I want to preface this post by stating that I am fully aware that my “difficult week” pales to nothingness compared with that of people who are currently unemployed, employed in dangerous jobs, sick, mourning the loss of a loved one – you get the picture. I am incredibly grateful for my life, warts and all. This time of COVID-19 is challenging for all of us though, and it’s probably not helpful to shame ourselves for feeling out-of-sorts just because others have it much, much worse.
On Tuesday I received a message from my biggest blog fan – my step-daughter Chloe. “No blog updates! I’m getting withdrawals.“ Unfortunately, I had trouble with my Messenger app this week and didn’t see her message until this morning. It was that type of week all around. As is probably true for most difficult weeks, several different factors contributed to making it so, and these factors also kept me from posting anything here until yesterday.
First of all, it was a full-on work week. I am now on my (remote) work computer a generous 40+ hours a week, and my department is in the middle of one of our busy seasons. We’re in charge of getting quarterly statements out, among other things, and although most of the first quarter 2020 statements have already gone out, we’re now trying to get the trickier ones ready to go. Over the course of the last week I prepared 313 of the 500+ that I need to sort out. Statement time has a certain amount of pressure associated with it, but like most things, I am the one who puts the most pressure on myself. I’m just a teeeeeny bit competitive, too, so let’s just pile on that internally-generated stress as well. I can’t help myself. When I worked crappy assembly-line jobs with my best friend Beth during high school and college, we would inevitably get into productivity wars with each other that tended to teeter on the knife edge between friendly competition and bitter rivalry.
So, work’s been challenging. That’s one thing.
Something else that weighed on me this week was the arrival of May 1st. Now, I knew better than to think that with May 1st would come some form of normality. Back in mid-March when this all began, May did seem sufficiently far in the future that the idea of a new normal emerging in May appeared plausible. And governor DeWine has outlined a cautious plan for reopening Ohio, which began with okay-ing elective surgeries and opening up stores (both with caveats). But even with the governor’s OK, I don’t feel like it’s safe enough out there to do anything but my grocery shopping. I mean, nothing’s changed with respect to the virus – it’s still out there as much as it was on April 30. So, we continue to hunker down, and I am incredibly grateful that I work for a company that follows DeWine’s guidance to a T. We are not only continuing to work from home (with a few exceptions), but they have bought us all new computers to help us work from home more easily (many of us have pieced together decidedly sub-standard work stations from whatever computers we had at home).
But even though all this is good from the prospect of what is most important – my health and the health of my family, friends, and neighbors – I am tired. This marathon is wearing me down.
I was scheduled to see my oncologist yesterday (actually my oncologist’s nurse practitioner – I don’t see my actual oncologist again unless the cancer comes back, so I hope I never see her lovely face again). That appointment usually brings with it a little stress, and this time it had to be accomplished over the phone. Not ideal. I sort of rely on the nurse practitioner giving me my gold star each visit after a thorough physical exam to carry me over to the next appointment (they started off every three months and now we are down to every six months). When we were wrapping up the call and she said, “OK, we’ll schedule you to come see me in six months” I whined, “I won’t see you for six months???” So now I have an in-person appointment scheduled for July. Squeaky wheel gets the grease.
Finally, although I have seen the death toll get larger and larger every day since this thing first hit my consciousness (I screen-shot the Johns Hopkins figures every night, remember?), it really hit home this week. A coworker lost not only her elderly mother, but a not-elderly cousin within the last two weeks, both from coronavirus. When I received her email, I immediately started crying. It was like someone turned on a switch and I fully understood that this is real. This is not something going on “out there.” It shook me, and I remain shaken. And when I went grocery shopping on Thursday and swung by the greeting card aisle to buy a Mother’s Day card and card of condolence for my coworker, I saw this:
Now, I had seen similar photos in news updates, but I always sort of thought the photos were taken in places like New York and New Jersey, not in tiny midwestern suburbs.
I know that I need to come to grips with this situation, because not only does it look like I may be working from home through the rest of spring and summer, but we will be continuing to hunker down regardless of what is technically allowed by the government for at least another couple of months (to be re-evaluated if the situation changes). I’ve dealt with the concept of “new normal” before with my cancer, but there’s a difference here. The new normal I am living due to my experience with cancer is a life-long new normal. I will never have breasts again; I will never have a life in which I don’t immediately think “cancer” (even if it’s for a split second) when I get a headache; I will never be able to be carefree about drinking a margarita on a Saturday night. Those changes range from mildly annoying to traumatic, but they are permanent, and therefore easier for me to adjust to. The current situation we are in is not only temporary but of uncertain length. Presumably we will be able to go back to our pre-coronavirus lifestyle when a vaccine is readily available. Whenever that is. But maybe we’ll feel comfortable doing some of the things we used to enjoy, like going to the library or having a coffee in a coffee shop, sooner than that. I really don’t know. And that is what makes this so hard.
But today is Saturday. I’m not turning on my work computer. The sun is shining. I’m finishing up a small jigsaw puzzle that I’m loving. We’re making our own chicken wings tonight to have while we watch a movie (I’m thinking maybe the new Emma). We are incredibly privileged and lucky to be healthy and safe, and that is what I am going to dwell on for the rest of today.
Love,
Michelle xoxo