Pandemic Side Effects

We've all been affected one way or another by the circumstances of 2020 and the Coronavirus Pandemic.  I've put some thought into sharing my outlook and how it has affected me.

I'll start with the basics: weight gain, tendinitis (aka mommy wrist), anxiety...but it goes a lot deeper than that.

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Parenting Burnout

I have enjoyed being a stay at home mom for years.  I consider myself a FUN mom and genuinely enjoying spending my days with my kids.  I feel like COVID has really robbed me of this.  

You know the saying "It takes a village"... I've always taken it to mean the support of family and friends.  But what I've gleaned during this time of quarantine is that the "village" is really more about the community.  The librarians who we've come to know as friends...the farmers market musicians that interact with our kids...the church nursery worker who you always seem to run into at the grocery store, the lady at the aquarium who asks if you want a family photo...  All of these (and a million more) pieces of the village are gone.  And we NEED the village, just like the saying says.  It's the village that sustains parents from losing our minds.  Without it, we're exhausted, impatient, frustrated, sad...completely and utterly UN-FUN.

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Building my Bubble

I've always appreciated different opinions and perspectives but I feel that 2020 has (temporarily) changed that.

I've built a bubble around my world, shielding from as much heavy and negative information as possible.  This is mostly evident in my lack of social media usage.  Pre-pandemic, I enjoyed social media as a connection to the outside world on days where I didn't interact with adults at all.  Now, it feels like a mine-field of attacks and anger.  I had to shut it down.  I've also felt the need to prune my relationships during this time.  In the normal world, it was easy to overlook/brush certain things off.  But this bubble makes me a lot more fragile, so I'm protecting it.

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Respect the Stress

Throughout my life I have found it hard to understand why some people behave the way they do.  2020 has really taught me a HUGE lesson on this subject.  This is the first experience I've known where every single person is dealing with the same stress.  Perhaps not the same exact circumstances, but we are all feeling it.  And we are ALL maneuvering it in our own ways.  I've learned to respect that everyone is different and is doing what they think is best.  It's obvious that NONE of us know how to handle this situation and therefore NONE of us are right or wrong.  This is such a valuable mindset for me to recognize, one I wish I'd learned sooner.  But I'm grateful for this pandemic side effect.

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How are you holding up?

xLaura