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Original poster

Anyone else still feeling flat?

423 replies

Summercocktailsinthesnow · 11/05/2021 14:23

I will say I am grateful to still be here, and I have not lost anyone very close to me to covid. Believe me I am grateful for those things. I am not depressed in the slightest either, however I am finding it increasingly hard to listen to all the conversations about hugging and enjoying life again on the radio and every news channel, and I am just not feeling it. At all. Things don't feel very different to me.

I have shivered through meals and drinks with friends, braved the weather for BBQs, I have even had my hair done! I imagined by now to be feeling much better than I am. But I don't feel better. I am so flat, and find things are not much better than before. The things I most want to do seem still a million miles away.

I am desperate for a holiday, we have worked all the way through, but how easy it that going to be this summer? Chances look exceptionally low. I want to dance at a festival, no chance. Or go to something with live music, anything.
I want to enjoy shopping without feeling muzzled, and I really feel what we have now is not really a whole life at all, it is like a half life. It is nothing like the life I left behind. I have no sense of when it will end. The scientist on the BBC today said she wasn't sure the next reopening will even happen....the moment when some kind of normal happens on the 21st of June.

I can't summon the energy to look forward to anything, because we have no idea if it will happen. I feel like I am being lied to, look at all you can do is the strap line, the reality is freezing cold, wind swept evenings eating cold over priced food, and everything is so limited in experience and in interaction, like trying to enjoy a facial with someone covered in PPE none of this is actually fun anymore!

I am optimist, by nature, and of course I have already counted my blessings for the things we can do, but really I just want my old life back so so so badly. Does anyone else feel like this?

OP posts:
Coldwine75 · 11/05/2021 22:05

Interesting most of us feel flat and no motivation, a pandemic, lockdowns and our normal lives turned upside down have done this. I always loved days out, holidays etc but have no desire or energy now. Cant even be bothered to go and shop. I havent even planned a holiday next year just no motivation. Cant be bothered to see friends, one wanted to meet in a pub garden last week but i made excuses not to.
Its weird..

Viviennemary · 11/05/2021 22:06

I've been looking forward to everything opening again. Now I don't know if I can be bothered going anywhere or doing anything.

ihearttc · 11/05/2021 22:07

I feel exactly the same, been in tears most of the evening and I don’t know why.
DS1 is in Y11, it feels like I’ve blinked and the last 2 years have just disappeared. He should be planning his prom and it’s been cancelled. We want to go on holiday and can’t go. Feel like I’ve missed all the last opportunities to do stuff with him whilst he still wants to.

Chachachachachachachachanges · 11/05/2021 22:10

I read this the other day and it super resonates
www.google.co.uk/amp/s/www.nytimes.com/2021/04/19/well/mind/covid-mental-health-languishing.amp.html

eurochick · 11/05/2021 22:32

I feel flat too. And so tired.

A few people have mentioned the lack of spontaneity. I completely agree that it's awful. To do anything you have to pre-book weeks in advance, playing the weather lottery. And then when you get there it's all painted arrows on the floor and being barked at to constantly hand sanitise or wear a mask. None of it is fun and relaxing.

BlossomOnTrees · 11/05/2021 22:40

I am so grateful for this post as I feel the same.
Like the feeling of being very disorientated and just not ok. I wake up every day feeling down and just not myself. I am glad I am not alone.

LittleBearPad · 11/05/2021 22:53

OP thank you. I feel exactly the same - so tired and almost numb.

We have a (UK) holiday in a few weeks and I’m anxious it will taken away for whatever reason that’s out of my control.

Everything feels fragile and brittle.

I’m so tired

Mooda · 11/05/2021 22:53

Can't relate to this at all. I mean I'd like to go abroad and that feels a long way off - and I really miss close family who live overseas - but everything else is coming back and this time cases are under control and deaths/ hospitalisations are very low. Vaccines seem to be working well and stopping both illness and spread - it's all good. Just very grateful to live in the UK and not somewhere where Covid is still raging. I do wish it would stop bloody raining though.

QueenPaw · 11/05/2021 22:56

Definitely. I lost my horse 2019 so I'm trying to find life without that too, my days off work were always riding or at the yard. Shielding would have been much easier if she had still been here but because shielding was so weird, it didn't feel odd she wasn't here any more
Now things are opening back up I feel.. lost? A bit "what do I do now?"

Coldwine75 · 11/05/2021 23:00

Its odd i feel so tired, someone said it was lockdown lethargy, just exhasuted

Stigsmother · 11/05/2021 23:08

All through all the lockdowns we have waited for this moment, to feel the dawning of hope, now that it is finally here it can't possibly live up to expectations. I feel disappointed, and let down. I don't think that we will feel a sudden excitement, more a gradual return to our previous lives, and one day, quite a way in the future probably, we will realise that we are back to "normal"

That's what I hope, anywaySmile

Ayeshstar2020 · 11/05/2021 23:11

I am so reassured to see this thread. I feel so so glad. I spend a lot of time sleeping and can’t seem to even get outside. I really feel frazzled by the last year even though it was a kind of hibernation. Saw friends last weekend and walking to see them felt exhausted and unwell! I’m going to build things up bit by bit... time outside everyday and hopefully kickstart my body and the mind will follow. Hugs to all!

katy1213 · 11/05/2021 23:12

What a gloomy lot you are. I'm booking tickets and looking forward to everything opening up again next week. Last summer was pretty normal and this one will be, too.

