What a shit time to be alive

[Mylittlesandwich]

I know we're all supposed to be keeping upbeat and accepting the new normal but it's bollocks.

Obviously we're all being screwed in different and inventive ways, personally I had DS in November by the time I'd fought through my PND cloud and felt up to facing people we were in lockdown.
We had planned our budget for mat leave perfectly. Then DH was furloughed.
We had scraped through lockdown and he was back at work when the Scottish circuit breaker popped up and he was let go.
We are so skint it's unreal. I'm working from what should have been a nursery as many hours as I can get my hands on to try and keep us afloat and I can't even spend a couple of hours at my mums to re-charge.
Feel free to add the ways covid has screwed you over.

It's hard. It's so alien for us to be apart when usually we default to the comfort of friends, family and community in hard times.

Goodness this thread is something else. Nobody has said that our situation is the same as living through a world war or natural disaster. I'm sure we're all aware that things could be worse but that doesn't mean we have to be delighted with the way things are.
You can acknowledge that things are crap without wallowing. I can't sleep for all the stress in my life right now but I still got up this morning, got ready and made the 30 second walk to work. Some people I'm sure like working from home. I don't. I also don't revel in the thought of having to take on a second job but I've applied for them anyway so I think moaning is a perfectly reasonable response to all of this.

Agree. It’s a shit time to be alive but there have been shitter times!

There will always be shittier times, and there will always be people living shittier lives.

Those going on about how heroic their grandparents were in WWll should remind themselves that they had it pretty easy compared to people in besieged Leningrad who were starving in the harsh Russian winter. By that standard, they really had nothing to complain about!

Telling people to buckle up because people had it worse 2 generations ago (because we didn't know that until someone on MN reminded us) is pretty moronic.

@Juniperandrage

But people know there have been shittier times in history, it doesn't stop them feeling bad now, it doesn't mean they are not struggling now, it just adds guilt to that struggle

Yes, that's why the whole 'positive thinking' thing - while it works well for some - becomes tyrannical when imposed on everyone. Some situations really are just shit. Telling people to 'cop on' and 'look at the positives' doesn't work when there really aren't any positives, and the pressure to look on the non-existent 'bright side' just makes it worse.

@Readandwalk

Jaysus misery loves company. It's not a shite time to be alive at all.

Actually it is. This pandemic presents some real challenges for people in terms of isolation, economic uncertainty and then actually getting ill or losing someone to this illness. Everyone I know has been negatively affected in some way.

It’s rubbish. When lockdown started in March I was working lots, even in days off, which helped. Lockdown relaxed started to spend “normal” time with friends but now we are back in a semi lockdown again.

I am single, live alone, family abroad in a quarantine country. My best friends live in scotland where I can’t visit as their area is shut down. I have friends here, but it’s hard to see the as it’s cold and wet outside. Dating is non existing. I do have a bubble friend which is great and life saving. Family Christmas cancelled as no one risks travelling.

I am on annual leave and it’s the third time my plans to see people have been cancelled. Nothing much to do except potter I lack motivation. Everyone thinks I am upbeat, but I have covid burnout.

On the positive. I have a job, healthy and friends. Honestly if covid didn’t exist I probably would be pottering at home not feeling low. But as the choice had been taken away, feeling low. Crazy I don’t feel like this at wotk as I am surrounded by people

I agree with @nicegerbil. I've been frontline in a riot having paving slabs thrown at my head, I've squared up to men with knives, I've gone into pub fights alone knowing my back up is 10 mins away, I've cut people down and started cpr in front of their devastated families. I'm a trauma practioner for my force and have resilient assessments - I'm fairly resilient!! During the first wave I developed crippling anxiety, probably due to lack of sleep as my DH and I had to work our shifts around childcare and I was averaging 3 hours a night. I ended up giving up my much loved role and taking a new one that involves wfh. The hours are great, the pay drop doesn't really affect me, my husbands job is secure, we have a garden. I'm extremely fortunate. But mentally I'm really struggling going from a "this is crap but we're all in it together" team mentality to sitting on my own all day in my kitchen. My fil passed away in lockdown and we hadn't seen him for months beforehand, thinking we were protecting him. My mum has broke her knee and I can't visit her (tier 3). My youngest nursery has closed for good due to covid. My eldest has developed anxiety and behavioural issues. I usually have steroid injections for pain but can't get those, and all my physio is online and basically useless. The only thing saving my sanity was my fitness classes and they have been closed. None of those things are big or insurmountable on their own (and again I know I'm very fortunate), but together they feel crappy. And then there's the guilt I feel watching friends who have been made redundant, relationships have broken down, worried about their businesses, lost loved ones due to covid and other issues.

