Pandemic personal consequences

[bellaozzydog]

I went quite mad during my 14 day hotel quarantine. Glad you're at the end of yours x

Today I watched all the Jason bourne films in French in a row

7 days to push

I don’t seem to be managing quarantine too badly other than the lying on the same bed as you are going to sleep in later devalues sleeping

Probably helps that my head meds got doubled on leave

On my third PCR test.

dropping weight madly as they are feeding us absolutely fuck all.

 

[cupid_stunt]

I've been back at work for a few months now (christ, was it August that I went back) after simply going back because I was bored and wasn't getting any better, and it remains the case that there's little or no difference between me just before having a breakdown and me now. I increasingly "lose" days through not feeling capable of doing anything at all - manifests in different ways, sometimes big fat panic attacks, sometimes huge periods of fatigue, very often just not seeing the point of getting out of bed in the morning (which is not in itself a weird thing but it's when you simply don't that it's different) - and it's been getting worse. Also now that I've returned to work there's an implicit assumption I feel that I've somehow stated that I'm better, and so have a responsibility to do things as if I was the happiest bunny in the whole of Toytown.

I don't really see much change from the sensory deprivation that was part of lockdown and the sensory deprivation that's part of working from home on my own all day all week. Before lockdown I deliberately went out of my way to pick a job that had a lot of human contact and wasn't WFH - it would have actually been easier to get WFH jobs - but now the role has become that indefinitely with no end to it in sight.

Sorry to hear you're still struggling, I know how you feel, as with the exception of the panic attacks, I've been suffering in much the same ways as you describe, since the start of this bloody year, although I seem to have stayed at about the same level rather than getting worst, but I am struggling to dig myself out of the hole, and now winter is arriving, which I hate.

Not that it helps, but we are far from the only ones according to a survey undertaken by the Mirror, and there's no easy answer for any of us. I just hope that when spring arrives I'll finally start feeling better, but I worry that's just wishful thinking.

Britain is in the grip of a mental health pandemic as Covid and lockdowns have left soaring numbers of people struggling with an array of problems and even feeling suicidal. In a shocking Mirror survey, one in four adults quizzed revealed their state of mind was now worse than before the virus struck.

One in 12 of all adults polled has had panic attacks, and one in 15 has battled suicidal thoughts. Within the group who said their mental health has worsened, one in eight has even tried to take their own life. In general, older age groups have coped better during the pandemic, but those aged 55 to 64 struggled most with anxiety, cited by 80% of them. The 18 to 24-year-olds were the next most anxious, with 72% suffering. Children have been hit hard, too – 13% of parents said their kids have experienced mental health problems and many had even been given pills for depression or anxiety.

Covid mental health toll as horrifying scale of silent victims laid bare

One in 12 adults have had panic attacks, one in 15 battled suicidal thoughts and one in eight have tried to take their own life during the pandemic

www.mirror.co.uk

 

[lazythursday]

I've been back at work for a few months now (christ, was it August that I went back) after simply going back because I was bored and wasn't getting any better, and it remains the case that there's little or no difference between me just before having a breakdown and me now. I increasingly "lose" days through not feeling capable of doing anything at all - manifests in different ways, sometimes big fat panic attacks, sometimes huge periods of fatigue, very often just not seeing the point of getting out of bed in the morning (which is not in itself a weird thing but it's when you simply don't that it's different) - and it's been getting worse. Also now that I've returned to work there's an implicit assumption I feel that I've somehow stated that I'm better, and so have a responsibility to do things as if I was the happiest bunny in the whole of Toytown.

I don't really see much change from the sensory deprivation that was part of lockdown and the sensory deprivation that's part of working from home on my own all day all week. Before lockdown I deliberately went out of my way to pick a job that had a lot of human contact and wasn't WFH - it would have actually been easier to get WFH jobs - but now the role has become that indefinitely with no end to it in sight.

