Did covid screw anyone else's life up?

[girlmeetsboy]

Interested to hear on this as I have been reading a thread where people loved the solidarity of it all. For me it was redundancy, house lost, business lost and savings...

Big lifestyle changes due to working from home that continues to this day - soem is positive but definitely a game changer all round and not for the best

Yes and no. I used to be quite active always had my makeup on and took great care of myself, was so much more motivated and went out daily and really enjoyed doing stuff. Since lockdown that's all really gone now. I find I'm at home a great deal more now with no plans other than being a parent and carer. Life sort of has lost its sparkle a little. I Appreciate that these are small things compared to people losing houses and business's but to completely change who you are/was in some aspects hurts.

Dd2 really struggled with her metnal
Health and as a result there was a catastrophic incident late last year which we will all feel the shock waves of forever I think.
She might well have suffered bad mental
Health anyway but being in locks down definitely exacerbated it

@Kissingfrogs25
of course it wasn't great. But it wasn't that bad. Dh went to work on a big site (provides water) every day. I went to my office some days, and worked at home for my other part time job, so we never felt trapped. We took every opportunity we were allowed, when safe, per guidelines. When allowed I went for twice weekly walk round our town with friend, talked the world right iykwim. As soon as we could we met up with close friends outside. Sat at distance, glass of wine bbq. Stil laughed. In the October, when allowed, went to our caravan in Dorset. Boys Didn't struggle with school work, found it fine, played Xbox with their friends all the time. They missed going out, and sport. But compared to others, they recognised that they were lucky, this was minimal compared to some. No catching up to do when back at school. Ds2's football team had regular zoom quizzes and we laughed.

These posts show how awful it was for many. I know this. It was bad. Trying to be respectful. But for us, and most people we know, fortunately the affects were kind of minimal.

my mental health really suffered - terrible PND being pregnant throughout the first lockdown (conceived Feb 2020), nearly losing the baby and having all scans and appointments alone. Gave birth pretty much alone in Nov 2020 then really struggled with my newborn and toddler in that terrible bleak winter. No contact from HV and I was so anxious. Baby was fine (though didn’t meet any family until 6 months old as they live abroad) but my then 2 year old really struggled and still has issues with socialising today. I feel so guilty for the impact on him. My relationship with DH also really suffered and I’ve struggled with my return to work.

Yep, total isolation and income loss induced mental breakdown.

A few months before first lockdown, I left my job to start a self employed events business, had a big contract for the summer, all of it got cancelled. Didn't qualify for any covid payments. No colleagues to talk to. It was the worst two years of my life.

These stories are heartbreaking, especially seeing how many the mental health of so many children has been affected. I think its important to say that it wasn't covid that caused these things in moat cases, but the lockdowns and mitigation measures put in place. They were a colossal mistake and I hope we are never so stupid as to do it again.

I was able to work from home, missed family as not close enough to see for a walk or anything as things started to ease. Seems like a distant dream now so I guess I'm lucky that it doesn't seem to have had any lasting effect on us. Well except the weight I put on, too much watching netflix and eating instead of being out and about.

We did. It was bad enough that there were only 3 of us (dad, me and my eldest sibling, the younger one had to watch it on video chat as no zoom funerals then), at her funeral without him feeling abandoned when he needed us most. I often wonder it it was the enormous sense of guilt he had at not being with her when she died and only being allowed to give her what he called "a sorry send off for a beautiful woman", that led to his cancer diagnosis 5 months later and his death after just 6 weeks of knowing he had it. I guess I'll never know for sure.

Yes, one of my parents became an extreme conspiracy theorist, to the extent they can’t talk about anything else. They stash food under their floorboards thinking the world is going to end.

I mourn the loss of the close relationship we used to have.

Not as bad as for many on this thread, but my health took a hit and I've found it difficult to access healthcare; even to get a repeat prescription, or a filling. I've had 2 teeth removed and my dentist thinks I will probably lose another next year.

