To think many people are still dealing with the trauma of COVID, but we just don’t talk about it?

Er, yes you are aware of people who have, given that you’ve just posted on a long thread of people saying they have, not least the OP.

Those that couldn't say goodbye to loved ones aren't over it. Those that are vaccine injured aren't over it. Those who had their freedom taken away while MPs had party's arnt over it. Those whose deaths were put down as COVID when in fact it wasn't (cancer treatment postponed etc) including murder those families aren't over it. Those who now can't get a GP appointment arnt over it. Those who struggle now with cost of living arnt over it. Those who are over it you are very lucky.

Some people are over it, some people were affected badly and some died. My husband and daughter had a lovely time furloughed, whilst I was suddenly named a key worker. Senior management worked from home and basically left us to it without a care on how we were affected in our 24 hour shifts which left us at risk of infection, insisting that we took temperatures many times a day, taking service users to be tested, organising activities for them every single day for a whole year and trying to restrict their outside movements as per Government guidelines. I left within 18 months, best thing I could have done. We collaborated as a family and shopped accessing food and items that were hard to get whilst taking care of two sets of elderly parents. We survived, some did not. Was it worse than the second world war, were we impacted more during Covid? I think not. Many people died during the war, many people lost relatives and friends, there was rationing and fear and air raids, children shipped out to the country, life changing injuries etc. Yes, Covid was unpleasant and scary, but what happened to resilience? It was the first major UK incident since WWII and we simply could not cope with the issues which it brought.

The Guardian is seemingly obsessed with the subject as well.

I can only say that I know of nobody who is still "dealing with the trauma of covid" (whatever that may mean).

We have moved on. It was not particularly traumatic for us.

150 years ago few children reached the age of 5. Society handled it and without too much hand wringing.

There will always be people who hark back to what a terrible time they had and tell us how their life just didn’t go back to normal.

I lost my husband to a horrible disease during lockdown and was his carer with very little help while he was dying. I had to bounce back and get on with my life because I’m self employed and had to earn money. It would’ve been so easy to pander to myself but I chose not to - because few people are interested.

We’re now talking five years ago - when will enough be enough? We all had to go through it - why do some people insist on boring the arse off the rest of us with their woe is me stories. If they don’t have long covid they need to give themselves a shake and not waste any more of their lives.

I think some people are still dealing with the trauma. Others are resilient enough to acknowledge it was an awful time but make the best of the life they have now.

It depends, it was a great relief for many, giving them the time to spend with family and friends.

I'm still pissed off that my kind sweet gentle mother had to die alone.

Otherwise I am over it.

Yanbu I nearly died was in hospital over a month and still haven't fully recovered

I literally haven’t given Covid a thought in the last 3 years. I am not aware of anyone who has

Same

To anyone bereaved or disabled because of Covid this is an extremely annoying remark. I really don’t see the point in discussing all this at length and reigniting strong feelings.

My daughter has ended up in a wheelchair due to covid.
She's only 32.

It’s important that we reflect on it, if only to better manage a future pandemic.

Discussion about the wider impacts of the political choices of managing the pandemic was heavily policed at the time, and that's affected society's ability to begin to heal and move on. Many people couldn't begin to process it at the time because they were prohibited from having a network to support them. It was incredibly difficult to discuss online without being shut down (often quite visciously) about people "sadly" dying and not being allowed to care about anything less than that (it was usually virtue signalling not people actually going through grief doing it). With such a huge proportion of society being put through a range of difficult times simultaneously people also didn't have the capacity to share the load with each other.

It's 5 years since the start of it, but it's only just past 3 years since official restrictions ended. Then there were additional restrictions that limped on well through 2022 for the sake of it (particularly in care settings)

People are at different stages of healing/ grieving for what happened. I hit anger by summer 2020, which turned to depression in 2021. Sometimes it took different lengths of time for the impacts to really show up. Because of the length of the restriction, it's often difficult to disentangle what was directly Covid/ lockdown related and what is life related. Was my child behind because they lost so much schooling, or are there SENs involved (it was SENs, diagnosed later than his sibling "coz Covid" delays). Was it depression because of the uncertainly of the potential return of restrictions in winter 2021, or a series of unrelated bereavements in 2022. Life kept happening and it's hard to separate things out. Covid wasn't a neat little box of spring 2020. In our case MiL died summer 2022, but despite it being an inevitable death from chronic illness, it was still tangled up with the Covid era because the carehome restrictions were not eased until shortly before her death when she was no longer recognising family, and it was getting too late to arrange the logistics of family travel. We had travelled over in 2021 but only DH was allowed to see her. The head-banging frustration for 2 years was that restrictions were not going to save her from chronic illness and we were prohibited from seeing her in her final years and being powerless to do anything about that.

The other thing that's hindered personal recoveries is the general state of the world. By the end of 2019 there was a quiet sense of optomism brewing, but lockdowns cost the economy dear, then Ukraine inflating living costs, effects of Brexit coming into effect and the general toll of a society being battered by austerity and the general social fallout of the Covid years (e.g. young men getting disengaged from real life society and getting sucked into Andrew Tate ideology). Sometimes 2020 is a widespread sliding doors moment.

It's a fact that for some people, lockdown was worse than covid, and indeed some people were made vulnerable by restrictions rather than the disease itself. The inability to protect everyone, requirement to throw some under the bus for the benefit of others is part of the reason why the trauma from this is going to be here for a loooooong while.

I mean, it wasn't great for me, I was hospitalised with a complication of covid, but recovered within a few weeks and was back to work - frontline healthcare worker.

If I'm really honest? My main feeling is bitterness and envy that I didn't have the option to be furloughed and stay at home baking and having lie ins.

I do feel for people who had their life course altered by the lockdowns, and there are lots of them. But I think the majority of people were not traumatised by it, many even enjoyed it and miss those days. There's a whole range of feelings and everyone will be slightly different.

But yes, it would have been so nice to have stayed at home.

Yes, but that a price worth paying for basic freedom.

What? Do you not remember the awful graphs of the number of deaths?

Do you seriously not remember the death rates and the overwhelmed hospitals? It would have been unthinkably worse if we had not have isolated.

I think this often but I’m afraid I clicked the wrong button, as I don’t think it’s unreasonable to think this.

My husband also died of Covid and the circumstances re hospital visiting etc. were very difficult and distressing at the time..
I agree that I can't see what I'm supposed to do but get on with things.
Before that happened lockdown wasn't difficult for us but I understand that people in different circumstances found it very difficult.
I can't see the advantage of it being talked about constantly ,it happened and it's over now.

I know someone with LDs whose life was upended due to Covid and it’s fundamentally changed them and subsequently their family. They would like to move on and “get back to normal” but can’t. Like you say OP there’s a lot of people still struggling in one way or another.

Similar here. Dd is a lot better than she was 3 years ago, but not back to 2019 levels.

I agree with you op.

I lost my father to covid in 2020 . Hospital acquired. It was very sad , and we were unable to be with him. My mother had a phone call to inform her he had died. I fought for 2 years to get answers.

People can have opinions , everyone is entitles to them. But to me it doesn't matter . I still lost my dad in terrible circumstances no matter what was going on in the world . He died alone in a side room and was only found after a nurse went to check on him. The sad thing is. He didn't even have covid when he was admitted . I could go on , but it won't help.

I hope anyone who lost a loved one during that time , are doing OK.