Pre-covid, I worked at home for many years, and sometimes found myself slipping into awful depressions through not getting out of the house enough and seeing people. I had to develop strategies to cope - and while many of these were fucked during the last two years they are available again. Find somewhere else to work for part of the week, even if it's just a few hours here and there - ideally 2-3 days. Luckily there is a very cheap hotdesking place near here but even the more expensive ones are worth it for your mental health. Even just sitting in a library for a few hours is better than being at home, even though you won't get a lot of chat, you at least see a bit of life. Another thing that helped me was getting up a bit earlier and making myself get out of the house first thing - generally I'd go and have a coffee somewhere and then come back and work.

 

[Steel Icarus]

Negative result. Back to the plague pit that is work then!

 

[SpookyFrank]

Weird personal consequence: a woman who appears on various covid-related NHS posters is the dead spit of one of my exes. These posters are everywhere in schools where I work, pharmacy windows etc and every time I see one I get a profound sense of 'argh wtf is she doing here'.

 

[William of Walworth]

For all my dismal, long-lasting, festival-missing , often frail and exhausted, and simply depressing hospital inpatient experiences since mid July, one excellent factor was all the PCR tests I was getting -- twice a week (Wednesdays and Saturdays) and every single one of them negative

And inbetween the two hospital spells, I got hold of a two boxes of Lateral Flow Tests also (used these four times -- all negative).
Those results reassured me that the shite I was going through prior to going in the second time, was at least not to do with Covid!

My most up-to-date personal consequence (of no-Covid ) is that I'm feeling gradually better every day

Spoke with Occupational Health at work yesterday, various adjustments are being made for me prior to my likely return to work next week, just for Thursday 14th Oct in the first week, and very gradually phased-in more hours in the two weeks following that.

I've been quite impressed with my line-manager (and now with OH) to be honest.
My employer can be really good with peoples' sicknesses, and I personally feel well-supported.
Not scared about going back, and with so much unused summer Annual Leave , I'll be organising plenty of Mondays off

As in something like a maximum of three Mondays in, all the rest off, between now and Xmas
With many more Mondays-off to come in the first four months of 2022, prior to my new leave year starting (10th May 2022).
Which is just before Festival Season 2022 kicks off

 

[Johnny Doe]

Idiot relative now not getting her kids the flu vaccine recommended by NHS/School because 'the hippocratic oath says 'first, do no harm'*. The NHS info she's been sent says this:

"By having the flu vaccination, children are protected againstthe flu, which can be serious. Importantly, they are also less likely to pass the virus on to friends and family, especially those who may be at high risk from flu, such as babies, elderly people or friends and relatives with a serious health condition. It is predicted that we will see an increase in flu this year, due to previous lockdown measures and lack of natural protection. Vaccination is strongly advised to protect your child, your wider family and your community."

The kids visit their elderly grandparents every weekend and the grandad is not in great health with various issues.

I get the flu vaccine isn't vital for the kids themselves, but it's all part if the same rubbish. Her interpretation of the hippocratic oath trumps that of the the view of the virtually all the highly trained people who actually took it for their profession. Fucking halfwit

*It doesn't

 

[MickiQ]

I would imagine most doctors must fucking hate Facebook

 

[Badgers]

I would imagine most doctors must fucking hate Facebook

Plus Google

 

[beesonthewhatnow]

I would imagine most doctors must fucking hate Facebook

I think the single greatest thing someone could do for the benefit of mankind would be to delete Facebook and Instagram in their entirety.

 

[Supine]

I think the single greatest thing someone could do for the benefit of mankind would be to delete Facebook and Instagram in their entirety.

I think someone tried that on Monday

 

[8ball]

I think the single greatest thing someone could do for the benefit of mankind would be to delete Facebook and Instagram in their entirety.

I just did it. Well, deleted Facebook off both the phone and tablet. Didn't have Instagram.

I AM THE GREATEST PERSON EVER (someone please go and update the "greatest person ever" thread - might look a bit conceited if I do it).

