Real World Peeves, Disgruntlement, and Irks.

[Duntada]

I was reluctant to try and start that show because people got kind of creepy with it online, but man did that show come out swinging when I started the first episode.

"Oh no! My one weakness! Dying!"

Alright show you have my interest...

[Testament]

I've had to go into work every day, so I suppose this sensation isn't something I'm able to really comprehend, labeled as an essential worker as I am. But working in a lab surrounded by Covid samples probably hasn't been too great for my mental health or stress.

What I have discovered is how truly alone I feel. Certainly I go into work, converse with my co-workers but something is missing. I go home and there's just...nothing. My cats, my significant other, certainly, but the friends I had before last year? Gone. Taking care of their own matters, their own lives. It's disheartening when you've tried to contact or reach out and told often that 'maybe later, let me call you'. And then you never hear anything. Despite how many times you try, and eventually, you stop trying.

And I've suddenly found that trying to connect with people, despite being around them through this entire over year long affair, there's less of a real connection anymore. People are too fearful of getting connected. Or maybe I am, I'm not sure. Could be it's just become so much harder than it used to be.

But what has hit me hardest is that I don't have any real connections anymore. Not in regards to real life connections. My online ones(the very few that I have)are different. You can only do so much. Mush with the ones that are into it. Or generally talk. But there's that lack of connection. Of being able to go out and do things together. Or just spend time together.

This solitude eventually starts to drain, starts to pull and tug and tear. Every day is exactly the same. You start finding yourself feeling strongly about stupid little things, because it's an excuse to feel something. It's hard to remember last week, because the week before that was exactly like the one that came after it, all blurring together. That's left me...I don't know, angrier. Getting annoyed about some process at work where it occupies more space in your head than it should and all you want to do is tell the Director that it's and stupid and you're making other suffer for it.. Or getting hurt by the fact that someone misconstrued something you said on a game as criticism when it was really just trying sympathize.

Maybe it's trying to put meaning to something, instead of looking down the barrel of one day after the next, repeating itself over and over. You try to occupy those empty spaces with hobbies, in an attempt to create something fulfilling for yourself. And maybe it's fulfilling for yourself, but it would just be nice a some point if it was noticed. Not even for being good, but the fact that you're trying. I daydream about that, thinking it could develop something more solid. Trying and failing to reach out to make some kind of connection and hoping something sticks.

I just feel very alone. And it's disturbing to consider the idea that this might be all I have to look forward to for the foreseeable future. And no amount of pills or talking to my therapist seems to make it better. It worries me.

[eye8urcake]

I'm super annoyed that my SO, whom I spend pretty much 24/7/365 with, seems pathologically inclined to mostly ignore me when I'm bored and doing nothing but to zero in and NEED ATTENTION BADLY whenever I try to focus on something in any meaningful or productive way... like the Python class I'm taking right now with a few friends who also want to learn it.

Every fucking time I manage to hone my focus in on it, he rocks up and MUST TALK ABOUT SHIT NOW. I don't even get it, and i don't know how to bring it up without being snotty about it so I just let it break my focus and then get fucking annoyed and kind of more down on myself than usual when I can't get it back when he's done (usually in a laughably short time, honestly).

Needless to say, my progress is slower than I like but thank goodness I have friends doing it with me because that is making it far easier to re-anchor into the material instead of just giving up.

[Wizz]

@solstice said in Real World Peeves, Disgruntlement, and Irks.:

This back to normal shit is happening too fast.
I can't just flip a switch and suddenly be okay in a sea of coworkers, vaccinated or no.

I've been doing Doordash off and on and let me just say how fun it is to see literally every business in the town I live in interpreting the changes just a little bit differently. I feel like I'm taking crazy pills, walking into a diner where the tables are still distanced and everyone is masked up, a bank where no one is masked or distancing and I feel like I stepped back in time or onto a movie set or something, a bakery with a zany mix and people working the counter with their noses exposed like they just barely started learning how to wear the fucking masks, etc.

