Living through a pandemic has brought about new levels of anxiety, fear, and feelings of isolation for many University students. When the pandemic exacerbated pre-existing mental health conditions and prompted new ones, some University students faced difficulties in transferring their in-person treatment to the virtual services offered by the Counseling and Psychological Services (CAPS). 

Talia Rodriguez ’24 said she felt isolated at the beginning of her first semester, but when she tried to set up a virtual therapy session, technological issues prevented her from accessing treatment.

“I had a really hard time adjusting last semester,” Rodriguez said. “Just being away from home during the pandemic was really tough. So that first week, I was like, ‘Yeah, I really need to access CAPS.’ The issue was that they sent me this form [to set up an appointment], and I couldn’t fill it out on my computer.”

While Rodriguez is grateful that her following experiences with CAPS were positive, she expressed concern that other students facing technological challenges might not have access to the support they need. 

“I’ve since worked with a CAPS therapist and had a really good experience,” Rodriguez said. “But I think in general, there has been a huge lack of mental health resources for students during this time. If I had really been struggling and hadn’t had family or friends that could have supported me, I would have been in a really bad situation.”

Whereas Rodriguez’s situation involved her adjustment to her first semester of college, other students who had sought treatment through CAPS before the pandemic started have also reported issues with receiving support due to state licensing policies. Pablo Puente ’22 struggled with the changes made to CAPS therapy when the pandemic first began.

“Sophomore year I did start to [use] CAPS a bit more long-term, and it was in-person at the time,” Puente said. “The second semester I was doing it, I finally felt like I gained some ground on some of my original issues that I was talking to my therapist about. And then the semester got cut short, and instead adapting to an online format, CAPS essentially just closed.”

Angie Makomenaw, previous Mental Health Education & Prevention Coordinator of CAPS, explained the reasoning behind this abrupt shutdown in an interview with The Argus.

“Clinicians themselves are only licensed within the state, so when COVID first hit we had this huge mass of trying to get the clinicians registered in all the different states,” Makomenaw explained. “We had this huge spreadsheet laid out because each state had a different requirement, each state had a different process of submitting the forms.”

This limitation forced CAPS to find a solution that would balance avoiding legal trouble and assisting students who were struggling with the unexpected circumstances of COVID-19. CAPS Director Jennifer D’Andrea explained how CAPS tried to navigate the licensing restrictions.

“What we did was try to fudge it a little bit and do like one or two phone consults with students,” D’Andrea said. “We didn’t call it therapy, we called it phone consultations, but even then we [were] in sort of a gray area. We’re also trying to weigh out breaking the law, which we don’t want to do, versus the potential risk to a student of just saying, ‘Well, we can’t talk to you anymore.’”

D’Andrea said that CAPS understood this decision could be harmful to students, but it was not within their control.

“That can potentially be emotionally damaging to a student, depending on where they’re at in their life and what they’re struggling with,” D’Andrea said. “So the way we tried to address both of those things—we don’t want to break the law, and at the same time, we don’t want to just leave students hanging—was by offering them a couple of phone consults to help them transition.”

While the transition to virtual therapy was necessary due to the pandemic, Puente found that this solution left him with having only one final session with CAPS to discuss the challenges he had been facing throughout the semester.

“I had one call to recap the session and work we had done, but I didn’t have therapy for the rest of the semester, and that was a bit strange—cutting off the things that I’d hoped to talk about,” Puente said.

After experiencing both virtual and in-person therapy, Puente was able to compare the two, and he reported feeling frustrated that his therapist could not sense his emotions in the same way over a screen.

“There was a level of disconnection because of the screen and because it was all online,” Puente said. “I was getting very emotionally agitated by what my therapist was telling me, but I don’t think they could notice. They couldn’t really perceive that what they were saying was affecting me negatively. And that was very strange and upsetting.”

Puente also misses the convenience of in-person therapy on campus.

“There’s definitely something about being able to walk over to Davison and [go] into the CAPS facility per se and having space allocated for true therapy,” Puente said.

Although Puente has been able to access virtual therapy from his house on-campus this semester, due to the licensing issues, students who have relocated outside of Connecticut have been unable to access therapy through telehealth services or continue working with their prior therapists.

