William and Kate are giving the world a rare glimpse inside their pandemic life this week, opening up about homeschooling their kids, the importance of staying connected, and praising NHS frontline workers for their heroic efforts.
In a video interview with BBC Breakfast last Friday, the couple, who have long been mental health advocates, shared about the potential mental health implications that self-isolating can have on people — including themselves.
They also offered up resources like their Every Mind Matters initiative with the NHS to help people manage their mental health.
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“We felt very strongly that now more than ever this was a vital tool and a vital service that people could easily access at home to guide them and give them just some very basic tips to mind their mental health, to mind their mental well-being through this process,” William said.
“I think again, staying connected, staying positive and being able to talk to friends and family is so crucial, and having just some tips and some ideas as to how to tackle some of these strange feelings and difficult circumstances we’re finding ourselves in is really important, just to nudge us through these next few weeks.”
He also noted that the mental health impacts of this pandemic are not limited to those who are isolated at home.
“Frontline workers are used to dealing, sadly, with very sad situations, death and things like that, but I think the scale and the speed of what’s going on in hospitals, bearing in mind also the isolation, a lot of these patients are dying with no family members around them,” William said.
“I think for the NHS frontline workers that is very difficult, because they are there right next to the bedsides, looking after and caring for each and every patient in a critical condition, and I think they take away that pain and that sometimes that fear and loneliness that these patients have to go through,” he noted.
“They’re the ones who absorb that and take it home to their families and I think again, I’ve spoken about the attrition and the daily attrition rate of that happening to somebody is not normal and we’re not superhuman any of us, so to be able to manage those emotions and that feeling is going to take some time after all this is over as well.”
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