It's also pretty aggravating and stressful to feel judged for choosing to continue to wear mine, despite being fully vaccinated. I've been smirked at literally every time I'm in public and I just want to shake them. They don't know me, or my medical history. Ugh, people.

Speaking of!

@testament said in Real World Peeves, Disgruntlement, and Irks.:

I just feel very alone. And it's disturbing to consider the idea that this might be all I have to look forward to for the foreseeable future. And no amount of pills or talking to my therapist seems to make it better. It worries me.

I feel you on this a lot. It's kind of funny, having a pretty small and tight-knit circle of friends was sort of a weird point of pride in my twenties, but damn if that isn't bleak as hell in my thirties when most of them are in different stages of life from me and we've all drifted apart. The pandemic absolutely did not help with that.

But hey, at least you've got us!!!

...that should be encouraging and not depressing and/or mildly horrifying ok

[Testament]

@wizz My thoughts on how I believe I'm perceived not only here but in most online spaces.

[il-volpe]

@eye8urcake oh god this. Can't get or keep their attention when you want it, can't get them to stop interrupting you when you don't.

[kk]

I am having a hard time adjusting to the pandemic being over. That might sound odd or maybe it doesn't sound so odd, I don't know how other people feel on this all.

I go places and see all these people without masks and get a bit nervous, maybe more than a bit. I put my mask even though I am fully vaccinated. I feel confused as strangers will get near to me while I am in my scrubs. Even the roads being filled to cars, feels more unreal than when they were empty.

I was convinced a few weeks back, we had a few rogue positive covid tests, that we had a variant in the building and the pandemic would all start a new and be vaccine resistant. I was terrified of that, but also resigned and ready to fight the next the battle in werid sort of way. I feel like I am just waiting for the next crisis to hit and can't stop the waiting. I don't even want to take my mask off when places say no mask required.

Us all testing negative and the state saying patient's don't even need to mask in the builiding anymore and life going back to normal has me feeling strangely a bit numb and confused. I should be happy and I kind of am. But I am kind of lost too. Things going back to normal feels surreal.

I find myself shifting between fearing a variant, being happy life is back to normal and feeling like...well it is hard to explain sort of shell shocked, not that I have the time to take a breath and be shellshocked. I lost several wonderful patients and I find myself thinking about them, long after other people in the building seemed to have moved on. I find myself reliving my own epperience of almost having a covid stroke and like...I almost died and I didn't even get that then. I was in the rush to get back to work while still short of breath, that seems sort of extreme now that I think about that. I am like was that really me?

I find it werid to see people gathering without masks and moving on and while I am glad that people are and happy about it, I sort of feel like I might never move on. I am not sure I even want to move on. It feels almost disrespectful to move on. I still cry over people who died. I cry over them more now than I did in the midst of things, I didn't have time to in the midst of things, but now it is really hitting me.

I am not fully sure how to move on. I feel like life will never be back to normal or back to the way it was before.

[kk]

And my air coniditor broke when its been 90! so hoooottttt.

[mietze]

I am finding that I'm starting to feel more of the trauma experienced earlier in the pandemic. Luckily in my immediate area people are still by and large wearing masks and keeping distance even when they don't "have" to so that is not a source of stress. But it does feel very strange to see people taking vacations again, saying they feel more normal, and having some events pushed forward (like the school district giving us a month and a half notice for and in person 4 ticket a graduate graduation ceremony) . Lots of people are happy about that but my kids have mixed feelings and so do I. It is like i got used to a certain equilibrium of functionality and now its rapidly upended by policy reversals and guidance reversals. And I'm more tired and unlike at the start there's no adrenaline rush into survival mode at all. At least for me it is manifesting as a profound sense of detachment with spikes of anxiety/feeling worthless/anger/grief briefly and then back to feeling like a blank wall of utter nothingness.

I was worried my kids were acting much the same way but they've started perking up a lot more. So I think I will thaw out more too eventually.

