To have lost all motivation for anything

[Pleidiolwyfimgwlad]

Is the endlessness of lockdown getting to anyone else? I seem to have lost all motivation for tidying the house, cooking, homeschooling, my job - all of it.

Me & the kids walk every day but that’s about it - it’s the relentlessness of it all that’s really getting to me I think. I just want to sit about eating toast & sleeping- I’d take to my bed if I didn’t have kids to look after.

I have quite a big job at a uni too and even the thought of it makes me feel depressed. It’s awful- I am fed up of my colleagues and they are lovely people so I feel bad.

Aibu to have just lost all mojo? I don’t think I am depressed- just OVER it all- I don’t even know what I need at the moment!

@Twentyweektraining

MorrisZapp

I miss my friends so much but I cba to phone them. My closest friend texted me to say 'chat later?' and I thought oh god, do I have to?

I can't even be bothered speaking.

I can so relate to this

Me too.

I will say though that after I forced myself to phone someone, I did actually enjoy talking to them.. so maybe give it a go.

Trouble is we've got nothing to talk about... "I got up, I tried to home educate my children and work, I cooked lunch (we had cheese and tomato omlette) we went for a walk, we did some more home education, I made dinner (smoked fish pasta with spinach) the children played x box and watched TV while I did some actual work, I ordered a fruit and veg box, they went to bed, I did more work and watched TV..." Its the same every f*cking day except the weekends when there's even less to do.

Oh I'm grumpy and worst we've finished the Christmas cake so can't even treat myself to a little slice of that at 4pm.

I feel the same.

I actually think I'm breaking and I can't stop it.

I feel very similar the op but thi is very similar to how I feel every January it is a particularly bad year but I've always loathed winter . I am always astonished at the number of complaints about the weather on here in the summer for instance. In some ways that helps though as I know it will improve for me by the time March starts and we have more light and improved weather. As long as we don't repeat the weather from the 'Beast from the East' year, where we had such a cold snowy March

Same. Hiding upstairs from kids and husband as just feel so flat. Everything feels so bleak and it doesn’t feel like there’s an end in sight any time soon.

hamsters i remember during the first lockdown feeling like even though I was really bored, long stretches of the day would often go by in what felt like an hour or two. A couple of my friends noticed the same thing, and my theory was that we were all so understimulated we were going through life in a sort of semi-sleep state. No idea if that has any scientific basis but it was certainly what it felt like.

Btw, I swear to God I'm not one of Those People but have you looked into doing some kind of self-study at all? I only mention it because you said about needing a challenge - I started an online physics course in December and it's saving my sanity to feel like I'm making progress with something rather than living the same day over and over. Totally understand it might not be possible if you're lacking energy and/or alone time though.

Whoever it was that said they'd had five hours' screen time, I have you beat - I racked up TWELVE the other day. Approximately one of which was productive, the rest was just pointlessly scrolling through shit. Banned myself from the laptop yesterday and felt much better for it.

Does anyone else find weekends the worst? At least during the week there is some sort of structure and something to get up in the mornings for. At the weekend I just feel exhausted and can barely be bothered to move from the sofa. I actually look forward to mondays now.

I'm totally with you, my people, on not wanting to talk to friends. If we've arranged a Zoom drink in the evening my heart starts sinking mid-afternoon with near-existential dread, and although I do quite enjoy talking, once it comes down to it, I always want to end the fall first first. A part of me thinks: why are we pretending, this isn't how it used to be; and as soon as I end the call I'll be going back into silence, so let's get it over with.

The silence of the days is odd. Yesterday the only speech I heard from people outside my own family was 'Who's been a big brave boy then' (man to dog, coming out of local vets), and 'no way to live, is it?' from another woman using elbow and reams of paper to wash her hands in the hospital loo. Both were very touching to me. I actually cried a little but when I heard the man talking to his dog.

Side point: if we're meant to wash our hand for 30 secs, why the fuck do hospitals still have taps that cut out after five??

I realise that a lot of this sounds like clinical depression, both in my post and others. But I don't think it is. If someone said the cure for Covid had been found, it was as cheap as aspirin and on sale in Boots now OTC, no need for vaccines, just pop one of these at first symptoms and 0% death rate then -- I would be massively jubilantly excited. When I've actually been depressed it's been a completely rigid, unyielding mood.

@psychomath
I’m with you. In the last month I’ve done a fiction writing course and have got deep into Jungian Psychology reading loads of books and listening to (literally) 100’s of podcasts. It helps,

I do little DIY projects. I do fitness. I cook really good meals still. I on the face of it seem quite productive. And I suppose I am. But it’s just not my usual levels of ‘living’ and it’s starting to wear.

I think it’s the lack of variety to the senses, that’s all I can describe it as. And I think it’s probably simply the lack of social interaction - a fundamental need for humans that we can’t deny and probably especially true of someone of my personality type.

