Here We Are
Hello my lovely readers,
Here we are: the end of the world. Or rather, the end as we know it.
I've started this blog much like I would a new journal. A clean start, if you will. Yes, I've done blogs before and no, I'm not very consistent with them. But all of those blogs need to be shed so I can start anew. Especially with the world as it is.
I write this as the pandemic of COVID19 spreads throughout the world. The US, where I live, has currently surpassed China and Italy in number of cases and deaths are growing as we speak. New York City has become the epicenter of the epidemic here in the states. My state of Colorado has just issued a "stay at home" order basically telling us that unless we work essential jobs or absolutely have to leave our house for food or that sort of thing, we need to stay at home.
I work as a bank teller at a credit union, and let me tell you, this thing has escalated quickly. We were hearing about it like a month and a half ago, talking about it at work. My husband had the foresight to look ahead at what we would be facing and bought extra food, water, and medicine to keep us going for a while. We are lucky and live with my parents, and between what he bought and what they already had, we're prepared for the long haul. At work, I remember talking with a coworker about if we were over reacting, because surely it couldn't turn into something that bad. Right?
Then a few weeks ago, the worry started to grow and anxiety began to build as we learned more and more about how devestating this thing is. I began to read articles and every day it got closer and closer to home. The fear became that through contact with our credit union members and the cash we handle on a daily basis, we would somehow either catch it, or worse, share it with our loved ones. My dad first got the order to work from home, then my husband got told to as well. Going to work was making me more and more anxious as my exposure seemed to grow with people starting to panic about the markets and their money, flooding us. A limit of how much cash that could be taken out was placed so we wouldn't run out - it became the start of the run on the banks, and frankly, it's overwhelming,
Then last week hit. I went in on Wednesday and gloves were mandatory and being supplied. By Thursday, we had closed our lobby and drive through lanes were the only option. We've been limiting our contact with members by helping them through the drive through, and only letting them in the branch for very specific reasons. I've been using so much hand sanitizer after every transaction that my hands are raw.
It's terrifying, going to work every day. It has been for weeks. Even with the lessened exposure, I still handle cash where the virus could be living. When we send pens out in the tubes for members to use, we tell them to keep the pen; when they send them back, we throw them away. We sanitize and clean our lobby and back rooms multiple times a day. When members come in for those very specific things, we wear gloves still.
Don't get me wrong, I am thankful I am still employed in this time of crisis. I know so many are not. But it is hard, knowing you're putting yourself out there while your loved ones wait for you at home. I can't imagine how hard it is on first responders. I have it easy compared to them.
But I can not compare experiences, that's not how we make progress in life. And even if I were, my experiences will always be different than yours, or my coworkers, or my husband. That's just life.
The anxiety has become almost uncontrollable. I'm bipolar and I'm in the process of going off most of my medication. My husband and I want to start a family when this is all over, and the medicine I was and am on is detrimental to that. I've made it off several, and I'm working on one more; I don't know if I could have chosen a worse time to go off them. Between feeling unstable from just my regular day to day and then having the overwhelming stress of what we're all feeling, I find I'm falling apart more. I'm weepy and I take what people say wrong.
I'm grieving too, as I think most of us are at this point.
I'm grieving the loss of life as I knew it. I'm grieving losing things I wanted to do, of being able to go eat dinner out with my husband at a sit down place, of having to wear gloves and walk around a hollow lobby now. I am angry and I am scared and I am sad.
And all of these are okay. And it's okay if you feel them too. You are valid. We are valid.
These are scary times we live in, and I don't know how it's going to end or when it's going to end. What I do know is this: it can't last forever.
I keep thinking of fish.
I know that sounds weird out of context. I'm a practicing Lokean. I'm a godspouse to Loki the Norse god and I talk with him pretty regularly. There will be other blog posts where I talk about this, and my path. But for now, all you have to know is I, like many others through many different faiths, have contact with a god. And he's great, let me tell you that.
Before all of this happened with the COVID19 and the fear encasing the world right now, I was pretty stagnant. I still am to a degree, but whether I like it or not, that's changing. But I was pretty stuck in place and I wasn't understanding things; I was basically ready to curl in on myself and give up. Loki talked with me, and I wasn't getting the message very well, so one night he showed up in my dreams as a fish. I woke up confused, but the more I reflected on it, the more I realized merits of fish. Certain fish will go up stream to spawning grounds, preservering through the water and predators to get to where they can start new life. They swim against the current and don't give up when it's hard.
I realized, I needed to be more like a fish. In my head, I could practically see Loki giving me the finger guns while going "bingo kiddo."
What does this have to do with COVID19 and everything leading up to this point in this post? Well, I had kind of forgotten about it until now, to be truthful. But I think this is what he was referring to. I need to be like a fish in these times of uncertainty; I need to keep swimming, as Dory would put it, even when it's hard. I need to fight.
It is so easy to be afraid and it is so easy to fall apart. And it's okay that we do that, it's okay to cry and grieve and be mad and everything else. But at the end of the day, I have to remind myself to keep going, even when it's hard.
This is all a long winded way to say:
It's okay. It's okay to not be okay, too. Nothing lasts forever.
