Hello, it's been a while

Hello, dear reader, and thank you for being here. How are you? I sincerely hope that you are well both physically and emotionally. I hope you are taking care of yourself the best you can during this crisis.

Hmm...I think I need to give you fair warning that this post is a bit whiny. But this is a personal blog and whining is sometimes a part of who I am.

Where have I been?

I’ve been absent from my blog and mostly absent from Twitter for a while. My last blog post was back at the beginning of March. I was already struggling to find time to post and then...well, this whole global pandemic situation happened. I’ve been wanting to post but I’ve been having difficulty finding the space in my life. By “space” I mean time, energy and motivation. Because, really, most tasks require all three don’t they?

My workload is roughly the same as it was before this crisis. I’m very grateful to have a job where the tasks I do are essential, however, it does mean that I don’t have this extra time that other folks seem to have. Some of my routine tasks I’m not doing, but they seem to have been replaced with more emails, meetings and other situation-specific tasks. My job is normally a nice balance of physical tasks where I move around a lot and computer tasks. I have some flexibility where I am able to schedule my tasks as I like. Typically, I intersperse my physical and computer tasks so I don’t get tired, but I also don’t get bored. Now, I am cramming all of my physical tasks, which need to be done at my workplace, together in order to be at work for as few hours as possible (~6 hours x 3 days/week). Consequently, on those days I am *exhausted*. On the days where I stay home and do work at my computer, I get antsy and have trouble focusing. There’s also that energy that is lost by transitioning from working at work to working at home, and I’m transitioning between the two all the time. I feel like I am working more and getting less done.

My personal routine is also mostly the same. As an introvert who heavily values alone time and has lots of indoor hobbies, my schedule hasn’t changed. I already wasn’t going out on weekends, lol. I realize that probably sounds a bit sad, but I avoid most social functions, honestly. I also don’t have friends nearby since we moved here only a few years ago. So most of my personal routine has carried on like always. This means I have several online games/chats that I’m running/organizing and they are all carrying on as usual. So, once again- no added free time!

Thanks to this situation, my anxiety is a bit more present than it has been over the last several months and I’m often worrying. My mind favors the cognitive distortion that assumes the worst and that every situation will have the worst possible outcome- otherwise known as catastrophic thinking. I’m fighting intrusive thoughts about losing loved ones, losing my job, and a future world that looks something like a zombie apocalypse movie just replace the zombies with Covid19 patients. I’m sure many of you are also experiencing this same thing, and in some cases, much worse than I.

Of course, my depression also has to make an appearance in a time such as this. My depression is pretty mild, but when it arrives it does lead to days of total disinterest in the activities I love. I hate that part. I don’t mind being sad, but as someone who is usually overly passionate about the things she loves being disinterested and empty is so frustrating and foreign and ugh. It’s awful. Once again, I’m sure many of you can relate. My heart goes out to all of you.

All of that- my normal workload, my somewhat normal routine plus anxiety, depression and weird back-and-forth transitions- has me feeling like my time is way more limited than usual. 

With blogging there is also this whole list of expectations/should-dos….I’m supposed to have a nice graphic image at the top of the post. I need photos. I need to pay attention to SEO. I need to talk about something specific that fits into one of the categories of topics I discuss. I need to give the reader something useful- teach them something or solve a problem for them. Yadayadayada.  

I have been avoiding Twitter (my main form of social media), as well. Actually, I’ve been ignoring news notifications and other outlets where Covid19 gets mentioned on a regular basis too. It helped improve my mood significantly to not be constantly bombarded with information and anecdotal stories related to it.

A cloth mask selfie of me at work.

What have I been doing? 

Besides working, what other things have I been up to?

Self-care: While I haven’t stuck to my original intentions since my self-care post back in March, I have been trying to maintain some good self-care. I’ve been trying to get at least six hours of sleep, exercise daily and meditate daily; and I’ve been continuing with my Nourishing Resilience group where I work towards improving my stress resilience using the concept of neuroplasticity. 

Games: I’ve been playing a game of Stardew Valley Co-op with my husband, which is fun but nearly as relaxing as single player Stardew. I’ve also been playing some Planet Zoo and some Animal Crossing. I’ve been finding it challenging to find enough time for Animal Crossing. The number of tasks I wanted to do in AC was stressing me out a bit. I purchased a Switch specifically so I could play AC as I thought it would relax me. I’m sure I will go back to playing soon.

Penpalling: I’ve been penpalling online through the Slowly app, which I have been enjoying. I also have an email/snailmail penpal. Penpals are the perfect friends in this time of social distancing!

Grocery & Meal Planning: Groceries have become a more significant part of my life. I place an online order every week- as I did before, but now I have to place it a week in advance of when I want it. Inevitably, they don’t have all the items I need. Usually, it is one item per planned dinner that I’m missing, of course. So then I need to go out to a different grocery store to purchase items. And sometimes they don’t have it either, so we have to check back...Trying to figure out what meals I can actually make with what I have on hand at the moment, and trying to manage grocery purchases has become a new hobby.

Thinking about Disney Planning: I want to start planning for my next WDW trip. However, there is so much uncertainty right now, I just can’t bring myself to do it. This makes me sad.

Thinking about playing the Sims: I’ve been thinking about playing the Sims. In particular, I have an urge to do a Sims Challenge...perhaps my old favorite, the Bachelor. I’m not a fan of the show, but it’s super fun to play in the Sims. Also maybe my Sims Bullet Journal Challenge, as the posts related to that have been some of my most popular posts. 

Moving Forward

I’m guessing most people didn’t make it this far in the post given how long and rambling it was, but if you did- thanks! 

I’ve been thinking to get back into the habit of blogging, I might just start doing more posts like this. Posts where I just write about whatever is going on right now. After all, this is a personal blog, so it can act as an online diary. I’m not sure anyone will read this type of content, but I like to write and it gets me posting something. Perhaps I will even do another tomorrow. We will see. One step at a time.