Can’t believe we are now living in a world where you need a ‘reasonable excuse’ to leave your house

[Despairandchocolatecake]

I do understand why but I still can’t quite believe it.
I feel extremely claustrophobic, the house is now a prison - and this could go on another six months. I now need a ‘reasonable excuse’ to step outside my front door. I don’t have one so that is it. We are locked up.
All that freedom we took for granted seems like a different lifetime.

@Despairandchocolatecake

No but I could have left before any time I’d wanted to. I also now cannot attend my counselling appointments or my solicitors appointments. It’s making me feel like I cannot breathe.

Ignore some of the insensitive a-holes on here - we all deal with this situation differently and we all come to it from completely different standpoints and life experience.

I know it’s not as helpful as face-to-face but there’s lots of online help you can access - I’d start by calling Rethink - it takes a while to get through but they are extremely helpful and can point you in the right direction for supportive online forums and chats with others - it’s better than nothing OP and it will help you get through this xxx :)

I feel the same.

Living in a world where I can't see my daughter, nor she come to visit me.

*Personally I don’t think this ‘lockdown’ is strict enough. It should be a case of- unless you are a key worker, stay the fuck at home.

Not going out for walks or popping to the shop for alcohol*
I hope you stocked up on the champagne then: you and those who have been pleading for lockdown are going to want to crack that open, now that you have your beloved lockdown and closed schools.

I dare not go out the house for fear of being judged

I'd say this is more in your head than in real life. You can leave the house. Literally no one is judging a person who is out for a walk.

Perhaps it may help you to stop catastrophising.

OP, I hope you are ok.
Hang in there, please use The Samaritans link if yu need to.
They are amazing to talk to and can really help.
Or please call your gp for help.
I can't believe this thread, when someone has asked for help.
Depression is awful and sometimes we are in no position to think clearly, or the obvious.

I think pandemics like this are so unusual it's just not something you can imagine until it happens. Even last March when in same situation it was new and almost an adventure (not saying a good one but something Novel can be interesting rather than oppressive).

We are now 10 months on and in same situation. It becomes less a novel thing and more of a chore.

I'm hoping this monotony lowers the number of people who decide to commit big crimes - people now will understand what being imprisonments actually entails!

sorry to hear you're struggling op, its a really hard thing to get our heads around and it does take time to adjust mentally, some days will be better than others, its a massive PITA to be sure.

Hello OP, we are really sorry to hear you are feeling this way.

We hope you don't mind, but when these threads are flagged up to us we usually add a link to our Mental Health resources. You can also go to the Samaritans website or email them on [email protected]. Support from other Mumsnetters is great and we really hope you will be able to take some comfort from your fellow posters, but as other MNers will tell you, it's really a good idea to seek RL help and support as well.

We also like to remind everyone that, although we're awed daily by the astonishing support our members give each other through life's trickier twists and turns, we'd always caution anyone never to give more of themselves to another poster, emotionally or financially, than they can afford to spare.

All your concerns are valid. I think it is ok to say to your Dh that you really need to go out for a walk with a friend and he looks after kids for one hour as you feel so low. He can take time off work if he needs to to help keep you well xx

Walk an elderly or disabled persons dog. Help elderly who don't shop online. Loads of things u can do classed as essential journeys. Not sure about exercising with different people though. That's taking the Mick one person one walk/run for your exercise once a day. But if u did the other things would be classed as essential/ support,/ voluntary work.

You're not really locked up. A friend said she couldn't believe we were restricted to one lot of exercise a day, but I thought you could go for a run, take the dog out for a walk twice, cycle or walk to work if you live close enough and can't work from home, and then in the evening you need a bottle of milk so walk round to your local shop. Ok in reality you'd probably combine the last with the second dog walk, but it's still a lot of getting out the house, especially if you still work outside the home too.

But he could appear. Or he could be on the stairs listening. It’s really not relaxing - it’s not an excuse but the stuff I’m talking about isn’t great and I don’t want to be interrupted and nor do I want dh to listen to my call

I am sorry you are having a hard time. But actually your situation is not caused by covid or by government rules, but the fault of your husband. It may seem worse by the situation we are living through, and I am sorry about that, but the problems you face at home are the cause. You can do very little about covid, but you can do something about the above...and I wish you well in doing it!