@girlmeetsboy

Thank you. I assumed noone would read/reply. We are slowly improving but half term has been a total kick in the teeth due to another "lockdown" because we have flu.

I had a lockdown baby. It was hard mentally with a newborn and a toddler but I thought we came through relatively unscathed.

Until this year where my lockdown baby (then nearly 2) died of a common respiratory virus. I know there will never be cause and effect but I can’t help but wonder whether the lack of exposure in that first 18 months left her with a weakened immune system on top of the way general respiratory viruses seem to have come back with a vengeance.

The impact on older people was colossal, and lockdown was meant to help them.

My father died (not of Covid) in March 2020 and my mother, who was already experiencing dementia symptoms, really nosedived due to the combined isolation of widowhood and lockdown. I wonder how badly lockdown exacerbated these conditions in the older generation. The old people 'shielded' in nursing homes and not able to see family also suffered dreadfully. It was a double-edged sword and all so bloody tragic.

Yes it really damaged my relationship with my eldest son :(

We lost our savings and then got into debt. DH was not furloughed but had his salary cut by 50% voluntarily. I lost my business ( wasn’t covered by SEISS grant because it was too newly established). My son missed taking GCSEs was given grades and went to college to do a 3 A level science based BTEC. All the students on the course dropped out because they were not able to cope with the difficulty. The college said that the drop out rate for those who are 17/18 now is massive because they were simply not ready for sixth form level study having missed so much GSCE work. My daughter was studying on a year long dance course at a top school in London. In Feb the course was shut down. Nobody received any further tuition or a refund on either their tuition or accommodation. My children now 18 and 22 have not really known much of a social life for the last few years.

Long Covid. 2 years, 8 months, and counting. Plus, one of the millions of self-employed people excluded from UKGov financial support. Life is spectacularly shit.

Justhereforchristmaschronicles so sorry to hear that :(

Yep husband had ptsd that went unnoticed and my mental health took a toll but only recognised what happened this year. I suspect I had some post natal depression but I also got paranoid and anxious of being out for our 1 hour a day thinking people would report us for doing wrong. I used to reherse multiple times before the house explaining to people we didn't have a garden so our exercise consisted of the park and sometimes just sitting on the grass! We counted ourselves lucky constantly saying how we still had jobs not realising other things were being effected. At the time we thought we were creating great memories baking and being a close unit buy it really wasn't the happy bubble we thought it was

I haven’t actually been personally effected, well apart from financially however I have always struggled there so same issue different reason really.

However my family suffered terribly, especially one of my children. The crushing pressure and responsibility of trying to get us all through lockdowns and out the other side almost finished me off.

Since the lockdowns I have then had to clear up and pick up all the pieces and put them back together. I feel like it is only really now that I can almost see the light at the end of the tunnel. We still have a long way to go but I really don’t have much fight left in me.

physically and mentally I am just exhausted. This has caused my relationship to breakdown, because I just didn’t have it in me to put effort into all of that.

Someone else mentioned how it feels like we are expected to carry on and act like lockdown never happened, this has really bugged me and makes me quite angry sometimes. I never felt like it was a precious time of memories and togetherness. It was just stress and isolation.

To be honest, I suspect if it wasn’t for my family I probably would have been fine. I would have just locked myself away and kept myself busy with work and streaming services.

If a pandemic was going to happen in my lifetime, it probably happened at the best possible time for me. My husband and I had no holidays planned for the first time in years and had just bought a house days before the first lockdown. We were also able to get married a week before the second and I found out I was pregnant around the same time.
We’ve spent too much time in the house since, but I’m not sure how much of that is due to lockdowns and how much is due to lack of funds thanks to all the above.

My husband worked all through Covid and I worked most of it (apart from during maternity leave) so I think we’ve been pretty lucky to get through ok so far.

