Just can't take any more of this new normal

[JuneMoonstone]

I'm feeling incredibly low and depressed. I am just so, so utterly fed up of Covid. I can't be bothered to go anywhere, do anything, make plans. I've been waiting months for my 5 year old to start swimming lessons and they kept getting put off due to covid. I found out that she can start lessons next month but once she turns 6 she'll no longer be eligible so she'll only get a couple of lessons, so there's no point in her starting. Before anyone has a go at me, I completely understand there are many people far worse off than me and I am very grateful that I have not suffered from covid or lost anyone due to covid. I just feel so so despondent and depressed about the future. Everything is a chore now, there is zero fun to be had. The variants will keep coming, the threat of future lockdowns continue to loom for God knows how long, maybe forever. We're told that Covid will never go away and the old normal will never return. If I didn't have a child I think I would end it. Life has just become very small, dull, joyless, wearisome.

I was thinking recently that I'm starting to forget what it was like to be able to go wherever we wanted without a second thought. If you include foreign travel, I wonder when we'll next be able to do just that? Another 2 years? I'm not desperate to go abroad, though, so I'll be satisfied once all the queuing/mask-wearing/pre-booking is scrapped in this country.

Today's very low death figure (when Tuesday is normally relatively high) makes me feel optimistic, as does the fact that the vaccines 'seem' to work against the Indian variant. But I think I'll always mourn the 'old normal'.

I do not want to go in pubs,restaurants etc, I just want to live my life without masks which I have been wearing for work for over 12 months.
I cannot even summon the energy to get excited about any relaxation of the rules, it does not seem to mean much anymore.

@FlorenceWintle

But normal life is returning. I went clothes shopping yesterday and stopped for tea & cake in a cafe. I’ve been to the office, DC is having a friend round for tea this week and I’m going to the pub at the weekend. It feels almost normal and far, far better than at any point since it started.

What I’m getting at is that I felt like you in lockdown but feel much better now and I’m wondering why it doesn’t for you?

Clothes shopping: masks (am exempt but am nervous about encountering aggro, and can't lip read and find it hard to hear the muffled speech from others). Plus access to changing rooms. Many shops haven't survived.

Cafe: track and trace, more mask issues albeit more brief. Space with reduced capacity. Different places have different protocols, everything feels less casual than usual.

Office: not directly relevant to me but DH is still WFH and constantly audible in the house although he's in this week due to technical difficulties and it's empty. He sees no benefit to being back until SD is a non issue.

Friend round for tea, normal.

Pub: restricted menus. Track and trace, and masks again. Bookings/ restricted capacity. Needing umpteen apps between different breweries. We went to two last month. First visit was fine (despite the sharp wind). Second pub ordering drinks from the app was a fiasco, had to be chased up and we were already frozen amd ready to go before we got them 40 mins after the food arrived.

The veneer of normal is thin. So many places still have crime scene ambience of rules/ haz tape/ screens. Spontenaity is thin on the ground. After doing fuck all for 6m since the November lockdown it's hard enough to psych up and get going without regularly finding things that you had looked forwards to being a damp squib either just from too much emotional investment or logistics.

So many things need SD and masks scrapping before they get the full atmosphere and enjoyment back.
Events such as races in the early summer are still being cancelled because of doubt over the conditions still being uncertain in the next couple of months. We're still far from genuine normal and just getting on without a cumulatively crippling amount of hoops to jump through.

@CC1991

I was thinking recently that I'm starting to forget what it was like to be able to go wherever we wanted without a second thought. If you include foreign travel, I wonder when we'll next be able to do just that? Another 2 years? I'm not desperate to go abroad, though, so I'll be satisfied once all the queuing/mask-wearing/pre-booking is scrapped in this country.

Today's very low death figure (when Tuesday is normally relatively high) makes me feel optimistic, as does the fact that the vaccines 'seem' to work against the Indian variant. But I think I'll always mourn the 'old normal'.

DS says he's forgotten. He's 10. It's over 10% of his life.

He's forgetting about things like casually turning up to fun sessions at the swimming pool. Parties. Indoor sports activities. Weekends away.
Extended family.

OP ignore the "at least you're not in a war" twats who are having fun sticking the boot in at every opportunity.

We've spent the last year unable to plan anything, living under rules making it a criminal offence to go have a cup of tea in your best mate's house - we've had our emotional support networks stripped away from us a lot (Zoom is NOT the same - someone compared it to a good shag versus a wank at one point) and all those bits of structure that we hook our lives on taken - and the indefinite end to it and ever shifting goalposts mean that you feel like you can't ever really relax and enjoy what we DO get allowed to do because you never quite are sure that the same thing will be allowed again in the future.

So it's this constant low-level stress dripping away at everyone - coupled with people taking the chance to behave like utter turds with complete relish, and everyone being at home with only online for interaction and all that that entails with people being braver behind keyboards to not interact in nice ways - and it's taking its toll massively on people.

