The comments in this thread are fine.
I am entirely sure that I have moderate-serious depression since the lock down started. I rely entirely on external structure and physical separation of spaces to keep myself sane. So WFH has been disastrous for me.
I have been eating worse, not working out, stopped pursuing hobbies/side projects and have been incredibly unproductive at work. Thankfully, a year of good results prior to this, has helped build a lot of goodwill I can burn through.
For the first time the current social climate has affected me severely too. My parents city is among the worst affected by Covid, and both my 80 yr old grandparents stay there. My anti-tribal-free-speech-absolutist and pro-equality-altruistic self have put me in a moral crisis as the BLM movement has picked up. Then today morning my favorite blog closed because of an attack by cancel-police. My country is on the cusp of actual war. I also spilled my coffee twice in the last 2 days and that makes me irrationally frustrated.
On the bright side, I have no suicidal thoughts. None of my relationships have been destroyed (yet). I still have my job and I know the cause of my current state is temporary. I've started therapy, which should start helping any moment now. Covid has affected people in worse ways, so I'm quietly trudging along.
Worst 3 month period of my life outside the one time I was depressed + alone . Now I am just depressed.
Last month I walked around Greenwich Park in London 125 times, each time following exactly the same route. I thought about that polar bear a lot as I walked.
Keep finding it weird that 10 years ago I was trapped in San Francisco (after Twitter's Chirp conference) when the Icelandic volcano erupted. I remember the combination of excitement, despair and camaraderie that developed over the 2-3 weeks it affected me. But then it was over and it was a fun anecdote ever after. This, though, I dunno. Hopefully the kids remember we were here and we never stopped trying (even though a couple of times we probably did).
We had our first child on Halloween and we both had only returned to work for a month before being forced to wfh. We both still are. It’s great watching my son every day grow. My wife’s job leaves her twiddling her thumbs a lot so she gets to spend a lot of time with our son. She does not understand the amount of focus necessary for my job as a SE. but we have never been happier and more sleep deprived.
I could imagine if we were out of work or had older children I’d be singing a different tune.
Work: Incredibly smooth, even if I'm confined to a 13 inch laptop as opposed to 2x 26 inch screens (OK, I occasionally hook up my TV for extra help). Peace, quiet, fully able to focus on my tasks.
Physical health: Several years ago I decided to dedicate a portion of my spare time to sports and I got into my best shape ever by end of last year(body fat ~10%, down from 20+). Which initially got me worried given that gyms were closed and whatnot. So I ended up ordering some weights for exercising at home and I started doing it every day just to make sure I stay in that shape. End result is I've gained a lot of muscle without changing my weight. Body fat probably in the lower to mid 7%.
Mental health: Again - a lot of improvements: I'm not fond of real life interactions and I operate significantly better on my own. I do get mildly pissed off when my phone rings, more so than I used to. On the downside, I constantly run out of books which is becoming incredibly annoying.
Finances: Not dealing with eating out for lunch and dinner anymore. Though my bills have gone up now that I'm home all day long as opposed to just coming in the evening, crashing on the bed and leaving first thing when I open my eyes. I.E. my water bill has gone up 5 times, electricity about 3 times.
Summer: I had some plans, one fell through completely (still unsure if that's good or bad) and the other is almost at the same stage but it might be for the better(it's complicated).
I spend 22 hours of my day in the same room, split between ten hours laying in my bed and twelve in my chair.
I had just moved to a new city before everything, started a new job. I don't know anyone, it's impossible to really meet new people.
My roommates all disappeared to larger living spaces in the middle of March. They're paying rent but I'm alone, and even when they were here I have nothing in common with them.
It's hard to find projects to do because I have no space to do them. I stopped watching tv because doing so in a deskchair sucks. I go through spurts of playing large amounts of video games. I spend most of my time either trying and failing to work, trying and succeeding to work, or aimlessly cycling between Hacker News, Reddit, rss feeds, youtube, and discord.
The only thing keeping me sane is taking 1 to 2 hour electric skateboard rides around my area and listening to podcasts but I'm starting to get bored of it.
There are a lot of underlying problems to my current life that I'm not addressing, and existed before all this started. The excuse of covid has only made justifications against self improvement easier. I'm stuck in a loop, I'm depressed, and I'm not sure what to do.
My company doesn't really have a good time line for going back. I'd love to work remote, it'd mean I can move to somewhere with more space. But until I get an OK from my company I'm stuck in the limbo of a place not really meant for remote work with no where to really go to.
I need to find a job, but because I'm highly experienced and older (35 y/o), most companies see me as expensive and difficult, thus don't want to hire me. Plus, I'm unlikely to put up with BS. I suck at interviews/coding challenges so I can't get hired at something like Google/FB in spite of having a stellar resume and long list of popular GitHub projects I created myself with thousands of happy users. Experience is a double edged sword: I can get things done much faster than most people, and I've pretty much done it all in computers by now, but I'm also jaded and can see through all the BS.
I'm seriously considering suicide. I'll run out of money soon, I own nothing, have no family, can't afford rent, and am not eligible for any government assistance because of the stupidity of the laws. I've read a lot of philosophy over the years, and I've decided that suicide is really not a bad option.
I'm so tired of being a peasant and working hard while someone else gets rich. I don't want to be someone's little worker bee anymore. I think the good opportunities are gone, and I don't want to contribute to bad companies doing bad things (i.e., most of big tech, and big cos in general).
Long time lurker around here, created an account to reply here.
I don't know. It's hard man. I know there are people in worse situations than me but it's hard anyway.
Working from home since March.
I spend all my day alone at home (with my cats). My GF arrives late and leaves early. She has to go to work everyday.
I feel unmotivated. I'm not socializing, I'm getting fat, I'm slacking on my work.
The worse part is that the effort that I and others have been making are worthless because a couple people can and will destroy it.
I'm living in Portugal and "we" thought everything was going back to normal. Of course not. The cases are ramping back up again. Today we have new and harder rules to follow once again.
I know that I won't be back into the office this year.
My summer festivals are cancelled.
I couldn't celebrate my birthday with my friend and family.
I miss hugs from my mother.
This shit sucks.
I got laid off unexpectedly, right at the beginning of the coronavirus. Severance package was terrible and I'm pretty much broke. Plus, the FMV of my options cratered, so the equity I worked hard for is already underwater.
Hit the interview trail hard and have received nothing but rejections. Despite getting referrals from current engineers, I don't even make it past the tech recruiter phone screen stage. And of course, no one is willing to offer feedback so I'm left with my worst thoughts of self-doubt and imposter syndrome.
Sitting here with no money, nothing to do, watching all my friends take advantage of the remote work by going to cool places. I'm going insane and all signs point to the continuation of this shitty status quo for the next year at least. I don't know what I'm going to do.
On the bright side, I have got a lot of free time. I’m learning lisp, doing excercises from SICP, jogging and cycling long distances. I don’t feel bad about what’s happened, I am re-evaluating my life now and I know that it’s going to work out one way or another.
Until I was forced to stay indoors for months.
I used to exercise regulary, gym/yoga/skipping/running before the lockdown.
But during the lockdown, it has all gone to hell. I eat, work and sleep. I used to watch a lot of tv shows but I cancelled all subscriptions.
But, on the other hand, I have begun writing stories. I had abandoned writing them for over a year now. In fact, I published my short story on Kindle last week. I am editing the 4 unpublished novels which I wrote and am trying to finish the 5th one right now. But it is difficult. Getting motivation is difficult.
At times, I feel anxious. And I totally understand the irony. It had never happened that I had 'gone out' in the last five years during a weekend. But now, I want to go out every other day.
Our government has started to ignore corona and they've begun opening up the country. The puppet TV news of the regime doesn't freak out people on Corona, which they did when the govt took corona seriously.
I miss cycling and going to the gym though. Yoga is a good alternative to the gym as it builds all possible muscles.
March / April I saw no one other than my girlfriend a couple times a week. Time became slow. I became a lot less motivated. I was cooking more than ever and saving more money than ever. I felt depression coming on. I live in a giant building and even leaving the apartment felt like a big production - can I trust the elevator? My doorman? People on the elevators? Why are they out too?!
By late April I realized I was going crazy without human interaction and no changes in my routine. Started organizing sidewalk happy hours with friends, where we distanced and drank and walked around the empty city. I think I’ll really cherish those memories for many years.
