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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To ask how your life changed since 2020?

133 replies

IceAndLemonPlease · 02/12/2023 10:01

Did your life get better or worse since covid happened ?
Mine definitely got worse. Made redundant from a job I was very comfortable in and which I had been in for many years. My colleague passed away at the age of just 39 (Lockdown became too much for her 😞) and DH diagnosed with a second chronic disease which caused a strain on us all. Life just feels very different now in a way I cannot describe. I wish more then anything to go back to 2019 life but I appreciate not everyone feels that way.

OP posts:
Bluevelvetsofa · 02/12/2023 10:09

It’s shrunk. And I don’t like it.

thefirstmrsrochester · 02/12/2023 10:11

Feb 2020 - got a labrador
Mar 2020 - DS diagnosed with cancer
Sept 2020 - DS cancer in remission
Sept 2020 - not so DH leaves to find his happiness.
Dec 2023 - DS still in remission, Labrador the love of our lives, completed the family of me, 2 x DS, DD and cat. Not so DH is lonely, bitter, selfish and spiteful man for whom the grass wasn't greener.

I am happy and feel very lucky now.

Lex345 · 02/12/2023 10:14

I'm so sorry to hear about your friend :(

COVID pretty much destroyed my career (registered nurse and care home manager when lockdown happened) and the stress of that has meant I have de registered and changed career completely.

Its taken until this year for me to feel like me again, still haunted by it (the COVID inquiry is dredging a lot of up, but almost feels like redemption).

One positive thing though, I know now who really cares about me and my family and who doesn't.

Hbh17 · 02/12/2023 10:16

Not been any change at all.

RhinestoneCowgirl · 02/12/2023 10:16

I'm in the third year of an undergraduate degree in my 40s, after dropping out in first year as a teen. Without the push of the pandemic I probably wouldn't be doing this. I'm in line to get a first which feels amazing.

On the other hand, it's become apparent that my youngest child is autistic (now 14), and the covid years were particularly stressful for her, in ways we're only just realising now.

OnlyFoolsnMothers · 02/12/2023 10:17

Better tbh- wfh has meant I see my children and they benefit massively imo. I also save on train fares but c. £80-£100 a month.
I still on the whole wish covid hadn’t happened for the greater societal good.

anicecuppateaa · 02/12/2023 10:18

I am happier now. 2019 dd died. 2020 we moved into our house and have finished renovating it from top to bottom. Had more dc. I’m still very sad about dd but my life is fuller and has grown around my grief.

PuttingDownRoots · 02/12/2023 10:20

Gone from living on base with DH, moving constantly and unsettled...

To DH weekly commuting while DDs and I live in our own home, attending the local school, settled in hobbies etc. I run my own business now. I am getting my own life really, not just a Wife.

It would be better if DH was a bit more local...

bombastix · 02/12/2023 10:21

Better I think. Partly renovated the house I bought, went into a new field and some more money, got the children into good schools.

The thing though I think COVID (the event, not the disease) has had some sort of long term effect on me. Despite all of the above, I feel less joy than I did. Or maybe I'm just now middle aged and annoyed that my face tells me that every morning.

PictureFrameWindow · 02/12/2023 10:23

I'm so sorry that your DD died @anicecuppateaa Flowers

Stitchesremoved22 · 02/12/2023 10:23

I'm fatter. That's about it.

Strawberrycheesecake7 · 02/12/2023 10:27

Mine has got much better but I don’t think it has anything to do with Covid. My DH and I have had a list of things we want in our lives since we first got together seven years ago. We have had an extremely eventful couple of years where we’ve somehow managed to do nearly everything on the list seemingly all at once. We got married and bought a house last year. This year we adopted a golden retriever in January and I gave birth to our son in June. It might sound odd to do the last two things so close together but this particular dog is an adult who is already trained and used to children and it’s worked out fine for us. It seems mad that this time two years ago we were living in a tiny damp flat with no children and a hamster as our only pet.

margotrose · 02/12/2023 10:28

Much better, but that's nothing to do with COVID.

BarryKentPoet · 02/12/2023 10:28

Since 2020 I've lost 9 stone and had cancer (and a double mastectomy) so I look completely different and my life is actually way better than it was in 2020. I have a different appreciation for life now.