There has undoubtedly been shitter times on a global level. But that doesn't stop it being a truly shitty time on a personal level.

Just to add I hope those dealing with this anxious and troubling time are doing OK.

Thanks for opening the thread Mylittlesandwich

I was sorry to read some of the responses, yes life can be worse, but let's not underestimate the uncertainty and stress of living in the time of Covid.

Telling people they can’t feel like times are shit right now because they were shitter in WW2 or whenever is absolutely irrelevant.

No one is saying they weren’t. No one is downplaying how awful it was for people back then, or during absolutely any hard times in history, whether years and years ago or more recently.

But telling people they can’t feel like shit because they can’t see their loved ones, they face losing their jobs or homes, they’re struggling to make ends meet and put food on the table and the thousands struggling with MH due to this pandemic, is downright unfair.

Have some bloody compassion for those people who are suffering right now.

Telling people they can’t feel like times are shit right now because they were shitter in WW2 or whenever is absolutely irrelevant

I agree, I would never downplay big shit events in history full of human suffering. But that is exactly it... these times are history, in the past. Even the ones that echo through to our time.

While covid-19 is happening now, people are suffering the effects now. Its real and happening as I type. We all suffer, why should we not share our stories so we know we are not alone?

@IcedPurple

Agree. It’s a shit time to be alive but there have been shitter times!

There will always be shittier times, and there will always be people living shittier lives.

Those going on about how heroic their grandparents were in WWll should remind themselves that they had it pretty easy compared to people in besieged Leningrad who were starving in the harsh Russian winter. By that standard, they really had nothing to complain about!

Telling people to buckle up because people had it worse 2 generations ago (because we didn't know that until someone on MN reminded us) is pretty moronic.

I don't know why people always act like they have some kind of greater authority because their grandparents 'survived WW2'. Firstly you don't get credit for someone else's experiences, even if by pure chance you do happen to be related to them. And second, surely that applies to pretty much everyone in the UK, apart from the small number whose family immigrated from a country that wasn't involved.

My own grandfather was an RAF pilot in WW2. He died a few years ago, aged 94, and frankly I'm glad, because spending the last year of his life isolated in a care home with dementia, not understanding why his family wouldn't come to visit, would have been worse than anything he experienced during the war.

"Stay safe" "shop safe" "keeping people safe". These phrases fill me with rage.....life is shit, and anyone who can't see that must be a sociopath

Covid19 has made me a fat fucking fucker. I look pregnant. I turned to food for comfort and I'm really struggling to break the habit

Those going on about how heroic their grandparents were in WWll should remind themselves that they had it pretty easy compared to people in besieged Leningrad who were starving in the harsh Russian winter. By that standard, they really had nothing to complain about!

Oh come off it - millions of people's relatives were killed fighting in WW2 in horrendous and terrifying conditions. I'd hardly say they had it easy compared to people in besieged Leningrad. They all went through an unimaginable hell.

Anyway, this conversation is going round in circles now. I think we all acknowledge that there have been more difficult times in history than what we're facing now - and if any of us were given the opportunity to swap places with a soldier in the trenches in WW1, for example, I doubt many (if any) of us would.

But that doesn't take away from the fact that 2020 is also completely depressing and shit for many.

None of us will ever be anyone else we can’t go back in time or anything so it doesn’t matter what the war was like because we are living now and it’s shite ! And for the record anyone I’ve spoken to who did live through the war and who is alive now says this is a lot worse at least they could see people then .

I totally hear you! I’ve got three weeks to go before I give birth. A baby that’s been in the planning for years, a baby that was conceived before COVID. At the risk of sounding dramatic, I feel robbed of an experience I’ve been looking forward to and planning for a long time. I’ve been unable to meet any new mums/mums to be and feel alone in terms of female companionship. My OH is great but it’s not the same. I had so many plans for making the most of my maternity and I feel like I’m just going to be at home with baby, not developing his social needs properly. I know people have had it much worse and I’m hoping that I still manage to do some of the things I had envisaged doing but we’ll have to see.