I used to travel a lot and missed that stimulation. Me and my girlfriend decided to drive NY - Los Angeles and stay on the west coast for the month of June. Stopped in national parks, saw some beaches, a lot of hiking, got a haircut in Manhattan Beach. Restaurants are open out west. Then ten of us rented a house in Lake Tahoe and had the most amazing time. Currently heading to San Diego to see family.
It’s turning around. My work motivation is back and work is now going better than ever. Working from new locations most days is fun. I feel great again. Interested to see how much NYC has changed when I go back July 1.
1. I was able to get out of the hellhole of my loud noisy open office that was a mix of developers, QA, project managers and customer facing pre-sales and post sales implementation managers.
2. We had a pay cut that caused me to run a Hail Mary and apply for a fully remote job at $BigTech in the cloud consulting division. I now don’t have to worry about an open office for a few years.
3. My relationship with my spouse has gotten even closer. We’ve found a balance between time together and our alone time. Luckily, we have enough space in our house to go to our own corners.
4. My wife was a part time fitness instructor before Covid and had a full time role in the local school system. During Covid, she turned her study into studio and she is now teaching classes online making pretty decent pocket money.
5. Because of Covid, I really didn’t want her back working in public again. Now with my new job we can easily afford for her to stop working and with her side business she will still keep herself busy.
6. Completely separate: we already converted another bedroom to a gym, our workouts didn’t miss a beat.
What I miss the most is being able to sit down at a Korean restaurant with friends and just EAT for two hours.
Overall, though, things are going really well. The transition to working from home was easy (half the team was already remote), I've had more time to exercise, and our company has been advocating good work-life balance throughout this whole ordeal. I have the efforts of my champion wife to thank for keeping a 3yo distracted all day while I'm at work, and that is not lost on me, either -- I'm in a good place now because I am with good people, surrounded by love.
Wishing you all the best, HN :)
After struggling with it for about twenty years and dealing with a particularly bad episode, exacerbated by 2020 things, I was diagnosed with major clinical depression and started treatment today.
Socially distanced Internet fistbump to anyone else having a rough go of it. Some subset of the problems are within the purview of medical science; consider asking.
Now I just kind of roll out of bed, slump over to the computer desk in the corner of my bedroom and sit there all day, wondering why I feel so "meh". I realized I'm missing the in-office collaboration more than I thought but I also started looking at the work with a predominantly more negative outlook, thinking thoughts like, "Isn't this all kind of pointless anyway? We just churn code and go around in circles endlessly." I've also started drinking almost nightly to the point of excess. Also, the world is going to hell in a hand-basket and apparently most of my family and friends from my home-town turned out to be a lot more racists than I ever knew.
On the positive side:
- I still have a good paying job that has allowed me to work remote through out all of this and even gives me an extra $200 per month allowance for WFH costs.
- I bought a treadmill and finally started to excercise.
- When I feel a lack of motivation I often turn on some course or tutorial and I actually started learning a lot of new stuff as a result.
- I started saving a lot more money since I don't eat out and cancelled all my vacation plans.
The documentation is garbage but that’s not so unusual. What’s unusual is that I have to ask questions in writing or schedule video calls with teammates if I want to learn anything that’s not in the documentation.
I know what onboarding is supposed to look like and this isn’t it. I’ve expressed these problems to my manager but I feel like I’m not being heard. Stress levels are through the roof.
The lockdown improved the focus on myself, since there are less things to take care of.
Some work of mine ended up gathering attention from "VIP"s in my field. I've started a systematic study of new areas that I'll use for a future, major, project of mine.
Fitness is very important for me; I was able to do a reasonable, minimalist, workout at home with some equipment, therefore, although I lost some shape, I've been in an acceptable fitness state.
I suffered mostly at the beginning. It wasn't suffering in a strict sense, rather, I was unsettled. Small things, like having to mind what to touch and what not, or people's fear of the future, were definitely taxing at the beginning. Now, I don't mind anymore - I got used to, in the good, and in the bad.
"Fine print" follows.
1. I'm certainly a person who doesn't strictly need social contact, so I didn't suffer for the lack of it.
2. I also have a certain discipline. Discipline in itself is (I suppose) always hard work even for people perceived as disciplined, but I guess that for some, guidance from somebody is, at least, a soft requirement.
3. Job uncertainty is a given. I'm in a good position now, but nobody knows what will happen [to my position] in 6/12 months from now.
I've been dodging bullets at college, yet still receiving praises and oportunities from my professors and actually every real and functioning adult (unlike me) regarding my "skills" on programming and music. Opportunities which, interestingly enough, actually make me feel worthless because I always feel like a fraud and that I'm not good enough for anything.
I have no job, no income, no dreams or aspirations and being trapped here, unable to do anything to distract myself (talk to colleages, Grindr hookups), has me constantly thinking of how empty and devoid of personality and life I am.
My mother is every day more verbal about wanting me out of the house (despite me paying the bills using the government grant intended to pay for college), and in the midst of it all I've been trying to fix my relationship with my father to find he only wants me as a tool for legal benefits (due to my parents' divorce).
I keep myself fantasizing about suicide, but it's okay because at least I'm confident enough I'm not (that) stupid. Also, my "problems" are just part of a temporary state of mind and don't even compare to real problems many people are going through everywhere.
Thanks for asking, op. Writing all these things down actually clears up my mind a bit.
[edit: formatting]
For nearly half of the last 12 months, because of a severely broken foot, I learned life in a wheelchair. It was confirmed I would need a second surgery, and within a week I was fired. That was Sept. of last year. My doctors expected me to be fully walking in January - that unfortunately didn't turn out to be the case - it took a few more months.
Just as I was finally able to drive again, and seriously look at work again, this pandemic struck. All events and interviews canceled.
I decided to do health assessment and triage volunteering at our local homeless shelter for over 2 months, which was quite helpful for the time I could tolerate it.
Living alone in a metro area feels almost more suffocating than being in a less populated area. When everything shut down, I was actually happy to be able to volunteer and help those without a home to go to. When things opened up in my state, and some people's sentiment's changed about the seriousness of this virus, I've sort of sunk into a bit of a hole.
I'm continuing to be positive when I can, and it is a struggle. Plenty of financial woes exist, but I'm still here. Depression is an absolute for me lately, although I've been working to lift myself out in part trying to indirectly help others, and by focusing more on my own mental health.
So, I'm holding up, but not well. Being alone is one of the biggest factors (no pets, no family in area, few friends), but so is the situation we all find ourselves in constantly changing in terms of the right/wrong. I focus on data quite a bit and it's hard to reconcile.
Hope this didn't seem too much of a ramble.
Since we are all home and not traveling we got in touch with the animal sanctuary again and have been fostering another round of kittens. These four bring our total to 18 since we started doing this. This is great because they are adorable, my children love caring for them.
It has also given me time to teach my children some basic microcontroller programming / electronics, which I think will benefit them immensely in the long run.
My wife and I have been walking a bit, ~5 miles a day. This does help me to stay in shape, although excess weight has never been a problem for either of us.
It's not all rosy, though. I miss my friends and family. Family is not as difficult as friends since my family is scattered around the country and we do not see each other on a regular basis.
It's hard living with someone during lockdown, especially when you're used to getting "alone time". You start feeling trapped. But that's something you can resolve with your own self, and talking about it with your SO helps a lot.
Additionally, I realized just how much work depresses me. What I enjoyed were the lunches and the laughs, not the daily meaningless grind and annoying people. And when you WFH it's so easy to just immerse yourself in stuff you actually care about and interests you, and forget all about that stupid 3rd party service you need to integrate into your system. But then, of course, you need to make up for lost time which creates a certain amount of pressure. And the urge to tell people to fuck off over video is so much greater than in person, maybe because they are too less polite and understanding because of w\e they are dealing with.
(1) Limit time reading "news" and social media - it's not inherently bad, but there's enough of a gloom glut to depress anyone. Set a timer if you need to. (2) Force yourself to have good daily routines (especially the big 3: eating, sleeping, and exercise - don't have to go extreme on any of them, just don't let them get too out of whack) (3) Brighten someone's day, every day. A small act of service, a phone call, etc. - doesn't have to be big. (4) Go outside, anywhere will do, though time in a forest or in the mountains is hyper therapeutic. (5) Pray. Even if you don't consider yourself religious, you might be surprised what it does to you. If you can't bring yourself to pray per se, at least try to still your mind and meditate for a bit each day.
