Quarentine Entry #1386

COVID-19 is very much the core of the public conscious at the moment.  Lifes are upended at best, to put it succinctly.  We're no exception in that we have our own challenges.  

Andy and I are definitely on the lucky side of things, and immensely grateful to report such.  We've been working from home since Monday afternoon last week and have stocked up as necessary.  Everyone in our home has their own space, so we do manage very well, with a healthy stock of books, board games, movies, house projects, and video games to keep us entertained several times over.  We've been playing DDR when we need some physical activity, too, which has been a few levels of fun.  All in all, we're doing just fine, here--still employed, setting a good example, and weathering the storm quietly at home.

Again, we certainly appreciate how lucky we've been through the whole situation.  That said, there has still been a bit of an adjustment:  I've been having a minor freak-out about staying in the house all day.  Emotionally, I associate staying at home with a different time of my life, when I was either in the hospital or freshly out of the hospital and needing a great deal of care.  I was convalescing home alone for long chunks of time while Andy was at work.  I was on medications that kept me from driving, so any time I got out of the house was when someone was able to take me somewhere.  And even leaving the house, I did not have much by means of energy to be gone long from the house.  

So closer to the end, I was very, very tired of the same four walls.  But also not in a place that I could do anything different.  And this is a particular trigger for depression and anxiety for me.  Hell, my fitness app even has my resting heart rate up a few beats for the last week or so.  Now, even though I've been out of that particular phase of my life for a long while now, this is another case where the body remembers.  What does that mean?  It means that a day and half of relaxing at home is fine; two days of relaxing at home and my brain starts to flip into those darker emotional places.  

Mentally and emotionally, I am staring at the ceiling of my hospital room again with a three or four surgical drains, an open wound, and a fresh ostomy trying to sort out the horror of it all.  I remember the amount of light in the room, the adjacent sounds and smells, all of it.  

There is no immediate danger for me being at home--it is the safer place to be right now--but my body is reacting like it's in serious danger.  Just for not leaving the house for a few days.  Logically, it's best to stay home.  It's the right thing to do for multiple reasons.  But the thing about triggers is that they don't always make logical sense.  Even getting out of the house daily is a bit tricky--we went to Office Depot last week for a quick trip and I felt like I was absorbing the "barely holding it together" energy from the five staff there.  Walking around the house or doing outside chores is a short burst of something, but it has been rainy and otherwise I cannot take too long a break away from my work computer.  There isn't an easy "fix."

So what I've done so far:  

• Denied it was happening in hopes that it wasn't
• Lots of comfort eating
• A bit of exercise
• A collective two bottles of wine for the week

What I'll probably move toward:

• Acknowledging what's happening
• Taking a breath to assess where I'm feeling it in my body
• Checking in with said parts of my body more frequently
• With the gained clarity, hopefully discern what some specific momentary needs are to even be a 10% strategy in the interim
• More exercise

And that's the rub, really.  Acknowledging what's happening in my body, allowing the wave to roll through instead of ignoring it or fighting it, that's what's going to make the most difference.  Taking a moment to be honest with myself and to stop whatever it is I'm doing to do so, well, it takes a certain amount of emotional energy.  I've been hoarding my emotional energy all week.  It's time to direct it toward the problem rather than smothering the symptoms.

Again, I'm fine, in a matter of speaking--this isn't necessarily a call to arms.  I'm a high functioning depressive so I can still socialize, get work done, and look peachy on the surface.  Saying the words aloud (or via blog, whatever) helps me put it together, helps me to start to work through it.  But my emotional resources are thinly stretched for a little while as a result, meaning that I can be of less support to others than I would want to be during this time--my reaching-out-range is minimal at the moment.  

...I could still use reminders to drink water, though.