I'm very open - I hit rock bottom (after a few bounces along the bottom) with the January lockdowns and I had what pretty much was a nervous breakdown - I have absolutely no idea how I continued to function at the skeleton staffing level I did (I got an assignment returned today that I have absolutely no recollection of actually writing!). It's broken people completely. For every person who loved an unstructured life baking banana bread - there's been someone else absolutely run ragged trying to deal with children angry and hurting and lashing out at their own isolation, trying to juggle demands and work set by school with their own employer and needing to pay the bills.

I know I have a lot to be thankful for but I am so fed up

I feel the same OP. My life is on hold and I've nothing to look forward to. Every time the finishing line is in sight, along comes yet another bloody variant - Brazilian, South African, Kent, Indian - who's next I wonder?

I was going to book a UK holiday for the summer but that could all change and I can't bear the thought of faffing about getting refunds as I'd enough of that last year.

I can't get any enthusiasm for anything - it's just eat, work, sleep repeat

@bookworm1632

Feeling sorry for yourself is always a choice.

Yeah, when I was depressed the thing I did was decide to be depressed.

F*ck sake.

Same here. Not going to lie, I've acted up a couple of times on Reddit in my worst mental states over it and got banned from the Covid sub there, I hope to do better here and be more controlled.

What gets me is finally feeling optimistic, vaccinations going great, pubs back, hugs finally aren't an illicit encounter etc. And then they're all "ah but if this new variant is 50% more transmissible like we think then there will be a hospital wave worse than January anyway", knocking us right back down to Earth. I am not a parent (just know this site is popular in general) and admittedly I am starting to have thoughts similar to the OP, that if we are about to head into round 3 of a perpetual cycle then I'm not sure I want to carry on. We're social animals. What we have done for the past year and a bit is not living, it's surviving, and I don't want to be like this forever.

@ajmouse

Same here. Not going to lie, I've acted up a couple of times on Reddit in my worst mental states over it and got banned from the Covid sub there, I hope to do better here and be more controlled.

What gets me is finally feeling optimistic, vaccinations going great, pubs back, hugs finally aren't an illicit encounter etc. And then they're all "ah but if this new variant is 50% more transmissible like we think then there will be a hospital wave worse than January anyway", knocking us right back down to Earth. I am not a parent (just know this site is popular in general) and admittedly I am starting to have thoughts similar to the OP, that if we are about to head into round 3 of a perpetual cycle then I'm not sure I want to carry on. We're social animals. What we have done for the past year and a bit is not living, it's surviving, and I don't want to be like this forever.

@ajmouse I agree with you entirely.

@Croleeen

I sympathise and totally agree. I had a major milestone birthday that's been postponed 4 times and even the new date in the summer now looks doubtful. We are moving to the US for good in August and so this was my last 18 months in my home country, forever. Increasingly I am finding that I agree with the 'conspiracy theorists' that we should not continue with these lockdowns and just get on with life and take the risk of Covid just like we do everything else. I'm going on the march in London on 29th May to protest any further lockdowns.

That's a bit rich, protesting against something that's there to protect us, before you fuck off out of the country

@Needanewhat

I honestly think the government were so utterly negligent in telling people it would be fine in 12 weeks. It's fucking criminal.

To anyone reading beyond the media it was so obvious this was going to be something that would drag on for a couple of years. People should have been prepared for it by the government.

The scientists were, but the government realised people wouldn't comply if they even imagined it would take 1-2 years to deal with & given peoples attitudes now, I can't say they were wrong. Sadly.

@ajmouse

Same here. Not going to lie, I've acted up a couple of times on Reddit in my worst mental states over it and got banned from the Covid sub there, I hope to do better here and be more controlled.

What gets me is finally feeling optimistic, vaccinations going great, pubs back, hugs finally aren't an illicit encounter etc. And then they're all "ah but if this new variant is 50% more transmissible like we think then there will be a hospital wave worse than January anyway", knocking us right back down to Earth. I am not a parent (just know this site is popular in general) and admittedly I am starting to have thoughts similar to the OP, that if we are about to head into round 3 of a perpetual cycle then I'm not sure I want to carry on. We're social animals. What we have done for the past year and a bit is not living, it's surviving, and I don't want to be like this forever.

It won't be forever. If the Indian variant had been kept out for a few more weeks, we'd be in a much different position. We just need a bit more immunity (through vaccines), in the community, that's why we NEED people to have their vaccinations.

If the blonde tossed had put India on the RedList & enforced quarantine we wouldn't be in this position.

We need to get vaccines into people & use our own common sense and show some restraint - just because we CAN do something, doesn't mean we should.

A bit of restraint now will save us going into another massive wave.