 

[stdP]

I've been back at work for a few months now (christ, was it August that I went back) after simply going back because I was bored and wasn't getting any better, and it remains the case that there's little or no difference between me just before having a breakdown and me now. I increasingly "lose" days through not feeling capable of doing anything at all - manifests in different ways, sometimes big fat panic attacks, sometimes huge periods of fatigue, very often just not seeing the point of getting out of bed in the morning (which is not in itself a weird thing but it's when you simply don't that it's different) - and it's been getting worse. Also now that I've returned to work there's an implicit assumption I feel that I've somehow stated that I'm better, and so have a responsibility to do things as if I was the happiest bunny in the whole of Toytown.

I don't really see much change from the sensory deprivation that was part of lockdown and the sensory deprivation that's part of working from home on my own all day all week. Before lockdown I deliberately went out of my way to pick a job that had a lot of human contact and wasn't WFH - it would have actually been easier to get WFH jobs - but now the role has become that indefinitely with no end to it in sight.

I think I mentioned it to you previously but I was in a similar state until I got my second jab and felt confident enough to go back in to the office. When you say "back to work" I'm assuming you mean starting working from home again rather than going back to an office? Did you have a go at a shared office space or trying working from a pub/caff or anything like that?

On the "back to work and everything's fine" point though, you need to make it clear to them that everything isn't fine and you're still having troubles - at the very least I think your line manager should know. I feel that this endless pretending of everything being fine when it isn't is very damaging to one's psyche, a bit like ignoring that nagging pain until it becomes unbearable. Time off work didn't help me even slightly when I was having wobbles because my study had just become the "place where I worry about work and not being able to work properly" and regular changes of scenery and personal interactions and distractions have been the only thing I've felt have helped (I won't say "fixed" because I still have issues with occasional anxiety, task prioritisation and time perception but I'd say I'm at about 85% of my pre-pandemic performance now).

Failing to understand that someone not being fine even when back to work was of course always a problem with any form of long-term illness before the pandemic but after my experience of the last eight months it seems particularly endemic right now and more people need to start speaking up about it. It's too easy for everyone to brush off concerns otherwise.

Even for my colleagues that do get on with WfH (although most of them are back in the office for three days a week now), I'm still worried about some of them. Some of them have just seemingly completely lost the ability to disconnect from work and in my biased perceptions at least are becoming more irritable, tunnel-visioned and an over all lack of concentration, with increasingly large amount of hours spent on less work getting done. Not that this isn't entirely unexpected in a workforce made up largely of youngish/childless IT blokes but it seems more acute to me now. I've spoken to a number of them about this (because it seems worryingly similar to where I was back in feb/march and that's a very worrying thought) and they seem to have the same issues to varying degrees. Interrupted sleep and "inexplicable" fatigue being the two big 'uns and of course classic signs of depression.

Incidentally, I've barely been reading or posting on urban recently because the workload at work has been pretty immense (there's a lot of deep seated and complex problems with our remote working setup for which I'm chiefly responsible) so aside from finally getting around to playing Cyberpunk I've been barely touching my computer at home. What with holidays being effectively useless, and with so much out-of-hours and weekend work giving accrued lieu days, I've got over 35 holiday days to use up by the end of the year so at least I've now got time to prattle to the void (assuming the power stays on) and queue up for petrol and food in the run-up to christmas.

 

[Chilli.s]

Still find myself getting pissy about people walking into my personal space

 

[weepiper]

Still find myself getting pissy about people walking into my personal space

Me too. Even people I like and trust. It's a bit alarming how much bigger my personal space zone has become since all this. Not sure what to do about it.

 

[Chilli.s]

Me too. Even people I like and trust. It's a bit alarming how much bigger my personal space zone has become since all this. Not sure what to do about it.

I just keep the mask on, swear a bit, Paddington hard stare

 

[existentialist]

Me too. Even people I like and trust. It's a bit alarming how much bigger my personal space zone has become since all this. Not sure what to do about it.

