Mental well-being and online workplaces

Dr Samhita Barooah
QueerUp India, Founder

On the occasion of World Mental Health Day on October 10, 2020 mental well-being at online workplaces has become a huge concern. With COVID 19, workplaces have turned online from physical platforms. I have observed the conditions of working professionals whose lives have suddenly turned topsy turvy with this tech saavy lifestyle. During pre- COVID days work timings were fixed and people could differentiate between work timings, off days, weekends, holidays and family time during festivals, family functions and other emergency situations. With COVID 19 everything has become different for better or for worse. But the most critical impact has affected the mental well-being of people whose lives are entwined between webinars, zoom and webex calls, online marketing sites and their children's WhatsApp chats and PTA meetings etc. Very recently my 70 year old mother was paranoid as her parent teacher meeting went off track. She is still learning technology to conduct her WhatsApp classes and attend Google meets to discuss about the progress of her set of 20 odd 5 year old kids. One parent wanted more of her time online for his son as he only listens to what my mum has to teach. While the earlier protocol was to lessen the screen time for children but now the parents demand more time for their children. 

My mother spends around 4 hours every day in engaging with the teaching learning activities directly with the children, their parents and her colleagues but the preparations and pre class activities and communications take almost 12 to 15 hours of constant onscreen engagement. She doesn't like to talk to any of her family and friends as she gets worried that the data pack and phone memory will fall short of her school activities. She wakes up in the middle of the night to check the WhatsApp updates and the online forwards which keeps on flowing in her work groups. Her anxiety levels increases when the networks get slow and the messages takes time to get delivered or doesn’t reach her on time. She has never been so regular on WhatsApp calls with her immediate family members or children. Her interests in anything other than her school activities has disappeared during this lockdown period. She is constantly engaged in making online videos, action songs, activities during the weekends and any off days which she manages to get once in a while. Her mental wellbeing is better when she is occupied with the school activities but with this non-stop online engagement, I get worried how can she cope with such hyper online activity. She has become a recluse, stopped all personal communication and lost interest in anything other than her school related work.

While at work I myself being an online educator would remain glued to the screen getting paranoid about all online work. With the current pressures of being an online startup founder, my work is practically 24x7. Putting my phone on charge or keeping it switched off is a distant luxury for me these days. My anxiety levels rise these days if I need to attend or make phone calls which doesn't concern my work. The other problem I find is that mental wellbeing has taken a toll on everyone who has to self quarantine themselves or they have gone through the trauma of attending to a death due COVID 19. Some people ventilate their thoughts on social media, chat up with counsellors while others are seeking mental health professional help during this period. I try to check on friends and family everyday whether they like it or not either through a message, ping or WhatsApp forward just to know if they are fine and whether they respond or not. 

We tend to worry more about the consequences and post trauma disorders of mental health conditions but we forget about our own mental well-being at the preventive stages. Mental well-being, mental health and hygiene and mental illness are all different aspects of the mental conditioning of a human being. We are oblivious to the fact that all these conditions can impact the physical health, social stigma and institutional frictions which might occur due to such concerns. 

Workplaces are no longer the same. There is hardly anytime for the occasional leisure chats, office grapevines and the professional parties for people to socialise and loosen up at work. People are constantly running after deadlines which remain constant while salaries are shrinking everyday and layoffs are rising with overworked staff in every work setting. Mental wellbeing is seriously at stake in this uncertain world where people are finding futile reasons to set themselves free and stress free. Some are resorting to lifestyle shifts while others are ending up in confinement paranoias. Overall mental health seems to be the most adverse impact of corona pandemic. Post pandemic workplace structures will involve some other forms of norms which might affect the mental well being of people in another way. Such concerns needs a lot of awareness, support and sensitivity in dealing with a post traumatic condition. Even within the household the quarantine norms, isolation practices and safety precautions can lead to severe domestic discords and affect the children and elderly differently. On this day I appeal to all working people going through minor or major stresses of not being heard, of not being able to share your work load or those who lost their work due to mental wellbeing conditions as a fall out of covid19 please reach out to your friends, families and well wishers for your own and their mental well being. It is also clearly mentioned in the universal declaration of human rights that right to leisure is also a human right. Being online is no longer leisure it has become a necessity in today's digital world. Lets get offline too for mental well-being and exercise our right to leisure whether at home or at work.