How have we lived with Covid for nearly 2 years?! Does anyone else feel like it still feels like only last year it first arrived? I thought it would be a good idea to compare 2021 with 2020 as a bit of a reflection because sometimes we forget to look at the bigger picture. It can be very easy to see a lot of negatives, when actually there has been quite a few positives, so I am here to share with you the good, the bad and the ugly of the last 2 years of my life, because at the end of the day, we are only human. I said I wanted to go back to doing more honest and open posts again, so here is hopefully the first of many this year.
Bad
Let’s start of with mental health, you guys seem to like it when I talk about mental health judging from feedback and messages both publicly and privately, and I guess it’s kind of not nice, because that is probably the wrong term, but reassuring maybe, that if you’re someone suffering with mental health, that your not on your own. I was on anti depressants last year and the year before that, and I was doing alright but there was just one thing that was stopping me from making anymore progress, and that was my relationship. I understand it’s not something easy to deal with if your the other person trying to support that person, however if that person is calling you crazy, or saying your making it up, or just being completely horrible about it, doesn’t even try to understand, then that’s not ok. I said bye to that person right at the start of first lockdown, must of been about March time, and honestly my mental health improved massively. I felt free.
Second lockdown I was alright, it was only for like 2 weeks in November, and I made the decision with my doctor, to come off the anti depressants. I felt like I was in control. Where I live was then put into tier 3, and then Boris decided to bring some crushing news about Christmas and that just completely ruined me. That was one of the hardest times of my life and it carried on right through to this year, when third lockdown got announced. The time I was off work at Christmas was horrible. I have never felt so much pain inside. I realised that maybe I came off my antidepressants too early, so I rung my doctor up, we had a conversation, and we agreed to see if things would improve when I was back at work. There was an improvement but I would say from January to about May was difficult, but my family were so supportive. There was a lot a lot of tears. I had good days and bad days, and I never went back on medication which probably was an error, but I pushed through it.
Good
I don’t know why, but I feel a bit teary writing this all down. The last nearly 2 years have been so tough on us all, and no doubt we have all been through at least something that has torn us apart within us, however, how strong are we? I didn’t feel it at the time, but looking back now, I crumbled a lot, had bad thoughts, but got through it. My mental health has improved massively, don’t get me wrong, I do have bad days, however these seem to be days when I am really tired and worn out mostly. As a person I feel I have grown, like I said I can recognize more now, what’s causing me to feel the way I do, so I get an early night, think to myself it’s just a bad day not a bad life, and get up the next day with hopefully a new mindset. If not, there’s always the next day, because at some point the feelings and thoughts end, no matter how much it feels like they won’t. It’s not easy and it’s taken me a lot of years to get to this point, but once you start being kinder to yourself, listen to you and your body, you learn a lot about you as a person, and no one knows you better than yourself.
Bad
My career was never bad last year, I enjoyed my job, I found it interesting and I’m always learning new things at the place where I work. Working through a pandemic wasn’t easy with not as many staff, but this was completely new to everyone and I thought we coped pretty well, so my job has never been a bad thing, and it does kind of feel wrong to put it underneath bad, but when I tell you what good came from it this year, I hope you will understand more as to why.
Really Good
Not going to lie last year was worrying for every single one of us who worked right? We didn’t know if we were going to have jobs, and if we did how long for? This isn’t something I’ve shouted out about from the rooftops and I’ve only been actively in the role for the last 10ish weeks I think, taking off holidays, however my career has done a complete 360, and I ended up getting promoted twice. First time was a big deal, but the second time was just like words can’t describe, because I had been offered a role I never thought I had a shot at. This has completed my career goals now, as I can’t see how it can get better than this and I will always be eternally grateful and it still doesn’t even feel real now saying it, but like I was saying, not knowing what was going to happen last year, to where I am at now, I am just so happy and thankful. I am really enjoying this new role, and so proud of the whole team for how they’ve adapted to the change, as I know it hasn’t been easy, but I am very excited to see what the future holds for us all.
Good/Bad
In the last 2 years I have really made up for my social life. The bad part is I’ve got rid of people who don’t add anything to my life, those who make me feel negative about myself and I feel so much better for it. Is that bad though? I guess what’s bad is I thought at the time they were good friends. What has been so refreshing is I have a lot of new people now in my friendship circle, also ones where we’ve got back in touch, and it’s just lovely to have people around where you support each others successes, build each other up, are there for each other and just laugh and have fun with, how it should be, no drama.
Good
I definitely made the most of restrictions being lifted, although a bit hesitant to start off with but, I got to see some amazing places in the UK and really explore the country in 2021. I didn’t get to visit London last year, but I hope to visit this year as I miss it so much, all I would like to do is visit the Natural History Museum to see the dinosaurs again and watch a musical haha. Covid has really made me realise how much I unknowingly take for granted, and to really appreciate time and living in the moments more. I thought I did this most of the time, but shamefully I’ll admit not as much as what I thought.
Really Good
In 2021 I managed to run 50 miles over a short period of time to raise £160 for ABF The Soldiers’ Charity. In 2020 I had actually given up on running, so to do this again from scratch and to raise money for such a good cause, was just a really great feeling. I definitely want to raise money for more charities this year and give back more, especially to less well known ones, so I’m excited to see what I can do this year to help.
I hope this encourages you to do the same, sometimes when we write things down, it helps us out mentally, but also shows us that things aren’t as bad as we first think they are.
A x
littlemissminor 