But I live in a tiny, 1 bedroom, city-center apartment. The desk I work at all day, is the desk that I also would come home to after work, and unwind/relax at.
There is no other space available in this apartment where I can put up an "office". It is simply too small. The best option I have is to sit at the "kitchen" table 4 feet away, but then i can't use my monitor.
The end result is I am having a horrific time at work.
On my best days, I think I can manage 80% of what I used to do workwise, at the office. On the worst days, its maybe 5%.
I think its compounded by the fact that I relatively recently became a manager.
There are many aspects of my job that I do not like anymore. I have been largely removed from real engineering. My PM was cut for budget/political reasons, so the amount of rote PM work that lands on my desk has gone up significantly, etc. But I was okay with this all regardless, because I derived satisfaction from managing my team well, and learning how to do so.
Now that we are entirely wfh, from a business perspective little has changed (besides the layoffs we just went through). I am capable of managing remotely. But personally, any positive feedback that came with management has evaporated. Where I could previously watch my team interact throughout the day, and see the impact I was making on company/team culture, or at least have a physical/visual reaffirmation that I have created a positive environment for my people (its a small company), I now have no positive social feedback, just lots of 1:1 video calls, which quite frankly, don't cut it on a personal level.
The combination of these two things has been awful and I am genuinely having an extremely hard time with it.
I really need help
Here's the text:
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Many of us are struggling living in lockdown.
Nelson Mandela has inspired me in many ways. Going beyond subsisting in captivity, he emerged from 27 years imprisoned on Robben Island---South Africa's Alcatraz---to become President.
Today's episode shares part of what I believe helped him, which I believe can help us. First, he endured 27 years. We're only a few months in, and not in a small cement prison cell with a bucket for a toilet.
More, he practiced daily habits. We can too. I describe his in this episode, I hope in ways we can learn from.
Here are a couple quotes I read in the recording, both from his autobiography:
“I attempted to follow my old boxing routine of doing roadwork and muscle-building from Monday through Thursday and then resting for the next three days. On Monday through Thursday, I would do stationary running in my cell in the morning for up to forty-five minutes. I would also perform one hundred fingertip push-ups, two hundred sit-ups, fifty deep knee-bends, and various other calisthenics.”
“I awoke on the day of my release after only a few hours’ sleep at 4:30am. February 11 was a cloudless, end-of-summer Cape Town day. I did a shortened version of my usual exercise regimen, washed, and ate breakfast. … As so often happens in life, the momentousness of an occasion is lost in the welter of a thousand details.”
For more on Mandela and daily habits, see my post, Nelson Mandela on sidchas https://joshuaspodek.com/nelson-mandela-on-sidchas.
----
Beside that post, I've found acting in service of others gives more meaning, purpose, and inspiration beyond any self-care.
Whatever your situation, others can use your help. For me, my podcast costs almost nothing, but drives me to help on the environment. There is no shortage of people who could use help, in person or virtually.
"To serve is to live." -- Frances Hesselbein
I live in Sweden and I started a new job half a year ago. In many ways it's much better than my previous one. The only real drawback was not being allowed to work from home. For the first few months, that didn't bother me since I had a lot of fun socializing with my colleagues. Then, the pandemic hit and we were encouraged to work from home. My wife and kids are also home, since my wife was on parental leave.
I don't get out as much as I'd want to, haven't been outside the small town I live in for months. I used to take the commuter train to the big city each morning. I do miss friends and colleagues, but I'm surrounded by my family every day, do precisely the work I want and win so much time by skipping the two hours of daily commute. My son misses his grandparents, at first he had trouble understanding the reason for our new routines, and he has said he misses grocery shopping. I get that. Personally, I'm really happy we've been able to order online from our local grocery store.
I do have friends who were infected. Friends of friends who have passed away. But all in all it feels like I'm living in this weird shielded bubble with zero social contact outside of my family. It's surreal and I feel almost guilty for having been so spared from any real consequences of this pandemic. I was talking to a friend and we concluded that we both feel that this change has been primarily positive to our daily lives, and that we're so lucky to work in tech.
I'm a foreign student in Beijing. Living off campus. Xenophobic landlord kicked me out and I discovered there was nothing I could do to get rent or deposit back. Been bouncing between places, very painful as a person of colour in this otherwise normally incredible city.
Oddly, the isolation was initially great. Wasn't so productive in March, but having the pause was magic for every other aspect of my life. Got into incredible shape thanks to eating well, sleeping well, and a light but consistent calisthenics routine. But still missed by first deadline for thesis. Struggled to ask for help. Then asked and found it the university didn't care. Cue total collapse.
Everyday I wake up and try to make progress on a thesis but just end up frozen behind my computer. This has been soul destroying. Showing up each morning but failing to move forward. Anxious beyond imagination. Quit caffeine (coffee, green tea) for a month, then restarted in spectacular fashion.
Visa expires soon. Back to home country in a worse state than China and with ability to right itself. Feeling very doomed, lost, and annoyed to not have been able to capitalise on all this free time. About to throw an entire master's degree program down the drain because I can't stop panicking about it.
Just afraid of the future. Post lockdown, looking back and wishing I did more. It's hard to lose a grip on the world and to operate without a sense of meaning.
The worst thing is it looks like it'll be like this for another year, ugh.
I joke that I barely noticed covid19: I was already socially-isolated enough (have been working from home for almost a decade, and in many ways I was/am already depressed for my own reasons) that the only change was my hair getting pretty long and my kids getting bored at home. I know I cannot complain - got a steady job just before the lockdown, my financial situation is not terrible, I have a garden to milk any ray of sunshine that Northern England might grant us...
BUT
I've given up on therapy, as there is no way for me to make any progress on my personal problems in these circumstances. I was supposed to spend a couple of weeks on a beach for the first time in years - it didn't happen and it might not happen for many more months. My parents can only see their grandkids every few months and now we're well overdue. I live in fear that my new employer will eventually feel the hurt and they'll have to cut, with LIFO putting a big target on my back. Even if I keep this job, my dreams of independence were shattered last year and there is no way to try again in these circumstances.
So it's shit really, but what can we do? Sometimes the planet just tries to kills us and all we can do is endure.
I know it's temporary but how things have gone during lockdown have changed my opinion on my country and a lot of the people in it and that's not temporary.
But in a personal level is has been terrible - my wife had covid for 2 weeks - which was rough but not life threatening. Then she got post viral syndrome and has been laid up for the last 90 days - even just going up the stairs wipes her out for a couple of hours. She is a fit and healthy 40yo who normally does yoga each day and exercises far more than I do. So having to watch her go through this has been terrible, at least we've had our kids to keep me going and busy, but it has been damn busy. As I said very lucky to have a flexible and welcoming employer who has given me all the space I need - but I'm still feeling in a personal level like I'm failing.
To top it off my son (who had no covid symptoms) has had an on and off bladder infection for weeks which they are now wondering is linked to covid and some possible kidney damage. The guilt as I was the last of us to leave the house before we locked down is huge.
Just so sad for my wife right now and no clear end in sight - some people on her long term covid group get better, other regress. It is similar to ME - so terrified it may be with her for life.
Work has been manageable. As some mentioned, definitely a lot more hectic dealing with varying WFH personalities across the organization. Not every day is a productive day but it doesn't feel too far off pre-pandemic productivity levels (including all the time lost in commutes/meetings/etc.
Personally, my partner and I have had some challenges: -Cancelled and postponed our wedding to 2021 -Nearly lost a family member to COVID -Lost 2 grandparents to non-COVID related illness But ultimately, spirits are better than expected. Our biggest challenge now is deciding whether to re-sign our lease in NYC and start spending more meaningful time there this fall. To be honest, I can't see the COVID risk being all too much different there vs. other parts of the tri-state and major populated areas. I think it might come down to how much is open and what sort of quality of life that provides outside of our small, but not unmanageable, apartment.
All in all, I held up pretty well, but I don't think I would be able to power through another lockdown. I'm from Belgrade, Serbia and looking to fly somewhere warm and remote for the fall and winter (Thailand/Bali/Mexico) where I'd have more freedom than being locked down in an apartment.
On the other hand, the news cycle is an ever present anxiety machine. Even when I don't tune into it, it filters in through texts and my wife. I worry that the medical supply lines are going to become unstable and that will be that, and there's only so long a type I diabetic will last without medical supply. It's odd that everyone else seems to be excited for some Mad Max style revolution, and I just want some kind of normality. I feel like the kid at the house party worrying about people scratching the table and breaking dishes while everyone else is having fun.
