Flu thoughts.

[oak]

Hi friends. I hope you are all doing well in these difficult times.

Can you all please check my thinking? I'm pretty sure the following is on the right track, but would like your second opinion.

1. Other than daily sunshine, fresh air, and walking, I don't have much interest or need for leaving the house.

2. I can start to put a demand on myself to apply for more jobs: any job I'd get would likely be working from home.

3. I can start to put a demand on myself to be just a little wiser at home: less screens, more tai chi, and more print reading.

I have clear plans for a more fulfilling life once this is all over, but it doesn't seem to me like May or June are the months to be out too much.

Does all this sound right? Am I missing anything?

[Beany Boo]

Maybe include something less task-based and more novel that takes you out of yourself, and out of survival mode.

Ideas:

Online dating (as in having dates online)
Online (Amish romance) book club
Live museum visits (online through Eventbrite)
Live visiting other countries (through Twitch just chatting)
Live online exercise

These are things I either have done, am doing, am booked to do or am looking into. They’re ends in themselves but also steps towards greater social participation. There’s the obvious limit of data available (which means choosing carefully) but also the risk of having to show up emotionally.

Anyway.

[Heatherwantspeace]

Hi Oak,
Like BeanyBoo, I have been participating in some online things in real time, and it does feel like a connection. I've strictly been an audience member on a few zoom shows, my face in the gallery and my laughs and claps in the audio. Still, it was nice. I could see other audience members in their homes and I was engaged in something that felt different from everyday. Lots of shows are pay what you can and you can choose to not be on video/audio if you want.

My first thought when you mentioned a job was can you ease in? A part time or limited job to get your feet wet? Would that mess up any financial aid you're getting? (I don't want you to answer that here). A volunteer job doing something simple and limited? I don't mean this to discourage you in any way, if you're ready, go for it. But my thought is, let's not add any big changes right now--for any of us. But you know you best.

I'm glad you're thinking towards the future in a positive way!
Heather

[oak]

1. In which I praise Beany Boo and thank Heather.
2. "Am I weird?"/Liminal
3. In which I am flirted with

1a. Yes, Heather, Beany Boo is one smart cookie! Thanks to his advise I've scheduled to take online solo blues dancing (way sexy) classes. I would not have thought of this without your generous advice, Beany Boo. Thank you.

1b. Yes, Heather, I I am okay financially for awhile, especially considering that I don't see May or June 2020 as any time to be out in the working world. Hopefully I'll get a work from home position in summer or fall. I changed careers six months ago, after preparing since 2014, so I have some options, with either field. And yes, I can ease into volunteering.

2. My grief/PTSD/depression has lifted. I am doing "small" things like: making beef roasts, wearing a watch again, and that's about it. Oh, and I vacuumed, and that is a huge step forward. That is a long way from where I was for late March and all of April. Strangely, I am nostalgic for that time: I think I did a lot of healing.

Though I know these are normal and expected after sitting all day for two months:

Am I normal for:

*having joint pain (I can't do my beloved tai chi [which is a very gentle exercise] for more than three minutes!}?
*being out of breath while taking the trash out?
*being increasingly cabin fever-y?
*being intimidated and weireded out by doing things that I used to do daily (eg making a doctors appointment)?

My dishwasher hasn't been properly draining since Before All This, and tomorrow the maintenance person is scheduled to come. "Violated" is far too strong a word, but I feel odd: my apartment has been my safe space, almost like a womb: I feel odd having someone view such an intimate space.

I am naturally easing into a weird liminal (in-between) state: I am not paralyzed with grief all day, but life is not anything like it was.

3. I was flirted with the other day!

This gives me a hint that there is a bigger world on the other side of This.

[Heatherwantspeace]

I'm gonna need some details on the flirting...

[Beany Boo]

There’ll be a time where there’s no oxygen; where you feel fragile and sort of gun-shy. Strangers will feel invasive. Its uncomfortable.. but normal. Even though you might get knocked about, just stick to the eat, sleep, rest routine. The air will come back in more, eventually. Trust your feelings, trust your decisions. If you find you’ve made a mistake, celebrate! And continue.

[oak]

1. How I'm doing/next steps
2. The healing power of ice water
2a. The sustaining power of paperbacks.
3. Grief to neuroticism
4. Details, as requested by Heather

Hi friends. I hope you are all doing well.

1. I am doing both better and worse: the quarantine is wearing on me, and if we can imagine a standard distribution of "mental health", I am now on the "bad" side of """normal""". So I'm definitely not myself (see below), but still on the """normal""" side (to the extent that any of us are normal!). Besides, these are in no way normal times: surviving is a great privilege.

At this point I can still turn things around by fixing my (improved) sleep habits for good, a little more sunshine/fresh air, more fruit, and more tai chi. So I'm definitely on the wrong track, mentally, but still have a clear plan to get back to """normal""".

I'm wearing a watch again, which is a really big deal for me.

2. In addition to our dear HALT, I also find late-night crazy-making thoughts to be mitigated by drinking ice water and holding on. If that doesn't work, I can eat some pizzelles, take 5 mg of Buspar, and take a shower. Usually that will fix it, but sometimes I just have to go down that rabbit hole. I give myself permission to suffer during these very difficult times.

