BBC article that I regret reading

[PurpleRainGirl]

I just read this article on the BBC website (if you are feeling anxious please DO NOT read further):

www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-51963486

and I am absolutely panicked, sobbing my heart out for the first time since this thing has started.

I tried my best to keep calm and carry on and to cheer up everyone around me in RL.

But I feel so, so scared and upset now.

No one knows what's going to happen, where we're going with this. Are we going to see horror scenes on our streets? Are we going to just let go at some point and let people die? The kind of measures that have been introduced are not sustainable long term. According to the article, there are only three ways out of this, two are a long way away and one is not a long term option. Is this the end of life as we know it? The actual apocalypse?

I'm so depressed having read this article and I don't think I can comprehend that it's come to this. It's finally got to me.

Don't expect anything, I know no one has any answers. Just needed to write this down.

I have severe ME. I been too ill to leave my home for ten years and bedridden for the last 6 years. I had an active busy life until ME. The quality of life for severe ME is very poor and this illness has been largely ignored by medical authorities and governments. All that has been offered is behavioural treatments that don’t work and make many of us with the illness permanently worse. I find myself incredibly emotional seeing the world saying people can’t live cooped up for so long. I don’t know why I am writing this. All I can say I have managed ten years within four walls, I have friends with the illness who have done it for 20 yrs. Also with the knowledge there there is no collective effort to find treatments and answers. The world is focused on coronavirus, progress and breakthroughs will come. Hold fast. People can do this, it’s hard, there will be grieving for loss of previous quality of life, but it can be done and it won’t be 10 years.

My sis lives in Japan.

They are back to normal now after 5 weeks of lockdown/ social distancing.

People still being careful but normality has pretty much resumed.

We do have to accept that the world has radically changed and for most of our lifetimes we have been used to it getting better and better. Now we have to be brave and resilient and look after each other and actually, because humans are basically decent and wonderful, we will get this solved together. We must all do our bit. The doctors and nurses and scientists and food delivery people will save us. And we have to accept that we have to make some sacrifices in our turn to make their work easier and buy them time. It is mind bogglingly crazy in the scale of change we have to accept but we can do this, together.

Agree wholeheartedly @ Branster.
Knowledge is power and while it doesn't change what is happening, it does mean that as each announcement is made, there are fewer surprises in them.
The pace of this doesn't help any of us.
We don't get chance to adjust before we have to take more stringent steps.
But as we adapt to the new normal, hopefully our anxiety will settle.

I feel we will come out the other side but with a far greater appreciation of the simple things in life.

This all scares me rigid.

How can their reports state this when a poster above has said Japan is pretty much back to normal in within 5 weeks?

And why is none of the positivity being presented by the government as @Bluntness100 says about a cure weeks away, it doesn’t make sense

OP, I'm really sorry, it is really scary, but there is nothing in that article that I have not read already. I feel the same as you - panicked and jelly-legged. But this info has been out there for a while now, and women on Mumsnet have been called scaremongers for ages just for sharing it.

It's a global pandemic - of the sort Hollywood films have been made out of - and it's happening. Life will be different for some time. But it's not the apocalypse, because the majority survive.

Take care of yourself.

We cannot focus on the positive now because we have to take significant action to buy time! We have to stay home and reduce the infection rate and that will make the positive future happen. If we rely on it it won’t happen.

@Feodora : I was looking for the flower emoji for you but couldn't find it.
Have a virtual hug instead - you are so right, it is akin to a bereavement.

I find myself incredibly emotional seeing the world saying people can’t live cooped up for so long - Feodora for you. It is sad how little research and support goes into chronic illnesses such as yours. Even with this small taste of isolation, your friends and family will never realise quite how much ME has taken from you. Sending you lots of love and an unMNetty, albeit socially distant, hug.

@Confusedasusual78 Maybe they don't really know when it will come and don't want people to be angry if they don't do it when they said they will? Or there are so many idiots in this country that they have to put the fear of Jesus in them for them to stay put for 5 or 6 weeks?

I really believe that we will be back to some sort of normal-ish in the next 3 months. Seriously, after whet we are going through, being allowed to go out when we want, to hug our family members will feel like the best thing we ever had.

We don't know the world has changed forever. We might go back to normal soon, be so happy that we spend like there is no freaking tomorrow, change our priorities and just focus more on social interactions than the rat race. Who knows what will happen.

@wingedharpy and @RUSU92, tearful and so grateful for your kind words. I know all the world is hurting at the moment and am being a bit self-indulgent, but I am so used to so many not knowing about the isolation severe ME bringsthat I feel so heard by your kind comments. Thank you so very much. Strength to all.

OP I know how you feel. I consider myself to be a fairly resilient, pragmatic and sensible person, I’m a healthcare worker for the NHS. I don’t fluster easily. I have been watching the news and feel lockdown should have stated 2 weeks ago. But have felt no real sense of panic.

Yet, something today tipped me over the edge. I won’t say what it was (because there is no sense in passing it on) but something happened at work which made me realise that shit is now getting real. That we are next. And for the first time in several generations, this is a natural disaster that we won’t be watching on the news, we’ll be living it.

Today I felt genuinely scared. I’ve cried a fair bit. But I now have to dust myself off and employ some strategies to get through it. People have survived worse. And remember, statistically, the odds are in your favour to not catch it and if you do, to survive it.

