вЂњPeople talk about how awful itвЂ™s going to be and how damaged people are going to be when they come out of this,вЂќ Barrett says. Research on astronauts, explorers, Antarctic scientists, and others who have long lived in isolated and extreme situations suggest there are plenty of ways to get through uncertain times in close quarters with your sanity intact, says Emma Barrett, a psychologist at the University of Manchester in EnglandВ and coauthor of Extreme: Why Some People Thrive at the Limits. Will incidences of depression, suicide, and other mental-health issues rise as a result of being cut off from friends, family, activities, and the outdoors? While studies of cabin fever and quarantine confirm that the psychological risks are real, there are also reasons for optimism. And as much of the world hunkers down under some level of quarantine, concerns have escalated about what the effects of so much isolation may be. What Larsen describes is a concept thatвЂ™sВ now familiar to many of us: cabin fever. вЂњItвЂ™s just uncanny, the similarities and the emotional peaks and troughs that you go through,вЂќ he says. With no clear sign of when stay-at-home orders will end, his time in that tent-stuck, unsure of when a helicopter would arrive-echoes what LarsenвЂ™s going through in quarantine. Mentally, that time in limbo was much like what heвЂ™s experiencing now, sheltering in place in Crested Butte, Colorado, with his wife and two kids, the result ofВ worldwide lockdowns to slow the spread of COVID-19. To pass the time, he started to ski tiny loops around the ice floe, then would sit on a sled until he got coldВ before skiing another lap.

He couldnвЂ™t sleep, partly because he was crushed with disappointment. For nine days, Larsen says, he had nothing to do but sit in a tent listening to an MP3 player with a handful of albums on it.

But a couple of weeks into their 2005 expedition, polar adventurers Eric Larsen and Lonnie Dupre found themselves trapped on a small chunk of ice, waiting for a helicopter rescue instead. The original goal was to be the first to cross the Arctic Ocean in the summer.

Cabin fever