Yesterday we held an online meeting with the parents of our players. One of its parts dealt with the issue of how to mentally cope with the stress of the situation all of us are going through these days. Our sports psychologists prepared a list of recommendations helping to take care of our emotional stability and our immune system, the strength of which is related with our stress management and coping strategies.

Here’s some pieces of advice from our BTA sports psychologist Oriol  Mercadé (who holds a Master’s title in neurophysiology of sleep) that all of you might find useful:

1- Patience: Acceptance that the situation does not help and that we will be able to take a little longer than normal to wake up. Do not worry and give that extra time to come to you, do not look at the clock. It is advisable to do this process and the next one on the sofa (without the TV) and when we have drowsiness we go to bed; we will never sleep on the couch.

2- Mental calmness: When closing your eyes, it will be one of the few moments that the mind will have to be aware of everything that we are going through, but it is better to give this space before going to bed and in bed to practice full attention, for example, observing the breath as it presents itself, or mentally reviewing our body parts, doing the so-called "body scan".

3- Stimulus control: We will only use the bedroom to sleep for nothing more. We do not use electronic devices in bed.

4- Road to sleep: We will avoid mobile devices 1 hour before bed, as well as listening to Covid news, disconnecting from other things, reading books, listening to music, podcasts on the non-news radio.

5- Thought Control: Let's not allow the brain make catastrophic thoughts, let's focus on more functional aspects ... the vaccine they are working on, in Wuhan it is already being controlled and think this is temporary.

6-Regularity: Maintain your schedule of sleeping, working, entertainment and sleeping, but normally we sleep half or an hour less than we need every day, so…now we can take advantage of the situation and sleep a little bit more. For teenagers it is a good time to do their natural rhythm, going to sleep a little bit later and wake up later too. It is ok. 

7- Consumption: Avoid alcohol or stimulants such as caffeine, tobacco, tea, or junk food that will have an impact on your resting. 

8- Share: Verbalize your feelings or write an emotional diary of how you feel.

9- At night: Eat early and have light dinner; avoid strong lights. Do not fall asleep on the couch.

10- By day: Keep the schedules and behaviour that you do in a normal situation, do not wake up late, do not go in pyjamas in the house. Look for the sun to hit you, exercise, it is important to make a difference between day and night. Nap, if you need it, but not more than 20 minutes.