**6. The Nigerian narratives**

The index case of COVID-19 in Nigeria was reported on March 27, 2020 and at present the infection rate has risen to a total of 55,632 confirmed cases, 43,610 recovered cases with a total death of 1070. In responding to the pandemic health professionals took the bold step of being in the frontline battling to attend to the infected in order to slow down the curve of infection whilst trained psychologists work alongside with them assisting the populace to manage the associated distress arising from the crisis. In this context, a free telepsychological service team had been constituted to provide free tele-psychological (e-counseling) services to the needy members of the public in a bid to assist them manage the present and aftermath effect of the pandemic on mental health [11]. Hence, the professional psychologists offer volunteer services despite the challenges and compromises they encounter. Some of the Nigerian counselors' experiences are presented using three themes as follows: Lack of experience versus poor internet availability, clients' perceived privacy versus data security and professional demand versus client's satisfaction.

#### **6.1 Lack of experience versus poor internet availability**

Some of the Nigerian counselors' narratives reflect instances of lack of experiences of handling online counseling particularly in the context of COVID-19 wherein social distancing completely deter face-to-face interaction. For some of these counselors, interacting solely online is overwhelming and they grapple with the best skill for assisting the clients to manage their mental health. Some of the counselors expressed that identifying severe depressive symptoms like suicide ideation is often challenging. Hence, the counselors are faced with the dilemma of either breaking the protocol of social distancing to reach out to clients who may be in dire need of their physical presence. Based on personal communication a counselor narrated her predicament as follows:

*I am having a session with a client who was sobbing, saying life seems meaningless, therefore, not worth living anymore as her husband lost his job due to company staff scale down in the face of COVID-19 pandemic, no food in the house, and suddenly she screams I feel like killing myself and the phone line goes off. I am frustrated trying to call back but she doesn't pick… I wish I could do more.*

In this narrative the counselor is not only frustrated but stretches his/her resources to reach out to the client by calling back. Hence, it can be argued that counselors are challenged to compromise their resources whilst offering online counseling to clients in the face of COVID-19 despite the temptation of wanting to break the lockdown/ social distancing protocol, another argument reflecting the idea of the emotional cost involved should be added as follows: Besides, it is important to note the emotional cost that the counsellor encounters based on the experiences of the frustration. The

*Volunteer Counseling Services in the Context of COVID-19: Compromises and Challenges DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5772/intechopen.101972*

counsellor could easily experience burn-out should s/he continue to experience frequent frustration. In addition, some other counselors emphasized that online counseling is always interfered with due to poor network connection. In this regard, one counselor via email communication expressed:

*The reality is that online counseling could be irritating due to frequency of on and off network connection. One is never sure that the session would begin and end smoothly; you are starting all over and over again! Often times the coherent flow of the session and understanding of the issue the client presents is impacted upon due to too many frequent beginnings...*

Explicitly, this counselor states that fluctuation of network services impact on the smooth flow of online counseling session. What this means is that more time is likely spent, which by extension means spending more resources on data in order to stay tuned in, and the question is how would the counselor and counselee sustain such expenditure? Equally, the experience of poor internet availability is affirmed by counselors who expressed that failure in power supply is one of the major causes. In this view, one counselor reported:

*Some of the difficulties experienced within this COVID-19 online counseling is the mere fact that clients do not have frequent access to electricity to charge their phones besides the resources to buy the data. Worst still some do not even have phones that possess internet accessories…*

Basically, the above narratives indicate that there are a number of challenges that counselors encounter ranging from lack of skills to poor internet connectivity, which need to be addressed in order to find a better way of providing online counseling. What is emerging is that online counseling cannot possibly replace traditional faceto-face [12]. Hence, negotiations are needed to integrate the two in order to withstand the stress of the time such as COVID-19 pandemic.

#### **6.2 Clients' perceived privacy versus data security**

Some counselors emphasized that although online counseling has facilitated client's perceived privacy in the sense that majority of their clients have made indepth disclosure of themselves which they may not naturally do within face-to-face counseling they are still worried about the clients' data security. In this line some of them narrated that they struggle to save data from being violated by service provider including safe guarding them from getting corrupt. In this context, one counselor in a radio interview said:

*So far I am happy with the progress my clients are making particularly as many of them are able to share freely their stories more than when I have face-to-face session with them. It seems they are more eager to talk under the mask of telephone conversation; needing less prompting but I am worried about the level of confidentiality as some of the conversations could easily be accessed by service providers...*

This counselor expressed that clients seems to be more open to sharing their stories over the phone in comparison to face-to-face conversation. For this counselor, this is a plus but he is worried about the security of the data. His major concern is

focused on the maintenance of confidentiality of which he is not alone as another counselor reiterated:

*Some of my clients have expressed that they are sharing spaces with either their family such as spouse, children and/or parents when talking on the phone. In such situation there is no privacy! In fact some maintain that they live in a very communal setting where everybody over hears everyone's conversation.*

In this counselor's narrative, the mismatch status quo is clear; it is the counselor's concern over security of data and client's attitude towards interference from others due to cultural orientation. Thus, what is the best practice counselors should adapt in order to bring their clientele to the same level where they are? This question relates directly to the next challenges regarding the clients' satisfaction and professional demand.

#### **6.3 Professional demand versus client's satisfaction**

Some of the counselors in their narrative claimed that online provision of services impact on some of the professional demand such as ethics of informed consent as many clients are not aware of such requirement. Therefore, they sometimes act like the counselor is wasting their time and data bundle by following the fundamental rudiments such as introducing yourself, your qualifications, specific approach, if you are a registered counselor including establishing which online facility the client prefers. Accordingly, one counselor presents the challenge she encounters in view of informed consent expressing that clients always seem to be in a hurry to get it over and done with (Abuja Local Chapter of Counseling Association Meeting, July 2020). In affirmation another counselor via email communication stated:

*One of the biggest challenges is that many clients feel you are wasting time whenever you start enlightening them about what is anticipated to happen during your session together. Sometimes you hear them sigh over the phone reflecting their displeasure and unfortunately the online inhibit observation of body language, so one cannot tell what exactly is going on in the mind of the client.*

Therefore, the challenges according to this counselor's narrative reflect the struggles counselors encounter in order to maintain professional ethics whilst sustaining clients' satisfaction. These are two parallel lines which if care is not taken might be compromised. However, another counselor emphasized that because she wants to satisfy the clients, she would always bend some of the professional demands in order to make the clients happier. As such she would allow the client to go straight on and pour out their narratives amidst tears as their experiences are stressful reflecting fear of contracting the virus, losing job, having children stay home all the time including the reality that a victim died in their neighborhood but they could not condole with the family among many others.
