How different would your life be if Covid hadn’t come along?

[Username721]

Just curious really!

Work? Relationships? Did the pandemic bring any long term life changes for you?

My brother may have still been alive. His suicide changed our lives.

This thread is a very sobering read. The accidental juxtaposition of trivial gains next to the awful loss and challenges people had to bear. I'm so sorry for all those people who lost loved ones and eternally grateful to those who supported them in their final hours.

We wouldn't have spent the money we did on our house. Covid lockdown made us see it more as our own little haven and an oasis, and we bought a jacuzzi and filled the back garden with raised beds and a greenhouse.

I would have been able to say goodbye to my mum before she died alone in hospital...

At a personal level my life got a lot better. Got a great new job and moved closer to family. Also I seem to be one of the people who is naturally immune to it. Will volunteer for the study if any branches open near me.

DH wouldn’t be working from home at all. He wfh at least 4 days a week and is much happier for it
My DDs, late teens when covid started, became really good friends after what felt like years of bickering.
DD2 didn’t need to sit her GCSES so that saved a lot of stress. Online learning really suited her and she did better than expected in her A levels.

On the negative side DS really struggled back at school after the second lockdown. I suspect that his school placement would have broken down sooner if it wasn’t for covid but less dramatically. It probably took a little longer sort a new school for him due to our LA falling even further behind.

Apart from 2 residents in the care setting I work in being alive still (possibly anyway) then absolutely nothing has changed. I worked continuously throughout. Finances are no different (well we got a £100 bonus for our continued hard work haha). I have no children or partner. My brother and my mum are my only family..my brother worked continuously too.

Are you and the pilot together?
An officer and a gentleman come to mind!

DH and I would probably have split up. He was seeing a counsellor who was quite frankly toxic to our relationship and made things so much worse. Once he stopped seeing her he became the old DH. Plus time spent together was good.

Sadly not and to this day he doesn't know how much listening to his tales of flights and training and where he went reignited my passion. He also doesn't know how much his encouragement helped me grow as a person.

I don't think it has had a major impact on DH and me, other than we can both WFH which has saved a lot of money and had a garden office installed which we had talked about off and on, but probably would not have done. Although I've not seen a friend for four years due to the lockdowns and travel restrictions but hope to see her this March.

I think it had more of an impact on ds, although he seems to be happy and has nice friends at university. Fortunately no mental health problems, but it was a real shame that his sixth form experience was disrupted so much.

Zero, nothing changed. Lockdown was kind of helpful in that my husband was working from home so could look after our eldest while I went off to Great Portland Street day after day for IVF scans and tests.

I don't know how we could have coped if he was in the office.

Not much has changed for us - same house, school, jobs etc. The main difference is that DH only goes into the office one or two days a week now, which suits us all better.

Things were different at the time obvs, but nothing is much different overall now really. Best thing is I work in a hybrid fashion much more than I did before (always did a bit of hybrid before) and it’s a much more accepted way of working, so best of both worlds for work/life balance.

Oddly, I can say my life has only changed for the better as a result. It caused some very sliding doors moments that in the end have meant everything turned out for the best.

I ended up (due to social distancing and not being able to visit each other, something was mentioned in conversation that caused me to do some digging...) finding out that my mum's partner is a convicted child sex offender. I absolutely never in a million years would have known otherwise and she had hidden this information from me for 15 years (even though he has continued to offend in this time). It meant I could go NC with them before my dc were of an age where they were having unsupervised contact with either of them. I feel very sure that it's probably meant the difference between my dc being abused and keeping them safe. I feel really grateful, even though it's been awful to go through and the circumstances that led to me finding out where not great.

And we had a house purchase fall through after the first lockdown due to the sellers being CEV and deciding not to sell. It was devastating at the time, but 18 months later, we finally bought our now home and it's wonderful. We are so much happier here than we ever would have been in the other house and we have so many new friends and a great community in our new area.