To not be over what happened to me during covid/lockdowns

[ifyougochasingrabbits]

Just a few of the things I went through

Losing my cleaning business i had built up over years overnight due to everyone cancelling us

Being humiliated by the headteacher at DC school shouting at me in front of other parents because I refused to wear a mask outside . My little girl being made to start school late and finish late because I was unable to wear a mask to collect her (school run was all outside I may add and I had no problem wearing masks in shops etc but I drew the line at in the fresh air outside)

watching thousands of pounds of income disappear at an alarming rate. while wondering if we’d still have jobs and be able to keep the house we’d worked our arses off for for years to buy. Going through six months of trauma with H furloughed and depressed because his work could not guarantee he'd still have a job at the end of it. He was on half pay as furlough was only paid up to about 30k salary iirc and if you were on more it was employers discretion to pay the full salary which his work didn't. He was even applying for jobs at supermarkets and delivery driving etc and getting no where despite having a high level job at a major house builder.

Watching selfish morons stockpiling at the very beginning

“Friends” dumping me, one Cos I dared voice out loud that I wasn’t personally scared of covid and was struggling with restrictions and did not agree with them.

Having to deal with the fact that many of my (remaining) friends had views I completely don’t agree with and accepting they probably feel same about me.
And having to cope with the fact they supported restrictions that were destroying our lives and mental health

Having my business absolutely trashed all over social media and being called a dirty bitch and worse by local people. Fake bad reviews etc. The “reason” was they took exception to me saying on a local page post that I didn't believe in masks in school (this was due to my kids really struggling with them) My 14 year old said he agreed and some of them then found him on fb and messaged him insulted his looks and called him stupid and a fucking moron etc. This was actual grown adults.

a random person inboxed me on Facebook due to seeing my business ad and threatened to "smash my face in" because she thinks i was “endangering lives” by working

My neighbour reporting us to the police for having an illegal gathering. This "illegal gathering" was me, my H and our 3 dc having a bbq in the garden. Needless to say we all live together

Being put on medication for panic attacks and anxiety in fact I minimised it to the gp. I was actually suicidal and the only reason I am still here is because of my kids and the fact my husband and parents had the same views as me. But I would secretly hope to die in my sleep and almost every day I would wake up and cry because I was still here.

Watching my 3 Kids completely fall apart due to schools being closed. While not only having to deal with seeing posts all over fb about how well other kids were doing and coping doing all their work, managing great. And knowing some people I care about actually wanted schools shut. One of my kids is still very unwell mentally and it all started with lockdowns

Oh and to add final insult to injury, in November 2021 I had to pay £5700 (which was part credit card and part all of our savings) privately for an operation that should have been freely available on the nhs. But cos covid they could not give me a date and I was getting more and more poorly and could not wait.

I am still angry and maybe I should get over it. But I can't. And There's probably more but these are the stand out moments. I'm doing okay now and I have a new business and I'm doing well, H has a new job as he could not trust his old place after covid. but I've been very low again recently with the anniversary of it all

A lot of people can only talk about lockdowns and Covid as if it happened 'to them'.

It happened to everyone OP. And a lot of people had it as bad and much much worse than you.

You were being ridiculous about masks and you the the situation worse for your children. Part of parenting during Covid for most of was trying to be calm and collected for the sake of minimising our children's alarm and distress. Instead you decided to 'draw the line' and make some ridiculous statement towards the school of all places- who were probably doing their damn best under a lot more stress for your child and everyone else's.

It was distressing, a lot of people are still not over it, it's great you're getting help. But try to develop some self awareness about the ways in which you made it harder than it had to be.

I felt sorry for you at the beginning of your post. However, the more I read, the less sympathy I had. You brought alot of it on yourself. You seem.to be making yourself a victim. I think you need to read back on your post and reflect on where you did not help yourself. That anger you feel, you wouldn't have half as much of it if you hadn't of been stubborn, selfish and self centred. You are the victim of your own behaviour and decisions.

I'm so sorry for your loss

And yes, OP, get some perspective.

I'm not usually one for getting into misery wars, people are entitled to feel what they feel, despite the fact someone always has it worse than them.

But really, your post comes across as very self-centred and also hypocritical. You did what you did, to the detriment of your daughter in one case, but aren't affording others the same luxury.

Covid killed people and people were terrified. Of course you should not have been threatened and your kids verbally abused, nobody is saying that is ok, but ultimately, it's not all about you. And your post very much comes across like you think it is.

^^ this

I have all the sympathy in the world, but it's so frustrating to see again the "but I was low risk for COVID", "the average age of death was 84" etc etc

The risks weren't just from COVID, they were from having a certain proportion of the population ill or needing hospital care at any one time. Society breaks down if suddenly loads of people aren't able to carry out their normal jobs.

COVID may very well have been no risk to you whatsoever @ifyougochasingrabbits , but needing an emergency appendectomy and being unable to have surgery would have been.

I’m going to raise my hand re the vaccine - it’s left me with food allergies and painful joint inflammation. I know a young guy who died of a blood clot in the brain caused by the vaccine.

But it also saved lives.

the vaccine was overall great, but please don’t forget the people it severely impacted.

