Which specific moment from this will stay with you forever?

[RosieLemonade]

Positive or negative.

in April and May, sometimes going for more than one walk a day with my toddler and feeling like an axe murdering criminal, worrying about what the neighbours might think/say.

the best feeling was seeing my dad after a long few months and watching my toddler chase him around the garden, i was so low before that and it really made all the difference to my mental state.

@MotherOfAllZipFiles

The poor 13 year old boy who died alone, that was just horrendous

There would have been staff. I appreciate that’s not the same as family.But not alone

Oh yes in January 2020 my wise mum told me NOT to book my summer holiday as she felt the issue in China might get out of control. How right she was.

Negative: My manager has died of covid. Both of us caught it at the same time from same person. She never recovered, I only had cold symptoms.

Positive: I enjoyed spending time outside walking miles back in May and June. I love being outside up a hill, in the woods or fields with no other person in sight.

• Friday 13 March 2020 - going to a job interview and the interviewer saying “we won’t shake hands, it’s this new social distancing thing”. ( first I’d heard of it. I’d been prepping for the interview all morning abs had t had the news on).Checking my email afterwards and seeing several meetings involving people from London cancelled for the following week.

• Watching the news about the virus spreading across Europe in horror. Talking to my sister in France when they went into the initial 2 week lockdown. Bring very put out when we got a 3 week lockdown a week later.

• Driving home from work in despairing tears when BJ announced that schools were closing. Stopping to get some groceries on the way, and finding bare shelves everywhere.

• Absolutely loosing my shit with the dc last week, after a very intense day of work in the corner of the living room. Lots of work pressure, none of which would be there if we could work face to face, it’s not the DC’s fault.

• Very early on in the first lockdown, going for a walk one evening with DS (11) and seeing hundreds of stars so clearly, trying to work out the constellations.

• Seeing DM in June 20 for the first time since Feb 20. Haven’t seen her since.

• Lining the route of two funerals, both for people who deserved so much more of a funeral.

• the family of an anaesthetist who lives nearby putting up pictures rainbows outside their house for her to see when she came home from a late shift, and how hundreds of people locally added to “the rainbow wall”.

• DH having to make several people redundant and the trauma this has caused him.

@ComDummings

In late Feb last year when I felt like I was losing the plot because not one person I knew was taking the threat of this seriously. That was a scary time. I honestly thought there was something wrong with me because everyone else didn’t seem to give a shit. I pulled my DC out of school a week before they closed, I’ll never forget that (I lied and said they had a cough, they didn’t). Hearing that schools were closing. I’ll never ever forget when the play park near us reopened in July having been taped off and cable tied since March. My children were so happy. I cried in the park watching them. If they closed the parks again I would just lift them over the fence now tbh 🤷🏼‍♀️ but that was a magic moment. The moments I heard about people I know dying. A couple of COVID and a couple of suicide. The moment the tiers were announced. My area has been shit and so restricted.

DS1's best friend and his older sister were pulled out of school 5 days before the schools were shut. His mother is a microbiologist and his father a medical research scientist of some sort and when I heard it i froze with fear. Then I went home and told DH and he went white.

I think that is when we realised this was going to be very very serious.

Our site supervisor going on the holiday of a lifetime to China at the end of Jan 2020. We haven’t seen or heard of him since. HR have but will only say “Mr Jones will not be returning”.

My DM passed away suddenly in October, not from Covid. Her funeral seemed very strange, as if I was taking part in something in a play. She would have had about two hundred people at her funeral in normal times and to see a much smaller group all spaced out seemed really odd.

Childrens headmistress crying at the gate when the kids were picked up for the first lockdown

@LongDivision

Sitting down to a long lunch every day with DS and DH The slower pace of life, the empty skies. The beautiful weather in the first lockdown, taking hours-long walks through the park.

My immediate response to the question posed by the OP was around the negative, but you are absolutely right - the real positive is being forced to slow down, having lots of quality time with my DP and spending so much time outside thanks to the beautiful weather last year really managed to lift my spirits when I was feeling dark and twisty. If anything I certainly have a much greater appreciation of the little things.

We are very lucky that everyone we love has remained safe, and I am desperate to hug my family and friends. I know now that I will never take them for granted again

I remember right back at the beginning when Italy was hard hit and I was going for a walk and I heard there had been 800 or so deaths in a Day and I literally couldn't believe it!!!

When my baby was born and I had to go through assessment of labour by myself and then stay in the ward with my baby by myself as no visitors at all were allowed in. Then no one could meet her for ages after, most of her family still haven’t. It’s an awful time to be a first time mum.

Some of this is heart breaking to read and makes me incredibly grateful to be in NZ. We are in such a bubble here and apart from the borders being shut to tourists, live a completely normal life. I'm so sorry for people that are struggling and suffering and have lost people.

this time a year ago, roughly the absolute fear. stress that we needed wipes and hand gel and wondering whether i should buy a surgical mask in the local chemist, washing my hands so much at work, but now it is absolute second nature, but then i was self conscious. walking along wearing surgical gloves, again self consciously, being so scared i gave up work as a carer, despite mumsnetters belittling and questioning my decision.
going into an office where someone had left a tissue,
one of the senior members of staff coughing quite close to me, even now i am hyper aware and vigilant about windows being open and people at work coughing, relieved that we wear masks.
the upset that Boris was so ill in hospital

my dds came home, in fear, but the relief that they had come home

@monicacat

Packing up all my grand child's toys and standing in the garden while my son-in-law came to collect them. My daughter and grand child both sat silently in the car and watched with the car windows shut. I didn't cry until they drove away.

That really set me off... the whole thread is sad but this just got me x

i think it was 26th February I posted on here about giving up my carer job

Negative - walking into the labour ward to be induced with my first (ivf) baby abs labouring for 8 hours alone until my Dh was permitted to be with me. (Early April)

Positive - the time DH and I had together after I brought baby home he ended up with extended paternity leave.

Toilet roll fights!

the first clap for the NHS was so joyous

Positive, I foretold this scenario a year ago, was told I was completely insane, both by friends,some of my relatives, I said to them if we all come out alive and without serious long term health issues I will be happy.

My lovely brother coming round every day in the beginning to look through the window and check we were ok ! I met someone just before lockdown last year in a pub randomly and we have messaged everyday since, it'll be a year on Tuesday since we met each other and we are still friends !

DD was swabbed for Covid last February after coming back from a Feb half term school trip. Seeing someone in full boiler suite PPE knocking on our door was surreal at the time.

Driving home in tears from my first shift after being redeployed to the NHS front line, after seeing the reports from Italy the thought of what I might see in hospital scared me tbh.

Don’t think I’ve had just one defining moment but a couple that have stuck out
When Boris announced the schools were shutting in March and I honestly thought they’d be back after may half term..... how wrong was I?
And when my best friends mum died and I couldn’t go and give her a hug, I couldn’t do all the things I’d have done normally, I think that was the worst time for me. It’s the time that brings tears to my eyes when I think about it.

@BikeRunSki

Our site supervisor going on the holiday of a lifetime to China at the end of Jan 2020. We haven’t seen or heard of him since. HR have but will only say “Mr Jones will not be returning”.

@BikeRunSki what happened to him? 😳