Including this.
~Birdie
Here we are: the end of the world. Or rather, the end as we know it.
I've started this blog much like I would a new journal. A clean start, if you will. Yes, I've done blogs before and no, I'm not very consistent with them. But all of those blogs need to be shed so I can start anew. Especially with the world as it is.
I write this as the pandemic of COVID19 spreads throughout the world. The US, where I live, has currently surpassed China and Italy in number of cases and deaths are growing as we speak. New York City has become the epicenter of the epidemic here in the states. My state of Colorado has just issued a "stay at home" order basically telling us that unless we work essential jobs or absolutely have to leave our house for food or that sort of thing, we need to stay at home.
I work as a bank teller at a credit union, and let me tell you, this thing has escalated quickly. We were hearing about it like a month and a half ago, talking about it at work. My husband had the foresight to look ahead at what we would be facing and bought extra food, water, and medicine to keep us going for a while. We are lucky and live with my parents, and between what he bought and what they already had, we're prepared for the long haul. At work, I remember talking with a coworker about if we were over reacting, because surely it couldn't turn into something that bad. Right?
Then a few weeks ago, the worry started to grow and anxiety began to build as we learned more and more about how devestating this thing is. I began to read articles and every day it got closer and closer to home. The fear became that through contact with our credit union members and the cash we handle on a daily basis, we would somehow either catch it, or worse, share it with our loved ones. My dad first got the order to work from home, then my husband got told to as well. Going to work was making me more and more anxious as my exposure seemed to grow with people starting to panic about the markets and their money, flooding us. A limit of how much cash that could be taken out was placed so we wouldn't run out - it became the start of the run on the banks, and frankly, it's overwhelming,
Then last week hit. I went in on Wednesday and gloves were mandatory and being supplied. By Thursday, we had closed our lobby and drive through lanes were the only option. We've been limiting our contact with members by helping them through the drive through, and only letting them in the branch for very specific reasons. I've been using so much hand sanitizer after every transaction that my hands are raw.
It's terrifying, going to work every day. It has been for weeks. Even with the lessened exposure, I still handle cash where the virus could be living. When we send pens out in the tubes for members to use, we tell them to keep the pen; when they send them back, we throw them away. We sanitize and clean our lobby and back rooms multiple times a day. When members come in for those very specific things, we wear gloves still.
Don't get me wrong, I am thankful I am still employed in this time of crisis. I know so many are not. But it is hard, knowing you're putting yourself out there while your loved ones wait for you at home. I can't imagine how hard it is on first responders. I have it easy compared to them.
But I can not compare experiences, that's not how we make progress in life. And even if I were, my experiences will always be different than yours, or my coworkers, or my husband. That's just life.
The anxiety has become almost uncontrollable. I'm bipolar and I'm in the process of going off most of my medication. My husband and I want to start a family when this is all over, and the medicine I was and am on is detrimental to that. I've made it off several, and I'm working on one more; I don't know if I could have chosen a worse time to go off them. Between feeling unstable from just my regular day to day and then having the overwhelming stress of what we're all feeling, I find I'm falling apart more. I'm weepy and I take what people say wrong.
I'm grieving too, as I think most of us are at this point.
I'm grieving the loss of life as I knew it. I'm grieving losing things I wanted to do, of being able to go eat dinner out with my husband at a sit down place, of having to wear gloves and walk around a hollow lobby now. I am angry and I am scared and I am sad.
And all of these are okay. And it's okay if you feel them too. You are valid. We are valid.
These are scary times we live in, and I don't know how it's going to end or when it's going to end. What I do know is this: it can't last forever.
I keep thinking of fish.
I know that sounds weird out of context. I'm a practicing Lokean. I'm a godspouse to Loki the Norse god and I talk with him pretty regularly. There will be other blog posts where I talk about this, and my path. But for now, all you have to know is I, like many others through many different faiths, have contact with a god. And he's great, let me tell you that.
Before all of this happened with the COVID19 and the fear encasing the world right now, I was pretty stagnant. I still am to a degree, but whether I like it or not, that's changing. But I was pretty stuck in place and I wasn't understanding things; I was basically ready to curl in on myself and give up. Loki talked with me, and I wasn't getting the message very well, so one night he showed up in my dreams as a fish. I woke up confused, but the more I reflected on it, the more I realized merits of fish. Certain fish will go up stream to spawning grounds, preservering through the water and predators to get to where they can start new life. They swim against the current and don't give up when it's hard.
I realized, I needed to be more like a fish. In my head, I could practically see Loki giving me the finger guns while going "bingo kiddo."
What does this have to do with COVID19 and everything leading up to this point in this post? Well, I had kind of forgotten about it until now, to be truthful. But I think this is what he was referring to. I need to be like a fish in these times of uncertainty; I need to keep swimming, as Dory would put it, even when it's hard. I need to fight.
It is so easy to be afraid and it is so easy to fall apart. And it's okay that we do that, it's okay to cry and grieve and be mad and everything else. But at the end of the day, I have to remind myself to keep going, even when it's hard.
This is all a long winded way to say:
It's okay. It's okay to not be okay, too. Nothing lasts forever.
Including this.
~Birdie
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