For those with mental illness, anxieties and such, how has Animal Crossing helped you cope?

[Dunquixote]

i live with diagnosed depression, anxiety and social anxiety. animal crossing has helped me out quite a bit, especially during this tragic and everlasting pandemic, but one of the main ways that it’s helped me is with my social anxiety; social interactions of any kind make me nauseatingly anxious and so i tend to avoid them. but animal crossing makes those interactions a bit easier; i’ve made so many friends through animal crossing and on this forum - it’s mainly through my posting constant lurking and the occasional trade but i figure, any social interaction no matter how small is a step in the right direction, right?

i’m still anxious and i’m always on edge during conversations + trades but i feel safe here and that’s something i’ve never really had before so i guess in a way, animal crossing has finally given me a community i feel i belong in. i’ve even hung out with my friend @Izuku Midoriya a few times and while it might seem like a trivial thing, it’s something i wouldn’t of had the nerve to do a few years ago so in a way, animal crossing has helped me to grow as a person, too, and face the things that make me anxious rather than run from them c’:

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this precious lil baby is also very good at providing my daily dose of serotonin, too, so there’s that

I just want to let you know that while I said that the game hasn’t improved my coping skills, I can actually relate to a lot of what you said and also thank you for sharing that with us (I mean it btw). I have been diagnosed with the same things plus OCD; still need to be tested for Asperger’s but my mom and I as well as my psychiatrist (who never brought it up) are convinced that I have it. The game has helped distract me from my anxieties and problems at home and the forums have actually helped while bringing me some additional but “minor” anxiety (like worrying about how my posts sound). For the most part, I think socializing with people here have helped me build some confidence in myself since I have made quite a few friends - most of them more recently but there are a few people that I befriended when I first joined and started trading to as well. I don’t have a lot of friends in RL so making friends online makes it easier for me to forgive myself and like myself a little for being me even if I am not all together and am an emotional, nervous wreck.

When I came back to the forums after a long hiatus from NL, I think I was just as nervous as I was back when I first joined these forums. But thankfully, there were plenty of members that were patient with me and didn’t judge me even if I’ve acted a bit off or weird and a few that were happy to listen to me babble to fret about something silly (thanks @JSS ).

The anxiety is still here for me too, but seeing that I too am now inviting a friend over and going to their islands to hang out and not always trade, since I never did much of that back in NL, I think you’re right to see that as progress. I would like to see it as such myself .

Sorry if this post is all over the place and if any of this sounds stupid, or if I made anyone feel uncomfortable. I get distracted and lose my train of thought all the time even when typing ><.

 

[IridianSky]

When trying to figure out what I wanted to do with terraforming and decorating my island this game was honestly probably the most stressful game I’ve ever played, and really added to my anxiety levels. I spent lots of time that I wasn’t playing the game just thinking about it and stressing over it, and sometimes even felt I might just have to walk away from it for a while because it was stressing me so much. Like just the fact that its so tedious and time consuming to get an idea set up, and then if you decide you either don’t like it at all or that it’s good, but just needs to shift over a tile or two.... ugh. Then you have to go through the painstaking process of reverting the changes or shifting things around.

When not dealing with that aspect of the game, it’s just a fun distraction for me just like other games I enjoy or like watching yt videos or whatever.

 

[eko]

Since I've been more actively "sharing" my island and comparing myself to others, New Horizons has caused me a great deal of stress along with the original coping that New Leaf offered. I've been professionally diagnosed with ocd, depression and anxiety with suspicions of adhd, so the game both helps and hinders my illnesses... When you think "ocd" you would probably picture a satisfyingly symmetrical and immaculately neat island, right? Yet my island is chaotic, messy and cluttered, desperately trying to break out of the orderly impulse (when I scattered my 10 villager houses to look more "cottagecore" and random, it hurt and I cried over it for a week lol) and eventually becoming proud/comfortable with how messy it looks. To make a mess in the game, knowing it's not permanent, I'm in control to change it anytime and that it can actually look good, has been so healing and hopefully be able to practice this mentality in real life as well.

Plus, it's been nothing but positive for my anxiety, especially with trading and talking with strangers online. I'm on constant guard that someone will be toxic or attack me but with how safe and reliable TBT has been, it's so refreshing to not be constantly terrified of people. The Animal Crossing community is amazing and our in-game friends are always so sweet and calming! I'm incredibly thankful that Nintendo made their dialogue more friendly, because if I got one of those passive aggressive or mean comments from older games, I'd probably sell my game tbh :'3c

 

[Le Ham]

Not officially diagnosed with anything yet, but have known things are wrong with me from a young age and I'm currently working on getting evaluated for what I believe to be OCD, ADHD inattentive and there's definitely some kind of social anxiety in there somewhere. I got by most of my life on a "tough it out" mentality, people-pleasing and sheer intelligence, but college finally pushed me beyond my limits and made me realize I do need to get help, because I won't be able to survive in the working world the way I live now.

Ofc then Miss Rona came in the spring and added the loss of routines and study environments on top of the pressure, and I was left basically out of commission for the better part of the summer. Even thinking about school gave me anxiety, let alone the fact my GPA was creating a tricky situation with the degree I was trying to pursue. I couldn't even bring myself to check what my GPA was until a few weeks before the fall semester, let alone email my advisers about it. Also had to work through feeling unaccepted by my friends/peers because my brain seemed to work differently, was never on the same page mentally as anyone else, etc. And how my disorders affected my general mental health throughout my life, the deep underlying self-hatred because I felt unable to do literally anything right. Because that's what angry words and personal experience led me to believe about myself when I had no other explanation.

In the meantime, I binged Animal Crossing. It was all I could bring myself to do. Wake up, make coffee, play the game, browse the forum, play the game with a couple friends in our group chat. That was my life from like May or so to early-mid July. I typically don't like when games suck me in for long periods of time and make me feel unproductive, like I'm throwing all my passion and energy into some meaningless material good, but this time I let myself sink because, like I said, it was all I could do anyway. Logged about 800 hours. Meanwhile, interacting with people on the forum gave me a lot to think about, in terms of how many different types of experiences people have, how those experiences color their view of life and the world, and without getting into my faith too much, I learned how important it is to take that massive variety of experiences into account in order to show Love to others. That also helped me understand how to view flaws about myself I can't control - that they don't define me in the end, but it's okay to accept where I am today and take it easy for as long as I need to get back on my feet. I found freedom to organize my life according to how I'm wired, rather than try to meet anyone else's standards.

I've fallen off the binge train now as I've processed my feelings, found resolve, and am back on my college campus with renewed motivation and a plan forward (and a big stash of masks and sanitizer dw). I don't know how much ACNH actually did anything to help other than distract me from responsibilities, but in doing so it served as a mental getaway from a lot of stress until I healed enough to face it.

 

[Monokuma73]

I can't tell from my perspective if it will be helpful for anyone, but watching many videos about AC I found this:

It's just what I found and I can't guarantee if this video content will be appropriate or not.