My reasonable excuse is that I want to (or Exercise if someone asks me)

Living in a world where I can't see my daughter, nor she come to visit me

I understand speakout. I physically ache to hold my grandchildren and as my husband is CEV and we have been shielding since March t's been a long, long time.

Loud tree has to be a troll surely? Why are people biting to her/him? Wouldn't surprise me if it's someone sat in their mums spare box room and regular tattle poster.

Op totally sympathise with you it's utterly shit, these lockdowns will cost a lot of lives not just related to covid.

@Despairandchocolatecake

I cannot attend appointments - even online - because I have my dc all the time and my dh is here. I don’t want him to listen to what I’m saying and he will. He doesn’t even know I’m having them. I was just going when the dc were in school and saying I was going to the shop. Now I am trapped. There’s no reason for me to leave the house so I cannot.

OK I see you have a somewhat different problem. I have wondered how the heck women like you (and it's always women) get on in this situation and I realise it is very hard. Can you go in the garden while he is working? He must have a call from time to time that he can't get out of?

To be honest it sounds like you need to take the kids and go.

Personally I don’t think this ‘lockdown’ is strict enough. It should be a case of- unless you are a key worker, stay the fuck at home.
Aww the first 'stay the fuck at home' I've seen this year 💘 how wonderful

@Despairandchocolatecake

I cannot go for a walk with a friend because I will always havemy dc with me and you can only meet 1:1 I’d be too worried about the police anyway. I can’t afford a £200 fine.

You can meet one other person outside your household for exercise, so you could meet them even if you had your children with you.

You really sound as if you are struggling mentally, can you talk to your GP or counsellor by phone?

A pandemic is the least of your problems, it sounds like you're living with an abusive partner. You need to take steps to leave, this is confounding your MH issues. Please please please reach out to someone!

@Despairandchocolatecake I can’t pretend to understand how you’re feeling but can only approach you from a rational thinking pov, there are some excellent suggestions on here. Particularly the one about arranging a click and collect for weekly appointments in car.
I appreciate it’s very difficult, and it’s your situation rather than lockdown that is the problem, but there’s always a way. Always. You owe it to yourself and your children. Make sure you get some time to yourself even if it’s when the kids are in bed, do something just for you. Make a plan and focus on it. You’ll be ok and you are strong enough to get out of this.

I can't believe we're in this situation either. Its incomprehensible. However having just come off an escalation meeting re situation in local hospital and the terrifying numbers of covid cases, I think that the measures are justified and should be stronger if anything.

So sorry you are feeling like this OP

A walk even if with the kids could work just for a break

Excellent idea from a previous poster to order click and collect, then go sit in the car park for your counselling or solicitors call - could that work?

Does DH ever have to go out?

Concentrate on building up your 'leaving fund' that will give you a reason to keep going

I'm not sure if I can express this clearly but every time I think 'this us unbelievable, I can't believe this is gappening' I remind myself that actually, this has been happening to people on an individual basis every day of life for other reasons. We just dont see it.

What about the person who finds out they have cancer and are either too unwell or too immunocompromised to leave their house for months on end. Or the family with a child who has similar. Or the family who have no money so can't afford to do more than walks anyway. Or all the kids in hospital who spend weeks in the same bed not going anywhere. Or the people who are imprisoned for years for whatever crime. Or the people who have lost the family member they would have been missing seeing if it was 'just' a pandemic.

The whole fuck up of Covid is for the politicians, statisticians and medical experts to take on board. As individuals, we just need to deal with our own personal circumstances and a bit of bad luck on any single year could have brought a similar limitation to our individual families in a heartbeat.

So we need to do what humans always do. Adjust and cope and get on with it as best we can.

It's not forever for goodness sakes. You can go for a walk and go shopping.

@Despairandchocolatecake
I’m so sorry you feel so bad. I totally relate to the despair. I feel it too.
Please only listen to people being kind on here. There are a lot of lockdown fanatics who will attack anyone.

If you would like to chat please PM me
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