But during WW2 didnt society pull together?

Now it seems that various factions of society hate each other. And the country is divided vmby Brexit/ Lockdown supporters/opponents. Even a new North/South divid.

The country is split, Scotland wants to leave, Wales and Ireland are doing what they want and ignoring Boris ( who wouldn’t) as is the North of England.

So, Corona is hateful but so are the divisions in the country. And l agree with the poster earlier on. We’ve had 70 years of relative peace am with no ructions. Life simply isn’t like that.

Oh come off it - millions of people's relatives were killed fighting in WW2 in horrendous and terrifying conditions. I'd hardly say they had it easy compared to people in besieged Leningrad. They all went through an unimaginable hell.

Then you are poorly informed. Britain suffered very few casualties compared to Russia, and life in much of the country was pretty normal on a day to day basis. Certainly there weren't whole families locked up in cellars and starving to death as in Leningrad. Civilian casualties and suffering were vastly higher in Russia than in Britain. No comparison.

But this isn't about the historical details. It's about the obvious fact that you will always find people worse off than you, especially if you choose to compare yourself to people living generations ago. But that's not how most people think. If it works for you, fine, but many of us don't find it an especially relevant or comforting way to think.

Then you are poorly informed. Britain suffered very few casualties compared to Russia

Still pretty horrendous for the hundreds of thousands of British people who did die in WW2 though wasn't it? Though having said that, I wasn't particularly thinking of WW2 from a British-only perspective. People from all over the world who fought in WW2 (and the First World War) must have had a pretty terrible time of it.

Anyway, I'm just as depressed at how 2020's turned out as the next person. It's fucking awful and the worst thing is, there's no end in sight as far as I can tell.

Oh come off it - millions of people's relatives were killed fighting in WW2 in horrendous and terrifying conditions. I'd hardly say they had it easy compared to people in besieged Leningrad. They all went through an unimaginable hell.

Interesting how you're arguing that it was just as bad for someone living in relative safety in the English countryside during the second world war as it was for someone starving in Leningrad.

Yet you won't admit that some people are having a genuinely awful time of it due to covid.

I've had two miscarriages this year, plus lock down and all the Covid shit, now we've just found out DP is most likely going to be made redundant this week.

I never celebrate NYE but this year I will, just to wave goodbye to the absolute shit show that has been this year. Fucking sick of it.

I read something today that I thought was very poignant..... Sadness fear and grief is not a competition, just because some people are worse off or have been in the past it doesn't invalidate our feelings, you have as much right to feel unhappy as the next person .

Sending hugs to anyone who needs it today at the moment we're all feeling it, one person's circumstances doesn't trump another, its shit for us all in 1 aspect or another.
Be kind

Still pretty horrendous for the hundreds of thousands of British people who did die in WW2 though wasn't it?

But you're the one saying we shouldn't complain about a situation when other have it worse - or had it worse 70 years ago!

If you insist that nobody should complain about losing their livliehood due to covid because someone's gran had it worse during the Blitz, then logically you have to agree that someone living a fairly comfortable life in an English town in the 1940s didn't have the right to complain because at least they weren't having to eat rats in Leningrad.

People from all over the world who fought in WW2 (and the First World War) must have had a pretty terrible time of it.

I'm sure they did, but what's that got to do with Covid?

I have a doctor son who was on the frontline during the first phase of covid . The anxiety I felt for him actually made me think with far more empathy of my grandmother who had threes sons fighting in France during WW11. The hideous anxiety she must have lived with for years cannot be under estimated.
Many generations have lived through various hideous events. This is ours.

Interesting how you're arguing that it was just as bad for someone living in relative safety in the English countryside during the second world war as it was for someone starving in Leningrad.

Yet you won't admit that some people are having a genuinely awful time of it due to covid.

What a bizarre thing to say. If you actually read my posts, you’ll see that not one of them mentions people living in the English countryside. I talk about people living in London during the Blitz and people fighting in the war.

I’ve also said numerous times on this thread how shit the current situation is.