Critical Thinking: Can Someone Be Overly Fearful Of The Coronavirus If They Were Abused As A Child?

Although there are some people who have done their best to carry on as normal since the arrival of the contagion, there are others who have been unable to do so. For someone in the second position, it might not matter if the restrictions have been eased where they live.

They may have continued to spend a lot of time in isolation and done their best to avoid getting too close to others. When it comes to their family and friends, however, this might not be an issue.

A Challenging Time

If this is the case, their life is going to be radically different to how it was before. There will be all the things that they are able to do now that things have changed but they won’t be interested in spreading their wings, so to speak.

Even if they were to think about leaving their home, they could experience a fair amount of fear and anxiety. So when they do leave their home, they are going to be filled with a lot of tension.

A Massive Risk

Behind this can be the belief that they are putting their life at risk by going out into the world. If they have to work in an environment where there are a lot of people, it could be difficult for them to keep it together.

As soon as they get to work, they could be looking forward to when the time comes for them to leave and go back home. But, even when they are at home, it doesn’t mean that they will find it easy to experience inner peace.

Two Parts

This can partly be put down to the fact that there will be a virus out there that they could catch at any moment and partly down to the fact that they are likely to spend a lot of time viewing the mainstream media. With the former on their mind and the latter filling their mind, it is to be expected that they would typically be unsettled.

There is the chance that they will have a strong need to know what is going on, so even if they are not watching the news, they could regularly receive updates direct to their Smartphone. This will allow them to feel as though they know what is going on, which can allow them to feel more at ease, at times.

Close To the Edge

After they have had a vaccine or a booster, they could feel more settled but, this could soon change after they have been updated by the media. After being told that the numbers are going up or that there is a new variant, for instance, they could soon be on unstable ground.

It is then not going to be a surprise if they find it hard to concentrate and are often unable to fall asleep at night. At any moment, it could seem as if their life is going to come to an end.

The proof

There can be people in their life who say that they are overreacting and they could be encouraged to spend less time consuming the mainstream media. This could fall on deaf ears, though, with one dismissing what they say.

If one was to think about the people who they have lost to the virus, their mind might go blank. Or, they may think of someone, perhaps who already had at least one health problem, who is said to have died from it.

A Closer Look

Now, one way of looking at this would be to say that as there is a killer virus out there, it is perfectly normal for them to be this way. They are simply behaving how any relational person would behave, given what is going on.

Another way of looking at this would be to say that there is something taking place within them, at a deeper level that is playing a part in their experience. Nonetheless, as this relates to inner material that is outside of their conscious awareness, they are unable to realise what is going on.

Old Wounds

This inner material can be the result of what they experience during their formative years, with this being stage of their life when they were physically harmed and perhaps neglected by their caregiver/s. Thanks to this, they would have often felt as though they were going to die.

But, as they wouldn’t have been able to stop what was going on or to leave this dysfunctional environment, they had to disconnect from what was going on. This would have allowed them to lose touch with how they felt but it wouldn’t have actually removed the feelings or the arousal that they experienced.

Recycling The Past

Therefore, although many, many years will have passed since this stage of their life, they will still be carrying repressed feelings and arousal. But, while they will have no conscious awareness of what is taking place at a deeper level - in another part of their being - what is held here will have an impact on their life.

It will play a part in how they perceive reality, how they behave, how they feel and what they fear. Taking this into account, there is the virus and what is actually going on and, then, there is what is going on for them and how this causes them to experience reality.

Final Thoughts

Naturally, if, deep down, they feel as though they are going to die, as a result of unresolved trauma, this is going to make it hard for them to be present. How they perceive the virus, as rational as it may appear to be, will be unconsciously filtered through a stage of their life when they were totally powerless and defenceless and their death appeared to be imminent.

If they started to resolve this trauma, they would gradually end up in a very different place and this would most likely cause them to be more at ease. By no longer projecting their past onto the present and being able to think more clearly, they would spend less time in fear and more time focusing on what they can actually do to protect themselves.

Instead of being plugged into the media and allowing their stress levels to rise, something that will actually lower their immune system, they will look into what they can do to enhance it. This will show that they are taking their power back and are being responsible for their health, as opposed to giving it away to something ‘out here’ and relying on others to keep them alive.

Of course, when they were in a traumatised state and felt powerless, they wouldn’t have believed that they had control over their health. They would have been a sitting duck and their health would have been in someone else’s hands. 

---

If you feel this has been of value, please leave a comment, like or get in touch. And feel free to share this article.

• Join my Facebook Page.
• Follow me on Twitter.
• The books I have written.
• Consultations.

Oliver JR Cooper
http://www.oliverjrcooper.co.uk