At my first party of 2021, I remember surveying the sprawl of people—or rather, limbs—before me, thrashing around with feral, muscular intensity. Their gripping hands, sweat-matted hair and contorted faces represented the primal emotion we all felt after over a year of sensory deprivation: insatiable hunger.

For almost two years, our worlds have been compacted into our bedrooms or flat shares, leaving us greedy for the expansion and expression of this summer’s reopening. We craved the anonymity of a heaving crowd and the fated embrace of an alluring stranger—and for good reason: studies have shown that synchronized movement and "the ecstatic joy of self‐loss" are key to human happiness. As social creatures, we thrive when merging with the collective. Part of this pleasure stems from our brain waves miraculously coupling with those of our front left neighbors, when performing complex actions such as moving to a beat. Dance floors facilitate this feeling of collective coordination and thus a sense of belonging—even if for a fleeting night.

Although 2021 heralded the long-awaited return of events, the repercussions of 2020’s emotional devastation continue. This October, researchers at the University of Queensland in Australia published a global report on Covid-19's impact on mental health. Using 48 studies, they linked depression and anxiety disorders to "Covid impact indicators" in Western Europe, North America and parts of Australia and Asia. Researchers found that these psychological disorders spiked more than a quarter in 2020 compared to mental health predictions of a pandemic-free world, and disproportionately affected women and young people.

Shubostar

Shubostar, an artist and owner of Uju Records, was diagnosed with a panic disorder during the pandemic’s first wave. To weather the financial strain of the lockdown, she moved from her base in Mexico City to her parent’s house in Incheon, a city one hour from Seoul, South Korea. "[My parents] forced me to find another job to make money, and some Korean clubs offered me crazy cheap prices to play. I felt like my career disappeared," she told me. As someone who overly identified with her professional success—which she notes, was to her own detriment—the transition was harsh. "I felt like I was losing myself," she said. "After a few weeks, all of a sudden, I started to feel strange things such as the ground moving, [my] vision fading in and out again." These symptoms prompted her to seek out a psychiatrist who issued her anti-anxiety medication.

Approximately seven out of ten independent artists experience symptoms of anxiety and depression, including panic attacks, due to financial instability and fear of failure, Swedish digital distribution company Record Union found in a 2019 report. As the live music and entertainment industry experiences an unprecedented period of volatility, DJs and producers in our world need more support than ever. With venues reopening over the course of 2021, Shubostar was able to gradually reduce her prescription. The most powerful antidote to her anxiety was her ability to work. By August 20th of this year, she returned to Mexico and stopped medication shortly thereafter." All the time I played, I literally cried tears of joy," she recounted.

For some individuals, freedom from social restrictions was a saving grace. For others, it created newfound complications. Caroline Whiteley, a Berlin-based music journalist, DJ and resident for Munich’s radio 80000, considers herself fortunate to have avoided the financial freefall that plagued many artists during the pandemic. But her mental health also suffered in unexpected ways. During the first parties of 2021, the self-described "extravert" abruptly found herself confronted with social anxiety—a condition defined by a persistent, intense fear of being judged by others.

Out of practice from the party circuit's usual light-hearted rapport, Whiteley confessed she "felt somewhat overwhelmed by seeing some people who were a regular part of my going out life [pre-pandemic] and wasn’t sure at that moment how to act and be natural in the flow of the night." The pandemic, she continued, "also coincided with a lot of [personal and professional] turmoil, so going out also meant running into people that I collaborated with and being confronted with the reality of everything that I went through."

Maximus Folly, who goes by the artist pseudonym Folly Ghost, felt a similar rush of anxiety, or as he put it, "a get away survival response" that seemingly came out of nowhere. The Brazilian DJ felt self-assured when parties resumed this year, describing how he was lucky to have been spared the level of social apprehension that his friends experienced. "It was fine until it wasn’t," he said. At a record label launch party in Berlin, he suddenly felt so much stress from interacting with large groups of people that he needed to leave. When asked if his response resulted from a lingering fear of the virus or the social situation itself, he was unsure. "I don’t know how to rationalize it, I have always had social anxiety, but to a whole other degree. But nothing [prior to the pandemic] triggered me like a ‘get the fuck out now’ type of situation."

