Read this again.
Read this to others.
Force the idiots, read it to them
If you have anxiety and you are struggling more during the lifting of restrictions than you did during the quarantine period, you are not alone and there is nothing wrong with you.
I know how silly it can feel. Things are getting better, right? So why am I suddenly feeling worse than when they were at their worst?
I asked my therapist this exact question, and she explained that while the lockdown was new and scary at first, we all built new routines around it, and soon enough we all knew what the next day, week and even month were going to look like.
The lifting of restrictions has broken our routine yet again, but, unlike lockdown, it hasn't given us a new, stable situation to adapt to and build routines around. Every phase is new. Every week we're allowed to do things that we weren't a week ago, but doing them doesn't feel like it did before lockdown—it doesn't feel safe. We know nothing of this new world we're headed toward. We don't know what we'll be allowed to do in a few weeks or months, so making plans is out of the question. We don't know if it's gonna get worse again—if doing the things that we're technically allowed to do right now is going to result in things getting worse again.
During quarantine we were living in a completely new situation, yes, but it was a consistent situation. Now the world feels like a deep sea of uncertainty, and we're being told to jump into it without knowing what's out there or a guarantee that we'll be able to swim through to the other side.
Uncertainty can be really distressing for anyone, but especially for people with anxiety. So please, don't be too hard on yourself if you're struggling right now!
And if you, like me, are distressed about what your life is going to look like these next few months, my therapist advised me to try to set goals that involve things that I can actually control. For example: I don't know if I'll be able to stay with my dad and his wife at the other side of the country during the summer holidays like I usually do, and the alternative is staying alone in my student flat with no car, nowhere to go and almost no one to see. So I decided with my therapist that, once I'm done with the uni semester, I'm going to play a videogame, read a book series, write a long fanfic, and practice painting with my watercolours. All things I have done before and I know I can achieve and that will prevent me from just...sort of...floating through the months, too anxious to really do anything but look at my phone and try not to cry.
You know how people who Do A Thing can’t watch movies about People Doing That Thing without having a million critiques ranging from the hilarious to the legit outraged?
The soldiers who get pissed off watching The Hurt Locker and every single health professional who has sat through an episode of Grey’s Anatomy… have now been joined by all of us. This is what’s going to happen to every pandemic or apocalyptic movie/TV show ever made and ever will be made.
Someone’s going to be doing a rewatch of The Walking Dead * in a few years and writing epic social media threads that go viral because “ten seasons and nobody’s so much as freaking mentioned toilet paper hoarding.”
All those empty streets with tumbleweeds are going to make people twitch. Everyone knows that the drugstore’s still gonna be open, there will be people lined up to get in to the grocery store even if it’s just got lima beans inside, and unless they’re in one of those weird places with government-run booze, the liquor stores are open because the hospitals don’t need to see the alcoholics in withdrawal.
All those post-apocalyptic movies where the ravaging hordes of violent thugs are the dominant species are going to be dismissed as just too unrealistic because come on, there’ll be assholes, but where are the samaritans delivering food and medicine to the vulnerable, the folks making survival gear out of whatever’s in the house and sending it to people who need it, and the minivans delivering paid-for-by-strangers meals to the first responders?
Actual movie review: “I’m sorry, but if you’re going to do a This Is How The World Ends montage and not have a single exercise walker or a delivery dude on an e-bike with a bandanna as a mask, what are you even trying to say?”
________
* I should point out that I’ve never seen The Walking Dead and they very might well mention toilet paper.
I would also offer an alternative explanation: as a person with anxiety, i can tell you that being panicked/tense all the time makes you EXHAUSTED.
after social distancing is over everyone is gonna be so touch starved every contact with another human will be like the hand flex scene in pride and prejudice (2005)
What I feel a lot of people learned this week:
Imagine all of the insufferable oscar bait quarantine movies that are gonna come out in a few years, about a husband and wife forced to stay home together, and slowly learn to actually love and appreciate their spouse.
One of the Important Scenes will be where Husband watches Wife idk fucking eat an entire can of olives and goes “I- I didn’t know you liked olives” and she’s like “Yeh I love them” *insert obnoxious slurping eating noises to prove she is a Relatable Female Character.*
And then cue dramatic melancholy music while he sits and thinks about how his job is actually meaningless in the face of the fact that it’s prevented him from learning more about the woman he married all those years ago.