All you can do is adapt to it. I think you'll find that before either the pandemic situation eases, or we all get more used to it, a lot of us will be feeling the same way. And we do pick a lot of these cues up from those around us, too, so you're probably as much as anything a reflection of the feelings about personal space that are going on around you, too.

 

[two sheds]

My sis and her husband visited yesterday and today so we ..... ..... went out. Apart from visits for jabs and things that's the first time for me for 18 months.

Went rather well (although I obviously won't know for another few days). Did forget my pin number at first try because I'd not used it for the 18 months . Couple of meals out at pub/restaurant which were very nice. We wore masks as required although staff and most other customers didn't - I found it reassuring even if only a couple of people in there wore masks.

Everyone seemed to give people their space. Nice to be out amongst friendly people again, I may try it again sometime .

 

[ddraig]

Went to a gig in a student area last night, busy bar, loads of freshers, only saw 1 mask
Didn't think about it too much at the time but got the fear later on when home, might do an LFT in a few days

 

[Cloo]

So I'm now booking seeing shows and stuff into November but spacing everything out a bit as I don't want to have any week with loads on in case it falls in the bit where we all have to isolate, which I'm still convinced is coming before the end of the year.

 

[Orang Utan]

my sister put the phone down on me cos I told her she should get vaccinated. got fed up of biting my lip, so thought it best to say it once and not mention it again. but now she’s upset and doesn’t want to come to a family thing tomorrow. Wish I’d said nowt.

 

[two sheds]

I think it does need to be said though - just the once as you have done.

Eta: worth apologizing if you haven't?

 

[Supine]

my sister put the down on me cos I told her she should get vaccinated. got fed up of biting my lip, so thought it best to say it once and not mention it again. but now she’s upset and doesn’t want to come to a family thing tomorrow. Wish I’d said nowt.

I am so close to saying the same to my sister. She is an idiot for not getting vaccinated. I have no idea what her problem actually is, she is evasive whenever the question comes up.

 

[Orang Utan]

I think it does need to be said though - just the once as you have done.

Eta: worth apologizing if you haven't?

already have by text. she may have a good reason not to, but it seems we cannot have a live conversation about this as she’s so defensive and gets tearful, which shuts down the conversation immediately.

 

[Badgers]

my sister put the down on me cos I told her she should get vaccinated. got fed up of biting my lip, so thought it best to say it once and not mention it again. but now she’s upset and doesn’t want to come to a family thing tomorrow. Wish I’d said nowt.

Best she doesn't go

 

[two sheds]

already have by text. she may have a good reason not to, but it seems we cannot have a live conversation about this as she’s so defensive and gets tearful, which shuts down the conversation immediately.

Done all you can then . I had the conversation with an ex neighbour - she's taken it a lot better than your sis though.

And what Badgers said - is good point.

 

[Orang Utan]

Best she doesn't go

we were supposed to be going for a walk in the park.
she at least told me something which indicated that she has a good reason for not getting it, but it’s always coached in such woo nonsense and an impossible to challenge lack of faith in the medical establishment, that it tends to get lost in a tetchy conversation with two entrenched and opposing positions

 

[Orang Utan]

had a tiny rapprochement by text but she made it clear she doesn’t ever want to discuss it. at least i said what was on my mind - i’ve had sleepless nights worrying about this and one of the things that was going through my mind was how awful I’d feel if she got Covid and died and I’d never said owt. but that’s bollocks innit, cos nothing I say will change her mind and vice versa, so really should have just kept schtum

 

[two sheds]

no I don't think it is bollocks - don't think you have anything to reproach yourself with. That stuff needs to be said.

 

[Orang Utan]

The reason I got so cross is I was asking how she was and she said she’d been quite ill with a cold that she thought she’d got off my Dad when he’d driven her on a school run and was saying how she should avoid being around anyone with a cold in future. This made my hackles rise of course. he is 79, with prostate cancer, and she hadn’t even considered that her vaccine hesitancy might affect him. i cannot argue with her about this though, in any way. She has CPTSD and I’m only lately realising why this makes it impossible to have a conversation in which you challenge her in any way.