How COVID-19 Changed My Outlook on 2020

Posted on by Astrid

Yes, I’ve said it before, but can you believe it’s May already? Four months have passed since the beginning of 2020. Time flies when you’re having fun, they say. Well, time also flies (and drags at the same time) when in a pandemic. Today I’m joining in with Finish the Sentence Friday (which is open all week), for which the question this week is how the pandemic changed your word of the year.

In January, I chose the word Wellbeing as my word of the year for 2020. I was at the time already a bit angsty about it, as I was in a bit of a hypochondriac phase and thought that if I chose this word, I’d die this year or something. Some kind of reverse law of attraction.

Still, so far, my word is still pretty true. I am taking preventative measures to hopefully keep the coronavirus out of my body. Just yesterday, my staff started taking everyone’s temp twice daily with a no-contact thermometer. Since the virus hit the home below mine, I have been a little more scared. At the same time, I still often avoid thinking about the pandemic too much. Actually, I realize that, as the month of April continued, I included fewer and fewer references to the pandemic in my posts.

I had a few hopes for 2020 too. The first one was to keep my marriage strong. I felt I needed to learn to travel to my husband for this, as I thought ultimately living apart wouldn’t be very good for our marriage otherwise. While I still feel I need to learn to travel to him independently once the crisis is over, I have learned that our marriage can survive a time of not seeing each other. It’s hard, but it’s doable.

Honestly, I must say the pandemic has given me a clearer focus on what matters most. I try to appreciate my husband more. After all, he isn’t a given. One day one of us might catch the virus. Besides, we can’t see each other now and it isn’t altogether logical that a marriage survives this.

On my other goals, I did pretty well so far. I’m actually loving it. I don’t know whether the crisis is the reason I’m doing so well, but I’m pretty sure it’s one of the factors.

#WeekendCoffeeShare (April 5, 2020)

Posted on by Astrid

I more or less abandoned the What Day Is It Anyway? posts when A-to-Z started, but I wanted to write a check-in anyway. I am joining in with #WeekendCoffeeShare, although it’s a bit late for coffee. I did have a cup of decaf about an hour ago. I also just had a nice orange-pineapple-guava drink. I am not a big fan of fizzy drinks, but thankfully usually we have some non-fizzy soft drinks or juice in the fridge for week-ends.

If we were having coffee, I would ask you all how you’ve been doing on your third week of lockdown. I had a pretty good week. It was better than last week. Last week, after all, I landed in some crises due to missing my husband and all the change that is brought on by this COVID-19 thing.

If we were having coffee, I would share that on Monday, my home’s manager came to talk to me. I was scared at first. Thankfully, she came to reassure me that I won’t be kicked out of the facility for having challenging behavior. That was quite a relief to me.

If we were having coffee, I would share that I made delicious crispy chicken with the staff intern at day activities on Tuesday. I made them with dorito chips for the crisp. I think I’d prefer them with slightly more spicy doritos, but I had intentionally picked the cheese-flavored ones, as I normally don’t like the paprika or chili-flavored ones.

If we were having coffee, I would share that I didn’t do as well on my step goal as I did last week, but I still managed to get to 10K steps once and reached over 8K steps on three other days.

If we were having coffee, I would share that I struggled a bit with health anxiety at the end of the week. Like I mentioned in passing in one of my A-to-Z posts, I’ve been convinced for years that, once I’d find a suitable living place, I would get a serious illness and die. This caused me to feel some intense anxiety when I had some health symptoms. Thankfully, I was able to talk it through with my staff.

If we were having coffee, I would tell you that I would originally have had a phone appt with my community psychiatric nurse from mental health last Friday. I waited for twenty minutes for her to call and then decided to call the secretary. Turns out my CPN was off sick and the secretary had forgotten to tell me. Thankfully, I didn’t have a face-to-face appointment.

Because I was struggling a bit, my staff arranged for me to have a phone check-in with the facility’s behavior specialist. She was pretty good at calming my nerves. She reminded me to look at today only. I won’t die today and I won’t be leaving the facility today. That was helpful.

