covid19stories - Tumblr blog

[covid19stories]

One good thing from all of this is today, I forgot to move my car and my dad forgot to move his truck to across the street because the street sweeper came today. While the city still wants us to move our vehicles, we won't be getting parking citations from this because the city suspended them until May 1.

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There is something carthartic about my right-wing mother saying that even though CEO's taking a paycut so they can continue paying their employees is communistic or at least socialistic, she also thinks it's the right thing to do right now.

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I'm a martial arts instructor. And even though we're doing virtual classes, I travel into the school for filming. My coworker who runs the desk also comes in. We try to stay apart, but it's no good when we have to touch the same equipment and student cards. Both of our spouses are essential employees. Her's is a manager for a restaurant with curbside pick up and mine works at a grocery store. I'm honestly surprised neither of us have gotten it yet.

The best part of my job is my students. Watching them learn and grow. Teasing them playfully and encouraging them is what makes this job worth it. But now, with all of this the only interaction I get is a like or comment on Facebook.

Today we did a live stream and I actually got to see a couple of people. And, honestly, I teared up a bit at the end. So much has been postponed or canceled, but my students are still there and they still want to learn. I think that's what keeps me going. That I'll be able to see them again. I just hope that I can stay healthy to see them.

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My mom's sick. I don't know what she's sick with, but it started two days ago. She stayed home from work yesterday, and this morning she was feeling fine. When she came home from work today, she was much worse. She's at the urgent care right now, and she's got clammy skin, no sense of smell, and can feel gunk at the back of her throat as well as trouble breathing.

All I can do is focus on the fact that she doesn't have a wet cough; she has a dry cough. But I'm still scared.

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I'm a high school dropout after a huge breakdown last year. I was doing good, and was. well. surviving. 90% of my recovery plan was getting up the strength to go out into the world and do more things. Magic nights, art, dnd, walking. I don't have that now. I sort of still have dnd, but my group is awful at doing stuff online, and one of us doesn't have a personal computer. I've had to stop the process of getting my state id and GED as well, cause it's non-essentially work. I'm not going to die without ID. It'll just be more of a rush to get me registered to vote when I do have it.

My mom's immunocomprimised, from a suicide attempt when she was in high school. My art tutor is 76, turned 76 today, and we try to talk online, but both of us are simply awful at technology. I've had to download facebook messenger, because it's the only thing she'll use, even though it makes me want to die when I think about how little privacy I have on it. I have to stay connected to her. I'm just about the only social interaction she has right now.

I got a starter cube from card kingdom: a kingdom of cards, two weeks ago. I want to play it with people, I want to do dnd without having to struggle through feedback loops and trying to convince people to use their headphones, and the burning headaches that talking through the staticy phones gives me.

I want to go outside.

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I'm not too sad about not going back to school. Frustrated, yes, but not too sad. I'm sad about how my little sister isn't going back to school. It's her senior year. Prom and graduation are cancelled. I don't know if she'll ever see her friends again, and she didn't get to properly say goodbye.

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I am from Canada but I've been living with my boyfriend in Mexico for a number of months. We now are forced to be long distance as I am here and he is there. I dont know when I'll see him again. I wish I could see into the future and know when all of this will be over. My anxiety was through the roof for awhile but i try not to read the news as much.

On a brighter note, I am happy to be spending so much time with my family and my pets. I am excited to watch spring bloom once it finally arrives. I've started doing yoga again and I'm making attempts to eat healthier and paint, read, and write as much as I can!

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I've been in as close to true self-isolation as I can manage, since I realized I got sick. Hiding from my housemates in this shitty basement room.

Regular allergy/cold symptoms - no fever, but intermittent cough, and runny nose. Thought nothing of it, because the air quality here was between "awful" and "very bad". Did my grocery shopping and errands. It escalated week or so later to shortness of breath at rest, fatigue. Could just be a bad cold and my allergies/asthma acting up.

Couldn't get tested- not that there was anyway I could have been exposed to it, really. A month ago - 3 weeks ago - we had no known community transmission. I keep telling myself that.  

