About a month ago I was starting to feel like my mental health was stabilizing. I was exercising regularly and getting dinner on the table, I was feeling like I had more physical and mental energy, and because I was feeling more energy I was able to get more done because I didn't have to work so hard to convince myself I could do it. I didn't feel constantly exhausted and defeated.
Sometimes I jokingly wonder if God said, "Okay, Marcelaine, you've passed 'Managing a Home and Family While Coping with Depression,' so now I'm going to move you up to 'Managing a Home and Family While Coping With Depression and Facing a Global Pandemic in Social Isolation.'"
Sometimes in my good periods I used to wonder if I really did have depression. When I wasn't experiencing it, it was hard to remember just how bad it was, and sometimes I would think I was just being dramatic or feeling a little sad. Then just as I would start to feel comfortable, Depression would come back and say, "I'm still here!!!"
A few days ago I was having a hard time in the evening, and it felt like that, complete with Depression saying, "Hey, I'm still here!" And then I heard the quieter voice of the Holy Ghost say, "Hey, I'm still here." It's comforting to remember that our Heavenly Father is still here. He will not forget us.
People keep saying they hope this will end soon. They act like things will go back to normal in a week or two. Honestly, I expect to be social distancing until May at least. If the government had started preparing back in January or February, maybe it wouldn't have been as bad. If widespread testing had been available with personnel in charge of tracking the spread of the coronavirus, it would have been much more doable to contain it by this point. I'm still shocked at how little they did. However, I do feel heartened that both the House and Senate have passed the bill to provide relief to Americans and help the healthcare workers get what they need. I'm not thrilled about how much this is going to add to the federal debt, but I do think it needed to be done. I think it would have been much easier to deal with the spending if we didn't have all that debt.
I don't think we're even seeing the worst of it yet. I think we're going to be looking like Italy within a month. I'm not really afraid for myself or my family. We're healthy and young, and we're doing a good job of social distancing. But what I'm dreading is that at some point people I know and care about will likely be affected. Our parents and my grandma are at higher risk because of their ages. There are elderly people in my current ward and in previous wards who are at higher risk. I'm wondering how long it's going to be until someone I know personally becomes very sick or even dies. For most people it still feels like something that's happening in other countries, but the truth is the United States now has the highest number of confirmed cases in the world, and because we're not testing people the numbers are likely much higher, maybe more than ten times higher.
I stress about school for my kids. I read a blog post recently that said this isn't homeschooling; this is crisis schooling. Sounds much more accurate. This week my kids are supposed to start having graded assignments again, and other e-learning activities. I'm a little frustrated that they haven't been more clear yet about what that will look like. The teachers don't even seem to know. The superintendent sent a letter out saying that e-learning will be happening within two three-hour windows each day, but I'm not sure what that actually means. I sure hope it doesn't mean my kids are going to be in Zoom conferences or doing assignments for six hours every day, because I can tell you right now there's no way I can make that happen.
We're very grateful that Ryan can work from home. I know many, many people are not able to work right now. He's working on getting a paper ready for publication, and it seems like it's coming together.
I've been reading The Lord of the Rings series every chance I get. I'm at the beginning of Return of the King. I reread the series every few years, and I love it more every time. It's beautiful writing. Because I've been making an effort to read poetry this year, I've also enjoyed all of the poetry in the books. It's probably my favorite poetry I've read so far this year.
I think there are some lessons here about how to build food storage and prepare. It's like the five foolish virgins who had to run to buy more oil for their lamps and missed the bridegroom. Because so many people weren't prepared, they all overwhelmed the stores and caused shortages. (And having huge crowds in the stores in the midst of a pandemic was also a disaster in terms of stopping the spread.) The time to prepare is when things are normal, not when the disaster is already happening.
Grocery shopping has been okay for us. They have 2-gallon limits on milk at the stores, which is kind of hard for a family our size, but I usually have to go to Aldi and then Wegmans anyway, so it's worked out. (Aldi is a smaller store that has great prices for the basics, but for things they don't carry I go to Wegmans.) I've started making whole wheat bread again too since they have limits on bread, and it's actually been pretty fantastic to have homemade bread again. I still haven't been brave enough to try Costco. I've seen pictures of the lines winding around the building six times, and at this point it doesn't feel worth it to me.
Ryan and Ann Marie are completely recovered. Heidi was sick with the same thing last Friday evening, but she recovered quickly.
I don't need to be partying with friends every night, but right now I think I could really use a girls' night with friends.
Saturday, March 28, 2020
Thursday, March 19, 2020
Coronavirus musings for posterity
We're living a major historic event right now. I think I'd rather be in a boring time, but here we are.
We've been watching the spread of COVID-19 for several months. Ryan was paying attention when it was mostly contained in Wuhan, and I still remember when it got out of hand enough that they couldn't trace the spread anymore because Ryan said, "Well, that's it. It's out." We immediately started being stricter with things like washing hands because we knew it was just a matter of time before it started spreading in the United States.