Accessing mental health assistance virtually has also presented issues for students seeking medication. Georgia Gerber ’24 is one of many students who has struggled to access her medication due to the remote limitations of CAPS.

“For me, part of being mentally ill is I have trouble figuring [certain things] out,” Gerber said. “It’s hard for me to say when my availabilities are, and remember to email, and email the right people, and then respond in a timely manner. That organizational aspect of it being remote has been difficult for me.”

Gerber has figured out her medication process at home, but when she came to the University, she had to go through several contacts at CAPS and prove her documentation to get access to her prescription. When Gerber needed a refill of her medication, CAPS required her to also undergo talk therapy in order to get the prescription through the center. 

“I don’t really find talk therapy super helpful personally, but you’re required to see someone who’s in CAPS to talk to the [psychiatrist],” Gerber said. “When you have all your school stuff happening, and then you also have to send your schedule to this lady, who then figures it out with the therapist, who then figures it out with the psychiatrist, it’s like three different levels of emailing people and waiting for them to get back to you just to facilitate a process that you’ve already seen streamlined at home.”

D’Andrea explained the reasoning behind the policy which requires students seeking medication to also schedule a minimum of 2-3 check-in appointments throughout the semester. If students choose to get medication from a source other than CAPS, D’Andrea said that the center offers consultation appointments to connect students with medication providers in the community. 

“Our model is that we regard medication services as a supportive supplemental service to students who are connected to a clinician,” D’Andrea said. “It is absolutely true that students cannot access us for medication-only services. If somebody is only interested in medication and does not want to connect with a CAPS clinician, they do need to get their medication from somebody in the community.”

Claudia Kunney ’23 expressed frustration with this policy, which complicated her access to medication before the start of the pandemic. 

“Over the summer I was having a ton of panic attacks,” Kunney said. “So I tried to talk to my mom about starting SSRIs [Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors], and she was super unreceptive. I was already in cognitive behavioral therapy, and I had been for the past few years, but I just felt like I needed something extra at that point.”

Kunney sought assistance from CAPS to get access to the medication she needed to treat her panic attacks and depression but, like Gerber, CAPS workers told her she could not access medication without talking to a therapist specifically at the center. 

“It was just a super invalidating experience,” Kunney said. “[The therapist] was basically like, ‘We didn’t tell you this before, but we should have, but because you’re seeing an outside therapist, you’re technically not a CAPS client, so we can’t give you medication.”

Further, the therapist Kunney was required to see told her CAPS would not be able to handle the multitude and severity of issues she was facing.

“And then they were also like, ‘We can’t help you because you’re having too many issues for us to deal with,’” she said. “I’m not exactly sure how she phrased it, but she was like, ‘You have too much going on for us to be able to handle, so it’s your responsibility to go find an outside provider that is more equipped to handle all of this.”

Kunney said that this experience with CAPS exacerbated her feelings of loneliness and hopelessness.

“I felt really alone,” Kunney said. “I was looking for the people at CAPS to be like, ‘Hey, we see you, we hear you. I’m sorry that you’re struggling with all of that, here’s how we can help.’ But they were mostly like, ‘Wow, that sucks. It sucks to be you, like, here’s more work that you have to do to solve this problem.’”

D’Andrea responded that CAPS is unable to provide the intensive support necessary for some students. In such cases, D’Andrea said that the center will meet with students individually to assist them with accessing intensive outpatient (IOP) care. 

“It’s not so much about the range of issues, it’s more about the level of support that students need,” D’Andrea said. “There are lots of students at Wesleyan who need very, very intensive support and the most that we can offer is bi-weekly therapy… Some of them without question need…IOP level of care…. IOP level care means going to see somebody two to three days a week for two to three hours per day, and there are lots and lots of students at Wesleyan who are engaged in IOP care in the community, both through Middlesex hospital and the root center, both of which are in Middletown.”

Clarification: This article has been updated to include additional information regarding CAPS services. For students to receive medication through CAPS, they must schedule a minimum of 2-3 check-in appointments throughout the semester. CAPS also offers consultation appointments to assist students with accessing medication providers in the Middletown community. Finally, if CAPS is unable to provide intensive support for a student, the center will assist the student in accessing IOP care. 
Stephanie Monard can be reached at smonard@wesleyan.edu