It's a strange dichotomy, this time we live in.
But if these times are so hard on you, why don't you share a bit more about your situation?
(I'm assuming this is still about the Corona crisis. Or is it about the unrest in the US instead?)
Things went pretty well in Germany and since I already worked from home since 2014, my work wasn't affected. I started a lecturer gig at a local university, but they gave me total freedom to do it remote.
I was lucky in many ways.
I moved in a new flat end of January, where I could have a dedicated home office and home gym.
Because I'm not a very social person, I was okay with not going to events anymore.
I'm also polyamor, so I had 4 partners I could met in that time, which helped a lot.
If you're struggling, it's probably because the systems that you put in place at the start of the pandemic have broken down. (Kinda like how we eventually forget/give up on New Years Resolutions...)
I'd recommend these[1] two[2] videos from CGP Grey to help. The first talks about the kind of things that you might be doing that are making you miserable, and the second about specific ways in which we can cope with the pandemic (and specifically a lockdown, if you are still in one).
Brief notes:
Avoid doing any of these things:
* Staying still, avoiding exercise
* Having an irregular sleep schedule
* Maximizing screen time; going to sleep looking at your phone, and using it as soon as you wake up
* Encouraging negative emotions, eg: by looking at the news
* Setting unmeasurable or unachievable goals. Waiting for motivation to strike.
* Obsessing over trying to be happy.
* Following your self-destructive impulses
Partition your house/space into the following spaces, and try to obey these rules about the spaces:
* A space for exercise. If you don't have equipment, you can do body weight exercises. If you have access to safe outdoor spaces, make sure to use that too. Make sure you set a minimum amount of time, and stick to it.
* A space for sleep. Do not use your phone here. Do not eat here. Do not linger here. It's just for sleep. If you're failing to sleep, leave and try again later. Setting an alarm to wake up is important to maintaining a consistent sleep schedule. It doesn't matter when you wake up - so long as the time is consistent.
* A recreation zone. Go here to do activities that you actually enjoy. Only do these activities if you intend to give them your full attention. Keep an eye on the quality of the recreation, and make sure you set a maximum time limit.
* A creation zone. Somewhere to work, study, or develop skills. Crafts, coding, cooking. Make sure this space is dedicated; so do not consume entertainment here, do not eat here.
[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LO1mTELoj6o [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=snAhsXyO3Ck
I'm also moving jobs and it's going to be interesting ramping up remotely.
Before lockdown, I had already been looking for jobs. Since then, I've been rejected pre-interview by a handful of companies, and have bombed out of a handful of interviews at the final stage.
I was also made redundant a few weeks ago, so I'm nearing the point where I need to find myself a new job.
Despite that, it's been weirdly nice to sit at home, on my own, and simply learn again. Obviously, I'm freaking out about being out of work soon, but I'm hopeful that the stars will align and at least one company will offer me something.
I have high hopes that the world is going to be better only from here. These hopes are backed up by seeing signs of empathy among so many online and offline communities.
I'm slowly passing the this-is-mostly-easy threshold in University. I expected that, but it's still somewhat sad. Before, I could put in the time and finish any homework on my own, now I get stuck on exercises or lecture notes fairly frequently. I've noticed that I easily obsess over the meta ("I should have read the notes vs watched the recording, that cost so much time") and I'm making some progress as far as not feeling guilty for not performing perfectly.
I'm also not sure what I actually want to do. I was cautiously eyeing academia because I like the idea of intellectual freedom (in CS, so not as concerned about the culture war) and enjoy teaching, but I haven't really found a field that fully interests me yet. Both theoretical CS and technical CS sound intriguing, but I haven't found a sweet spot that is a) easy enough to be tractable and b) significant enough to be rewarding. I think this is mostly hitting me right now because of a lowered sense of self-efficacy and mild burnout that makes any problem look uninteresting, but I still yearn for some long-term goal that excites me and I can't find one.
I had surgery last week and have been mostly tuning that out. I'm not in any pain, but do have to wear a compression vest that gives my breathing issues if I use my ADD medication. So I'm a bit more foggy and unfocused then usual, which to be fair is still much better than having to gasp for air all day.
For now I have a job, but nothing is certain. Also feel helpless seeing so many people suffering and not being able to help ...
Having a relatively secure job makes a lot of difference I think. Mine has stayed consistent, with a few months of working at home, and now back in the office with a skeleton crew.
Thing is, I never swung for the fences. I've stayed in jobs that didn't pay as much as I might have left for, but they were secure, and allowed me to build up, so now in my early 50's I make at least 1/2 as much from investments each year as salary (total 200K+ a year living outside of a major metropolitan area). My spouse did the same, so together we're doing fine financially, and I think that security helps our piece of mind a lot. We've always been saving for the rainy day, and now that it's here, we're coasting a bit.
So we do what we did before anyway - head out to the woods, bike, hike, play board games, the random video game, and keep up our garden and yard. We're simple people with simple needs so we're easy to please. Probably the only thing we miss is travel - we used to head south to Mexico or South America every two years, and that's on hold, of course.
Oh, and zero, zero, zero social media and mainstream news. I mean none. I think that helps me a lot. I don't even enjoy NPR. If it's not something in depth and reasoned, I don't even bother. The world at large really holds very little for me, except places like here (HN) where there is technically interesting ideas to explore.
I feel for the folks that are struggling, though. I can completely see the "There but by the grace of God go I." I really like seeing people step up to help in this thread. You're my heroes for the day. Thank you.
In about a week - terrible. As I have stated in other threads, my work has banned all remote work once we're forced back next week. Banned. Outright. So those of us with children and no childcare, or those with comorbidities are just screwed. The anxiety about that is building. Luckily, I have a neighbor that can watch my child until school is back in session. But I honestly don't know what I'm going to do in August. Our daycare has been and will remain limited in the number of kids it can take. The school is looking at a 2 day/week schedule to reduce the number of kids in the building. If that happens, I have a 7 year old with zero options for daytime care. I do not have enough PTO to take those days off, nor could I and keep my job, even if I had the time.
Hopelessness is starting to creep in.
Since then I've done a few things to help pull back some sanity...
* I took up running. Every day I try to run a little farther and take a new path. Last Saturday I was able to do a 20k fasted AM run. It was the first time in my life I was able to run that far without stopping.
* I filled my duffel bag with jugs of water and used that for weight training instead. It doesn't really take the place the gym but it's better than nothing.
* I started taking flights to the bay area to visit my family in 2 week cycles.
I'm physically fine right now, but like some of the other people here I wish I had some friends / co-workers / general people to hang around and talk with. If you're in a similar situation, in your 30s, and live around Boston, feel free to drop me a line at this username at gmail. I would be more than happy to come out and chill.
Insanely perhaps, I sold nearly everything I own on eBay as well. This was liberating too.
I just lost my drivers license due to a medical issue (my "controlled" epilepsy ain't so much any more). My partner left for a six-week trip recently. I'm working from home because my office still can't open up. Most of the stuff near me is still shut down. I'm effectively restricted to a relatively small radius around my house.
I'm trying to get out as much as I can, and go as far as I can. I'm taking the opportunity to get more cycling in-- which is my hobby anyway, but it feels odd in light of the fact that now it's my ONLY reasonable option for, say, getting to the grocery store.
I think if my partner were home, I'd be okay. I think if I had my license and could just go around and take a drive somewhere, I'd be okay. I think if work were back to normal and I could spend the days working with people in close proximity, I'd be okay.
But it's everything together that's just screwing me up. I feel isolated. I feel trapped. I'm losing weight because I'm not bothering to cook or eat beyond the occasional slice of toast or handful of trail mix. I'm not sleeping well, which is making my seizures worse, which is going to make the wait for my license reinstatement take that much longer. All the stuff reinforces all the other stuff, which makes it difficult to break out of it.
I don't know. I'm lucky that my seizure are not, comparatively speaking, all that bad. I'm lucky that I have a job, and that I can work from home-- plenty of my neighbors and friends are out of work. I'm SUPREMELY lucky to have the love of an incredible woman whom I love dearly, and who makes me want to be a better person. I'm lucky to be able-bodied enough to go cycling, and I'm definitely lucky to have the money to afford my groceries.
All in all, I don't have it bad at all. But everything just feels like shit right now.
On the plus side, not having to commute, cooking more at home and generally having more time (because a lot of things we used to do we can't any more) has been great. Also fortunately I am employed and my company is doing well.