According to a 2020 study published in medical journal The Lancet, prolonged social isolation—around ten days—can cause a host of psychiatric symptoms, including anxiety, panic, insomnia and depression, for up to three years. Folly's incident likely stemmed from his month-long period of quarantine. Between March and May last year, he was traveling in Brazil just as Covid-19 rapidly spread around South America, and in the last two weeks of his trip, was forced to seclude himself in an apartment due to a high-risk situation in his original housing. Upon returning to Berlin, Germany's government had yet to subsidize lateral flow tests for residents so he spent another two weeks in isolation. When he finally got out, he had mixed feelings. "It was so nice to hug people, but at the same time, I felt like there was a remaining anxiety of really having to power through that month when I was completely alone," he recounted.

The accounts of both Folly and Whiteley can be explained by the phenomenon of scarcity mentality, or social scarcity. Those who are overly conscious of their lack of social practice tend to act more anxious, becoming tongue-tied or fumbling an exchange in key interpersonal moments. Social scientists Sendhil Mullainathan and Eldar Shafir call it a "scarcity trap." This makes human connection all the more elusive.

Since loneliness doesn't dissipate when the party starts, many turn to drugs and alcohol as a way to mitigate their perceived inadequacies. During my first night out, a woman collapsed in the middle of the dance floor. Mid-sway, her frail figure, almost in suspended motion, hit the concrete. The music stopped. Various people clambored around her while others stood in shock. Minutes later, she came to and the venue staff carried her away. Propulsive techno resumed, as revellers tightened their concentric circles for the last ten minutes. "Do you think it was drugs?" a friend whispered into my ear. Perhaps the woman was a victim of a scarcity trap herself. Maybe it was her first party in a while and she turned to substances to assuage her nerves. Or maybe her single-minded pursuit of liberation caused her to lose control.

The relationship between addictions and mental health is becoming increasingly clear during pandemic-era nightlife. This year, Resident Advisor reported on drug overdoses in London, Berlin and New York. Drug-related deaths across major clubbing capitals have reached record highs in the past year, with many citing mental health disorders as key contributing factors. Lockdown restrictions have caused those with dependencies to relapse in the absence of support networks or treatment facilities. Substance abuse is often a comorbid condition with anxiety, depression and a lack of human connection. One disorder can exacerbate the severity of the other, creating a vicious cycle of emotional adversity in the underground club community.

As many parts of the world grapple with reimposed restrictions on the cultural sector, there's no immediate end in sight to the global mental health crisis. It's particularly bad for players in an industry predicated on the expectation of uninhibited sociability and subject to the whiplash of capricious government rules. Instead of bolstering misconceptions of raves as escapism, it’s time to acknowledge that tribulations trail all of us through the door. Candid conversations on negative emotions are one step towards normalizing disorders that were previously considered taboo, or inharmonious in a party setting.

Caroline Whiteley

"Some things that helped me recently to become a little more secure and cause the social anxiety to wane, is remembering a lot of people are going through some similar stuff," Whiteley stated. "I don’t know anyone who has come out of this year feeling like they’re thriving. Everyone is insecure in some form or another."

We can reflect on this past year as a clarion call to address mental health concerns and question the ways in which our community can support individuals who continue to be impacted by unprecedented social disconnection. The intensity of highs and lows appear unavoidable for now, but at the very least, we can continue to cultivate a greater sense of compassion towards ourselves and those around us. However alienated we may feel in our struggles, it is important to remember: in this milieu defined by almost utopian ideals of interdependence and healing, we are never truly alone.

United for Global Mental Health is an organization dedicated to mental health advocacy efforts around the world. Find a list of national helplines on their website