Last two weeks, the grocery and pharmacy have signs saying "Don't come in if you have respiratory symptoms". The grocery's delivery service is booked for the next 3 weeks and change. I medicate up and touch nothing I won't buy, dodge people as best I can. I can't not buy food- my shitty little hotel fridge barely fits food for a week if I play Tetris, and I spent all my spare cash on an air purifier and cold meds and thermometer. 

I'm terrified I was a vector. But if I was as healthy as I ever was, I would be doing the same thing. Allergies in spring means "respiratory symptoms". I catch colds like flypaper, and usually realize after the fact. A month ago - 3 weeks ago - we had no known community transmission. I keep telling myself that.  

In so many ways, I've been lucky - I can work from home, and I have my inhaler on hand. I'm terrified for people like me: no immediate family nearby, no car, shared apartment, asthmatic, trained to ignore their health.

I'm terrified of people like me. How many people did I turn unlucky?  

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When this all started I wasn't sure what to expect. I heard about everything going on in China and felt so bad for them and hoped they would be okay, but didn't ever think it would get that bad here.

Now I'm stuck at home, and my depression has been going on a wild rollercoaster for weeks. Im a school bus driver, and I adore my job (despite being the youngest driver EVER), but it was one of the first to stop. It feels as though we are never thought about, that our job is unimportant or forgettable. For the last couple of weeks I knew I wasn't going to get paid unless I used my sick leave, which I was okay with. We were offered to work odd jobs to make up for the loss of pay, and I let my other coworkers take those. I didn't need them as much as they did because I had financial support. Besides, it gave me the time to pack and get ready to move at the end of the year.

But I have learned that I actually am rather extroverted, and I haven't been able to go see my friends in so long. I can't because one of them is already so sick, and I would not survive at all if I was the reason she died.

That with the added emotional toll of packing has made me so tired and depressed. I'm frustrated all the time and I am getting sick and tired of it. I'm so worried that this won't blow over, that I will be trapped forever and unable to do the major life changes I want to, and it feels so selfish of me to worry about that. I'm supposed to be the one who helps everyone, and now I feel like no one is able to help me.

I'm so sorry for everyone who is suffering from this, I hope you all are staying safe and strong. Despite what my depression is determined to tell me, I know we will get through this. I love you all!

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I'm a non-essentail retail worker in the UK so all our shops are shut and we're all at home. The government is now paying our wages, only 80% of them, but I still count myself lucky that I'm being paid.

My main issue is that I live at home with my parents - my mum is high risk and is working from home, and my dad is a key worker but only doing alternate weeks. Although I do count myself very lucky in that financially I'm going to be fine, I'm finding it tough to be around my parents all the time with no breaks. My dad's a huge control freak and I'm finding it very demoralising to listen to everything he has to say all of the time, and that my only private space now is shut up in my room, like I was 12 all over again.

I was redecorating my room (which hilariously hasn't been done since I was a child) and initially I thought all this spare time would help me get it done faster but my motivation is out the window. I struggle with mental health stuff which causes some executive dysfunction and that has multiplied since I've been stuck in the house.

I just want to get in the car and drive but the police are out on the roads so I can't. I want to go and watch the ocean which has always calmed me but people are 'strongly discouraged' to drive to places to do their one piece of outdoor time a day and I don't live in walking distance of the water. There's a very big difference between CHOOSING to spend time indoors and HAVING to be indoors. I understand why we have to be indoors and while I was working still my anxiety was very very high, so I'm glad we've taken this step, but it doesn't make the being indoors any easier.

The only good thing that's come out of this so far is I've taken up dance again and am practicing in my kitchen late at night when the house is quiet. I retain my motivation for that at least.

Is it possible to feel both completely alone and also way too crowded in my people? Because that's how I feel right now.

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nothing has changed - i still go to work, take care of patients, and yet everything has changed -

everyone is scared, more than they usually are when they need an abortion

everyone is grateful, more than they usually are when we can help them

i'm not on the front lines but i could be at any moment

i'm proud, i'm grateful, i'm scared shitless, and i'm gonna be a doctor in less than 2 months.

