Something wrong with me, loving lockdown

[Coronackered]

I love that nobody coming toy door, I live that I don't feel obligated to visit family, only thing I'm hating is they're phoning me more often. I have a lovely family what is wrong with me 😭

What if this goes on for, say, 4 months. You really don’t mind staying in for all that time? 🤔

I'm enjoying it. Love having no pressure to go out and see people. Enjoying socialising on Zoom etc. Going for a walk early every morning when streets are deserted. Working from home. Family having lunch and dinner together every day.

My life is almost exactly the same except all my kids are at home and I don't have to go to the supermarket as much, which i love. It won't get boring!

Plus have lots of time for hobbies, learning to paint, reading, learning the piano. It's like a sabbatical. I work 4 hours a day which is perfect. Wfh.

I am enjoying many elements of it. Can totally relate to the thing about freedom to pander to other people’s demands. Still have to look after my DD and work but not needy friends/boyfriend/dad.

I do miss being able to do stuff but there are some plus sides.

I really really miss swimming. I live next door to the pool and used to go every morning before work. Sometimes I look at the door and wonder if anyone would notice if I broke in

I love it too. I love not having to keep up appearances and the guilt to go out and no waste the day has gone.

I love relaxing at home.

Second week and I'm loving it.No 12/13 hours days.I can wear my own clothes not uniform see an and DS when he gets home.sit in my garden see my pets catch up on chores cloud my hair paint my nails.Read message friends paint the house.TBH I do have social anxiety\agoraphobia so I didn't do anything before.I do love a break from my frantically busy life.
Meals at meal time and not coming ho me at 1030 pm....bliss.

There haven’t actually been too many negatives for me. Setting aside the fact that my parents are hating it and DD is missing all her sports, for me it’s been quite a positive experience so far.

I am usually horribly stressed at work. My job exploded 3-fold a year ago and since the autumn I’ve been looking for a new job. I come home from work and take DD to a club 3/5 days. Weekends are taken up with sports, shopping, cooking and cleaning. Money is tight and there never seems to be an end in sight. I’m permanently knackered, have no time for fitness, have no time for myself.

Since all this madness I am still at work, still being paid FT, but I’m only in until lunchtime, then I’m wfh/on call. All the ‘extra’ tasks that drive my stress are on hold and I have the time to do the important things.

DD is diligently doing her schoolwork whilst I am out and tbh doing a better job on her own. DH is sorting the garden and resolving my ‘shame’ at the state of our driveway. When I get home I potter about, read and check my emails. DD helps with the evening meal and DH stays out of my way!

I know that I’m really lucky, but it’s making me even more determined to change jobs.

Congratulations on not valuing nature, the gym, work, social interaction, culture, sports, travel, or any of the other things that keep most people going. What do you want, a medal?

those of us with rich inner lives are less prone to boredom

+1

I'm not enjoying working from home

But l love spending time at home. I also have homely hobbies, like sewing, baking, knitting, reading. But l hope l get to smell the sea again before too long, and see the blue sky from a different angle to our little patch.

What's a rich inner life?

Me too! No 5am wake ups for commute to work, get to see my husband and DD much more and we eat all our meals together. WFH works well for me and I can do all my job from home. I feel like it's forced us to have a slower pace of life - we've done things that we never usually have time for - games with DD, obstacle courses in the garden, puzzles, cooking together as a family, baking. I miss my parents but we've video chat a lot and honestly, I'm enjoying it so far. Obviously I'd rather there wasn't a pandemic and I'm prettified of getting sick or my family getting sick (husband is front line nhs) but I'd been feeling completely burnt out recently and this has forced me to slow down.

What's a rich inner life
well I was being somewhat facetious :o but something along the lines of...' I'm so self absorbed I dont have time to get bored':o

Fair enough

Thought I was missing out on something there

Oh, I read ‘rich inner life’ as simply meaning the ability to be at peace with oneself, to have the ability to amuse oneself through whatever it takes and not need (or want) external validation or distraction. But again something quite natural to introverts has to be turned into a negative.

I too am loving the fact that me and DH are spending time together. He works, sometimes long hours, and I don't. I am fine being on my own but love it when he is home too.

I know it's not been long but I am happy for it to be quite a bit longer. We are saying no matter what Boris says we will stay home for a month at least but more probably longer.

We have plenty to do - gardening, decorating (our whole house needs doing), reading (we have hundreds of books and lots of them are unread), watching dvd's (lots unwatched but happy to rewatch others), loads of stuff recorded on tv, netflix to watch too.

We have been listening to audio books every afternoon for an hour or so. Also listening to music and searching for new singers and groups.

I have loads of wool so will be doing some knitting. I also intend to try and teach myself to crochet. DH likes doing model making and normally doesn't really get the time. He also likes tinkering on cars.

We have quite a lot of furniture we bought very cheap which we want to upcycle. Also although we can both speak basic French we want to improve.

DH is self employed so is not earning. He will get the help offered by the government though.

I know what you mean. I usually hate staying in the house and will go wandering round the shops or go out to do things just for the sake of it so it’s actually quite nice just to stay in and not have that option. I do miss seeing my mum and dad and other family members though.

You do have a point.

I am working from home, which I hate, but the positives are that:

• it’s pretty quiet (neighbours are not having noisy parties, streets are empty if you go for a walk in the evening)
• teen dd, who has a hectic schedule (long school day and extracurricular activities, which she loves) suddenly has more time to do stuff that she doesn’t usually get time to do
• I am exercising more as trying to make sure I don’t turn into a couch potato

Spartacus I think it means that too 😊 or maybe that's just another way of saying self-absorbed 🤔
I'm too self-absorbed to take an objective view 🤭

Spartacus I wasn't meaning to attack introverts I am the most introverted person I've ever met (not that I meet many people obvs)
I am a total loner, the most unsociable person ever

Sorry UYScuti. I'm just a lone introvert in a workplace (and world) full of extroverts. I see 'self-absorption' as a negative trait, but not necessarily associated with introversion or extroversion. I also see the ability to be alone with one's self and one's thoughts as a positive attribute.

One thing I hate about the New World Order is that I used to be able to go to work, pretend to partake in the chit-chat, but also maintain my privacy. My privacy is very important to me. I like my space and my solitude and my home is my home and only those close to me are allowed in. Now we have everyone wanting to do conference calls where we have to show off our homes and it feels very confronting. Thus far, I have fobbed them off with technical difficulties. Hopefully, the novelty wears off and they find other outlets for the sociality they desperately want and need and I am left alone.

Agree OP. I am finding lockdown so much calmer. Of course there are worries and frustrations but I think that the pace of life in the UK is too fast and we're so used to it going too fast that it's hard to jump off the treadmill. Look at the continent or even Australia, where the work life balance is way better than ours (or was).

I think what's helping me is that I'm in the middle of researching a novel set in WW2. Leaving aside the 'Blitz spirit', people endured 6 years of death, destruction, rations and being apart from their kids (some of whom had sporadic education) and families.

And of course many poorer countries are going to have a far tougher time than we are right now.

That's not to belittle what anyone is feeling because it's natural to find this tough but it's helped me feel grateful for everything we still have and has made things easier to cope with. Plus I'm an introvert!

Nae worries Spartacus😊
I agree with you about self-absorption - I think it's generally presented as a negative trait.
But when you mentioned that you see it as not necessarily associated with introversion or extroversion I wonder if you conflate self-absorption with narcissism, to some extent?