Well as a humorous Mom on the internet has been saying, “It is day whatever of the pandemic,” as we’ve all pretty much lost track at this point. At first this virus thing seems like a skirmish but now for most of us it feels like a siege. War comparisons ring true and at this point we all do feel rather battle weary.

As a country we pride ourselves on our spunk, stamina, and resourcefulness but this crisis is stretching all of us beyond our max. As the joke goes, “God never gives you more than you can handle, well…God must have me confused with someone else!”

Home schooling would require 24 awake hours in a day, if employed you have probably never had more to do and less support to do it, the kids are cranky, your significant other is less than charming, (and if you are alone you’re equally annoyed with yourself), and you could really use a haircut.

Welcome to the “just how long is it possible this will last,” phase. We all feel vulnerable emotionally, financially, professionally, and physically. Here are some ideas to get through this part of the crisis just a little easier:

Solutions and Tools

1. Keep an eye on the overall stats on how many deaths and how many diagnosed as most numbers are falling in every part of the country. Realize nothing (even the good stuff) lasts forever.
2. Watch the news on the possible therapeutics that may change the lethality such as the antiviral by Gilead and blood plasma taken from recovered people. Though a vaccine is nowhere near anything that keeps this bug from killing us means we can return to our lives.
3. Expect you are normal if you are pacing your house like a caged tiger and getting really restless.
4. Don’t feel guilty if you are a serious introvert and loving your quarantine. There is a humorous t-shirt logo that quips, “2020 the Year I realized I didn’t like people anyway.” If you truly revel in your alone time you are lucky!
5. If you are working also expect that maintaining your usual emotional connections with your professional community is really tough via Zoom, Skype, email, and phone. You will miss your work community more than you ever thought!
6. Realize we are proving telecommuting works and that office face time is not the only way to be productive. There is definitely room for some clever tech company (Microsoft challenge) to invent a Zoom like platform that does a better job with a virtual office environment. We could wear our special virtual reality goggles and find ourselves choosing our seat in our virtual meeting while gossiping with a co-worker.

As I often say to my therapy clients how ever you are feeling is fine, how ever you are coping is reasonable, and few people are experiencing their finest hour. Wearing pants is optional, you may rock those pajamas all day, and take a stab at cutting hair.

We are all going to learn a lot, no these lessons won’t be worth the price of going through a pandemic but we might as well benefit from the microbial siege of 2020.

May you be well, may you be at peace, may you come out of this crisis better than you went in!

Warmly,

Dr. Skube

interpersonaledge@comcast.net