On the other hand, monotony has really set in, where each day feels the same. Despite cooking more I'm less healthy now than before, because I sit in the same chair most of the day and have been exercising a lot less than before (used to play group sports). I really miss traveling and exploring new places. And lastly haven't really interacted socially with anyone besides my girlfriend since this thing started. I've also been spending a lot more time than I should on news and social media, I guess as a way to feel connected to the world.
All in all it's been an interesting ride but I want off now.
Since I'm not in a relationship and I live alone, loneliness kicked in hard. Dating is also very impractical right now, so all I've done is just working 7 days a week.
Luckily in my country (Netherlands) the COVID counter-measures are now slowly being relaxed. Social live is slowly picking up again.
I have returned to my office a couple of weeks ago already. I have a private office in a shared building, so I can keep distance. This helped tremendously, I am happy to have people around me again. Since 2 weeks bars and restaurants are also allowed to open, I noticed that the ability to go out for a drink (although alone) tremendously helps my well-being.
But you know what? It could be a lot, lot worse. I still have a job - the hit to my productivity is manageable, and my wife also has her job too. Every day I see on Linkedin, people posting about how they have been laid off. These are people with 5-10 years of work experience post-MBA (often from prestigious schools) and I am still really grateful to not face any financial hurdles yet.
For me it's the fact that all our normal stress relief outlets are shut that is the big issue. The children can't go to scouts, my daughter can't do her ballet classes and my son can't see his friends. My wife leads a few choirs which were very social, but now she has to run rehearsals over Zoom which is a pain. I'd love to go fishing or camping, but I can't. I am a radio ham, but having just one hobby available to you can get a bit dull after a while.
The biggest issue for us is our work schedules. For a few months before it all went a bit weird I had been gradually setting up my own business. A mixed bag of IT consultancy jobs and app development. I was happy with it and I had to the time to put in to it when the kids were at school. The lockdown messed all that up as my wife is a speech therapist and now has to do teletherapy from home. Unfortunately that is something she has to do during the day - thus I have to look after the children during the day. That includes homeschooling, cooking cleaning etc.
My wife has to put in a full 9 to 5 shift. It's not just a few Zoom meetings, but also note and report writing. So after she finishes work, we have dinner, a bit of family time and then if I'm lucky I might have an hour or two to work on my own things - I'm not a great evening coder.
When it all kicked off I had some plans to learn and achieve new things that I thought the lockdown would give me time to do. Stuff like learn welding, do some redecorating and learning Unity. In reality this has been the busiest period I've had since having children. Plus I've put on a fair bit of weight so that is one more thing to deal with.
That being said, we still have a good income. My wife's work is secure, in fact she is earning more with the teletherapy model. But, her employer has given up the lease on their office as they can't see a return to face-to-face working for quite some time. I have a few passive income streams. We have good family whom we can keep in tough with via Zoom etc. Putting it all into perspective we are Okay compared to some others who must really be struggling.
Edit: Plus our children's sleep schedules have gone completely bonkers.
Not being able to go to coffee shops/coworking spaces for socialization, as well as not seeing friends in person has really started taking a toll in terms of depression. I am an introvert, however people often confuse that for not wanting any social interaction. I do prefer to have social interaction, just with close friends and usually in smaller groups (followed by rest after).
I do realize that I am lucky to still have a job and be healthy. Still, it has been a tough time.
For unrelated reasons, I had decided in December I would be sober all of 2020. I have a feeling that things would be much worse if I were drinking during all of this.
Since I'm remote, I went home. Staying with my mom has been really enjoyable. I've gotten a lot closer with her, and gotten to enjoy her cooking again. If this had happened a year ago I probably would have hated it, but things are much better now. My vacation plans got cancelled, but I am happy to spend time here.
When my school sent everyone home after spring break, the first few weeks were rough (dealing with loneliness), but I have basically gotten used to it now. I have old high school friends I could visit, but since my mom is a doctor, it is best that I minimize exposure lest I get infected, pass it to her, and she transmit it to dozens of patients before finding out.
I think the lack of commuting has been a real benefit to my life. I've got back into reading regularly, back into the habit of cooking healthily almost every day (well, except for one or two takeaways a month if I'm feeling lazy), and I've smashed through a lot of stuff on my to-do list which had been lingering there for months or years. I've also had the time to start up a second weekly game group, so I'm now in 4 RPG sessions a fortnight (done over Discord and roll20). And finally I've been getting more sleep, I'm consistently getting >8 hours a night for the first time in years.
I like my own space a lot. Since moving away from home to start university, I've hated living with people. So having almost no in-person contact since late March hasn't bothered me at all.
Regarding work, I have a very stable job and absolutely no worries about being let go, so no concerns there. I've been less productive, but not to the extent that anyone has commented on it. So, no less productive than anyone else has been. It's been very nice getting away from the open office, though.
Recently I took a week off work. I couldn't go anywhere, of course, but just having a week to myself with no commitments at all, just being able to sleep in, read books, do some programming... it was great.
I wouldn't mind things remaining this way for the rest of the year.
About a month ago, I ended a serious relationship, and since gf moved out and I started quarantining alone, it became so much harder. I still stand by that decision, but it couldn't been worse time to become isolated. Got into one of the worst depressive episodes I've ever had. Lost my job, and then couldn't keep a sweet, high-paying remote gig that was supposed to be the next one. Fucked up responsibilities and ended things badly, fully guilty and feeling it. Sleeping 16 hours a day, spending waking hours completely aimlessly. My amazing friends and family try to pull me out of it, and I'm okay while I'm around them, but then I either go home tired and alone, or a quiet friendly get-together turns into a wild party with lots of booze and coke and hard depressive hangover for the next few days. My chronic health problems (blood flow to the brain) got much worse, and I even got myself to see the doctor and get some pills, but still can't change my life in a serious way to prevent it; it looks like I have a very high risk of having a stroke in the next month or two, but I just can't bring myself to care about it.
And the worst part of it is, I see myself climbing out of this hole, again, getting a good job, looking after my health, being a productive member of society, all that – and I see nothing to be inspired about. In my previous life, and in my possible future life, that looks just the same, there's just nothing worth of all that effort of living.
Despots and tyrants are gaining power. The world's most powerful nation has a billion people and no concern for ethics. Everyday people - myself included! - live in a system where fighting to improve these things means risking your kids' home, healthcare, and well being.
I'm a nervous wreck and when I look at my beautiful daughters, who are the most loving creatures I've ever met, my joy at their existence is filled with horror at the idea they will witness the end of civilization, perhaps the species.
Worst, perhaps, is that normally this kind of fear subsides after study. Most of the things we worry about are not, really, that big a deal, in a species-wide sense.
Climate breakdown is the one topic I know where the experts are more scared than regular people, not less.
I have been trying to find liberal democracies with arable land in cool climates with a credible national defence, and have found none.
https://twitter.com/solar_chase/status/1021686779093680128 puts it well.
"Honestly, I fear my daughter will have to kill innocent people or be killed in the struggle over the earth's shrinking habitable places."
I also got accepted to speak at a (now virtual) industry conference which checked another goal I had set for the year.
Outside of work I've also reconnected with a number of friends from college who live in different places. Lately I've seen a lot more people reconnecting this way; I suppose the forced quarantine changes the dynamics of who is "easy to hang out with" since everyone is confined.
My wife and I have been taking evening walks a lot more, which has been good for our physical and mental health.
The only things that have been difficult are not being able to visit older family members, not being able to enjoy the typical NYC activities, or hang out in person with friends, and traveling. We used to travel 6-8 times a year and are really itching to get out of the apartment these days.
I got here, to Kuwait, last week and was forced into quarantine again because some people on the flight had not gone through quarantine yet. It’s been a little lonely. After four or five days I was able to get a hold of an electric socket adapter so that I can recharge my phone and laptop. Life was a little rough without electricity for my personal devices while locked into this quarantine camp. In this forced quarantine area we cannot access any form of shopping and I really need some laundry detergent. This morning a cute little mouse tickled my foot and that spooked me a bit. After about 2 to 3 days here we started getting some cooked meals. I have gained a new appreciation for MREs.
Since I have separated from my corporate job and family I have gotten a lot of programming complete on a personal project. This morning I completed a major milestone on secure software routing for this decentralized file transfer project that executes with a fast GUI in the browser.