[Rinel]

@mietze said in Real World Peeves, Disgruntlement, and Irks.:

I was worried my kids were acting much the same way but they've started perking up a lot more. So I think I will thaw out more too eventually.

Kids are resilient, but keep an eye out for unusual behavior that lingers. I'm not trying to be an alarmist or say YOUR KIDS NEED THERAPY, but this has been tough on everyone, and psychological stuff is a lot easier to nip in the bud if you can catch it.

This applies to the rest of y'all, too, no matter your age. If your situation allows for it, I'd really strongly recommend seeing a counselor/lcsw/therapist for a couple of sessions just to let it out. And if you start displaying serious psychological symptoms, do everything you can to get help. Trauma is insidious.

Take care of yourselves.

[mietze]

@rinel we are, for a host of reasons a therapy friendly family, it's just like regular health care to us. So my kids have had access throughout their teen years in particular and we live in a state (and have taught/supported then in learning how) they can take charge and manage their care (as well as us helping out with transportation, ect). Most of the bigs have at least touched base with a therapist during this time. But we prioritize their care financially.

Unfortunately I do not believe what I am experiencing will be at all alleviated by talk therapy or medication, I think it is largely a matter of time. Thankfully due to previous work I know a lot of strategies for dealing with trauma issues, so those have been helpful in managing things this whole time. I'm glad that the unusual nature of this hasn't been personally triggering to me, having seen others suffer that because it is to them.

Sometimes things just are what they are though.

[Aria]

I think the thing that's getting me is how many people are saying "We're back to normal! We're back to normal!" except.... we're not.

I'm still working from home every single day of the week and because of various health issues in their respective families and households, have seen literally any of my friends in person exactly once, fully masked, standing outside in the street since.... March 1st of 2020.

My husband is still working the shitty, shitty job that was the only thing he could find after his company laid him off and for all these claims of being unable to find workers, he's had at least have a dozen companies email him to schedule interviews and then never reply to his reply, schedule interviews and then not show up, or get him through multiple rounds of interviews to never call or email him again, even with a form letter rejection.

Almost all of the ways we spent our free time were ones that involved very large crowds -- concerts and comedy shows and movie theaters, none of which will be happening for several more months where we live.

I still get an email about once a month from my program announcing another one of my classmates who just died from COVID. Including yes, literally this week.

So when people say that things are "back to normal", I honestly don't know what the fuck they're talking about. What is the phrase for feeling like you're being gaslit by 300 million people?

[faraday]

@aria said in Real World Peeves, Disgruntlement, and Irks.:

So when people say that things are "back to normal", I honestly don't know what the fuck they're talking about. What is the phrase for feeling like you're being gaslit by 300 million people?

Same.

[Tinuviel]

@aria said in Real World Peeves, Disgruntlement, and Irks.:

What is the phrase for feeling like you're being gaslit by 300 million people?

An election campaign.

Similarly, we shouldn't be aiming for 'back to normal.' Normal got hundreds of thousands of people killed. We should be aiming for better than normal.

[Aria]

@tinuviel said in [Real World Peeves, Disgruntlement, and Irks.]

Similarly, we shouldn't be aiming for 'back to normal.' Normal got hundreds of thousands of people killed. We should be aiming for better than normal.

^ This. If there's one thing I think the pandemic demonstrated, it's how many things were just.... fundamentally non-functional in our society and that I don't want to go back to.

So seeing so many different groups from schools to businesses to government agencies bungle it so badly in the hopes of rushing us back to things the way they were before we have the chance to notice or object is infuriating.

Even my own company, whose decisions I laaaaaaaaaaargely approve of (which is a big part of why I work there) is making a return to work plan that, while not dangerous, is inherently stupid. It absolutely takes zero advantage of a model, does nothing to lower our costs, actively exacerbates a few key space issues we've been having for several years now, and is pissing off employees. And the response by management is to shove their fingers in their ears, shout "LALALALALALALA CAN'T HEAR YOU", and double down.