Didn't suffer financially during Covid but I'm still feeling adrift as I no longer have the routine I had pre Covid and am struggling to find a new one (partly menopause to blame for that I'm sure!)
I had various voluntary roles pre covid which have not started up again and I used to go to exercise classes 4 mornings a week. This moved to at home classes after lockdown 1 as although I returned to the gym they had made changes that didn't fit in with what I'd done previously. I bought gym equipment and now exercise at home. The consequence of this is that I mostly go all day without conversation unless I go out to the shops.
I'm trying to sign up for new activities but find myself making excuses why I can't do it this/next week so don't do it at all.

Working in a hospital through it gave me anxiety. I don’t enjoy my job the same now. Wearing masks all day still in my trust. Thought measures are minimal it just never seems the same anymore. Covid still causes us issues day to day.

The hospital and locality I work in was badly impacted by covid we had several ICUs open and some days several people died on just one ward. Horrific. My uncle died of it in a couple of days just before he got his vaccines.

Lockdowns were needed at first because we weren’t quick enough to react ( closing borders would of been a start!) but went on too long, too complex, too all over the place. Then there was no long term planning when it was evident it was coming in waves and wouldn’t just go away. No foresight, no leadership, no forward thinking just finger crossed for vaccines and close everything when it gets bad.

My way of dealing was doing things and seeing people whenever restrictions were lifted. We went on uk breaks when we could even with restrictions like masks/distancing/rule of 6 it really helped. Also my exercise/cardio routines helped and still actually do help my anxiety.

So many people have been either impacted by the actual hideous virus or the lockdown measures. These stories are awful.

I luckily didn't lose my job, nor was I furloughed. I'm an HCP (a Sister on an acute resp ward), so was able to see colleagues and do my job. However, I didn't see my children for 3 months - my brother kindly took them in as I'm a single parent, he and SIL were WFH, and it meant that I was available to work any time (on top of my FT hours as needed) - I could only do video calls with them as I didn't want to go there and for my youngest (then 6) to forget and try to run to me and have a hug. I know very much how lucky I was/still am to have a job. I feel so much for those poor people who lost so much.

The thing that haunts me is what I saw/heard. Of course, I expected to see sick people (that's my job after all! And I look after some of the most poorly patients). However, it haunts you when you have to take phone calls from relatives saying their goodbyes, or begging you to try and save their loved one. Or when you only have a finite number of ventilators/NIV machines and have to chose who gets them (like the lifeboats on the Titanic, there were not enough to go around, nor were there enough of us nurses who were trained to nurse those patients). Or when the tablets at work don't bloody work/a patient didn't have a mobile phone/means to contact family, and you pass your phone over to a patient so they can have a last video call with their relatives (I know that we weren't strictly allowed to do that, but I'll be damned if I stopped someone, or a family, from having that opportunity to say a final goodbye). Except those patients were hooked up to NIV and unable to properly speak/make themselves heard. The PPE I wore meant that they couldn't see me crying whilst I was holding up my phone for them whilst they had that last video call. So many deaths (of older people, younger people, people like me), and so quick. That's the stuff that I still dream of, and it's what wakes me up at night.

A lot of staff have left because of it. And colleagues became ill and were hospitalised due to covid. A dear workmate (and friend) of mine died. People are now too scared to come to my ward, because of covid (and during the bad times, it was even worse). What also got to me was that so many followed the rules, to keep people safe, and then we found out about the parties and gatherings at Downing Street. It made an absolute mockery of the things my poor patients, their families, and the general public had to endure.

Weirdly though, I didn't get covid myself until this year!

I escaped losing everything by a whisker. My exH walked out on me in August 2019 and I decided to hell with it I'm going to move somewhere I've always wanted to live and get a new job as my old job was hateful.
I moved 300 miles away, downsized and bought a lovely house - it's much cheaper around here - and got a new job in the NHS. I worked privately before self employed.
Then covid struck literally the same month as I moved and started my new job and I was safe, had I stayed where I was I didn't qualify for furlough as I hadn't been self employed long enough, I would have lost my house and used up all my savings.
Had he walked out a couple of months later it would all have been too late.