COVID-xiety
Living with crushing anxiety in the age of COVID-19
My 9-year-old boy pipes up on his zoom call in the living room. Apparently the fable of the three little pigs is about the consequences of adequate preparation. How ironic. My husband curses softly in his makeshift office: the WiFi is acting up again, freezing his Bloomberg screens. He has been staring at them since 6:30 this morning. My 11-year-old daughter is her bedroom, giggling, singing a song in her zoom Mandarin class. “It’s so silly, Mommy” she declares while briefly on mute as I deliver her breakfast. I move stealthy from location to location, cleaning as I go. Delivering food and hugs, taking away dirty laundry, used water glasses, drained coffee cups. I am at once the housekeeper, the short-order cook, the tech help, the psychiatrist.
Having moved to Arkansas to be closer to my sister as we rode out this storm, my family has been stuck home together for a month now. We’ve had no personal contact with anyone other than with my sister and my parents. We consider ourselves lucky to have even that much. The cases in Washington County, where my sister has lived for the past seven years, are still in the low double digits. Social distancing is practiced religiously in this Bernie-loving college town. Restaurants and shops have been closed for a while. People give each other a wide breadth on the streets and in the numerous outdoor parks, for the simple reason that they can. There are few of us and a great deal of space. It’s unsettling for a New Yorker like me.
These are truly unprecedented times. Much is expected right now of our nurses and doctors, of hospitals and caretakers. An undue burden has been put upon on anyone in a “critical” role — which I hope we have now and forever more come to realize includes our grocery workers, pharmacists, truck drivers, our mailmen and delivery personnel. But not much is expected from the rest of us — other than to just stay home, stay safe. To not add to the burden of others. To cover our mouths when we go out. To wash our hands when we come home.
It’s really not too much to ask for… if.
If we knew when it would all end. If we knew when life would resume. When schools would restart and shops will safely reopen. If we could mark a large red X on our calendars for that party to celebrate an anniversary, a birthday, a wedding. If we could be certain that our jobs will be there waiting for us, hungry for our efforts after the months of quiet. If we knew that our savings, our livelihoods, our very lives and the lives of those we love would not be threatened by this merciless virus that seems to choose its victims heartlessly.
But we don’t. No one does. And the absence of knowledge has always been fear — and so we rightly feel anxious. What under different circumstances would be a pleasurable respite from the hustle and bustle of our busy lives turns into a poison pill for us all to swallow unwillingly, daily. It’s hard not to think: “who or what will I lose before this is over?”
This worry is enough to drive me mad most days, unless I prefer to drown myself in food and Netflix. Either will do. Neither is sustainable in the long run. And let’s face it — we are all in this mess for the long run.
I know anxiety well. That bitch and I are old, old friends. And she is bigger than ever now, sitting in on every happy moment. But there are ways to mute and muzzle her. I’ve learned every lesson below the hard way:
I focus on the mundane. Life is made out of small, inconsequential moments: A few minutes spent baking cookies with my daughter. A math game played with my son. An hour curled up with a good book. I try hard to stay in these moments. Be present. Focus on what I am doing. Enjoy it, the best I can.
I organize and clean. Making beds, cleaning bathrooms, keeping the kitchen shelves neat, making to-do lists and crossing them off. I find that there is a great deal of satisfaction to be had from accomplishing the simple tasks that keep our homes livable.
I walk. I know how impossible that sounds for those of us quarantined in our tiny NY apartments, but I find that I have to take steps to deal with my anxiety. Literally. So I pace in circles if I have to or now I walk around the neighborhood since I have that luxury. But one way or another I get to 8000+ steps in a day.
I medicate. Anxiety is an illness. And just like any other illness (a headache, a stomach ache, a sore throat) there are thankfully medications that can treat it. There is absolutely no shame in taking these medications so that you are not crippled by this disease. The shame would be not taking them and letting anxiety ruin your life. So when I need to, and with the guidance of my therapist, I medicate.
I try not to borrow trouble from the future. My mom always says that you can never conceive all that will happen to you, good and bad. She is unfailingly right. I could never have conceived six months ago that I would be living in Arkansas this summer. Not in a million years could I have told you that. So who knows what will happen six months from now. I certainly do not. There is something liberating by surrendering to the fact that there are forces outside our own that shape our lives. So I deal with today. Live in today. And do my best to leave tomorrow to tomorrow.
My list may be different than yours. I know for sure that my worries are a privilege compared to many. I do not have to ponder where tomorrow’s meal will come from or if we will have a roof over our heads by the end of this chaos. And most importantly, so far, all friends and family have either isolated effectively or survived the virus without needing hospitalization. But anxiety does not listen to reason. She is cruel and unpredictable and will ruin your sleep and every waking hour if you let her. So I try my best not to let her. I don’t always win. But these days, I rarely give up without a fight. I refuse to let COVID-19 steal my sanity from me. This virus has already taken enough.