WillowTit · 02/12/2023 10:28

my job has changed,
dont like it now

very sad
the whole team is feeling isolated now

it was not a good move

Lottapianos · 02/12/2023 10:30

Pre COVID, I worked from home about 1 day a week, and had 4 days in the office. Since COVID, that has swopped so I'm now mostly working from home. It's one of the best things that has ever happened to me and I absolutely love it. I'm so grateful

RoseyLentil · 02/12/2023 10:31

2020 working in a field I love but at a horrible company for horrible people who constantly put me down. My self esteem and confidence was on the floor. I was desperate for them to value me and worked very very hard but it was never enough.
Lockdown came and I got furloughed. It was the best thing that could have happened. I had space and time to reassess and recover. I volunteered for a public sector organisation during lockdown one. Loved it. In the same field but on the service side.
October 2020 my furloughed ended and my company engineered my out. I started at the public sector organisation as a full time manager. Pay slightly better than the horrible company. Loved it at the public sector organisation. Brilliant, kind and caring people.
2022 now at a global NGO working in the same field but in policy. Awesome organisation doing awesome work across the planet. I'm earning twice what I was at the horrible company and my colleagues and clients respect me and value my knowledge and experience, my ideas get put into practice. It's amazing.
Without lockdown one to provide me with thinking and recovery space and the opportunity to volunteer within the field I love and am passionate about I might still be with the awful horrible company letting them grind me down, desperately trying to please them.

AllProperTeaIsTheft · 02/12/2023 10:31

Better. Dh left a horribly stressful job, took a pay cut and is doing a much nicer job, and luckily this coincided with me finally getting a great ft job after being pt for years. Dd got a place at her first choice uni and is doing really well. Ds is doing well academically and is applying to a new school for 6th form after being at an increasingly crap school for ages. We were one of the lucky families who had easy lockdowns, because of the nature our jobs and the fact that our dc were teenagers who preferred distance learning to being in school. We are financially slightly better off than we were before Covid.

Bornonsunday · 02/12/2023 10:32

Much better.

Being able to work from home allowed me to break into a new career. I live a long commute away from all the jobs in this sector and still have primary aged kids.

WaddesdonWanderer · 02/12/2023 10:32

Fatter, and somehow now have 4 cats! (2 were lockdown kittens).

Feel very fortunate that lockdown was good for me - was furloughed, did volunteering, now work mainly from home. Am very aware though that many were not so fortunate and am very sorry to hear of some of the stories on here. Feel sad for my older DC who didn’t get to experience a proper 6th form and I think it’s negatively affected her socially.

Nofilteritwonthelp · 02/12/2023 10:35

People seem much more unhappy

Crushed23 · 02/12/2023 10:35

To be honest, it’s mostly been very positive changes.

Bought my own flat in 2020, got really into exercise, fitness & healthy eating from 2021 onwards and look the best I’ve ever looked. Oh, and there was fierce labour competition in my industry so my pay has increased by over 50% in the last 3 years.

I do think 2019 & before was a better time overall for most people. I myself deeply miss the late 1990s and early 2000s. But life is what you make it.

HellonHeels · 02/12/2023 10:41

I have 2 lives, 1 before 2020 and one after.

My DH died by suicide during lockdown, it changed everything for me. I had a breakdown, couldn't work. My manager was desperate to get rid of me, work paid me off. I sold the marital home, moved out of London to a new life in a small town in a rural county. My career took an unexpected turn, I still do the same kind of work but in a very different way, that suits me better and pays much more. I would never have had the courage to do this in my old life.

I have a good life now and feel happiness and contentment quite often, but it's sort of rolling along on top of this void of loss and grief. Sometimes I have a look into the void and it swallows me whole, other times I look and move on again.

Tangled123 · 02/12/2023 10:44

I was still able to do a lot of stuff I planned. My wedding and house purchase still went ahead. We also had our first kid in 2021.
I also missed out on the negative effects of Covid, like I don’t know anyone who died or lost their jobs due to covid. My husband and I also didn’t lose out much financially due to it, I was able to absorb the cost of 6 weeks furlough and my husband worked the whole way through.
Being able to work/study from home also opened up some opportunities for me. I can now study a course from home I would have had to travel miles to without Covid, and I now have an exclusively work from home second job. I also get work from home days in my full time job.

We did potentially miss out on a lot of fun though. I missed my SIL’s hen party due to catching Covid, we didn’t get a honeymoon due to lockdown and we didn’t get to build a social life around our new home thanks to lockdowns either. Our last year before becoming parents was a bit limited too as groups were either online or didn’t happen. I also didn’t get meeting people from my course, events now are still too far away to travel to.

Uncooperativefingers · 02/12/2023 10:56

Unequivocally better for me. Lockdown gave me the realisation to end a relationship that was slowly killing my self-esteem and zest for life.

So we split, which I was very sad about (7yr relationship and in my early 30s), but then he repeatedly delayed moving out of our shared house by 5 months. His only plan was to move back in with m&d which he didn't want to do. I repeatedly offered to be the one to move into a new rental while I looked to buy (the biggest bone of contention in our relationship was that he wasn't prepared to buy a house unless it and our relationship were "perfect"). After I finally moved out, our issues were so much in sharp relief that my heartbreak was basically cured and I felt a huge weight off my shoulders.

Later that year, i bought my house alone, met someone else and we're now married. Started a new job the year after that and have just had a promotion. Planning to start ttc in the new year. But most of all, I'm happy and content, with a man who loves my gung-ho nature and shares my long term goals. Building a future with him feels inevitable