If we were having coffee, I would share that I’d been trying to record a video and then take a picture of myself for my husband. I reasoned he may like to see me now that he can’t come here. We don’t normally video call or anything, so he hadn’t seen my face in a month or so. Unfortunately, the picture I took showed my eyes and nose only. I wonder how other totally blind people learn to take pictures. Anyway, I finally had my staff take a picture of me. In this picture, I’m holding my stuffed panda. I often cuddle it when I miss my husband, because the panda is the largest soft toy I own. No, my husband isn’t fat like the panda, LOL.

How have you been?

#IWSG: Writing in Times of Corona

Posted on by Astrid

Today is April 1 and aside from the start of the #AtoZChallenge, it’s also the monthly Insecure Writer’s Support Group (#IWSG) day. I skipped it last month, but today I want to join back in.

I did a lot of writing in the past month. What else is there to do? I mean, I could have spent my month reading, but I still usually read partly for the purpose of blogging about it. So I spent my month writing.

The world pretty much turned upside down in the month of March. Early on, I didn’t see a month full of writing on the horizon at all. Neither did I see COVID-19 coming. In the first week of March, the press at least here was still not taking COVID-19 too seriously. The first cases in the Netherlands were confirmed, but for the most part I still thought this was a far-off thing. A satirical site had a test online about when YOU would contract coronavirus. I had presumably contracted it two days before while trying to stockpile the last packages of fresh meat. I joked about it when having a meeting with my community psychiatric nurse and the facility’s behavior specialist on March 6. We even still shook hands then.

On March 16, schools and restaurants closed for three weeks. A week later, we went on “intelligent” lockdown. This means we are encouraged to stay home and gatherings are prohibited, but going outside isn’t strictly forbidden. My facility implemented a no-visitors policy on March 25.

Just yesterday, we were told that schools will remain closed until at least April 28. Restaurants are closed till June 1 I think.

So, while I’m in self-isolation, I do still try to occupy myself. It’s good that I like writing, huh? For the month of April, I have lots of things I want to write about. I’m participating in A to Z, of course, but I’ve already seen some other prompts that inspire me.

How are things in your part of the world?

What Day Is It Anyway? (March 31, 2020) #WDIIA

Posted on by Astrid

Okay, I assume Linda intended #WDIIA to be a daily feature and not only did I skip last Wednesday and Thursday, but I skipped the week-end and yesterday too. I’m still making use of the feature while it exists, as though I don’t exactly have to remind myself what day it is each day, a reminder every now and again can’t hurt.

I slept in till 9:15AM this morning. This isn’t unusual for a week-end and my staff said it was okay despite it not being a week-end. After all, day activities are still provided at the home.

I seem to have lost my exercise mojo a bit. Though I did walk three times today, I took “only” 8.5K steps and don’t feel motivated to go on the elliptical to reach the 10K mark. I haven’t been on the elliptical since Saturday. My sister did compliment me on having beat her husband on Fitbit last week though.

At least I haven’t lost my blogging mojo as of yet. Like I said yesterday, I don’t usually schedule posts in advance but I did tomorrow’s post for the #AtoZChallenge. I feel pretty motivated to write.

Someone from the adaptive tech company, or I assume their carrier service, came to collect my Braille display today. It has a few broken cells. I originally intended on waiting for it to be fixed till this COVID-19 crisis is over, but then last week the company sent out an E-mail detailing their continued service during the crisis. They don’t repair tech in the customer’s home anymore, but they still do collect and return. They also provided me with a replacement Braille display while they’re fixing mine. I doubt it can be reliably fixed though, as this was the second time some cells broke and I’ve only had it for nine months.

This evening, the prime minister held another press conference regarding the coronavirus crisis and its management. Schools are out till April 28 at least and the “intelligent” lockdown will remain in effect. This means, I assume, that the day center will remain closed until April 28 at least too. I don’t mind, as I actually rather like it this way. The staff noticed this too and they might find a way for me to retreat into my room if needed once the day center reopens.

How has your day been?

