‘Exhaustion,’ ‘frustration’: Why some vaccinated people are losing motivation to stay safe

“If other people aren’t going to put in the effort to end this pandemic, why am I putting my needs of… a good mental state (aside)… for others who just clearly don’t care,” Sowa adds.

Dr. David Rakofsky, a licensed clinical psychologist and president of Wellington Counseling Group, says he is seeing a wave of patients experiencing this attitude shift.

Several factors are driving the shift, he says, including vaccine overconfidence, responsibility fatigue and decision fatigue.

“Even I felt a sense of invincibility once I got the jab,” Rakofsky admits, but adds the vaccine can only do “what it’s supposed to do.” “It’s keeping us from the hospital, it’s keeping us from dying.”

He also sees a shift from believing individual factors create the outcome to believing the outcome is a result of external factors beyond their control.

“The feeling maybe for these young people (is) that this may be as far as we all get, and I’ve done what I can do. Now I roll the dice and the rest is outside of my direct influence,” he explains.

The frustration also has been illustrated as a group project, where everyone has to participate to get a good grade (have the pandemic end). But, if part of the group isn’t participating (the unvaccinated), the others (vaccinated) start to see their efforts as pointless.

“That’s all part of the same phenomenon… These were the things that were internal to my control that I was going to do… We were good soldiers, and now we’re left with a battalion of people that aren’t going to fight,” Rakofsky explains.

Sowa says it feels like “we had like hope dangling in front of us and now it’s being fully taken away,” making the year and a half of her safety efforts feel “pointless.”

“I’ve gotten the shot… I’ve been doing my part to end this pandemic, and I wasn’t supported by everyone else so what’s the point at this point?” she says, adding that she now only wears a mask where required and is less worried about big crowds.

Rakofsky explains this feeling of hopelessness can lead to mental health issues.

“When someone is given a task that they can achieve and despite their efforts, despite doing the things they’re supposed to, they do not achieve, a learned helplessness is what sets in, and that’s part of a kind of depression that can linger.”

So apparently, we’re reaching the point of “fuck it, we can’t beat the crazy people so we’re just going to join them”?