like, we tried to grow strawberries in our backyard and we couldn't grow any. We killed them all. I think we tried to grow tomatoes. It was a it was not good. We grew spinach for a while, but we only grew enough spinach for a salad.

SPEAKER_01 12:21

One salad, Carol. What?

SPEAKER_00 12:27

Yes, only one salad. Spinach was slow, but you know what?

SPEAKER_01 12:32

Good on you for planting it. I I can't say anything because anything green, I can love it and do all the things I think I'm supposed to do, but it it just dies on me. So I've just learned that I'm going to enjoy other people. That one head of spinach that you had, I'm thrilled.

SPEAKER_00 12:50

Thank you. I'll take it back. Um, so what would you say to a client about the fear of fear of this right now?

SPEAKER_01 13:01

Just what I said, you just can't do it. I I personally have uh stopped watching the news. I don't, I'm not burying my head in the sand by any stretch uh of the imagination. I'm making my I'm making sure that I'm aware, but I'm not allowing myself to go to that place. And as I tell everybody, the only thing you can control is how you respond to things. So I am choosing to not respond in that crazy fear, oh my god, doom and gloom. I'm going, okay, we got to be aware of this, but we got to live 100%. This is it's we just have to live our lives, you know, it can't stop.

SPEAKER_00 13:39

Exactly. Educate, inform, understand your personal and specific risk factors, and understand when this doesn't affect you. And you know, there's a lot that we don't know, but I would tell people from a scientific perspective that these things aren't going away. Like maybe hauntiviral, you know, disease is just a part of existence.

SPEAKER_01 14:03

Yeah, it is, and like you've said, it will continue to be.

SPEAKER_00 14:08

Absolutely. All right. Well, we hope that you can figure out a way to manage this in a way that feels right for you. And uh just know that you will be okay and it will be okay. And we'll see you on the next one.

SPEAKER_01 14:24

Yeah. Thanks for spending time with us today. We do hope you're feeling inspired, entertained, or at least had a moment to breathe.

SPEAKER_00 14:54

And if you did enjoy your time with us, do us a little favor, leave a five-star review wherever you're listening and let the world know what you love about the show.

SPEAKER_01 15:04

We'd really love to connect with you beyond the podcast. So you can find out uh all the details about staying in touch with us in the episode notes.

SPEAKER_00 15:13

And hey, if you're interested in working with us or you just want to chat, all the details are there as well.

SPEAKER_01 15:19

We'll see you next time. And remember, you are never too busy to take a pause.