Coldwine75 · 11/05/2021 23:16

Its not being gloomy, the pandemic has had a huge effect on everyone's mental health. Last summer normal? was it? Had no Gcse's, no prom, we had to cancel our holiday abroad etc etc You are definately in the minority.

AnyFucker · 11/05/2021 23:21

I am better than I was 6 weeks but still low, tearful, brittle and hesitant

I don’t dare to acknowledge feeling happier because it can be pulled away at any moment.

SylviasMotherSaid · 11/05/2021 23:23

I love this thread . I feel like everything I used to enjoy is either still not happening or just too much of a hassle to even get excited about . I want that feeling so bad of waking up at 5 a.m excited about going a nice day out or a holiday but our finances are in terrible state I doubt we can even afford a night away . None of my friends appear to feel the same way as me they don’t mind masks and queues and having to book things . the highlight of most days for me is lying in bed with a book .

AnyFucker · 11/05/2021 23:27

And there we have it

I have just seen a thread updated that BitofFun has sadly died.

Fuck it. Fuck it all to hell. I hate this world, often.

QueenPaw · 11/05/2021 23:30

@AnyFucker I just saw it on her FB. Fuck Sad

LondonWFuck · 11/05/2021 23:41

I feel the same. I just can't be arsed with anything. I had a week off last week and mostly spent it in the living room (which is also where I work, so I basically spent it at work 🤨) and wasted LOADS of time just sitting around flicking through tv channels whilst also flicking through shite on my phone, concentrating on nothing and generally feeling unfulfilled and dissatisfied. I used to be so full of life!!! Even now I make plans to see friends and then when it comes to it it feels like a massive effort. It is nice to see them actually, but everything just seems to have a bit of a layer of fakeness - like pretending we are all having a great time eating food at a table on the pavement. Fuck that.

LondonWFuck · 11/05/2021 23:42

@AnyFucker

And there we have it

I have just seen a thread updated that BitofFun has sadly died.

Fuck it. Fuck it all to hell. I hate this world, often.

I didn't know this person but that's incredibly sad and I am sorry for my cross-post - I hadn't seen this post when I was typing mine Flowers
AnyFucker · 11/05/2021 23:45

BOF was a long standing poster but not posting so much recently as she was very ill. You weren’t to know x

Ostara212 · 12/05/2021 00:55

Really sorry to AnyFucker and others for your loss

Wheresmybiscuit3 · 12/05/2021 01:29

I’m really sorry to hear that @AnyFucker :(

I just came on to say I feel the same. I was okay till about three weeks ago. Now I’m tearful all the time, I have no motivation, I don’t want to work (have worked in a caring job throughout) and I did contemplate calling the GP and asking to go on to antidepressants again. I feel quite similar to how I felt when I had post natal depression after my last child.

I stopped smoking two weeks ago too and today I’ve really battled with it. Not given in yet. Brew

Arrowheart · 12/05/2021 06:32

@katy1213

What a gloomy lot you are. I'm booking tickets and looking forward to everything opening up again next week. Last summer was pretty normal and this one will be, too.
Yes we are gloomy. We are describing how we feel and yes it is gloomy.

If you think last summer was normal and that this one will be too then I think you have a very odd idea of normal. Masks, queuing, no escape, loss of jobs, mental and physical health, being ordered to follow arrows on the floor, having limited numbers in your house, not being allowed to sit on a bench (I could go on but you get the idea) is not my idea of normal but you crack on.

Original poster
Summercocktailsinthesnow · 12/05/2021 06:33

I am sorry anyfucker for your loss, and for everyone else that knew her Flowers

Its okay to acknowledge that we are feeling like this, it is not gloomy but honest. We don't have to pretend. If others are feeling the excitement of the reopening, I am very happy for them but I feel like an old empty car trundling along every day on the fumes of an empty tank. The only thing I am ready for is the scrapheap.

It will be interesting to see if over time, our energy returns slowly and we start to enjoy things again. Whether this period now is one of recovery. Almost like our body putting us on standby to get over the stress of the crisis.
At the time most of us were flat out working, home schooling, shopping, worrying, looking after the elderly and trying to keep everyone safe and well around us now. The moment of danger has passed, and we are switching off the high alert now. I wonder if those languishing were those under the most pressure during the pandemic.

I would feel a lot better if I thought it was all over, it is the niggling thought that it might be a short reprieve that bothers me most.

I understand the need for a cautious reopening, but more attention needs to be paid to the consequences.

OP posts: