NSW Covid-19 2021: Celebrities reveal mental health secrets to beating lockdown

Mental health battles during our longest lockdown affects everyone, including celebs. Local stars reveal how they’re coping and how they turn bad days good.

Triple M radio host Jess Eva is juggling playing teacher and daycare worker to her two young kids while still turning up on the airwaves each morning. Eva, who co-hosts Moonman in the Morning, admits it’s been “a process” to cope with the challenges of lockdown but is trying to make time to stay positive.

“With everything going on in the world, you feel guilty saying you’re struggling in comparison to others, but as a human being you always hold yourself to a really hard standard,” Eva, who found fame on reality show The Block, says.

The Triple M breakfast host Jess Eva believes we need “to give yourself permission to vent” during this time. Picture: Justin Lloyd

“But we have to be kind enough to ourselves to openly admit we’re not OK, give yourself permission to vent, but then work out what you’re going to change to make tomorrow better … attempting a solution to create positive neurological habits is the best lesson I‘ve learnt.”

Claiming she’s “failing miserably” at homeschooling her kids Fred, 6, and Matilda, 2, Eva has decided her kids’ mental health is more important than class work for now.

“It’s all about switching mindset, I went from this struggle as a working parent to realising we’ll never spend as much time with the kids ever again as right now,” she says.

“My philosophy is we’ll work it out, they’ll catch up, we’re doing all that’s required but after riding them hard for a few days trying to do extra handwriting, it was a total disaster … now we just practice fun, we had a birthday party for coronavirus last week, we decorated the whole house.”

Eva adds: “We’ll never have these moments again, and I feel I’m really getting to know my children … when we get out of this I think there’ll be a lot more appreciation for the lives we do have, and the value of time and experiences.”

Eva is not the only celebrity willing to honestly talk about their mental health during this lockdown. Below, more celebrities reveal to The Daily Telegraph how they’re coping mentally, and reveal what they do to try and turn the bad days good.

TOM DERRICKX

Former AFL star turned musician and model Tom Derrickx has the quote, “if everyone put their problems on the table, you would take yours back,” taped up in his house. It serves as a reminder about perspective in a world that is seemingly spinning out of control.

“Like everyone, I’ve had moments in lockdown where I feel awesome and feeling good about ticking so many things off my to-do list and being creative with my music,” says Derrickx. “But then I’ve had lots of down days emotionally.”

“I’ve had a week where I haven’t exercised at all, which is very unlike me. But I also know I have to be kind to myself on those days.”

“I’ve had a week where I haven’t exercised at all, which is very unlike me,” says Tom Derickx.

Derrickx, who is an ambassador for RUOK?, adds keeping a gratitude journal has helped him mentally. “I won’t turn on the TV at night until I’ve written three things down I’m grateful for. And they can be small, like, being grateful for my TV, but it makes me feel better,” he said.

While last lockdown Derrickx says he was consumed by trying to get home to his family in Western Australia, this time round it’s different. “I try not to think about when I will get back home because it can overtake me. And it’s completely out of my control. Instead I focus on the little things, in the moment, I can control.”

JESSICA ROWE

Journalist and presenter Jessica Rowe might have launched a successful new podcast, “The Big Talk Show with Jessica Rowe” in lockdown but that doesn’t mean she’s found these time easy.

“I found it hard to be creative last lockdown. My attention span was so much shorter, and I felt all I was doing is making snacks for my girls. I was just putting one foot in front of the other to get through the day,” said Rowe, mum to Allegra; 4, and Giselle; 12. “So for me, working on my Podcast this lockdown has actually been a godsend because I felt that like I’ve had a purpose. I do feel lucky this time around I can create.”

Jessica Rowe feels grateful she’s been able to be creative this lockdown. “I felt like I’ve had a purpose.”

However Rowe adds the struggles she felt last year left her better mentally equipped to handle the current lockdown. “I went back on my antidepressants last year during the last lockdown because I started to think, “oh, wow, I’m really feeling this!”

Rowe, a mental health advocate, adds for those who are experiencing mental health conditions brought on by Covid, it can be frightening. “Mental health organisations are finding a lot of people who haven’t experienced mental illness in their life are having bouts of it and are like, “What is this? What does this mean?,” she explains. “But I want to say essentially it just means you have an illness and you need some help to get through it. And please ask for help.”

“The more we talk about [our struggles], the less people feel alone and that there’s something wrong with them, None of us have it all together. Some of us are just better at pretending than others.”

BARRY DU BOIS

Du Bois has had a “dark couple of weeks”. TV’s “Mr Fix-It” on The Living Room reveals he’s been feeling the weight of friends and acquaintances anger at the state of the world and it was creeping iinto conversations.

“I was constantly having conversations with people, a lot who I agree with, but it would turn irrational and the conversation would add on an angry or negative note,” he said. “I started thinking, I wish I would never have started that conversation in the first place, which is not a good place to be in.”

TV Presenter Barry Du Bois. Picture: Tim Hunter

Having had cancer, Du Bois has been well versed in the practice of meditation and breathing techniques, which was part of his treatment. Even though these techniques were brining him peace while doing them, he still felt like he was being triggered by other people’s anger and frustrations.

“I would find inner peace when meditating, but then everything outside that was negative. So I knew I had to change that,” he said.

Du Bois, who announced he’s running for Senate in the next Federal Election, believes the key to life is curious conversation and decided to do his bit to end his conversations on happy notes. “People don’t need to agree, but when we get irrational the beautiful gift of conversation is terminated and that’s not good for anyone’s mental health,” he said.

OSHER GÜNSBERG

The Bachelor and Masked Singer host has always been very open about his mental health and is biggest advice to anyone going through tough times at the moment is, “no mental state is a permanent state.”

Osher Günsberg wants to start a nation wide conversation and suicide and mental health.

“Suicide is a very real and prevalent problem in our community and I know firsthand what it’s like to experience suicidal ideation,” he said. “Two profound symptoms of mental illness are that it can make you feel like you‘re the only person this is happening to, and it’s going to feel this bad forever.”

Gunsberg’s set to explore Australia’s suicide and mental health crisis, which has been exgasserbated by the pandemic and constant lockdowns in an upcoming documentary on SBS, Osher Günsberg: A Matter of Life and Death. In this he details that often what’s helped him get through life’s darkest moments is human connection. “There is so much help out there and it starts with putting up your hand,” he said.

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Originally published as NSW Covid-19 2021: Celebrities reveal mental health secrets to beating lockdown