Ice water is a very powerful way for me to heal.

2a. Thanks to two orders of used books, averaging $1-2 a book, I have an embarrassment of riches for printed word. In addition to my dear Amish romance novels, I also have a bunch of books about topics I'm not particularly interested in, but get me to whole new world, even if just for an hour: professional wrestling, history, mountaineering.

This helps get me away from screens, which create eyestrain, and are usually about news (ie bad reports of people suffering and arguing)

3. My mental state has gone from grief/PTSD/depression to neuroticism.

Freud (or Jung or whoever) said that "neurosis is a substitute for legitimate suffering". Ergo, it is time for me to make those awkward calls to my family, clean my apartment, and ramp up my job search in June and July.

4. Details of flirting episode, as requested by Heather.

First up, let me playfully and lovingly castigate (gently): you all think you are so clever, so smooth, and so unobtrusive when you all flirt!

Example: while picking up a Caesar salad yesterday at the local coffee shop, an employee just walked out and stared at me.

Y'all are so obvious! I wouldn't have it any other way.

So, you guys have six signals of interest, which were ancient and accepted a thousand years ago, and just as current today:

1 Tucking hair behind their ear
2. Staring (like our friend above)
3. Laughing at things that aren't particularly funny
4. Looking through their eyelashes, tilting their head down and to the side, so hair covers one of their eyes, just like Veronica Lake
5. Tossing their hair back, using the whole upper part of their body, as if they're in a shampoo commercial.
6. Touching the man's forearm

So in the situation in question I was chatting up a stranger, and for some reason I mimicked how to escape a wrist lock.

Suddenly, using her pretty brunette hair, in 1.5 seconds she does the following from the list above:

4-5-3

So yeah: I can take actions that improve my attractiveness to women. And romantic love, or the hope to pursue it, is an excellent reason to pick myself up. If I am lucky enough to live through COVID, I owe it to myself, and those who didn't make it, to make the most of my life.

[Beany Boo]

I accept that you may not survive the pandemic. Your fear is real. It is better to feel it and let a realistic and adaptive response form, even an overwhelming and irrational one. Denial can be more terrifying and turn into unhealthy coping mechanisms.

I’m glad to report, you definitely are sounding better than you were.

Iced water is a brilliant idea. Showers too. The science indicates that it’s impossible to stay in the fear center, and rumination, when you stimulate your senses in the present. The two things just occur in two separate parts of the brain.

It never shifts immediately. It takes some considerable time for the amygdala to quiet and the adrenal glands to stop acting after they’ve been stimulated.

Feeling the texture of a towel under your hands as you rhythmically stroke it is another good one. Listening to newspaper as you slowly tear it too.

Letting your normal breaths draw out long, gently and slowly, only through your nose with that dragging whisper sound works, although again it takes time, and is a test of will.

I think flirting is definitely beneficial.

I tried searching for an Amish Romance online book club, but without much luck, sorry.

For myself, I’m prioritizing the daily consumption of fruit and vegetables over thoughts of my long term survival. That seems to be the right trade off. I find I can sit at my empty table and use the time it takes to watch a show on TV, to prepare and consume some combination of cucumber, carrot, pear, apple and banana. I only have to do it once a day.

I’m also trying to sit with the sensation of feeling like an asshole. I usually flee on reflex. But I’ve learnt there’s always a natural tension when you listen to people. You’re not an asshole just for feeling it.

[Heatherwantspeace]

Hi Oak,
The flirting account makes me happy for 3 reasons:
-you got out of the apartment, with hygiene attended to
-you treated yourself to a Caesar salad
-you had a meaningful human connection

I have to think, you are in your own personal "phase 2" of the quarantine. As I've noted elsewhere, I'm struggling with our town's phase 2 and feeling some fear. We all have to cope with our experience of phase 2 and feel the feelings. While mine is my feeling about the outside world intruding on me, yours is more personal.

I have been on an almost complete internet fast since Tuesday. It doesn't feel great to not be participating in the greater outside world, but I was not doing well. I too, am picking up books instead. I'm sleeping better and waking earlier. I wish the same for you. It takes some perseverance for sure!

The ice water thing is interesting and I will find some version of this for myself.

I’m also trying to sit with the sensation of feeling like an asshole
Me too, Beany Boo. I inadvertently hurt someone's feelings this week being task focused instead of people focused. I made amends, but I still needed to sit with the feeling of being an asshole. The fact that I didn't mean to doesn't change the fact that I did.

And I'm going to put my own thoughts along side Beany Boo's. While it is a realistic statement to say you might not survive, you likely will. Life seems to be more about the mundane human existence than not. Put more cheerleader-y, I think you'll be okay!

Tara Brach has some great meditations available free. I'm doing well with them.
Take care,
Heather

[Beany Boo]

You don’t really know me. But I absolutely want you to get through this. It just makes it more difficult to process panic if you’re holding back feelings of fear.

It’s sort of a case of letting go in order to reach a place of having more control.

I’m not a professional. I’m not experimenting on you. I’m just in recovery like you.

If this is too much, ignore me and trust yourself. Trusting your own instincts is what’s important. That’s what I’m doing.