To pp. I don’t think this is anything like clinical depression. When you are depressed you go inwards and it’s ‘all on you’. This is a longing to do things, it’s outward looking, a yearning to see family, friends, people.

@soundofsilence1

Does anyone else find weekends the worst? At least during the week there is some sort of structure and something to get up in the mornings for. At the weekend I just feel exhausted and can barely be bothered to move from the sofa. I actually look forward to mondays now.

Absolutely - I HATE weekends now. As you say at least the week has some structure to it. DH is wfh all the time but finds it hard to find things to do at the weekend so stomps around, in and out of the back door, bringing mud in every time. I just tend to stare at my laptop most of the day, apart from the dog walk.

My TV in the lounge has just broken too. Oh goody

Same here ...... I feel utterly useless and am scared of planning in case the rug gets pulled out again. Meh.

m.youtube.com/watch?v=ARr2l4TLDsE

This also sums it up quite well.... did enjoy the song posted earlier....

Oh yes hamstersarse I understand that feeling. I'm getting a lot done and even quite enjoying it some days, but it's no substitute for social contact or normal life.

I still like weekends better - I'm ostensibly still working but can't really do my job from home, so weekdays are exactly the same but with the added stress of checking my email every half hour to see if anyone wants anything. Also I feel vaguely guilty for sleeping in or going out during my work hours even though I'm not doing anything

I read this article last year, and it uses the metaphor of “depletion of surge capacity” to describe the sense of rolling loss and ambiguity, and how it impacts particularly badly if you are a fixer and a doer, as a few of us in this thread are. Maybe you’ll find it helpful.

elemental.medium.com/your-surge-capacity-is-depleted-it-s-why-you-feel-awful-de285d542f4c

I had a couple of calls with friends yesterday and upfront I said I didn’t want to talk about anything pandemic related, so we didn’t. We talked about the really big topics- philosophical questions, pet theories about historical events, nature/nurture and consciousness - and it was fantastic. Really refreshing. All of those big topics are still there, and will still be there when we get out of this. It helped me a lot. And I didn’t once have to cast my mind back to try to remember how I filled my time exactly between Tuesday and Thursday this week, when nothing really happened and I can’t remember and it would be boring to talk about anyway.

Oh @Pleidiolwyfimgwlad I could have written your post if I could be bothered

I feel so meh. Can't be bothered to properly clean, sick to death of everything I cook, I am usually quite a motivated and jolly person and I am struggling. Same as you-I walk the dog and then that's it.

My pre-lockdown jeans won't do up and I can't even care about that-just wearing things with drawstring waist. I feel awful even writing this!!!

I feel so bad for my teen DC. It's just so boring for them.

@HappyFlamingo

I feel so bad for my teen DC. It's just so boring for them.

Me too. My teenager is in the shielding category so has been locked down for nearly a year now with very little break. She got screwed over in the exam fiasco and is struggling with her mental health 😕

@SophocIestheFox

Great article, thanks

I wouldn’t say I’m bored but I have no motivation at all! Even getting up & having a shower is a chore. Cooking and doing a load of washing is an even bigger chore.
Don’t even mention cleaning the house.

Currently only half way through very strict chore list headed ‘by 11.00’. Seem to be lying on sofa surfing web and listening to an Agatha Christie audiobook (which was supposed to assist my chore completion). Managed to put a wash on. Oh dear.

@HeronLanyon

Currently only half way through very strict chore list headed ‘by 11.00’. Seem to be lying on sofa surfing web and listening to an Agatha Christie audiobook (which was supposed to assist my chore completion). Managed to put a wash on. Oh dear.

Don't worry Heron; take "by 11.00" as meaning November 2100. We might be let out by then.

(I took a good minute trying to work out what the next century is and how to write it. My brain has definitely atrophied)

@HappyFlamingo

I feel so bad for my teen DC. It's just so boring for them.

Mine are 14 and I'm hoping the snow here today might just lure them away from video games for a bit.

My teens have not been outside in days

I used to have a job that with commute kept me out of the house for 55 hours a week. Now I leave the house for a couple of hours every two weeks to get some groceries, and work less than an hour a day from home. Then I would do more in a 2-day weekend than I can be bothered to do in a whole month at home now.

I don't really understand it. I don't think I'm depressed. It's actually very nice not working, and in fact I semi-retired and was used to something like this lifestyle even before COVID. But there seems to be some sort of phenomenon whereby the less you have to do every day, the less you feel able to do. I think this is the flip side of the managerial saying, that if you want something done, you should give the job to the busiest employee.

HeronLanyon a wash is better than nothing!

I think the problem is it feels like there's no reason to do anything now when there's an indefinite number of days ahead that will be exactly the same. I used to spend weekends on tasks like tidying because I knew that on work days I'd be too tired, so it would be my last chance for a week or so to get them done. Now there's nothing to motovate me to do it today, when things would be exactly the same if I left it til tomorrow. And as a result it doesn't get done at all.