There’s a bunch of scenes where they look pensively at each other from the doorway. They start off quarantine sitting on chairs on opposite sides of the living room. As the days progress they move closer and closer. By the end of the movie they’re next to each other on a love seat.
It’s about two upper middle class white heterosexuals. He works at a bank and she runs an etsy shop making tiny idly jewelry. Their neighbor is an Eldery Likable Black Man who offers them sage advice talking over the fence of their backyards. He of course eventually dies of the virus, leaving his two neighbors to learn and grow from the experience- and to treasure what really matters in life.
It makes 10 Bazillion dollars and several high brow movie critics talk breathlessly about how it accurately and beautifully handled the emotional and social struggle of life during the pandemic.
Husband is played by like Leonardo DiCaprio or something. Wife is a slim blonde actress who is 20 years younger than him, even though in the move their characters somehow went to high school together. Black Neighbor Killed Off For Character Development is played by Morgan Freeman. The movie is touted as one of the most Important Films Of The Decade.
Yep. That’s The Movie. IMO there also will be Elderly Heroic Asian Woman, owner of a grocery store, speaking bad English, suffering but Performing Heroic Acts for the community, even the asshole racist who will eventually reform, cue tears.
Unpopular but true: a large reason why grocery store are empty now isn’t just because there’s a bunch of greedy, awful people panic everything in sight to spite others. Sure, there’s some hoarding assholes, but a lot of it is people realizing they will now need over a month’s worth of groceries in one go when they might usually only buy enough to last them a week, maybe two, and people who can no longer supplement with going out, people who are now eating three meals at home when usually their kids eat lunch at school and they have lunch at the office… that’s a hell of a lot more food than most families need to have on hand, including people who normally never cook and just grubhub everything. The food supply chains will hopefully stabilize a bit in the coming weeks - just wanted to point out it’s not all malicious and people aren’t as awful as is being said. I’m under self imposed quarantine, social distancing, working from home and staying away from others. Hoping all of you guys are safe and feeling ok.
just about every person coming through my line at the grocery store is just buying what they’d usually buy when they buy groceries. They’re just buying MORE of it than they’d usually buy. Because they’re needing more than they’d usually need. I lost count of how many times I was asked if we had any more eggs simply because people told me they were cooking sit down breakfasts for their kids now instead of ‘something they can send them out the door on the way to school with’. We’re not sold out of milk because we’ve got milk hoarders stalking up their garage for the next five months with milk. We’re out of milk because everyone’s home now and drinking more of it. Same with bread. Our cake mixes aren’t flying off the shelves because people are worried about dessert shortages. It’s because people are home and doing baking with their free time. So - yeah - there are some assholes out there hoarding shit. But its not that simple. It’s rarely that simple. Beware of people that tell you its that simple.
should also point out that my store, and most others, have, for a couple weeks now, had a limit on how much of a certain thing people can buy. So no, even when we do get trucks in, no one’s walking out of our store with two cartloads full of toilet paper. And I’ve only had to turn away two people that tried to overbuy in the past two weeks as well.
Most of the supplies will stabilize soon.
People are not eating more than they did a month ago. They’re eating more of it at home and less at work/restaurants.They’re cooking for kids, who used to eat at school.
People are not using more toilet paper now; they just want to stock up in case they’re told “don’t leave your house for a week.” Once they decide they have enough in stock, they’ll go back to their previous buying habits.
These are all distribution adjustments; they’ll settle down.
There are a few people being assholes, but there’s a lot more who are suddenly trying to feed a family of 4+ without fast food as the simple option if they’re overwhelmed. There are now mid-to-high income couples who almost always ate at restaurants because it’s easier and much faster than buying supplies and doing complete dinners. There are families with 5 kids who used to eat lunch at school, whose breakfast used to be toaster/microwave something grabbed on the way out the door. There are “three dude roommates” who used to buy prepackaged everything, but one of them’s laid off and another’s on half hours, so they’re going to cook from scratch and have no idea what they’re doing.
We ARE actually using more hand sanitizer and more paper masks. For those, we need to increase production, not just change where they existing supplies are going.
But most of the stores-being-stripped issues are “people who are stuck at home and know that they might not be able to go out tomorrow.”
Be patient. Try to be kind. Everyone’s scared, and fear makes people react in different ways.
Now, more than ever, clear writing matters.