Being against lockdowns is basically saying "I'm too selfish and ignorant to accept basic precautions to protect society."

Hard to be sympathetic.

The most ignorant people were the ones most opposed to vaccines, masks, and lockdowns. She drew the line. Please!

I didn’t say anywhere that we were stronger because we don’t have mental health problems and people who do are weaker….I was merely suggesting that the OP probably made her children’s mental health problems worse with her attitude…which is likely! So please read more carefully in future 🙄

Because of the Nazi’s apparently.

@BeachBlondey I couldn’t agree with you more - hindsight is a wonderful thing, but in 2020 we didn’t have a fucking clue. I was terrified, mine and my families mental health took a nosedive, my parents are still suffering with ill health because of it and I’m still (like many many others) trying to sort my shit out from it.

It's ridiculous and offensive to say that people were blindly following orders we didn’t agree with when it comes to distancing and masks - no, we were fucking terrified we might kill someone BECAUSE IT WAS A NEW VIRUS. Do people really not appreciate that?

Was that poster not bagging bodies before?

I assume they were.

But even if they had a new role during covid of 'bagging bodies' what relevance does that have to the OP expressing how she was effected during covid?

It's that kind of dramatic, over-emotive posts that were designed to shut down discussion during covid and designed to shut it down now.

It's manipulative and toxic and designed to shut down discussion. Not cool.

You chose to single your child out by not wearing a mask outside. You could have stopped a lot of bad feeling by just wearing the mask for a few mins twice a day.

A school mum I know lost all of her local friends during covid due to her very vocal anti-vax and anti-lockdown views. The way people were gossiping about her was really rude but I suppose she made a choice to be so vocal.

@ifyougochasingrabbits
I am sorry you were affected so badly by Covid. Many of us were and still are struggling. Non-Covid Health issues are at an all time high and waiting lists for treatment/surgery are horrendous. Mental health for many - including children -has still not recovered. People I personally knew, died from Covid and I know 2 people suffering from Long Covid. It was a dreadful time for many. So on that count YANBU.

Unfortunately your post reads as if you are are angry about the lockdowns and the restrictions because of Covid - rather than being angry and upset about the arrival of Covid itself, which is why you are getting a hard time on here. You are of course, entitled to your own views on whether the Covid restrictions were necessary - but behaving the way you did, since so many people were terrified for their health and for those of people close to them, was HUGELY Selfish since you were basically saying to others, in effect, 'I don't think Covid is a problem, so you don't have the right to think differently and I don't care about what your worries are, you are wrong''. it doesn't matter if you were right or wrong in your opinion, you basically said 'screw everyone else, I don't care about anyone else' and for that YABVVU

Bullying her children is absolutely awful and unacceptable.

Losing her business is awful too. But her attitude is spoiled and she seems unable to even see her own role in some of the difficulties she went through, which happened as a consequence of the way she chose to behave.

She has a choice: accept that if you're going to not conform to the rules, consequences are going to unfold. Make a decision if you want to conform/not conform and get on with it.

Or whine.

You clearly don't know how averages work 🙄 Everyone I know who died of covid was significantly younger one being 19 and had no underlying problems

No it isn't but people were dying from COVID older than they were dying from other things. Total Life expectancy is 83 , average age of death for COVID was 84. Everything became about quantity of life Vs quality. I'm sure many elderly people who were dying from other things didn't want to be locked up into forced shielding in the precious last month's years of life.

This. Every word.👏😀

I do wish people could move away from this black and white thinking about covid (and life generally)

My little girl being made to start school late and finish late because I was unable to wear a mask to collect her (school run was all outside I may add and I had no problem wearing masks in shops etc but I drew the line at in the fresh air outside)
You put your child through that, when you weren't "unable" to wear one at all?
That's shameful, actually.

I clearly do know how averages work the ONS calculated that. An average is that so if the average is 84 a good number would be above 84!!! If a huge number of young people were dying the average would come down a lot.

This. I'd be unimpressed that you couldn't bother to wear a mask to get your five year old to school on time.

Sounds like you brought a lot of it on yourself.

Some of what you have listed is just consequences for your choices. You refused to wear a mask at school. You expressed opinions belittling the risks and criticising the restrictions. You allowed your DC to express opinions online that you knew were contentious.

There was research that showed a direct correlation between DCs' MH during Covid and their parents. You deliberately made public stances on Covid issues and then seem to have complained that they upset people; and that then impacted your DCs.

See a counsellor. Your inability to appreciate cause and effect; your lack of empathy for others and your seemingly obliviousness to consequences - will impact all of your life, not just Covid.

An awful lot of that seems self inflicted to me.

I don't usually believe in responding to someone saying they had a tough time with saying other people had it tougher but you really need to get some perspective. You were the maker of your own drama in most of that. I wont share my own experiences during covid because plenty of people have shared theirs. You need to move on and be grateful that you came out fairly unscathed compared to others. Some of us are still living in covid hell and can't see us escaping it any time soon.

Sorry, didn't mean to imply that nobody was negatively impacted, but there is a narrative pushed by some that the vaccine is harming more people than COVID did.

(Also that COVID only killed people over 80, so who cares they were going to die soon anyway, which is what I'm getting from at least one person on this thread.)