We've been trying to maintain a supply of soap and cleaning supplies as well as food. I think we were pretty prepared. There were still some things that we realized we were missing, like we're a little low on white flour (plenty of wheat, though!). The panic buying is making me anxious. I'm hoping people will start to calm down about that soon. My friend who lives in Korea said they didn't have that problem there.
We've been socially distancing because it's really important to us to do our part to prevent the spread of the virus. We're not normally the type to go to restaurants or movie theaters, so it's not a problem for us to be missing out on that type of thing. DC Temple Choir rehearsals and concerts have been cancelled, and I'll miss those a lot. I'm sad that the public library closed, even though I think it was the right decision. We'll be relying on our home library a lot for a couple of months, and we'll be using OverDrive to access ebooks. I might get a Kids Kindle (the kind that you can only use for ebooks) if it starts to feel like that would help, but we still have plenty of reading material. We're a family of introverts, so it doesn't feel a lot different to be staying home since we do that anyway.
Grocery shopping is a challenge. I was planning to use the curbside grocery pickup service, but when I looked it up today they're booked four days out. So if we do that, it would require some planning. I feel so strongly about the social distancing that I even feel bad at the thought of going to the grocery store.
It's interesting to see how much I took the ability to go out for granted.
We may have already been infected, which is part of the reason I'm hesitant about getting groceries. Ryan and Ann Marie have had symptoms of an upper respiratory infection. Ann Marie is completely recovered now, and Ryan is still sick but seems to be doing better. It was very mild for them. Ryan hasn't been able to find a place that will test him because there just aren't tests available yet. He's been staying home for over a week now. If we do have it, I think I'd rather we all get it because then once we've recovered we'll be immune and it will simplify things. We wouldn't have to worry about accidentally infecting others.
School has been cancelled, which is of course a big change. The school has given some suggested activities, mostly in the form of online activities. Those can be helpful, but with three kids it's hard to keep track of what they're doing, so I often find that after I've set them up doing some math on the computer, I come back later to find them watching a show or something. And I can't seem to get them to sit down and do school like they would for their teachers. I've decided that my daily goal is to do something school-related (not necessarily a lot) and something physical like going for a walk. When we go for walks, we don't stop at the playground or play with other kids, and we stay with just our family. Today we set up a frisbee golf course behind the house using trash cans and baskets. That was fun. I've found that adding routines works better if you add things gradually, so I'm not expecting to jump straight into a rigid homeschool routine. We'll start with doing a little school and "PE" after breakfast, and gradually add more as needed. I think schools all over the world are going to have to figure out how to be flexible and adjust curriculum and milestones for this year. I'm trying to be easy on myself. I see other moms' pictures on social media with their kids all gathered around the table doing their school, and I feel inadequate because I'm not doing much.
I'm very angry that our government hasn't done more to prepare. They should have been organizing widespread testing and figuring out how to support and prepare the hospitals (especially with supplies) over a month ago. We knew this was coming. Instead it feels like most of our leaders have been more concerned about keeping the stock market up. I sort of thought we were better than this.
A sad but interesting effect of a pandemic is that viruses don't care about who's powerful or rich. Normally those people can bribe, intimidate, or lie to get out of their problems and get what they want, but those tactics don't work on viruses. Iran has seen that firsthand, because many of their government leaders have caught the virus, and several have died. We may see it here too. Not that I'm hoping that anyone will catch the coronavirus and die, but I do wonder if it will make people stop and think. I certainly wouldn't be surprised if this sparks a revolution in Iran.
Social media makes a pandemic interesting. The Coronavirus memes have been so fun. I love that we can joke about it to help us get through such a stressful situation. I'm grateful that the internet has helped us be more informed and that it has so many resources for learning, connecting with others, and being entertained when we're all trying to stay home. But it's also been a source of stress at times. I've realized that I spend a lot of time scrolling Facebook. Honestly I think a lot of the time I'm doing it to escape. A couple of days ago I wrote this on Facebook:
So I'm trying to be more purposeful in how I spend the day instead of worrying about things I can't control. It's a great time to connect with the kids and maybe teach them some things that they wouldn't get at school. Since the kids are home in the spring for once, we get to enjoy the outside before it gets too hot, which is great. I started reading a book out loud to them last night, which we haven't done for a long time, and that's been enjoyable. Maybe we can take this time to accomplish something great.
We've been watching the spread of COVID-19 for several months. Ryan was paying attention when it was mostly contained in Wuhan, and I still remember when it got out of hand enough that they couldn't trace the spread anymore because Ryan said, "Well, that's it. It's out." We immediately started being stricter with things like washing hands because we knew it was just a matter of time before it started spreading in the United States.