Do ppl know about trump actively trying to buy the company that’s currently working on a covid vaccine and wanting to keep it to American use only or is this a Germany only headline
A source
It gets wierder and more troubling too. Apparently the CEO that met with trump has abruptly stepped down. The company is now being run by one of its founders. Wtf is going on here?
have not seen it in america but that IS pretty fuckin horrifying so like hey what the fuck
You really need to see this in the US because everyone else on the fucking planet has been seeing this for nearly a week and we are PISSED
Your government, in the middle of a global fucking pandemic, literally tried to buy the vaccine under development for said pandemic exclusively for the US.
This isn’t just a daily fail bullshit squawk, this has been confirmed by multiple sources, INCLUDING THE GODDAMN GERMAN GOVERNMENT. “CAPITALISM HAS LIMITS” and you have crossed a fucking line.
Today I learned that the German word for large/panic/horde shopping is Der Hamsterkauf.
why can’t people accept “the media is over-hyping coronavirus” and “coronavirus is concerning given the lack of knowledge surrounding it” are both true? like can I order some nuance
and also “stop panicking about dying because most deaths will be due to previous immunocompromisation” and “we should work to reduce the spread as much as possible to keep those immunocompromised safe” are both true
also “the lives of the immunocompromised are important and we can’t sidebar them” but at the same time “if ur not a member of a high-risk population stop buying out all the fucking soap, first aid kits, and toilet paper like it’s the end times”
If you are not a member of or in constant or semi-constant contact with someone in a high risk population, well, you shouldn’t be doing that bullshit anyway but do follow all the recommendations to protect them just as if you were a member.
My grandmother and grandfather are in their eighties. I love the very much and her stage of possible Alzheimer’s has reached me; she’s forgetting me. I went to San Antonio with some friends last weekend: a museum, a very crowded restaurant, a less crowded restaurant, and a coffee shop. I don’t visit them enough and I should. I was planning to this weekend.
My mom–who hasnt’ gone anywhere even vaguely worrisome–is visiting. I am not. The risk is less than one for me, but not zero. 99.9999999% there’s not anything to worry about.
My grandmother gets hospitalized for colds over the last twenty years. Summer colds, even.
My risk actual is zero; that is when I feel comfortable not taking any precautions. There is a low chance even if I got it, it would kill me. It’s there, but eh; presumed risk maybe 2, normally wouldn’t even notice it. For my grandmother, for my mother, for my sisters, for my coworkers with asthma and pregnant and someone I have never met who is on chemo and may exist where I am, however, I’ve set presumed risk = fourteen days and next weekend should cover it.
I’m not going to stop living my life; I will live it quite happily, just modified to avoid killing anyone, and also wash my hands like a lot, avoid phyiscal contact, stay away from crowded areas, cover my mouth with a tissue, handkerchief, elbow when I cough, stay away from the vulnerable, reset the counter higher if there’s confirmation in an area I was exposed to, and loop until risk_actual = risk_presumed and that’s when exit value = 0.
This is quite literally the easiest thing I have ever done to avoid killing people. Maybe second to just not being a murderer, but close.
Be ready? But how? … [M]any doomsday scenarios advise extensive preparation for increasingly outlandish scenarios, and this may seem daunting and pointless (and it is). Others may not feel like contributing to a panic or appearing to be selfish.
Forget all that. Preparing for the almost inevitable global spread of this virus, now dubbed COVID-19, is one of the most pro-social, altruistic things you can do in response to potential disruptions of this kind.
We should prepare, not because we may feel personally at risk, but so that we can help lessen the risk for everyone. We should prepare not because we are facing a doomsday scenario out of our control, but because we can alter every aspect of this risk we face as a society.
That’s right, you should prepare because your neighbors need you to prepare—especially your elderly neighbors, your neighbors who work at hospitals, your neighbors with chronic illnesses, and your neighbors who may not have the means or the time to prepare because of lack of resources or time.
this essay is the first piece on covid-19 i’ve seen so far that has actually made me feel somewhat empowered to face this thing. the author’s tone is very calm and practical, and she offers sensible advice – wash your hands!! stock up on nonperishable foods (and meds etc) you would use anyway, in case you can’t leave the house for 2-3 weeks – and helped me, at least, step out of my anxiety spiral and actually start planning
if those of us who are able do these things, then in turn we help those in our communities who are likely to be most impacted by this virus
now i’m thinking of how to help my community, instead of just panicking while reading the news, and that is exactly the kind of re-orientation i needed