But since you asked. I'm not holding up. I was already pretty deep in a semi-regular depression valley, triggered by some bad decisions regarding relocation and leaving a line of work. In hindsight, I was stupid. Then covid took away the little social life I had in my new location. And made the future so damn uncertain. And showed me how brittle everything is, how even if you do everything just right, it can all come crumbling down at any time. I'm not even doing anything right. I've managed to build up a good skillset and a good degree and an OK CV, but only through sheer luck. I now have none of the drive that made me able to obtain those things. Nothing pushes me anymore. If I could get back on track, this whole covid and the crumbling of liberal democracy situation has shown that it can still all come crashing down at any point.
What's the point. If I could barely "make it" when I was younger, had a fire lit in me, a large social circle, etc., how am I going to have a chance when I get older every day, there's barely an ember in my soul, my poor decisions have physically distanced me from my close friends (and hell, we all know those things disintegrate with age anyway, it was all existing on loaned time, making younger and younger friends to compensate). I'm so close to giving up. Don't take it the wrong way. Life isn't pain yet, so I'll go on slogging, but I'm close to stopping struggling and just let it slide into a gray monotony. The longing for a fire and a desire is so painful that it's better to just forget about it. To just go with safe. Lock it down. Time to grow up, I guess. In my mid-30s. I don't like this, one bit. I really don't fit in in society. Which would be charming if I were a risk-taking adventurer who "lived life to its fullest". But no, I'm deeply risk-averse at heart. Luck and great people put me into niches where I blossomed. It's all charming when you're in your mid 20s and you're "promising".
And yes, I am going to therapy. I'm learning a lot, but it's not "helping".
I'm so tired.
Thanks for listening.
Have been working on a startup idea as a solo developer for some time and everything was on track. MVP was almost complete and had a verbal agreement with an investor for a pre-seed investment which was going to allow me to fund a solid team (the team was ready to go as well). Then the pandemic hit. Investor bailed out, my personal savings got dried up as I've been funding myself for some time and bills started piling up.
Still pushed forward, got the MVP ready and collected some solid leads to reach out to. Yet, beyond this it's all pitch black as I got to find freelance gigs to pay the rent - which is not going well either - meanwhile pursuing clients, doing development, doing marketing, fixing bugs and a whole bunch of other things for my startup. It's a constant stream of fires that are waiting to be put out.
Have never been one to quit and don't think I will this time either but just giving up, giving up everything looks way too attractive.
Throwaway, because I don't really feel comfortable talking about these issues publicly. Thank you OP for asking, had been looking for an opportunity to vent. Hope we'll all pull through these terrible times.
I could continue like this for the rest of my life so very happy about my personal situation. Still worried about the world though.
I'd also say the following three factors hurt it too:
1. The feeling you're wasting your time. If you go by Hacker News/Reddit/Product Hunt/other sites, you'd think everyone and their dog has built some world changing product or service in this lockdown period, and that you're a complete failure for not having managed to do the same.
2. The lack of alternatives. Previously, working remotely was fun because there were other things you could do, and other entertainment you could enjoy if you were burnt out. In this lockdown, you basically can't go on holiday, visit any interesting places, buy things in most shops, eat in any restaurants, etc. There's nothing except 'do work' and 'work on your side projects'
That's left me in a situation where I feel like I'm just not able to do anything, and have little to no motivation to even try to do anything.
Personally, I'm in the "love" camp. I have gotten ~5 hours of my each day back due to not having to commute, which is 5 more hours for my family, my hobbies, outdoor activity, etc. It's great. I'm getting so many things done and fixed around the house. Making a lot of progress on wood working and metal working hobbies. Taking time to exercise and get outside more. My work schedule has remained pretty much the same but minus the commute it's like I have a second life to fill with things to do! I'm an extrovert, so I thought WFH would be a real bummer and drag, but the benefits are vastly outweighing the drawbacks of fewer human interactions.
I started off by discovering that social obligations were a huge stressor for me: I often wanted to do things by myself, but I nearly always felt guilty about it, dwelling on all the friendships I wasn't investing in, imagining myself becoming isolated and truly alone. Now I can schedule a couple of FaceTime calls a week, text a couple other people occasionally, and have my social obligations met. And I'm fortunate to live with my partner so we can give each other a baseline level of human contact. This has freed me to really dive in and embrace a couple of hobbies I had been robbing myself of.
On the other hand: I'm incredibly stressed about the state of the world and the future of our society. I feel powerless, I feel cognitive dissonance about how wrong so many things seem, I feel like things are falling apart around me. These feelings are probably exaggerated by generalized anxiety and secondary information sources, but it's hard to shake them off without being able to go out into the world and see some degree of normalcy- that some things, at least where I live, are a semblance of okay. It also wouldn't hurt to have the option of distracting myself with a movie, or some tacos and a margarita, every once in a while.
And then there's all the little stressors: sanitizing grocery deliveries one item at a time every week, not being able to properly go to the doctor for non-emergencies without risking exposure to a deadly disease. Even taking walks is a bit stressful, having to constantly navigate around other walkers in our neighborhood to make sure we're all keeping our distance. These things were terrifying for the first couple weeks, then they became normal, and now they've become grating. Part of me definitely just feels tired.
My personal projects are sort of stagnant but I'll occassionally try to tinker with Rust, hone my front end skills or just dump more hours into real work.
My guitars probably annoy my neighbors as I slowly start to increase the volume on my amp that much closer to 11.
I saw my brother after 2 months and a friend after 3. Dating just stopped in all forms (e.g. virtual).
I'm reading The Intelligent Investor by Benjamin Graham and taking "stock" in my overall investment strategy and just trying to be more aware.
Been asking myself what I really want as a dude with over 23 years of IT exposure, living by himself. The life questions really have become more prominent during this time.
Lost my ex-brother in law who I really got along with. He died suddenly of cardiac arrest due to stress. He was 33 yrs old. 10 yrs old when he came to the US. It hurts a great deal thinking about that, but it forces me to ask some serious questions about what I'm doing with my life.
[Health]: With commute out of the picture, I take long walks at 23:00 every night. Tokyo is a crowded city and the night time walks lets me avoid crowds/people. I escape into the woods and off the beaten path during weekends.
[Finance]: Financially secure for now since my new job is stable. I made the right call at the end of last year. The startup I worked at previously is going through a very rough time right now. The acquisition wasn't favourable, they downsized and pivoted into an entirely different product.
[Play]: Keeping myself busy with gardening and video games.
Overall quality of life hasn't changed. I'm not an extrovert so I'm quite comfortable with the stay home logic.
I was in the process of moving in Netherlands when the lockdown happened most of my day-to-day stuff were already there when the borders closed with me on the wrong side. I had to live with my mother during two months in my teenager clothes doing remote working and my job as a TA with a 13" Fedora laptop remotely connected to a Windows workstation and screen sharing through Teams. It was painfull and very hard.
I managed to cross the borders last month and now, I am finishing my contract in Belgium before going back to Netherlands and finding a job (and an appartment) there.
I managed to put more money on the side during that time but it was the only positive thing that happened the last three months. My focus was off, I was highly unproductive. I have already WFH in the last year and it was good because I was able to balance it with a active social life. Being stuck at home with the space as a working desk, a sleeping roam and the only part of the appartment where I could be alone was... well not a good time.
The only things keeping me sane at the moment are camping (which I've been doing every chance I get), yard-work, or sitting in my backyard and watching bees gather nectar.
I'm the only one making a salary in my household which supports my wife and kids. We have health issues also, so must have health insurance. With the price of housing and groceries continuing to skyrocket - and one of my kids approaching college age soon - it only re-enforces the idea that I have to stay in this occupation for much longer. I want a simple work-to-live not live-to-work life on some acreage, but I'm trapped in this suburban life-style.
I've been trying to stay sane by working in my garden, cooking more elaborate meals than I normally do, biking to the farmers market instead of driving to the grocery store (more expensive, but it makes for a pleasant day out whereas the grocery store is just a chore), and playing soccer on the weekends with my COVID bubble.
On the plus side, the experience made me realize that the human brain, much like modern commercial aircraft, has a lot of excess/untapped capacity that can be called upon in an emergency. I wrote this based on my experience: https://medium.com/@h_liyan/finding-time-db449c8f8c10
Overall, I think in the very long run, COVID-19 was good for the world's soul, so to speak. I think we realized some things, both as individuals and as a species.