Dear Diary: 2021

Posted on by Astrid

A ton of ideas are floating through my mind for topics I want to write about. However, I’m tempted to just do another #WDIIA post. I also realize I signed up for the #AtoZChallenge and haven’t even started drafting my posts for it yet. Ugh, that’s me being a blogger. Instead of drafting a post in advance though, I’m participating in Mindlovemisery’s Menagerie’s Sunday Writing Prompt for yesterday, for which the theme is Dear Diary. And no, this isn’t going to be a boring description of today. I hope it will be a diary entry I can write someday in 2021, when like I predicted last year, everything will be okay. Here goes.

Dear diary,

I just took a look at some old blog posts from last year. Today is September 30, 2021. My sister and brother-in-law have their fifth wedding anniversary today. Hubby and I just had our tenth on the 19th. It was wonderful! We celebrated by going out at my not-so-newly favorite restaurant, where both of us ordered unlimited piri-piri chicken. It was delicious! My husband had the following week off, so I decided to stay with him for the week. Since traveling still was discouraged last year, but isn’t this year, we took some time to vacation at a nice resort. I spent most of the time in the swimming pool. Boy, have I missed swimming!

I’ve also missed going out to dinner. Oh and ordering pizza. Though during most of the COVID-19 crisis, Domino’s still delivered pizzas, there was no-one to eat them with, since my husband couldn’t visit.

Oh, I’m so happy my husband didn’t leave me over that whole COVID-19 thing. I mean, it took several months before the no-visitors rule was lifted at my care facility. I was worried all of this time that hubby would want to have a real wife who could be with him. Apparently not. He wants me.

I’m so glad the worry is a lot less than it was last year. I’ve been working on my self-worth in therapy and getting EMDR for my childhood trauma. Thankfully, mental health resumed regular face-to-face sessions in June last year. By now, I feel better than I’ve ever before.

In 2019, I wrote on my blog that, by 2021, everything would be okay. I could not have predicted a pandemic making life much harder first. Thankfully, my husband and I survived and it’s made us and our relationship stronger.

What Day Is It Anyway? (March 27, 2020) #WDIIA

Posted on by Astrid

I’m once again doing a #WDIIA post. I skipped them on Wednesday and yesterday, because I didn’t feel like writing the same old shit again and again. Today I was seriously confused about what day it is. The staff awoke me at around 8:30AM and said I had to shower. I normally shower on Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays if I have no outside obligations such as visiting my husband. Obviously right now I don’t. On the other days, I do a quick wash. Now I seriously thought it was either Thursday or Saturday, but it’s Friday, yay!

I must say I awoke some 30 minutes before that from a really horrible nightmare. In the nightmare, I somehow left the facility to visit my husband and then couldn’t come back because of the lockdown. It ended with my husband being angry with me for wanting to go back to the facility at all.

The nightmare was somehwat realistic, in that indeed the new visiting rules that have been put in place for care facilities say that, if family take a client home, they cannot return to the facility until this COVID-19 lockdown thing is over. Family or others cannot visit the facility either unless in exceptional circumstances such as if a client is terminally ill. Obviously this means I won’t see my husband for another while still to come.

It’s the “working” Friday, so we did get day actiivities at home today. This meant, as it has consistently for the last while, that I did go outside twice for walks. I went for another long walk in the evening. As such, I reached 10K steps again. I looked up how I compare to my sister, since we’re Fitbit friends, and I took nearly 1.5 times her steps over the past seven days.

It’s now past 9PM. It’s the weekend now, so we had chips and soda this evening. Tomorrow morning, I’m going to have bread with a boiled egg on it for Breakfast. We get boiled eggs delivered to us by a former staff here who has her own chickens. I assumed she wouldn’t be allowed to come now that the facility is in lockdown, but maybe she puts the eggs at our doorstep and then leaves. So at least that tradition can continue for now.

How was your day?

Thankful Thursday (March 26, 2020): My Staff’s Approach to a Meltdown

Posted on by Astrid

Today I’m having a really hard day. I found out this morning that my husband is not allowed to visit me for the duration of the COVID-19 situation. Only in exceptional cases such as when you’re terminally ill can you have a visitor. Well, I guess I’m grateful I’m not in that situation.

