[Coping in families with members suffering from a mental disorder]

Stress and coping during the lockdown in families with mentally ill members have not yet been described.

First findings on this issue are to be gained in order to derive questions for further research.

Narrative interviews were carried out on a convenient sample of healthy families (n = 4), families with mentally ill children (n = 12) and families with mentally ill parents (n = 3). The quantifying evaluation of the in vivo codes assigned by two raters for the categories "problems" and "coping" was carried out with the help of numerical ratios and detailed analyses of the codes that differentiate between the families.

The lockdown resulted in a large number of problems in all families. While in families with mentally ill children the restrictions were the biggest problem, families with mentally ill parents reported mainly about a lack of support. Families with sick members more often reported about risky coping patterns, in particular rumination and denial, and less often about protective coping, especially the mobilization of social support.

Both risk groups require targeted interventions that focus in particular on adaptive parenting behavior and mobilization strategies.