I’ll bet you 100,000 dollars that I can survive thirty days in a dark, enclosed space, Rich Alati, an American poker player, challenged. Two years ago, he allowed himself to be locked up in a small room with only a bed, a fridge and a bathroom. No light, no television, no WIFI. His meals were delivered at irregular times, so he could not mark the passing of time by them. He tried to keep himself occupied with yoga and meditation.

After four days, he started to hallucinate. “First shapes and colours, then I saw a train”, he said later. “I had to convince myself it wasn’t real. It was hard, because I was frightened too.” Then he started having bad thoughts. In the end, he wanted to settle: couldn’t he be released early and get $62,400?

That was allowed – after all, he was there voluntarily – and after twenty dark days he walked in sunlight again.

POST-TRAUMATIC STRESS

Scientific research has shown that long stretches of isolation often have a detrimental impact on our mental health. People who are isolated for a long time are frequently confused and angry and display symptoms are post-traumatic stress sooner than other people. A study of Taiwanese hospital staff who were quarantined for nine days during the SARS outbreak in 2003 reveals that they displayed symptoms of acute stress, exhaustion, fear, irritation, insomnia, had an inability to concentrate or make decisions and performed badly at work sooner than normal. Symptoms of post-traumatic stress can even occur three years later.

Nonetheless, scientists found that quarantined Chinese students did not seem to be mentally affected (during the outbreak of Mexican flu in 2009), perhaps because the students were young and had no serious responsibilities (like caring for a family).

Due to the coronavirus, Dutch people started self-isolating en masse a few days ago. Unlike the surrounding countries, where complete lockdowns are in place, we are still allowed outside here in the Netherlands (even though many occupants of Leiden student houses are staying indoors voluntarily). But what if that changes? Which lessons can we learn from earlier instances of isolation?

People frequently go into isolation, for scientific reasons, for instance. Italian sociologist Maurizio Montalbini shut himself up in some underground caves for a total of three years. His record: 366 successive days When he resurfaced, he claimed he had been down there for only 219 days. Although he had lost weight and called himself “mentally unstable”, his outlook was bright and his motto was: “You shouldn’t fight the loneliness; you should make friends with it.” Maybe the one and a half kilos of chocolate he took with him to the cave eased the solitude.

The ultimate isolation is perhaps that of astronauts. In the seventies, three American astronauts were so fed up with the long hours, exhaustion and disagreements with NASA that they turned off their radio and ignored their bosses for an entire day.

Hallucinations

Staying locked up for so long affects our brains and causes hallucinations. A Russian space mission had to be broken off in 1976 because the crew could smell something strange and suspected a leak. Back on Earth, the smell turned out to be a hallucination.

Researchers on Antarctica are also severely tested: they are often shut off from the world in a region were winter can be six months of complete darkness. The stress levels are high at the research stations there and can have extreme consequences: in 1959, a researcher at the Russian Vostok station was so extremely angry at losing a game of chess that he murdered his opponent with an axe. Since then, Russians have been banned from playing chess on Antarctica.

Of course, that was an exceptional case, but high levels of stress and depressions are a serious threat on Antarctica.  “If you’re there with someone you don’t like, it’s hard luck, you can’t walk out”, American psychologist Peter Suedfeld has said. “And if you miss someone very much while you’re there, that’s hard luck too. You’re stuck there without them.” He is studying ways to reduce the stress. He believes that virtual reality could be the solution, as it offers researchers “the chance to step into another, completely different and exciting world.”

Are there any other ways of getting through a lonely period if you don’t happen to have VR handy? Many prisoners, including those in the Netherlands, choose to educate themselves and many get their (business) qualifications, some of them even attend criminology tutorials with university students.

According to Leiden historian Bart van der Boom, self-tuition was how many Jewish people passed the time in hiding during the Second World War. “They took correspondence courses on bookkeeping or drawing cartoons, they kept diaries and read books, but overall they felt that they were wasting their time. Most of the time was spent speculating how long they needed to remain in hiding.”

Playing ludo

Helen Berman spent three years in hiding in Rotterdam from the age of six and tried pass the time with schoolwork. “My father would spend the mornings teaching me subjects from primary school, even though he wasn’t a teacher. We acquired children’s books by illegal means, until the time came when I had read everything we could get our hands on.” But she didn’t spend all of her time learning. “I’d play games with my father, too, like Ludo, and we’d do crafting together. My second cousin was taught gymnastics by my father.”

Of course, her experience of isolation can’t be compared to the current corona quarantine. “The Jews’ experience in hiding was marked by a lack of information”, Van der Boom continues. “The worries about their friends and relatives gnawed away at them. Sometimes they managed to smuggle out a letter but often as not they didn’t succeed. The overwhelming uncertainty, we don’t have that now. You can ring anyone, or get in touch on Whatsapp or FaceTime. We can communicate ourselves silly if we want.”

Of course, her experience of isolation can’t be compared to the current corona quarantine. “The Jews’ experience in hiding was marked by a lack of information”, Van der Boom continues. “The worries about their friends and relatives gnawed away at them. Sometimes they managed to smuggle out a letter but often as not they didn’t succeed. The overwhelming uncertainty, we don’t have that now. You can ring anyone, or get in touch on Whatsapp or FaceTime. We can communicate ourselves silly if we want.”

The study above reports that communication is crucial for getting through this current isolation. According to the researchers, a telephone with an Internet connection is “no longer a luxury, it’s a necessity”.