Which specific moment from this will stay with you forever?

[RosieLemonade]

Positive or negative.

When Boris announced Christmas mixing and having a sudden feeling of fear for my close relative as they were recovering from surgery in a London hospital. They later caught Covid there in late December and sadly passed away. I remember feeling so so angry, especially that Boris implied it was humane to cancel our annual festival. My relative had been shielding since March 2019 so we never got to meet up.

The beautiful spring and early summer we had in 2020 lockdown 1. Oh boy, the weather was wonderful! People seemed so fixated on the Covid situation (rightly so) but I was daily luxuriating in the warmth and sunshine. Everything bloomed so abundantly.

Also, the 2 weeks my dh and I spent in Cornwall in September. Again, gloriously hot weather and wall to wall sunshine. It was such a simple getaway but it felt so special. One of my favourite holidays ever.

Great thread idea, should definitely be in Classics.

I have so many I could bore you all to tears.

That sick feeling of dissonance at the start, where indoors everything was normal and outdoors was empty supermarket shelves, death statistics and silence.

Long walks with DS 9, sitting in waist high grass in a locked football field (we found a gap in the fence), making daisy chains and chatting. It felt like I was being given back the baby years I lost due to PND.

A wellbeing survey we were asked to complete in work, which had one question about whether we were able to find enough food. This was very early on, so going from Normal to THAT in a few weeks was just too strange for words.

Michael Gove on breakfast TV defending Cummings’ trip to Barnard Castle. He was asked by the interviewer if he would drive for half an hour to check his eyesight, and he replied that he would, and I knew then just how utterly contemptuous he was of the British public. He knew he was lying and he didn’t give a shit.

@Shelovesamystery

When Rishi announced furlough.

DH and I both work in a restaurant and it was so bloody scary at the start. First Boris announced that everyone had to stay home, and then the restaurant was so quiet. We were all scared that they would just refuse to close hospitality and the restaurant would just go under. Then they announced that everything had to close, which was sort of a relief, but no word of financial support. We spent those few days frantically figuring out how we were going to pay our bills and whether we could get jobs working for amazon and whether our shifts could work around each other for childcare. Then I can remember me and DH sat in our living room watching Rishi announce the furlough scheme and I burst into tears and we just hugged. I have never felt relief like that in my life.

That period of time between Boris telling everyone to stay home and Rishi announcing furlough was such an emotional roller-coaster for us. I feel a bit wobbly just thinking about it actually.

Same for me. I remember locking the door in the office building with my stuff in a box, listening to the announcement on my headphones and weeping with relief that people were going to be supported.

Obviously it hasn’t all worked out brilliantly but that is a memory that will stay with me

My brother ringing just after I text him to say that he needed to come and see Dad that dad as just after my text he had a phone call to say he had been in contact with covid and should self isolate and what should he do?

Told him to come anyway as it wouldn't make a difference (Dad died less than 12 hours later)

Then the small funeral with masks and us all having to go to our own homes afterwards instead of spending time together grieving and remembering

@RosieLemonade what are yours??

1, The shock of watching the Prime Minister say ‘you must stay at home’ when he announced the first lockdown.

2, The 45 minute queue around the full perimeter of Sainsbury’s car park before finding shelves stripped bare of pasta, rice, loo roll etc at the peak of panic buying last March. It just seemed utterly surreal.

Hopefully, number 3 will be the moment I get vaccinated. 🤞

Visiting my parents just before lockdown, my dad is usually very calm in any sort of crisis, he used to be a police officer, he's the kind of person you'd go to with any problem, and even though I'm an adult now, he's more of an adult than I'll ever be if that makes sense!
He was worried, really worried, and that's when it hit me that this was serious

Bad times- so many but now returning to work feeling robbed of my maternity leave. Spending so many days on my own with my son as my husband was working away and bubbles didn’t exist. Sadness for my son not meeting half his family as they live too far away to meet for a day. We were meant to see them in the summer. They were put under tight restrictions the night before we were due to drive up (we were packed and everything). Then again having to cancel on them at Xmas as we were put into tier 4.

Good time- seeing my mum hold my son for the first time in months when she formed a support bubble with us. He is her only grandchild and seeing the pure joy on her face was amazing. My dad dancing at the window to get my son to laugh during the first lockdown. (He used to drop my medication off to me).

When I wondered if it was time to write letters to my children for after I had died.

Shielding.

