The positive mental health thread - part 4

[Spudlet]

Keeping it positive, keeping our sanity, people 👍

My FB friends are generally ok, it's some of the groups I'm in that are the problem, but they are useful for local info.

We are eating from our preppers tins as we've not been able to leave the house. We had meatballs and mash.... Not very good but a full shop comes in two days

Beef stew in Guinness for us tonight, with a prepper’s tin of carrots as we didn’t have any fresh ones. They tasted ok in it though!

Asking - your pillow exploits remind me of my outdoor beanbag disaster a few years ago. We had a giant garden beanbag which was waterproof, however it wasn't sunlight-proof and one day I picked it up to move it and it ripped open. Gazillions of staticcy little polystyrene beads all over the lawn. Plus a ripped open beanbag with millions more still in it and unable to be moved without spilling the lot. We managed to parcel tape the bag shut, but ended up having to hoover the lawn.

Ofwarren - sorry you are unwell with it, glad you were prepped enough to see you through to your delivery.

Beef stew nice! I haven't had a stew in about 12 years I need to get a slow cooker 😩.

I'm very jealous of your lie-in @Spudlet! I've been ok today, it's really starting to dawn on me that we can't take the kids out. We made some loo roll animals this morning, that was fun, got covered in glitter though.

@AskingQuestionsAllTheTime that sounds like quite the task! Perhaps weirdly, I am really not a fan of feather pillows - I find them simultaneously too soft or too hard and also cold. My DH loves them though. I was looking into spending a bit more for some really good pillows before this all happened. Apparently they recommend different ones depending on the position you sleep in, who knew!

Our veggie efforts have gone out of the window - something primal has gripped us and our fridge is now stuffed with sausages and chicken! 🤣

My Facebook feed is looking so much better, since I snoozed a load of negative people!

One of my lovely nieces did a bit of shopping for us yesterday including potatoes and mince so I made a HUGE shepherds pie today which should take us through to Monday. Fortunately we don't mind a repetitive diet

Had a video chat with my best friend which was fun. Chatted to 88 year old MIL who's getting a bit bored now but I think I managed to cheer her up.

DH has been digging over the allotment. The sunshine has highlighted my lack of housekeeping so I blitzed the kitchen and bathroom, changed the sheets, did loads of laundry. That's me done for the weekend. Tomorrow I plan to do NOTHING.

I need to stay off most of the Coronavirus threads on here. On one of them people are saying that we will be in lockdown for months. I can’t see that happening. Many people will find it difficult.

I have been feeling sad about it all, but this thread is giving me hope.

There is hope. One day this will be over. Humans have been through epidemics before in much more Spartan times (eg Polio epidemic). I’m trying to make the best of it. I’m lucky (?) enough to still be working but on days off there’s no urgency to do anything and no school run 👍🏻

I'm looking forward to our online shopping delivery in 2 days. First chocolate in 2 weeks.
The kids will be so happy.

Hi all, thanks for keeping the positives going. Mine are that we are over the worst of the illness, and a lovely friend dropped off some food including 12 eggs.

Also some positives in the need about levelling off trends in some countries badly affected.

Have you been ill too @blerg? How long for? Glad you are feeling a bit better

Evening all!
Loving the food descriptions. Feeling hungry now though I’ve had a perfectly good meal.
My positive for today is that my sister had very typical symptoms over two weeks ago, absolutely fine now. She has been self isolating with husband and 2 kids, and they’ve had no symptoms at all. Which makes me think either a) they’ve managed not to get it all, b) they’re the unusual ones with a very long incubation period or most likely c) they’ve also had it but with no symptoms.
I think there are likely to be a lot of people who have it or have had it with no symptoms- whilst not such good news re spread, it would be good news re overall fatality ratio being lower than initial estimates.

Yes daffodil my 4 year old has it right now and he just has a cough whereas I have all the symptoms.
Kids seem to be totally fine

On one of them people are saying that we will be in lockdown for months. I can’t see that happening. Many people will find it difficult.

No it absolutely won't go on that long. That's not how these things work. That's people projecting their own fears. Once you're past the peak (which we're maybe 2-5 weeks from) things will change. It could be we are living with restrictions up to about week 12 to really kick the virus's butt but it will feel so different then. Things will be drawing to a close and seeing new cases fall will make it feel better. And we'll all be in planning mode in terms of what we all want to do with our freedom. It's just about hanging on in for now. That will be the easier bit.

I hit a really wobbly patch out of nowhere tonight. It really helps me to say 'I don't know how I can get through the next few weeks but I can get through today.' That is all that matters. Just today.

And if it helps, i was reading an article on the Spanish flu. It was really bad at the end with number of cases and then suddenly, just like that it came to an end as the virus mutated to a much more benign form. Things went from being awful to suddenly back to normal in terms of people not catching it. It burned through society in terms of picking off the weakest than ran out of steam. As humans we have faved so many pandemics in our history. There us a lot of knowledge about how they behave really. It's written into our dna to know how to survive these things as a species including in terms of our resilience.

Thank you Noooblerooble

I was having my first real wobble this evening too and your words have put it all back into perspective for me.

@Noooblerooble thanks for the encouraging words. So after the 2-5 week peak the restrictions can lift a bit you mean? Or did I read that wrong?

Remember the antibody tests are due soon too. More people will be able to go back to work and some restrictions could possibly be lifted at that point too.

Viruses become less powerful over time, as immunity builds, they weaken into strains which cause very mild symptoms.

The Spanish flu was a good example. This one will do the same.

So after the 2-5 week peak the restrictions can lift a bit you mean?

I think it's possible but it would be in a limited way. But it's more likely not quite the case. But think of it this way, if we get 5 weeks down the line and the cases are dropping and they ask us to stay in for 3 more weeks to save lives, that would feel doable, right? 3 weeks isn't too long with news stories coming of more and more people recovering day by day. And if they then said 'if people can stick it out for 2 more weeks we get x% fewer deaths overall' again it would feel achievable. Not easy but ok. There was some news headline today which said the fact China had extended their lockdown by a bit longer meant they'd get 24% fewer deaths across the whole of 2020. 24% is huge!

And what might happen is we get testing by about 5 weeks down the line to confirm who has had it and if the numbers come back as pretty high you never know, that might help. They might start saying if you have a certificate saying you've had it you can do x, y or z. And that will change things. It's all so hard to predict. But I promise the more we take this in small bites the easier it will feel. The days do speed up.

We are approaching that "it's darkest before dawn" stage.

We just have to remember it will happen.

Got woken up by a huge crash half an hour ago! Dd came rushing in to say the bread machine had fallen off the kitchen table! Bread mix ruined on floor! Still we rallied round and made a fresh dough in our sleepy state and reset machine. Dd had to read out instructions for me as I had left my glasses in bed!! Team effort! Fun way to start Sunday!