Anxiety

Pandemic Recovery

by Jason Rinehart
5 min read

Updated December 2024: This post has been completely rewritten to reflect my evolved understanding of anxiety and to match the voice and insights developed over the past few years. The core experiences and tactics remain the same, but the storytelling and context have been significantly improved. The original was written in survival mode. This version is written with perspective.

Pandemic Recovery

PURPOSE

I thought I was having a heart attack.

Sharp pains in my chest. Weird sensations in my extremities. The kind of symptoms that make you drive to the emergency room at 2am convinced something is seriously wrong.

It wasn’t a heart attack. It was anxiety. Specifically, an anxiety-induced panic attack that I’d been experiencing off and on for days without recognizing it.

Here’s what should have happened: the ER doc tells me my heart is fine, I feel relieved, I go home and move on with my life. Here’s what actually happened: I left the hospital with proof that I wasn’t dying, and it changed nothing. The symptoms kept coming. The fear didn’t stop. My logical brain had evidence. My primitive brain didn’t care.

That was before the pandemic. I was managing. Barely, but managing.

Then 2020 happened. Job changes. Locked in the house 24/7 with my family. The accumulated stress of watching the world fall apart while pretending everything was fine. Whatever coping mechanisms I’d patched together stopped working. The anxiety that had been background noise became the only thing I could hear.

I had to completely rework my life. Not tweak it. Rework it.

This post is what I learned in the process. Not a cure. Not a fix. Survival tactics. The things that kept me functional while I searched for something deeper.

If you’re in crisis or experiencing a mental health emergency, please stop reading and get help. Call or text 988 (Suicide and Crisis Lifeline) or visit Panic & Anxiety Community Support Emergency Help Lines for immediate resources.

WALKTHROUGH

We Figured This Out Together

Before I get into tactics, I need to tell you about my wife.

She was just as confused as I was. She watched me spiral and had no power to stop it. I can’t imagine what that felt like. Loving someone whose mind is attacking itself and having no way to reach them.

But what she didn’t have in answers, she had in strength. The strength I lacked. The light I needed in the darkness. Everything I’m about to share, we figured out together. None of it would have happened without her.

If you have someone like that, lean on them. If you don’t, find professional support immediately. You cannot fight this alone.

Professional Help First

I have Generalized Anxiety Disorder. Your anxiety might be different. The tactics that work for me might not work for you. That’s why the first thing I did was seek professional help.

I started with my primary care physician. Then a licensed therapist. Then a psychologist. Understanding what was actually happening to me physically as a result of my emotional state was the foundation for everything else.

My therapist helped me understand the anxiety circle. Thoughts feed feelings. Feelings change behavior. Behavior creates space for more thoughts. Round and round until you’re so deep in the vortex you can’t see the way out.

I didn’t understand it fully then. I do now. But even partial understanding gave me something to work with.

The Ammunition

Professional help gave me the framework. The tactics below gave me the ammunition to stay in the fight while the framework developed. Think of these as survival tools, not solutions.

Diet. You are what you eat. My doctor recommended Mediterranean. My body responded better to Keto. My wife needs an auto-immune approach. The specific diet matters less than the fact that you’re intentional about it. When your body gets what it needs, your mind has one less thing to fight against. And the knowledge that you’re doing something healthy for yourself improves your mood on its own.

Exercise. The quickest way to combat anxiety is to burn off the excess adrenaline you’ve built up. I’m not talking about becoming a gym rat. A walk outside. Time in nature. Anything that gets you moving and out of your head. Exercise increases endorphins. Endorphins make you feel better. Simple biology working in your favor for once.

Sleep. Your brain needs time to cool down. Lack of sleep creates a weak mind and a poor attitude, which only feeds the anxiety monster. Talk to your doctor about this one. Sleep problems compound everything else.

Human Contact. We were not created to be alone. The pandemic made this brutally clear. Isolation amplifies anxiety. Quality time with people you love, friends, colleagues, even strangers at a local brewery, it all matters. Get back into the world. Your mind needs it.

Music and Stillness. Music is my personal anchor. It allows me to focus, settle down, and drown out the noise around me. Especially in a busy household with kids everywhere. But the real principle is intentional breaks. Scheduled moments where you turn everything off and find stillness. I use music to get there. Find what works for you.

The Question I Couldn’t Answer

Underneath all of it, the ER visits, the panic attacks, the tactics that kept me functional, was a question I couldn’t escape:

Why is this happening to me?

I’m a problem solver. I’ve spent my career breaking down complex systems, finding failure points, building solutions. And here was my own mind, malfunctioning, and I couldn’t see the architecture.

At this point in my story, I didn’t have the answer. I had tactics. I had support. I had professionals helping me understand. But the deeper question of what was actually driving this, what the real trigger was, that took years to figure out.

CONCLUSION

If you’re new to anxiety or haven’t yet realized you have it, my hope is that this gives you somewhere to start.

Get professional help. Talk to your doctor, find a therapist, don’t try to figure this out alone. Lean on the people who love you. Build your ammunition: diet, exercise, sleep, human contact, intentional stillness. And give yourself grace. This takes time.

Also, check your employer resources. Many companies offer mental health support, mindfulness programs, or employee assistance. If yours doesn’t, that’s worth knowing about the place you work.

The tactics in this post didn’t cure me. They kept me alive while I searched for something deeper. Five years later, I found it. That’s a different post.

For now, if you’re in the storm, know that survival is enough. Stay in the fight. The understanding will come.

Resources That Helped Me

This post is the first in a series. Debugging Myself was written five years later, from the other side. If you want to know how the story ends, start there.

If you’re struggling, please reach out to a professional. This is my story, not medical advice. But know that survival is possible, and so is victory.

Photo by Erik Mclean on Unsplash