We've been trying to maintain a supply of soap and cleaning supplies as well as food. I think we were pretty prepared. There were still some things that we realized we were missing, like we're a little low on white flour (plenty of wheat, though!). The panic buying is making me anxious. I'm hoping people will start to calm down about that soon. My friend who lives in Korea said they didn't have that problem there.
We've been socially distancing because it's really important to us to do our part to prevent the spread of the virus. We're not normally the type to go to restaurants or movie theaters, so it's not a problem for us to be missing out on that type of thing. DC Temple Choir rehearsals and concerts have been cancelled, and I'll miss those a lot. I'm sad that the public library closed, even though I think it was the right decision. We'll be relying on our home library a lot for a couple of months, and we'll be using OverDrive to access ebooks. I might get a Kids Kindle (the kind that you can only use for ebooks) if it starts to feel like that would help, but we still have plenty of reading material. We're a family of introverts, so it doesn't feel a lot different to be staying home since we do that anyway.
Grocery shopping is a challenge. I was planning to use the curbside grocery pickup service, but when I looked it up today they're booked four days out. So if we do that, it would require some planning. I feel so strongly about the social distancing that I even feel bad at the thought of going to the grocery store.
It's interesting to see how much I took the ability to go out for granted.
We may have already been infected, which is part of the reason I'm hesitant about getting groceries. Ryan and Ann Marie have had symptoms of an upper respiratory infection. Ann Marie is completely recovered now, and Ryan is still sick but seems to be doing better. It was very mild for them. Ryan hasn't been able to find a place that will test him because there just aren't tests available yet. He's been staying home for over a week now. If we do have it, I think I'd rather we all get it because then once we've recovered we'll be immune and it will simplify things. We wouldn't have to worry about accidentally infecting others.
School has been cancelled, which is of course a big change. The school has given some suggested activities, mostly in the form of online activities. Those can be helpful, but with three kids it's hard to keep track of what they're doing, so I often find that after I've set them up doing some math on the computer, I come back later to find them watching a show or something. And I can't seem to get them to sit down and do school like they would for their teachers. I've decided that my daily goal is to do something school-related (not necessarily a lot) and something physical like going for a walk. When we go for walks, we don't stop at the playground or play with other kids, and we stay with just our family. Today we set up a frisbee golf course behind the house using trash cans and baskets. That was fun. I've found that adding routines works better if you add things gradually, so I'm not expecting to jump straight into a rigid homeschool routine. We'll start with doing a little school and "PE" after breakfast, and gradually add more as needed. I think schools all over the world are going to have to figure out how to be flexible and adjust curriculum and milestones for this year. I'm trying to be easy on myself. I see other moms' pictures on social media with their kids all gathered around the table doing their school, and I feel inadequate because I'm not doing much.
I'm very angry that our government hasn't done more to prepare. They should have been organizing widespread testing and figuring out how to support and prepare the hospitals (especially with supplies) over a month ago. We knew this was coming. Instead it feels like most of our leaders have been more concerned about keeping the stock market up. I sort of thought we were better than this.
A sad but interesting effect of a pandemic is that viruses don't care about who's powerful or rich. Normally those people can bribe, intimidate, or lie to get out of their problems and get what they want, but those tactics don't work on viruses. Iran has seen that firsthand, because many of their government leaders have caught the virus, and several have died. We may see it here too. Not that I'm hoping that anyone will catch the coronavirus and die, but I do wonder if it will make people stop and think. I certainly wouldn't be surprised if this sparks a revolution in Iran.
Social media makes a pandemic interesting. The Coronavirus memes have been so fun. I love that we can joke about it to help us get through such a stressful situation. I'm grateful that the internet has helped us be more informed and that it has so many resources for learning, connecting with others, and being entertained when we're all trying to stay home. But it's also been a source of stress at times. I've realized that I spend a lot of time scrolling Facebook. Honestly I think a lot of the time I'm doing it to escape. A couple of days ago I wrote this on Facebook:
I've spent the last few days feeling anger and worry. I check Facebook all the time to see what's new with the coronavirus even though by this point I'm pretty familiar with the symptoms and what we're supposed to be doing to flatten the curve. I've put a decent amount of energy into being upset that our top officials aren't taking this seriously and preparing.Last night I had an epiphany thinking about the kind of memories and experiences I want to create during this time. I don't think I want to look back and remember feeling angry and scrolling too much. I want to remember doing what I could to help people I care about, even if it's through texts. I want to remember teaching my kids and playing games with them. I get to create my life. I get to choose what I do with these experiences.
So I'm trying to be more purposeful in how I spend the day instead of worrying about things I can't control. It's a great time to connect with the kids and maybe teach them some things that they wouldn't get at school. Since the kids are home in the spring for once, we get to enjoy the outside before it gets too hot, which is great. I started reading a book out loud to them last night, which we haven't done for a long time, and that's been enjoyable. Maybe we can take this time to accomplish something great.
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