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My mom is having colon cancer surgery tomorrow. All we can do is drop her off at the door. Nobody can visit her post-surgery, nobody can enter should anything go wrong. The world is feeling really small to me right now, its selfish to think about but the only ones that matter to me right now are the ones under my roof. Suppose everything goes off without a hitch, and she contracts the disease from the hospital? Rhode Island already has three deaths and over 200 cases despite our best efforts, all older people, and the state is /small./ I can’t lose her to cancer. I can’t lose her to a mistake in the operation. The world needs kind souls right now, she has to be okay

I dunno, it just kind of sucks to think about personal disasters amidst global ones. God I hope that’s not selfish

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I work for a state laboratory. One of the things we're responsible for is satisfying EPA testing requirements for drinking water so that water systems can keep running.  So I am essential and still working but only from a bureaucratic standpoint.  The specific chemicals my group tests for are not harmful at all, and the near-pointlessness of my job from a scientific perspective has weighed on me for a while.  Now that's compounded by the fact that just by going to work I'm risking contracting the virus and potentially spreading it to my parents who I live with.  To add even more anxiety, I'm also going back to school in the fall, and I need to be looking for a place to live, but I can't exactly get tours during a pandemic.  Well, at least not responsibly.

 Apart from the above and The News being how it is, my life actually hasn't changed much.  I'm still working, and it turns out the social and relaxation habits I've developed over the last 15 years technically count as a "quarantine".  

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Im always one to take in person classes at college, since the environment helps me learn. Now i’m stuck at home, having to do all this online stuff, and it’s really breaking down my ability to actually get things done. It’s not like i can even go to the library and focus there. And then there’s the fact that i’m majoring as a pharmacy technician, and we’re supposed to be doing all practicals now. So our teacher put together a big bag of stuff for us to take home (before the college closed) and now she’s showing us how to do injections over Zoom. It’s rough, and I hope i’ll still be able to get my certificate this summer so I can start working. And Maryland has started a “responds” program where even medical /students/ can sign up to help the community. I just hope that this online stuff counts when it comes to getting certified. I don’t want to have to spend even more of my life in school.

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I'm starting to think I'm the only human being who loves my partner and enjoys spending time with them. I think the next time I hug my mom I'm going to burst into tears. 

The virus had just started to spread when I moved back into my hometown. We have a bigger apartment. We have friends who live here. I have a better chance of being hired. This was supposed to be an easier time. I had a job interview on Friday for a job that might never look the same again.

I signed up to participate in a mutual aid network. Then never responded to the first call I got because it made me anxious to think about. I hope whoever needed help got it. I hope I get another chance to do better.  

I have a friend who lives in an abusive situation and the only thing I can do for her is to listen and support her with words. 

I've never seen a grocery store so empty. All I can think about is children in detainment camps, violence against southeast asians around the world, demagogues claiming their countries are invincible and refusing to cooperate, craft stores and video game shops insisting they're essential. It's baffling that people can look at the world right now and still see dollar signs. 

I'll be fine. I don't know if the world will be. It's insane and privileged that I get to worry about other people, but I worry nonetheless. 

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I was working in a large city for the past few months, commuting from home until I could save enough to live in one of the nicer residential areas. All of my coworkers are much older than me. I haven't hung out with anyone my age since I graduated college.

I was staying with my family at the time, but I didn’t have much by way of independence. My hopes when I moved were to travel around and build strong social networks.

But my city has some of the largest case numbers in the country, and is currently quarantined with curfews. All of the places I wanted to see and things I wanted to do have been shut down. My family wants me to come back home, but I'm far less at peace there. I am grateful for the fact that I can still work, and stay in my own place. But in a lot of ways, I feel like I have to put my life on hold. 

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My mom passed away last summer after living in a nursing home for six months.  As I follow the news here, I see all these reports of nursing homes being hit with the virus, of residents dying, and I feel selfish for being glad she's already gone.

My dad is extremely high risk.  He's disabled and can't do a lot of stuff on his own, so my sisters and their kids often help him with things.  But a lot of them work in grocery stores and one in a doctor's office, and I can't help but think it's just a matter of time before he gets sick, and if he gets sick, I don't think he'll make it out

I live in New Jersey, which has the second highest amount of cases in the US, while my dad lives in Michigan.  We've been advised not to travel if at all possible, and I wouldn't anyway because I'm terrified I'm an asymptomatic carrier.  I worry constantly that he's going to get sick and I won't be able to visit him or eventually attend his funeral.  But it would be way worse if I was potentially the one who got him sick, so I'll stick around here.