We're just at a tipping point & the idiot(s) shouldn't have allowed the May 17 lifting to take place, but they're simply not learning from their mistakes.

Sorry didn't mean to detail just hoping to give some positive reassurance to those who feel it'll go on forever.

BJ & co are making massive mistakes (yet again) but the scientists are doing brilliantly - we just need to listen to them and do our best to keep people as safe as possible while everyone gets the vaccination

@ComtesseDeSpair

This has been a strange eighteen months, but in a few years’ time we’ll just look back on it as a blip in our lives. It isn’t going to last forever, we’ll learn to live with whatever variants arise just as we live with different variants of ‘flu – some of which cause tens of thousands of deaths in a bad year. With the best will in the world, life is not over because a five-year-old’s swimming lessons have had to be delayed.

You can worry yourself into a depression; or you can just make the best of things, knowing that it really will be over soon. Whichever route you choose has no effect on what actually happens, so the worrying is pointless.

Some people won't be here in a few years to look back and reminisce on this 'blip'. We get married on Saturday, we wouldn't have chosen a lockdown wedding but at the moment he is well enough to enjoy our day, in a few weeks/months he won't be, in Nov 2020 he was told he had six months to live. I live in hope that June 21st happens as planned.

@ComtesseDeSpair - you are getting some unpleasant responses to your first post and I just wanted to say that I agree with you. This is just a blip and one day it will all be over. People in many parts of the world deal with much worse. So many people have such a negative reaction - and then they wonder why their children aren't coping! Life doesn't always go according to plan and people have to develop coping strategies, not act as though the world is coming to an end.

Babbalouska, watch a drama series called Foyle's War, it's apparently a good indicator that the war wasn't all Vera Lynn and sentimentality. I had it on good authority from my WW2 veteran father that the war mucked up so many people's lives. While folk were celebrating VE Day, my dad was getting bombed on a battleship in the Pacific. My mum said rationing was very difficult, people did get down,and on VE Day she had mixed feelings, not just due to my dad still fighting overseas, but because so many people lost homes and loved ones. As a woman you also had to watch yourself in the blackout. People were still the same then as now, some coped better than others.

But my mother, whose dementia has worsened significantly over the 6 months, will never get anything back. My Dad and FIL who have got much more frail through lack of activity and social interaction will never recover those months.

@PerveenMistry I'm going to charitably assume that was a drunk post.

Ok, just to focus on one thing that is a bit more within your control. For swimming lessons ask around the local pools for an independent volunteer-run group. In our area the lessons run by the leisure centre were really inflexible and had long waiting lists. Yet the same pool also had a Ccommunity led swimming group renting the pool for 5 hours a week, offering cheaper, better lessons (with qualified instructors), swimming galas, fun activities, quieter family swims etc. Groups like this also exist for things like orienteering, athletics, etc. Keep asking around. You'll find yourself getting involved with a bunch of enthusiastic and largely optimistic people, as well as your daughter getting her lessons and making a bunch of new friends. Stuff like this is uplifting and makes a huge difference to quality of life. Good luck

@skybluee

I wonder if the reason everyone is feeling down, well, at least for me, is related to this...

When this first started I believed it would be temporary - that things would be terrible for 6 months - one year and then go back to normal. But it's started to dawn on people that we may never get back what we had before.

Shy - I meant in terms of what people are missing. I cannot walk without pain. I haven't been on holiday since 2013. All of my dreams have gone - everything I wanted to do. All sports, pretty much. Any travel plans. Wanting to go around the city centre with a friend. I can barely get down the stairs where I live (no lift) and this is my home and I don't want to leave. So, in general (I don't mean relating to this thread) when I hear people talking about not being able to have a holiday for this year, or missing things, I understand it - because I think of how my life has turned upside down and what I miss. I miss going around shops. It is like stepping on glass with my left foot and I used to be an athlete. I can cope with giving up sport but I would give anything to have a normal day-to-day life back, to be able to do things, be outside, instead of being stuck in four walls, in my own personal lockdown since 2008.

Totally agree! I couldn't summon up any sort of excitement in Monday. Spontaneity has gone, can't just pop into the pub for a drink or food have to book. I'm also sick of wearing a stupid mask on the office at work when we've all been vaccinated twice and we are social distanced. When will it all end ??

[quote MaxNormal]@PerveenMistry I'm going to charitably assume that was a drunk post.[/quote]
Nope. Just weary of the whiners.

@PerveenMistry

Get over yourself. Focus on what you DO have.

At least you aren't burning a loved one in a parking lot pyre as many are elsewhere. Your spawn will learn to swim eventually.

How about you get over yourself. You literally have no idea what’s going on in other people’s lives. Ignore people like this OP, things will get better but I know how difficult it is right now.

Nope. Just weary of the whiners.

Maybe don't bother reading threads where people are struggling then.
Or is it more fun being spiteful?