The numbers are scary when you see them constantly rising, and it’s alarming, but there are 60 million people in italy and 6,000 people have died from corona virus. Think if that in terms of a percentage and it feels a bit less scary. And maybe compare to the other big killers in the UK. For example:

If you were to have an hourly update of how many people were dying from heart attacks in the UK you would be constantly looking at your loved ones wondering when they are going to be next:

“Heart and circulatory diseases cause more than a quarter (27 per cent) of all deaths in the UK; that's nearly 170,000 deaths each year - an average of 460 people each day or one death every three minutes. Around 44,000 people under the age of 75 in the UK die from heart and circulatory diseases each year.”

(Taken from the BHF)

@Feodora I had a cry reading your post.

I've had four bereavements in the last 10 months and I felt I'd come out of it all, that the grief would lessen. It did for me, but I have no idea what it's like to live with a disability long term. I can't imagine what it means to have to face it, as well as the grief it causes, every single day.

You are right, this is grief. We've lost something, the world will never be the same.

I used to think after my baby girl died that things will never be ok, that this was the end. And it was the end of what my life was at the time.

I then had a new, reinvented life. Not sure if it was worse, it was sad she wasn't with me, but my life changed for better in many ways too. I've learned grief isn't a bad thing. It's part of life.

Maybe this is going to happen again, this reinvention, one day. Yet again, it is something life-changing for me.

I wish you that after this ends, people are more compassionate, supportive and understanding of your needs and what you're going through 💐

The article is fine. It is the truth. I would rather have the truth and the truth should be available to citizens. (Although maybe there needs to be a new system of content warnings in news articles so that those who are feeling wobbly can avoid harsh truths.)

I have been thinking a lot about my family members and our forebears in general in 1914, 1939 and the beginning of other global crises. Many of them survived and went on to thrive. I think we can draw strength from historical precedents like that.

OP - this is how it is right now. Don't look too far ahead and just deal with the moment. It's difficult for all of us. We need to remember the #bekind of last month.

I find myself incredibly emotional seeing the world saying people can’t live cooped up for so long.

@Feodora I am disabled and have previously been housebound but nowhere near as severe as your situation. I’m so sorry to hear that this is your normal

You raise a good point, though, in that I think previous experience of isolation is strangely helpful now.

Maybe the world will become more compassionate after this experience.

@PurpleRainGirl what a beautiful post. So sorry for the loss of your little girl.

I then had a new, reinvented life. Not sure if it was worse, it was sad she wasn't with me, but my life changed for better in many ways too. I've learned grief isn't a bad thing. It's part of life. This is what I've been trying to explain to my DS who is struggling with all this. Thank you.

@purpleraingirl, my my symptoms are getting quite bad and I can’t write much more this evening but I wanted to reach out and offer a hand of love. I am so sorry for you going through so much bereavement recently and the loss of your darling baby girl. I am touched by your words and insights into grief and change. Much strength to you.

Provided it is possible to develop immunity, if no vaccine is ever developed, and no treatment ever found, it will become a childhood disease within a generation or two. After two generations, people will argue over whether a vaccine is even necessary, just as they do measles and mumps.

We're lucky. Think what it must have been like when measles first made the leap from cattle (or animals related to cattle) centuries upon centuries ago. No hope of organising social distancing back then.

Some positives - there are many people who have recovered from this.

Although many have had it critically, there are also many who have had it mildly.

There are thousands of scientists across the globe currently working on solutions and vaccines and antibody testing (the latter would help to show who would be able to return to work and society having protection against the virus).

It's true and sad that some people die from it. But not everybody, as the recovery figures have proven. Some will never catch it 'in the wild' but in time will be immunised from it via a developed vaccine.

Meanwhile, plans are ongoing at a fast pace to develop the beds, spaces and equipment required to treat it.

No, this isn't likely to just disappear in a few months and we can all "have our summer back" but there is both hope and proof that measures taken can and do make a difference.

We are heading into the summer months rather than heading into the winter months. Although it's too early to see the effects that the warmth/sun has on the virus, if nothing else, the sunlight and warmer air rather than wet and gloom will help our general physical and mental heath, even if the benefit has to be gained from sitting in front of an open window, on a balcony or even in the garden for those lucky enough to have one. Also we do know of viruses that die down in the summer months, so at least we won't be dealing with winter viruses simultaneously in the same way we might be if it was currently November or December. We are in late March, heading away from the winter viruses.

Sit tight, concentrate on doing the right things ie following the sensible advice. It might be a scary ride, but that doesn't automatically mean a scary ending. It might mean that life has to become a lot simpler in various ways for the foreseeable - but it won't always be. There will still be people and with that finances, economies and trades.

But do please at least keep in mind that a significant amount (rather than a tiny amount) of people can and have recovered from this. This has knocked the socks off all of us, so the shock will play a big part in how we feel at the moment, in addition to all the constraints for our own good. But people are very adaptable.

It's not the apocalypse and life won't be forever changed. Really sorry you're in this dark place atm

@ariettyjones, thank you, truly. Sorry can’t write more tonight.

PurpleRainGirl

cross-posted with you. I am so, so sorry that this is coming after such a time of personal losses. My condolences on your baby girl.

@Sprinklez that was lovely to read. Thank you.

@Knobblybobbly Reading that scared me, I don’t know what you’ve seen/realised 😢sounds horrific.