The pandemic has changed people's lives.

I have interviewed four different people who

have similarities as well as differences in the different topics asked about how the pandemic

affects their mental health.

The COVID pandemic caused people's routines to change drastically. Odry says that not

only she but also her family experienced the change of routine. Mostly in the taking of

precaution not to get infected. This led to his family shopping for groceries in the morning. On

the other hand, Doménica comments that she had changed her routine, but that she also changed

her schedule. Which made her have free time since her activities had been canceled. This led to

his sleep hours changing and now he fell asleep later and got up later as well. Diego says that at

the time of the closure his routine had to be modified and that his studies have changed

drastically. On the other hand, Bryan says that he does not change his routine much since he

usually stays at home most of the time and that he did not have a problem in the studies. In my

view I think people react differently because of the way they had the lifestyle.

Many people experienced mental fatigue with the curfew. Doménica comments that her

mental health has been affected by the interruption of the activities she carried out, also by the

lack of socialization and activities she did daily. On the other hand, Odry comments that due to

the pandemic her mental health declined exponentially so now she gets tired very quickly

mentally and that there are things that today overwhelm her more than before. Bryan says there

was a point in the curfew where he got to a point where he no longer felt very comfortable being

always locked in the house. Diego says he was mentally exhausted as he could not socialize with

people other than his family and had the need to leave the house. In my choice there is quite a

similarity of people when it comes to getting mentally tired during confinement.

 Since the beginning of the pandemic, people realized that the people close to them were

in danger if they did not take care of themselves so Diego, Domenica, Odry and Bryan, comment

that they took great care to take care of their grandparents since they were the most likely to be

infected and die. Odry says she didn't see her grandparents for more than 5 months and that

everyone in her family took care of herself to take care of her grandparents. Domenica says that

they simply did not leave the house since she lived with her grandparents and that when they left

they took great care of themselves. Diego says that he moved far away from his grandparents

because vaccination was not feasible yet, but that it took almost a year for them to be reunited,

but always taking care of themselves. Bryan says he didn't see his grandparents for almost a year

because his family was too strict about seeing them since they were very old. I could hear how

the answers were similar since they took care of their grandparents and that some moved away to

take care of them so that they do not get infected. Domenica, for example, she lives with her

grandparents and what she did was simply not go out so as not to expose her grandparents.

Communication is paramount between people, but there is a big difference between a

communication through a telephone than a communication physically. Odry comments that the

affection that is received virtually is not the same as in person, but he says that if a person

answers messages quickly he is pending and is gentle it can be the same. However, she says she's

never going to compare a face-to-face affection or being around people. Doménica comments

that the affection that is expressed at a distance does not equal the affection expressed in person,

but she suggests that expressing affection in any way is the same and that this never ceases to be

so. Bryan agrees with odry since he says that affection in person will never be the same as face-

to-face. Add perhaps many times the words that are said by message can be lies. Diego says that

the messages can have hypocrisy since they are not expressed in formal face-to-face and that the
truth of those messages is hidden very well. In my opinion it can be said that people share the

same topic, which is that you can never compare digital communication with face-to-face

communication since the essence of being present in a conversation is lost.

Virtuality during the pandemic has been one of the primary tools in communication

between communities around the world, so people had to get used to that form of

communication. Bryan says that he has not yet become accustomed to the use of virtual

platforms for his studies and that he is still working on having a greater focus on the study of his

career and believes that a career as dentistry is a career which is not very optimal to learn by

zoom. On the other hand, Doménica expresses that if she has become accustomed to organizing

herself both at work and virtual classes since she has many technological work tools that allow

her to perform homework effectively and efficiently, but that she is very easily distracted since

she is very exposed to the use of social networks. Odry says that he prefers virtual jobs more

since he does everything with his computer, but that at the beginning it was hard to get used to

since all change is hard to make. That does not mean that she prefers to go to classes in person

since she can focus more on learning topics. Diego says that the virtual form had to get used to

the force since it was the only method to study and that it was the main way in which teachers

could communicate with students, but that if classes become complete face-to-face metting he

would have no problem returning. In my opinion, people have very similar things. For example,

most people had to get used to having their work or studies virtually. Unfortunately, people had

to get used to it suddenly. The difference that also exists is that most people do not prefer virtual

things since they believe that it is very difficult to concentrate, but there are other people who

made their lives easier to have their work or classes virtually.

 In conclusion, I could hear how people have many similarities and very few differences.

This led me to a conclusion and that is that the pandemic and the curfew affected us almost

equally and that only differentiates us depending on the type of life that each person had before

the pandemic.

Bibliography

Andrade,D.(2022). Personal interview.

Mino,O.(2022). Personal interview.

Pacheco, D.(2022). Personal interview.

Polo,B.(2022). Personal interview.