For what it’s worth, the irony of any negativity remaining in this post following the April energy preview (suggesting that we stay positive in this time of recuperation) is not lost on me…

Last week, when drafting this post (April 8), I felt really bad physically, mentally, and emotionally. I had no idea how to handle the day.

For the few days before I began drafting the post, a word hounded me whenever I thought about how bad I had been feeling: regression.

You have probably seen this word a lot if you read parenting books and blogs: When your child is ill or is working on a new big skill, she may regress in other areas.

For example, when my son had an ear infection, his toilet training almost completely regressed. Almost as soon as the infection was gone, he resumed his previous level of toilet competence.

 

Social Distancing Begins

Before social distancing, my day followed a clear routine that I imagine is much like that of other  parents with children of school age and younger: up at a certain time, with set times for meals, work, meeting the school bus, and getting the kids bathed and to bed before dragging yourself to bed, sometimes already beyond exhaustion.

Once school in our state was canceled and my husband’s place of work closed for the purposes of flattening the curve, he and I planned to stick to our normal times for waking up but let the kids sleep in, then get our daughter’s eLearning out of the way early in the day so she and her brother can play freely the rest of the day.

I’ve been working full-time from home for eleven years now, so I well understand the importance of a routine on productivity, and in March, I stuck to our routine the best I could, making three meals a day for the family, getting the eLearning done early, ensuring that the kids were bathed regularly, and going to bed and getting up at set times

But in April, it’s all gone to shit.

 

The Shit Show

From March 30 through Apr. 3, I felt awful every day. I had problems breathing, I was lethargic, I was nauseated, I had no desire to eat, and I was constipated. I couldn’t work, couldn’t read, could only sit—not even upright most times—and sleep most of the day away. In short, I was stagnant.

Coincidentally, it was April 3 when we took my son in to see the doctor, and that’s when we received the diagnosis of ear infection. Cleaning up in this time of toilet regression added to the stress in our home. My husband and I have been through regressions of other sorts with both kids before, and we knew this one would end and everything would go back to normal for our son would. But that didn’t help much in the moment, as we threw one more pair of underwear into the soaking bucket and scrubbed the carpet yet again.

The next week, I realized I was sleeping all the time because I wasn’t eating enough. I started to force myself to take in a little food and drink every so often—and was rewarded by being able to work for almost three hours each day, with lots of breaks between. I felt incredibly successful.

 

I have been trying to actually pay attention to my body and give it what it needs instead of forcing myself to get up at a certain time or to work, even though we need the money.

I haven’t been making breakfast. My husband takes care of himself; I force myself to eat a handful of something to keep my nausea at bay and my energy levels high enough that I don’t just sleep the day away. Our son refuses to eat until 9 a.m., his snack time while his sister was in school. My daughter sleeps until sometime between 8 and 10:30, and I give her something easy for breakfast, like a leftover pancake.

Lunch is similarly slapdash. My husband has a protein shake, and one of us scrambles to put something in front of the kids around noon. I again force myself to eat a handful of food.

For about a week and a half (since making myself eat a little protein every few hours), I’ve been really successful: I’ve made dinner each night—so long as it’s not too complex.

Rather than eat dinner as a family at the dinner table, which is our normal weekday habit, we’ve been eating in the living room—maybe with a DVD in, maybe not. The kids may or may not get bathed. My son might be in bed by 7 p.m. The rest of us go to bed between 7 and 8 p.m., and we fall asleep whenever our son finally quiets enough for us to fall asleep.

I don’t know if our behaviors of April are going to be a blip on the radar or if we’re somehow moving to a new “normal.”

 

Essential, Nonessential, and Unsolicited Advice

Technically, my husband works for a company that is “essential,” but its been closed since mid-March, so his income hasn’t been coming in. My publishing clients are still paying, but sporadically, given all the challenges they face in being “nonessential,” so I feel somehow justified in my sporadic efforts on their projects this month.

I’ve had no intuitive or Reiki clients during this time, and though I’ve thought about reaching out to remind people that all my services can be very helpful right now and can be performed remotely, I don’t know that I have that kind of energy right now.

I’ve even stayed away from much interaction on social media. I used to visit certain groups—usually spiritual and entrepreneurial—daily, and I loved interacting, but these days, I’ve grown cold on them. I feel like 99% of what I see in those groups is about how you can grow your business during this time, or how to not lose your business during this time, or how a lot of good can come of this time spiritually—if you’re putting in the work (ostensibly while everyone else lounges around and eats bon bons while bingeing Tiger King), of course.

To be honest, those posts all ring hollow with me.

They all feels like unsolicited advice—you know, like when you’re walking down the street, pregnant, and someone you don’t know walks up out of the blue and starts telling you how to raise your child once it arrives.

I’m not interested in any advice right now.

In this moment, I’m not interested in growing my business. I have no interest in anything.

It’s taking all my energy just to live.

It’s taking all my energy just to not go crazy … and I’m not sure I’m succeeding.

It’s taking all my energy just to remember to feed myself and take the medicines I need to take, so I can function at the bare minimum to feel moderately human and to help my spouse keep my kids fed and their laundry clean.

 

I’m still grieving.

At this point, I’m not even sure I know everything I’m grieving over.

A lost way of life? Maybe.

My previous energy levels? A little.

The physical pain and uncertainty I’m facing? Certainly.

 

Worldwide Regression

I think everyone in the world is in a regression of some sort right now.

Part of the mystical side of me thinks all of my physical discomfort since March 30 could be because of “energy downloads” happening for “human ascension.” Or that this is all a result of me announcing to the Universe—coincidentally (?) on March 29, the last day I felt normal—that I was ready for accelerated spiritual learning. (Be careful what you wish for.) Or that as an energetically sensitive person, I’m picking up on all of the crazy energy from everyone else in the world and am displaying the symptoms physically.

Then there’s the completely nonmystical side of me that has alternately worried that I have a urinary tract infection, COVID-19, a kidney stone, a newly developed food allergy, pancreatitis … Heaven only knows (I seriously can’t remember) what else has run through my mind as a possible cause of all of my weird symptoms.

Maybe my body’s regressing just like my son’s did, but in response to the stress and grief.

Whether the cause is mystical or nonmystical—or some combination—however, I feel broken. And I just want to feel normal again.

I’ve finally been unwell long enough that I decided to see a doctor to try to get some answers. I know that we will finally find answers and that, just as with the current pandemic, the grief and tension from the unknown will go away (perhaps to be replaced with another grief). I also know that eventually, when the immediate huge threat of COVID-19 passes and social-distancing measures will no longer be (so extensively) required, we will be able to step out of our regression and start figuring out our new normal.

Deep down, I think we all know it will be impossible to return to life as we knew it before COVID-19. To be honest, I don’t think many of us want to, because we’ve learned a few things during this regression.

I think right now, it’s okay to say, “I’m doing the best I can,” and to just pay attention to your body, your emotions, your spirit, as well as the state of the world. I think we’re all learning things right now about our society, our bodies, and even our mental health—things we didn’t want to admit before or that we were just too busy to pay attention to.

For now, it’s okay to just be in it, to cope the best way we can, and to not be okay. There will be time enough later to make sense of it all.

 

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My Year of Shadow and Light (My Memoir)

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