Blog Post 6 - News Review

Coronavirus and Nightmares: How to Stop Them? 

In reality, we are all in the same boat during this pandemic when looking at it from a humanistic point of view. But how many of us are being attacked in our dreams by COVID-19 and transforming them into nightmares? How many of us cannot escape COVID-19 even when we're sleeping? According to the article I'm reviewing, a sleep doctor gives us tips to stop having COVID-19 nightmares and start dreaming again. 

Right now, we quite simply can't escape the impact of COVID-19—not even in our dreams. No, really, not even in our dreams. There's a good chance that you, like me, have your shoddy four or so hours of sleep riddled with intense nightmares: hospital zombie apocalypses, tiger chases (with Joe Exotic), frantic climbs up mountains of toilet paper rolls that you inevitably tumble down, down, down. Perhaps you, like me, wake up the middle of the night, shaking, asking yourself, "Why am I having coronavirus nightmares? And how can I make them stop?"

The article is a good read but the tips that are given are not essential to the pandemic that is occurring because we should and need to incorporate them in our daily lives. I think the article lacks originality in this sense that it should not have been aimed as Coronavirus nightmares but rather COVID-19 should have been incorporated as the crisis we are facing in present times. It is part of the psychological problems occurring in people right now and as a result, a percentage of people are having trouble sleeping.

"Stress or anxiety can be nightmare triggers, and certainly the stress of the COVID-19 pandemic could precipitate vivid nightmares," says Dr. Watson. Thus, in this difficult time, it is important to focus on our general health and sleep health in order to have nightmare-free nights."

This is a general example given by Dr. Watson saying that the pandemic could cause vivid dreams but in our everyday lives we encounter nightmares on a daily basis so looking at it from a reader's point of view, the pandemic is another nightmare amongst all the nightmares we might have witnessed in the past, we're witnessing in the present and shall of course witness in the future. What I am coming to is people experience nightmares every day of their lives due to tragedy, death, illness, heartbreak. Therefore, only saying that during this difficult time, we should focus on our health is just a straightforward answer given to ease the stress we're encountering. By putting it in a more generalistic view, it would have been better and not put too much focus on the pandemic itself because it is a wave that we're living through today. In the future, another wave will come, and then what. I'm sure by then we would have had multiple nightmares and I'm sure health always needs to be a priority, not only today.

The writer says that we should focus on taking care of ourselves during this time and be aware of what we can realistically control. But shouldn't we do this every day of our lives? 

Ending on a positive note, what we can learn from this article is to take the given tips and use them for our daily routines even after this pandemic ends.