How can we best prepare for the psychological impacts of social distancing during the age of Coronavirus? In this episode, host and therapist Carter Umhau, LMHC shares her experience with self-isolating a couple weeks ahead of the curve in Seattle, a city already ahead of the curve in shelter-in-place mandates than most other US cities. Opal: Food + Body Wisdom's Co-Founders, Lexi Giblin, PhD, CEDS, Kara Bazzi, LMFT, CEDS, and Julie Church, RDN, CEDRD-S, CD, ask Carter the questions, exploring topics such as loneliness, loss of routine, experience of food, and relationship to exercise during this unprecedented time. Julie, Lexi, and Kara offer insights and wisdom from their areas of mental health and eating disorder expertise. While this episode speaks to the privileged experience of getting to self-quarantine and work from home, it doesn't significantly address the growing economic crisis or the experience of the many people working jobs to keep the rest of us afloat, with no option to stay at home. Despite these gaps, we hope this conversation offers you a place to find resonance and support while we all live into the new, challenging realities of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Links:

Deliciousness Matters, by Sam Sifton for the New York Times: https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/18/dining/deliciousness-matters.html

Encouraging Messages from Italians in Quarantine: https://www.theatlantic.com/video/index/608113/italy-coronavirus/

Research: The psychological impact of quarantine and how to reduce it: rapid review of the evidence: https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(20)30460-8/fulltext?dgcid=raven_jbs_etoc_email

Research: The Healing Benefits of Nature: https://www.opalfoodandbody.com/reflections-on-covid-19-and-spending-time-in-nature/

Connect with Opal:

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Thank you to our team...

Editing by Hans Anderson: http://www.hfanderson.com/

Music by Aaron Davidson: https://soundcloud.com/diet75/

Daniel Guenther at Jack Straw Cultural Center: http://www.jackstraw.org/

Host and Producer Carter Umhau: www.carterumhau.com