I’m able to WFH and I’m in a spacious sunny place which helps a lot. Also, I’m not alone as I live with my partner. However, provided that lots of startups are laying off people, there’s be a slight chance that I would be laid off too. That’s OK as I am a staunch believer that job security does not exist.
But It’s really hard to be calm with all that’s happening all over the world, and with some family members living abroad, in countries where the pandemic is hitting very hard. That’s the worst part.
Also, coping that your stack of choice is rather undervalued and rather "old", makes it appealing to learn new stacks/languages, but hard to land jobs using these new ones. Adding up the fact that there's no such thing as job security, and that maybe I would be fired given the situation, puts the stress up.
I'll keep up anyhow, because I enjoy my work, and I'm willing to get better.
I still don’t know why - I don’t even have a hypothesis. Lack of fresh air, social contact, exercise?
Luckily I think everything’s coming back. I’ve been doing Pomodoros to work on my focus, and gyms re-opened yesterday here which is a godsend.
I trust that by working on discipline, motivation will follow in time.
I just spend my days coding, reading, and playing muh games. Gotta admit, I'm loving 2020.
We elected to stay in Lanzarote for the duration of the lock downs, working remotely. It’s been great here, with good weather and very few cases, though the Spanish lockdown was very extreme compared to Ireland’s. Working remotely played out better than anticipated — an island far from home is no different to home when the whole company is working remotely. Bit of an eye opener there for sure!
We’re Leaving in four weeks to return to Dublin. Lost a lot of weight due to healthy eating and a lack of junk food and processed food. Cut out the alcohol almost entirely, and the stress levels dropped off a cliff after the first week of lockdown.
The whole experience has raised a lot of questions about where and how we live and work. The first thing I'll be doing when I get home is handing in my notice on my over priced apartment in Dublin.
I got screwed over by a re-org that went against previous (unwritten) company policy, and now I’m just angry every time I see the exec talk about how well they treat their employees.
I’m still not sure what to do about it. I had really liked the duties I had there, but it sounds like the role I enjoyed no longer exists.
I was buried in "I'm the victim" mindset for most of the past 4 months. Most opportunities were squandered because of fixed solution mindset (ie, I cant work out because the gym is closed). In taking ownership of the situation (instead of leaving it in Gavin Newsom's power hungry hands), I have been able to begin moving forward utilising what is available to me.
Whereas I previously was skipping workouts because I was fixed on how to do that, was medicating the pain/confusion of how to pivot with video games and junk food, was not taking ownership of the situation. Now I am taking ownership of what value can still be derived, ensuring I am doing the work required of where I want to be.
My drive certainly isn't what it was a few months ago, but I'm thankful to have reasonable social and emotional health and to be working part-time while I look for something full-time, and I may be entering grad school for mech eng this fall if nothing comes through. I'd welcome any comments or suggestions from those of you who have been through grad school or job searching during recessions.
Downside: my girlfriend still lives with her parents (who have pre-existing risk factors), so we have only been able to go on walks for the past several months.
I have been avoiding my feelings by spending quite a bit of time after work in Hyrule (Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild).
EDIT: I should say that I am overall very fortunate. Still employed doing something that I like, safe and healthy, and my family is the same. My family doesn't live near me, so I miss them and am not sure when I will next be able to see them.
At first I loved the isolation, lack of traffic, and lack of commute and having to be at work. I realized I have strong social anxiety and the part of my brain that has to work extra hard to get along with people finally got a well deserved break. I put about 10,000 miles on my car during the pandemic--I live in the Washington DC area and the lack of traffic was one of the best feelings ever, especially since I had just bought my first real sports car last year. I started doing Geohashing again (the game invented by Randall Monroe: https://geohashing.site/geohashing/Main_Page) Under the auspices of geohashing I hiked every mountain, lake, river, and dale I could find within a 2 hour radius of my house. At one point I used cruise control for 65 miles continuously on one of the most notoriously congested highways in the area (I-66). That may have been the highlight of the pandemic for me. I now have an intimate understanding of the terrain from Southeastern PA to western MD to all of Northern VA and even much of WVA and learned a lot of history in the process.
However there were some down sides. I have gained a TON of weight. The long drives and medium-to-long hikes didn't make up for the physical activity I was getting from going to the gym every day. I discovered many new delicious restaurants in the area in the name of "supporting local business."
Also, finally, in the last few weeks, my social batteries finally recharged, and I'm starting to get lonely again.
Also, traffic is back, so no more long rides.
Also, I caught Lyme disease due to all the deep woods hiking. It's resolving well and my knee feels slightly better each day (I did make the mistake of continuing to hike strenuously on it when it first swelled up and even now try to push it a little too far either with exercise or bike rides)
The good news is, gyms just opened back up.
Overall I would say my mental health is better than it was before the pandemic, and my physical health is worse.
My job has remained steady and engaging.
In mid-March, after a messy parting from a startup, I left Manhattan for my parents' place in the suburbs, intending to stay for a few weeks; three months later, here I am.
I had blue periods where I got nothing done and just scrolled through reddit all day. Today I am enjoying running barefoot, the 16 hours of daylight, and the sheer luck of getting along well with my parents.
That last point is the big one, to me. I guess if I had any general advice, it would be to put energy into having good relationships with your parents, if you can. They won't be here forever.
I did start to gain a few pounds due to the convenient proximity of the fridge, but overall I am actually down a few pounds now. I can take a pause in the middle of the day and go for a walk, or even do more intense cardio, then go back to work for a few hours in the afternoon.
If your job cannot be WFH, you are single and/or you are living in a big city - the quality of life may have gone down.
Can you share more details?
But I got a sudden and serious reminder yesterday that even if I'm doing fine, other people in my family aren't doing so well at coping. So I should be putting in more of an effort to help others through this.
The major downside is I can't lift anymore having no access to a gym, and I know I've lost noticeable muscle mass as a result. I'm running now, but it's just not the same.
All things considered I'm in a good spot - stable job that has allowed WFH since the beginning.
But, the lack of looking forward to anything is really wearing on me. Work ends at 5? Nothing to do. Weekend rolls around? Nothing to do. Looking at my calendar? Nothing for the next year.
I fill the time with random projects, biking, reading, or video games; but it's really just become "filling the time", not getting any enjoyment out of them.
Joking aside, I've been working from home with my wife for years but not being able to plan or have any holidays has been the biggest problem for us. I know, I know, 1st world problems and all but still feels crap. From a different perspective though, this situation gave us more opportunities to find our more about ourselves and our partners.
Since moving here a few years ago, and passing through several jobs, I'm beginning to think there aren't any worth working for. There's so much broken:
- office-first culture
- heavy big design up front
- fealty to waterfall and middle-management
- nepotism and corruption - relatively poor pay
I've never been one to get homesick, and I still don't think I am, but holy cow is it easy to get lonely when you don't see anyone besides other passer bys in the grocery store once a week. At the beginning, my only real interaction with people beside the occasional call with family were my morning stand ups. 10 minutes of human interaction with people I knew, and I needed it. Some days my boss's schedule would fill up and we wouldn't have stand up, and those days were awful. My motivation had plummeted, but I spent a bit more time with some friends from high school on Discord.
With all that said, that was at the beginning. Now, I'm going quite a bit better. I've gotten used to being able to be alone a lot longer, and as my state has opened up, I've been able to see some coworkers/friends outside of work, which has been a huge help. My motivation is still pretty lacking, and I'm much less productive from home than I am in the office. I can't wait to get back into the office so I can have a good environment again. I live in a 170sq ft room, and share a kitchen and bathroom with my roommate. 170sq ft that I sleep in, work in, eat in, entertain myself in, pursue free lance development in, make coffee in, etc. I do everything in this ratty beaten up room that has peeling paint in a drab white color. I'm someone who has always preached the value of separation of spaces, and here I am, confined in one space.
All in all, I really can't complain though. I'm very lucky that I haven't really felt depressed at all (sometimes a bit sad, but nothing serious), mt expenses are low and I can save a lot, I have a lot of great friends and family I can talk to regularly now that their classes are over, and I'm taking some classes this Summer to ease my last year at Uni, so that makes my time feel a bit more productive. I'm very fortunate to have what I do, and it looks like things are getting better right now. With that said, this year blows.
It could be better. But I know how good I've got it, and I'm grateful for that.
I banged my head on this for months and finally had to acknowledge (on my birthday, to make it even more depressing) that there was no hope.
And that's really painful.
Plus the circumstances don't make it easy to deal with this extra feeling of loneliness.