During this time of day activities at the home and the chaotic situation that ensues, I’m struggling a lot with basic mistrust. As I explained to my staff, including the behavior specialist, some weeks ago, I’m finding that I experience a lot of distress due to past trauma. I’m pretty sure I suffer with significant attachment issues and am acting those out towards the staff now that I’m beginning to feel slightly safe. I mean, there’s a part of me who says that if the staff truly know me, they’ll kick me out of here or abandon me in some other way. I guess this part is giving the staff a hard time because they’ll ultimately abandon me anyway so I’d better push them away first.

As such, this afternoon, I had a major meltdown. I was watching a video on the Center for Consultation and Expertise website about a man with mild intellectual disability who had a lot of challenging behavior. The way in which I could relate to him, triggered me. I tried to tell my staff, but couldn’t and then I threw a glass to the ground.

Now here comes the reason I prefixed this post with Thankful Thursday: my staff were amazing about it!

My assigned support worker, who happened to work on my side of the home today, called another home for a staff to come over. This was a staff who had also worked in my home previously. She hugged me and took me to my room to talk while my assigned staff cleaned the mess.

This did further trigger me, but it was a good trigger. I mean, in the psychiatric hospital I would’ve been secluded or kicked off the unit and basically abandoned. I had tears of gratitude and sadness at the same time because of how lovely my staff handled this situation. My assigned staff even said maybe we should watch the video together sometime so that I could point out in which ways I relate.

Now here’s hoping my behavior won’t escalate further. After all, then I may in fact be abandoned. My inner critic still says that I’m making up all the factors behind my challenging behavior and it’s all just attention-seeking and abandonment is exactly what I deserve. Regardless, I’m so extremely grateful for my staff!

What Day Is It Anyway? (March 23, 2020) #WDIIA

Posted on by Astrid

Well, this thing called What Day Is It Anyway? (#WDIIA) is presumably a daily feature during the COVID-19 crisis. However, I won’t promise I’ll make it a daily feature. I’d like to participate when I can though, as I must admit I lose track of the days too.

Today is Monday, March 23. I awoke at 8:29AM according to my Fitbit activity tracker. I got showered, brushed my teeth and got dressed. I then had nice yoghurt with crunchy muesli with nuts for breakfast. I bought it with the staff on Saturday.

Then I went back to my room for a bit, until it was time to have coffee in the living room, which is our day room now that the day center is closed. The day activities staff are still figuring out how to best help all clients in the seven homes that are part of the facility.

I went for two walks during the day, one in the morning and another in the afternoon. Then after dinner I went on the elliptical. Then finally while prime minister Rutte was delivering a press conference on the COVID-19 situation, I took another long walk. I reached nearly 12000 steps today.

As such, I didn’t hear myself what the prime minister had to say. I later heard on the news that people found gathering in even small groups can be fined up to €400 per person. It’s up to each city’s mayor though to take appropriate safety measures. Shops can (and probably should) have strict limitations on the number of people entering at a time. All events and festivals have been canceled until June 1. The prime minister will give out further details about school closures next week. But the good news is… no complete lockdown for now! Though the prime minister did say that people should really go outside alone if they’re outside at all, I doubt I’ll be fined for taking walks outdoors with just one staff. I hope not at least, as walks are true stress-relievers for me in normal times already and this time is definitely more stressful than normal.

Then again, I’m not sure I’m affected more by this situation than most others, or maybe even less. I am constantly on edge, but that’s my normal. That’s what living life with (C-)PTSD and BPD traits is like everyday. My distress level simply is never at a one and this time is no exception. Though obviously the lack of routine is distressing, I must honestly say it’s really more the usual things that cause me overwhelm.

Welcome to Another Day #SoCS

Posted on by Astrid

Welcome to another day. What day is it anyway? I have to check my iPhone to be sure. It’s Saturday, March 21, 2020. Here I almost wrote it’s March 20. Where does time go?