My NHS wife moving out from me and our toddler because she was terrified of killing me(came back after two months,but MH was broken,took a while to put (mostly together).

Mil moving in to help me,so I could look after my daughter but still do WFH key work (need a bit of physical help)

Leaving the office the Friday before look down,and walking through the city to the station, still is a surreal memory.

The Queen's speech in the summer and tearing up.

My toddler now asking "Boris said no?" When's she's told we can't do something.

Finding out we'll be having a summer baby (not technically a lockdown one😉😁)

Rushing out the door to get a vaccine at last minute notice as had spare at end of session.

I know many will disagree,but I am feeling so hopeful now (just need not to rush it )

I started dementia care work for the first time in January 2021. It was much more physically demanding than I thought it would be but for the time I was there I really fell in love with it and the people I was looking after.
I remember sitting in the day room with BBC news on, all about Covid. I remember looking around at all of the faces of the residents and thinking "what happens if it gets in here?". I left for health reasons a couple of months later and now eight of those lovely people I took care of are dead of Covid. The whole thing really affected me and after it happened I think I went into shock. I just wasn't emotionally or physically resilient enough for that sort of job but I'll never forget them.

The sheer panic of the first lock down

And now... how accustomed my 7 yr old is to staying home, not going to school doing his team meets and not playing with his friends, it breaks my heart that he thinks this is normal

And I just have to treat it like it's fine ha ha normal EVERYTHING WILL BE FINE face

Going into work on first day of the March lockdown. Only four of us working from a team of eleven and only a handful of children still coming in. Felt so surreal and that we were the last ones on a deserted ship going into dangerously unknown territory.

Picking my parents up at Manchester Airport in the middle of lockdown 1. They'd managed to fly out to Australia about 30 minutes before they declared no more unnecessary travel and then spent about 5 weeks there (visiting family) before coming home. The airport was empty, it was really eerie. It was also so weird being in the car, driving and seeing someone so close. I also snuck in for a cuppa. I figured I might as well after sharing a on hours car journey with them.

Also queuing to get into a supermarket about 4 weeks after lockdown 1 started. I felt weirdly nervous.

I work in a supermarket. The panic buying was the worst thing I’ve ever seen. People attacking my colleagues as they brought out a delivery of toilet rolls. Customers filling their trolleys with much more than they could ever need .........and elderly people crying because they couldn’t buy what they needed after being told they would have to isolate. That will stay with me forever.

Driving to get my Mum, with DD secretly in the car. She didn’t know we were nothing coming to get her.

The first lockdown announcement and schools closing

The dread of the certain knowledge that Christmas mixing was going to fuck up everything for months. Imagine how much further along we’d be if we had been told to stay at home over Christmas, combined with the vaccine and schools being off. How many more people would still be alive? The decision flew in the face of explicit medical advice. Chris Whitty actually stood in a briefing and told people to unpack their bags and stay at home. The absolute absence of political leadership has been breathtaking.

Getting the news alert on my phone that we were locked down in March while I was laid on my sons bed with him at bedtime and looking at his chubby little arms and pudgy cheeks and wondering what the fuck lay ahead for us all.

Standing in my parents house at the end of may and feeling so emotional and almost dizzy with relief to be there with them, in my childhood home.

Walking back into my classroom in September with March 16th written on the board - I had gone home that day to find my son had been sent home with a cough so we went into isolation. Little did I know then how long it would be before I went back in.

We lost a family member right at the start. Not being able to travel to say goodbye. Having to miss the funeral. I don't think that will ever go away. Happier times include planting seeds with the children, tending them x

Saying in a meeting at work that we should prepare to be told that we should work from home if possible (I think this is when things were already bad in Italy etc) and being told it would have to be “apocalyptic” for that to happen. Needless to say we did not prepare and people had to travel into our central London office for much longer than they should have once lockdown was announced while things were sorted.

On the 12th March last year I had just come back from a trip to America and been handed a leaflet warning me about travel from/through China and Italy. Got the bus from Heathrow to central London, went to find something to eat, walked back to the coach station for a coach home. Everywhere I went all I could hear was people talking about coronavirus, it felt like a disaster film, and for the first time I really didn't feel safe on the coach back. I still have a photograph of the first Covid billboard I saw in London that day.

@Lovelydovey

Two: visiting a covid ward to say goodbye to my DF, then visiting a covid ward in another hospital the next day to tell my DM he had gone.

I am so sorry