In February we started caring for a family member suffering from psychosis. This time has allowed me to take daily walks with them to help with recovery and keep track of mental health (every service is closed due to covid, so have to take it into my own hands).
This has made the transition to living with us much more tenable I believe.
Pro: I'm more motivated than ever to work toward finding a new job.
Con: The job market is terrible for someone trying to change careers.
People had no idea what was killing their loved ones and we had the entire genome sequenced for covid in a few weeks.
In the grand scheme of things I am doing absolutely fantastic.
The last few weeks have been pretty tough though. I understand myself to be prone to becoming over-stimulated from following the news too closely and so generally heavily moderate my intake of it. The last few weeks really de-railed that though, a severe escalation in craziness in what has already been a crazy year, and I've found myself glued to keeping up with what's going on and what's being said by both sides of the current argument.
The hit to my personal, non-work productivity has been one area affected but I'm not too concerned as I can play catch-up on some of that. The larger hit the past few weeks has taken is that it has essentially confirmed my concerns that America is not, and will not ever be, home for me.
Watching Marxism grip America by the throat, after seeing the damage it has wrought in the past, and the sheer level of support for it now, has been incredibly demoralizing. Consequentially I'm now placed in the position whereby I've to start looking at packing up and moving my family's entire life yet again which is... not great.
Life feels richer and less complicated.
my family? not really. two deaths because of covid-19. we are in shock because we couldn't even go to the wake/burial.
Positive: my garden benefits from my weeding-therapy sessions. Its mindless and physical, which I need.
Working from home is great, but I already did that. It kinda sucks to be somewhat locked at home, but I just focus on my job and wait for this to pass.
"The quantity isn't there and the quality isn't there."
Could be worse I guess.
but yeah, some projects that has been agreed on with future client previously is either canceled or pending until further notice. and that has forced me to tighten my family expenses while I'm struggling to find another job or projects.
Career-wise as I've posted previously my job is in peril. Finding another role that pays as well at 50+ can be a challenge in IT, I believe the current economic strife will amplify the difficulty.
Personally things are far worse.
TL;DR: on paper I have a perfect job/damn good life but I legit cannot force myself to do any work.
Let's look at the brass tacks for me and why I should be so happy: 1. 5+ years salary in the bank. 2. Several rental properties, all operating normally, covering all of our monthly expenses. 3. A high-paying remote job with infinite autonomy. 4. 10-month old baby, our first. My mom provides free childcare.
This person has it all, right? Oh my god no I have never been this miserable. Our partners are insurance companies, and they are always slow to work with. With COVID they are effectively non-operational when it comes to implementing new software. This means we just spin our wheels.
Life have never been so meaningless from 9-5. There are days when I don't even open my editor or attend meetings. There is just this incredible detachment amongst the whole team.
When I clock out, life is perfect. I never liked going out or anything anyways, so it's just the perfect excuse to sit and home and work on my creative projects.
I am currently working on a plan to take a leave of absence because the alternative is that I just resign. Sitting so close to the life I've always wanted (being a couch potato) and having my beautiful son to be with all day has made it impossible to contribute to my team and the guilt of that is gutting me.
When the decision was made to work-from-home, I just used my work laptop. A few days later I drove to the office and grabbed my monitors, keyboard, mouse, and various other odds-and-ends. I now have the same setup at home as I did at work. I already had a home-office set up, so all I really had to do was shuffle things around to make room for all of my work stuff.
I did have to buy some stuff to make the home office more usable though. I've added a keyboard tray, cheap portable air conditioner (my home office is west-facing, so afternoons can get quite toasty), and a cat hammock for the window. Of all of those, the cat hammock was the biggest boost to my productivity since it keeps the cat off my lap/keyboard.
I went from an open plan office with 250 people (across probably a dozen departments) to my own private office with a window that opens. My commute went from about 2 hours per day on public transit to about 1 minute per day. I haven't had to buy lunch (or been tempted by vending machines) in over three months. I can open a window and smell freshly cut grass and hear birds chirping.
Socially, I'm actually keeping in touch with friends slightly better than I was pre-lockdown. On the other hand, I'm not seeing friends in person as much as I used to and I'm not walking nearly as much as I used to - these things are slowly taking a toll. My volunteer gig also completely shut down, I really miss that.
I'm not looking forward to going back to the office. I'm not looking forward to wasting 10 hours per week sitting on a bus. Actually, the chances of me being willing to take the bus when there isn't a vaccine available are pretty slim, so that will turn into about 8 hours per week of driving, not to mention the added costs of gas, maintenance, insurance, and possibly parking - none of which I'm looking forward to. My current car is a pig on gas, which is fine since I'm not using it for commuting, so I may need to replace it to make driving to work even a little bit reasonable.
In regards to everything else: Heartbroken. Liberalism is being replaced with racial collectivization, something with which you cannot build a stable or just society.
How about you?
I've had to make some big adjustments to my life plan due to Covid, though. In February I was planning to move into a van, because I wanted to own my own living space, but didn't want to commit to any of the locations I found where I could afford to buy property. Part of this plan was to shower in rock climbing gyms, but all these closed down, and even though some in the South are reopening now, I don't think the pandemic risks are worth it. In late May I finally bought the van and I'm showering at a friend's place until I can build a shower in the van. Frankly, I'm terrified of this whole process--it's hard to sleep at night sometimes because I tend to ruminate on all the ways things could go wrong. But I'm doing it, and so far I've made it through all the challenges.
Three years and nine months ago, I stopped drinking and started consciously trying to build real coping mechanisms, and today I'm seeing my efforts from those years pay off a lot. Here are some things that have been helping me:
1. Exercise: I'm fortunate enough to live in an area where I can rock climb, which I love. But almost anyone can run, and cardio arguably works better than anything for improving ones health and mood. Years ago I used a plan similar to this one[1] to run a marathon, and it was not as hard as I thought it would be. I would encourage anyone who is having trouble staying fit right now to pick up this plan and start. You don't need an official marathon event to run a marathon--there are plenty of 26.2-mile loops in the world. Do it for yourself not for the medal.
2. Gratitude: one thing I've been trying to do is spend some time each day thinking of what I'm grateful for. This has helped immensely: as a problem-solver my tendency is to focus on problems in my life because things that are going well don't require any action, but the end result of that is that I only ever see the problems in life. If nothing else, I can hear, I can see, I can walk--these are all incredible things and they are not guaranteed--many people can't do these things. And indeed I'm much more fortunate than just these basics.
3. Let love guide my actions, not fear. It's easy to let fear run away with my thoughts, but when I'm doing well, I can act out of love. Earlier in my life I thought I needed fear to keep me safe, but I've learned in the past few years that all the things I did out of fear to keep myself safe, I can do out of love for myself and others. Sometimes that means doing the same things--wearing a mask, washing my hands, being politically active--but doing these things out of love for myself and others feels different than doing them out of fear. I'm far from perfect here (as anyone can see in my post history) but I've made a lot of progress.
4. Meditation: setting aside time to actually think about 2 and 3 and refocus is key.
5. Diet: eating well has been really hard for me, but recently I've been focusing on eating healthy, low-calorie things (vegetables, fruits, lean meats) rather than focusing on not eating unhealthy things. It's a subtle difference but it seems to be helping.
6. Going easy on myself: I have trouble with consistency and motivation on all these things, and can judge myself really harshly when I go days without meditating or exercising or eating well.
7. Understanding my own limitations: I have a lot of strong feelings about systemic police racism, brutality and murder, the mass death being caused by irresponsible handling of Covid, etc. But ultimately, I'm a white guy who can't speak for black people, I'm a web developer whose skills are unsuited for helping with Covid, and I've got enough problems and responsibilities in my own life that I can't take on the totalitarianism which is rising on both sides of the political spectrum. It's not within my abilities to save the world. I try to create the change I'm capable of, but at the end of the day I'm no use to humanity if I can't take care of myself.
8. Staying connected: I've been making a concerted effort to show my face on Zoom calls, call people I'm close with, and spend time in person with people (6 feet apart and wearing masks). I've even met new people during the pandemic, and I've kept in contact with some elderly people in my community which has been incredibly rewarding--these are the people most at risk from the pandemic and the dangers of isolation and with the most experience to offer you.
This is just what has been working for me. I hope something here helps someone.
[1] https://www.halhigdon.com/training-programs/marathon-trainin...
I don't know how I'm going to guide my children through this new dark age.