[Arkandel]

@aria At this point I'm convinced many of the businesses who want workers to return just have leases for the office space they are already paying for, and they figure they might as well use it.

But they might be in for a rude awakening. Although not every line of work can WFH, the ones who can have had a year and a half to realize that hey... they can work for anyone. Maybe that other company located a thousand miles away will pay them better without having to deal with a 45 minute commute each way.

[Aria]

@arkandel In our case, they've decided that pretty much everyone except for people processing customer transactions can WFH two days a week. And for those folks processing customer transactions, the speed of them is mandated by federal regulations that were temporarily loosened due to the pandemic. That one is really not our call. Home internet simply cannot support the infrastructure required to meet those restrictions once they're restored.

The trouble is, they've decided that everyone on the hybrid schedule is going to be in the office and working from home on the same days.

Our space issue isn't going to get any better because we're going to need the exact same number of desks for our employees. Our parking and traffic issue isn't going to get better because all the same people will be on campus on all the same days. Our conference room issue, which has been a problem at least since I started in 2014, is actually going to get worse because people will not be shifting to Teams meetings despite our increasing number of offices globally. They're going to try to cram five days of in-person meetings into three days of conference room availability. Meanwhile, because we own the bulk of our buildings (at least in our US offices), that means that for the other two days of the week.... most of campus is just going to be sitting largely empty, costing us money to operate for the very (comparatively) small number of people on campus.

For people at my company who have both spouses employed there -- which is not unusual, as we have over 15,000 employees -- family care is going to get harder rather than easier because both people will have to be in the office on the same days. Including people in departments who already had customized schedules that will now have them overridden, even if those arrangements have been in place for years. I know at least one couple whose family is completely fucked now because of the shifts his wife works as a nurse really needing the schedule he'd had so their young children aren't left alone for two hours every morning, which just isn't an option at their ages.

It's especially aggravating given the fact that our space issues had necessitated that entire departments in certain areas work on a 3/2 model already, so it's been proven that with a rare few exceptions due to the nature of certain jobs we can manage just fine when employees pick their days with manager approval. Is it harder to keep track of in the paperwork? Yeah. But it works, we know it works, and because of the allotted flexibility, most of our employees are more than happy to shift their home lives around without any complaint or excuses for big lifts that actually need them, if you just give them a little warning. And for the departments that were used to it, there was absolutely no stigma associated with attending meetings remotely because literally everyone does it. It was just a question of which meetings based on which day they were booked, which actually made them easier to get on the books.

Whose stupid "solution" was this?!

[Rinel]

@aria said in Real World Peeves, Disgruntlement, and Irks.:

So when people say that things are "back to normal", I honestly don't know what the fuck they're talking about. What is the phrase for feeling like you're being gaslit by 300 million people?

Capitalism.

I'll say this, informed by but not exclusive to my leftist bent: the situation is not back to normal. But the attitudes of your bosses? They absolutely are.

[Selira]

Hey everyone -- please remember that we're human and we've all just been through something that humans really aren't supposed to have gone through. This shit is taxing as hell on our mental health and if you've been pushing that to the side, as society starts to move past the pandemic and you're struggling, then 1) remember that it's okay and expected and 2) try to take some time to address that. Depression, anxiety and even PTSD rates all shot through the roof recently. There's help for all of them out there.

Take care of yourselves.

[Aria]

@selira said in Real World Peeves, Disgruntlement, and Irks.:

Depression, anxiety and even PTSD rates all shot through the roof recently. There's help for all of them out there.

Take care of yourselves.

As someone who has legit been on and off meds for all three of those for the last... 22 years? And who has had multiple suicides in her family?

If you're overwhelmed by the mental health system* in the United States, I am more than happy to help you. Even if you don't particularly like me and I don't particularly like you, I will put that aside to answer any legitimate questions you have if you need help and have never done this before.

(*Note: I use the word 'system' as loosely as possible here. As loosely as possible.)