It’s the first week of whatever this self-isolation thing is called here in the Netherlands. It’s not a complete lockdown, but there’s not much we can do anyway. I went to the supermarket today, only realizing later on that if I’m allowed to go there and be relatively close to other customers, I should be allowed to see my husband too. Or is that flawed logic? I mean, no-one is really keeping the five feet distance that’s recommended.

I miss my husband. It dawned upon me last Thursday that if I do fall seriously ill with COVID-19, my husband won’t even be allowed to see me. I know, I’m in good immunological health, so I most likely will just get some nasty flulike symptoms, but still. It sucks not being able to be close to my husband.

Then a voice in my head said: “But you chose to leave him.” I didn’t leave him, as in divorce or abandon him. We’re still married and planning on staying so for life. But I did go into long-term care when I wasn’t literally dying living with him. I was struggling to keep up, but I did have food to eat and could, for the most part, get ahold of something when I was hungry.

I bought a bag of liquorice and ate it almost in one sitting today. Then I had a terrible stomachache. I don’t know why I decided to eat all the liquorice. I guess some part of me is feeling rather awful.

Yesterday, a little (inner child, for those not familiar with dissociative identity disorder) wrote to an E-mail list. I don’t know what she wrote and haven’t checked the responses.

Generally, we feel pretty calm, but I guess there are parts of me who are severely triggered by something about this COVID-19 crisis. Other parts are just bemused. It’s a strange world we live in indeed.

I’m linking up with #SoCS, for which the prompt today is “Welcome”.

Gratitude List (March 20, 2020) #TToT

Posted on by Astrid

It’s Friday and that means the Ten Things of Thankful (#TToT) linkup is open again. I haven’t participated in a while, but in these weird times, we need gratitude more than ever. Here are the things I’ve been thankful for lately.

1. Relatively tasty dinners. Here at the care facility, we get our dinners from a meal delivery company. Last week or the week before, I complained that we got boiled potatoes like four times a week and that I’d like rice, pasta or the like more often. Thankfully they customize the meals for each resident, so it’s not like if I want pasta, everyone gets pasta. I think my assigned staff told the company. In any case, I’ve had pretty varied meals lately. On Saturday, we got tuna macaroni and I loved it!

2. The sensory room. The real one at the day center and the makeshift one at the home. The day center was still open on Monday and Tuesday, so I was able to use the snoezelen® room then. On Thursday, some of the staff created a makeshift sensory room in the currently empty bedroom at our home.

3. Walking. Yay, we’re not in complete lockdown (yet)! I’ve been grateful for walks often before, but in these weird times, I get to appreciate it even more. I managed to get over 9000 steps everyday this week so far except for today (and I’m not going to make it today either).

4. Getting day activities at the home. I was a little scared that, once the day center closed, we’d get no activities at all. Thankfully, that’s not true. I brought some games from the day center to the home with me and we have enough staff to do activities with us.

5. Going on the elliptical. I went on Tuesday, thinking I wouldn’t be able to use it for three weeks after that. However, two staff members transferred the elliptical to the empty room in our home, so that it’s now a combined sensory and gym room. I went on it for like 20 minutes yesterday.

6. Modern technology. I’m so glad this pandemic is happening now that we have the Internet and smartphones and the like. Otherwise I wouldn’t be able to connect to my husband, my family or the wider community at all. I’m so happy this thing does connect us all in a weird kind of way.

7. Meditation. I use an app called Insight Timer on my phone for meditating, but I hadn’t used it in a while. Then I checked it out and saw they have a whole section devoted to overcoming fear in these weird times. I loved listening to some guided meditations.

8. A phone appt with my CPN from mental health. We had a pretty good session. We actually did get started on some cognitive behavior therapy like we were planning on. She’s also going to get me signed up for the eHealth module with the agency.

9. My husband. Yesterday I was suddenly overcome with fear that I’d never see my husband again or that he’d want to divorce me due to our inability to be together in this crisis. My husband reassured me that I won’t lose him. He’s so lovely!

10. My health. I almost forgot that this thing is about a viral disease that takes actual lives. I so far haven’t had symptoms of COVID-19, but I’m confident that when (yes, it’s most likely a “when”) I do get the disease, I’ll survive.

What have you been grateful for lately?