Why COVID-19 Is Killing Your Boundaries

Source: Pixabay

This week, we learned that, according to the Kinsey Institute, one in five people report they have been contacted by ex-partners during the current crisis and isolation related to COVID-19. The researchers speculate that these contacts come from a variety of motives, ranging from checking on the health and safety of former partners, to existential questions about whether it was right to end past relationships. Renewing old relationships in this time of crisis may be a sense of safety or stability in an unstable time. It might also be a way to develop “after-isolation” plans and potentials for hooking up.

This also reflects one of the changes occurring in people, as we live through this unprecedented crisis – boundaries, agreements, past decisions, and expectations are all seeming to become a bit more nebulous, more flexible, and less substantial, as we live on in isolation.

Many parents started the isolation with excellent intentions and plans to engage with their children and promote excellent individualized homeschooling. And now, they’re fine to tell their kid to find the educational opportunities available in yet another re-watching of The Avengers.

TikTok is ostensibly for young people. But thanks to COVD-19 isolation, we were treated this week to Dame Judi Dench busting out TikTok dance moves with her grandson.

Many of us started this isolation with the best of intentions in maintaining work focus and productivity. We dressed for phone calls and Zoom conferences. Until we didn’t. Many men, such as myself, were taught that we take off a hat when indoors. But, today, and many other days, I’ve been wearing a hat, indoors and out, including during conference calls. Why? Because my hair is getting out of control, as this GQ writer discovered when she investigated the phenomenon.

Source: Justin Lehmiller via Instagram

As I’ve transitioned to telephonic therapies with most of my patients, I’ve found that I have to remain extremely conscious of my boundaries and the professional relationship, or I find myself lapsing into a very casual, friendship-type discussion with patients, rather than a dialogue I would consider consistent with my expectations of psychotherapy. Many therapist colleagues report similar experiences and find themselves navigating strange situations such as talking to patients who are still lying in bed, or who are drinking a beer during therapy. (To be fair, many therapists are also reporting that this form of communication now allows their patients to open up in novel, insightful ways, and engage the therapist into new and previously invisible aspects of their lives.)

It is well known that prolonged isolation has a significant psychological impact. People placed in solitary confinement experience demonstrable and measurable changes to mood, emotional functioning, and psychological wellness, effects that appear to persist even after the isolation ends.

Fellow PT blogger Frank McAndrew wrote this delightful piece several years ago, detailing the ways in which isolation can break down our boundaries around reality, leading to the common experience of psychosis and perceiving ghosts and the presence of people who aren’t actually there. The effects of isolation are present, even when we aren’t alone. Research with scientists stationed in Antarctica over long periods of time finds that the unchanging, unvarying nature of the social isolation leads to conflicts, bickering, grating, and stress in people who simply can’t escape from each other. These effects erode their patience, good nature, and even common politeness.

Why are our boundaries breaking down, and are they going to be gone for good? Simple erosion from fatigue is the most likely culprit, undermining our boundaries. We have physical, temporal, and social boundaries between work and personal life for instance. When people work from home professionally, they often report that they are most effective when they set firm boundaries, establish a home office, and keep a clear schedule. We need these divisions set in place so that we don’t have to consciously maintain them through sheer willpower. But, the COVID crisis has pushed us all into a situation where we must try to maintain all these various boundaries and divisions, strictly through our will, without the benefit of sustaining structure. And that’s exhausting.

Source: Pixabay

When we return to normal lives and work, whatever the new normal looks like, many of us will experience the return of those boundary structures with relief. It will be a huge weight off of us to not have to enforce those boundaries, just through effort. Some of us might chafe a bit, and I expect we might see folks who really wish they could just wear the sweatpants to work, the way they did at home. But by and large, our boundaries will return. This is an opportunity though for all of us to evaluate those boundaries, those divisions, those rules and expectations, and decide if they are ones we want to continue.

In the past, background noises, children, and pets interrupting us during conference calls or video meetings were embarrassing and professionally challenging. Now, we’ve adapted and had to accept that these things happen in real life. Some folks have even taken to playing Bingo during video calls with co-workers, calling out when they spy pets, children, or someone forgets to mute or unmute themselves. Let us hope that our patience with places where boundaries get thin persists past this crisis, and allows us to approach the work-life balance with more kindness for ourselves and each other.