By: Revanche

Living in the time of pandemic: COVID-19 (203)

April 22, 2024

Year 4 of COVID in the Bay Area.

Year 5, Day 19: My OB’s covering person is being really thorough. She’s approving routine prescription refill requests, and emailed me to follow up on health issues I reported in 2019 and 2020 first, before approving them. They’re not a problem anymore but that was weird and unexpected. If only all doctors were as diligent (and believed their patients with chronic issues).

Brain fog is thick today, and I find myself easily irritated by the littlest things that require brain processing. I have so little to spare today, y’all, I need every little bit I can hold onto! But I got through a record amount of work with some time to spare for recruiting JB into my weeding crusade. Quality may be another question entirely but for now we’re not asking that one.

But in “happyyyyy??” (as they would say it) news, it was Smol Acrobat’s turn to make me think they were bodyswapped. They ate their entire dinner using their own hands, including veggies, without a complaint or dragging heels. After each food group they’d turn to me: I ate my vegetables, are you happyyyyy?? They used the toilet and the real capper: put on their face lotion all by themselves. They NEVER do the face lotion! They always kick and whine and fuss. I know it won’t last so I’ll marvel over it now.

Year 5, Day 20: Our bills coming due this and next month will be spectacular in the blowing cash flow sort of way. I keep thinking what on earth did we spend on??? Oh yes, Sera 🐶 (4 digits this month alone), the new washing machine (another 4 digits), therapy. Some big ticket items are coming up soon too, between life insurance and homeowners insurance premiums, so I am having to harness my “we have enough cash for all the things” feelings, particularly when it comes to mutual aid. There’s so much need but we have to take care of our responsibilities first.

Speaking of which: we have a working washing machine again! Thank goodness. We didn’t replace the dryer because it was still working, please cross your fingers that it continues to behave another few years to justify not replacing them both at the same time (which would have saved $300). I’d like to keep it out of landfill for at least 3 more years (totally arbitrary number).

After getting dive bombed by that daddy long legs, and catching and releasing it outside, I caught the little sneak trying to get back inside the house three more times. I yelled “you don’t live here” but it just tucked up against a box and ignored me. Rude.

I took the Favorite IA Supporting Character Quiz and ended up with Her Grace. I do like her a lot. But maybe primarily because she’s linked her survival to Dina and so she won’t turn on her. I’d be less of a fan if she weren’t so bound.

Year 5, Day 21: 🐿️ mode today. My brain wants to dwell on “you’re a bad friend and a bad person“. I asked a longtime friend for advice and they were angry at me when it landed as selfish and inconsiderate. Of course I apologized, I try not to be horrible to my friends intentionally but am not immune to accidentally being so. They haven’t spoken to me since so it feels like I broke our friendship over asking for advice. That feels awful. And as another friend observed, my brain reflexively blames me when things go sideways so if someone I respect and care about deeply called me selfish, maybe they’re right. I mean, they’re definitely right that I haven’t been able to check in with everyone I care about on a regular basis. I try, but this year has kicked my ass in so many dimensions I can’t even count the number of ways I feel like a failure, so that plus one, now. Maybe there’s something else going on but, in the end, they felt I was selfish at them and seemingly don’t want to be friends anymore. That sucks. This whole thing hurts. But I’ve done my best to mend fences to no result, so the best I can do now is to try not to destroy myself over this.

My gut reaction (to blame myself and go to that dark place of just how horrible am I) is not super healthy so, after a hefty dose of therapy, I’m working overtime to stay in neutral emotionally even if I can’t manage to be affirming. That means constantly redirecting my brain every single time it wants to go There. That means SQUIRREL!

I started a load of laundry. Filled the dishwasher and started that.

My seeds still haven’t shipped. *Poke poke* Ship them! So that I can plant them and then stare at the soil waiting for them to grow..

We had to file our tax return very close to the deadline so it’s still processing. Poking “Where’s my refund” won’t make them process any faster buuuuut…

I ordered garden stakes, maybe they’ll arrive when the seeds arrive.

I scheduled recheck appointments for Sera 🐶 who still isn’t eating nearly enough to sustain life. Her appetite dropped off last week and it’s been a daily struggle to get her to eat anything but a handful of treats. She’s weak and unsteady on her feet much of the day and some of that may be her disease but the low caloric intake cannot be helping. She’s also increasingly resistant to taking her meds. I’d started out giving them to her with pill pockets, now she refuses the pill pockets. She keeps chewing them up and spitting them out. WHY. The whole point is that you don’t need to taste them! I started giving her a handful of treats, roughly the same size, mixed up with those pill pockets. That worked for two doses, then she started chomping on the entire handful and spitting it out. Now I’m wrapping them in smaller pill pocket wraps and embedding treats in those smaller pieces. Cross your fingers that she stops being so picky about it all? I really don’t want to have to pill her twice a day. It’s unpleasant for everyone.

There are MANY more things on my to do list but I can’t seem to spare the executive function to schedule any more things, so keep circling back to my emotional support bank accounts for comfort. Alas, it’s not helping the way it used to.

Year 5, Day 22: Taking care of Sera 🐶 is bringing up all the grief from losing Seamus as she declines in small but significant ways. She wandered the hall last night for hours. I took her out for a pee at midnight just to be sure she was ok and she paced intermittently for the next three hours. I listened to the click click click of her nails, remembering Seamus’s last months when he’d have confused nocturnal meanderings and I’d have to get up and help him settle down. But his first choice was to settle right on top of Sera. She didn’t object.

She absolutely refuses to take her meds now. She will take the treat wrapped pills from Smol Acrobat’s palm, not mine, but then she bites it in half and spits it out. Her appetite is very low. Her energy is correspondingly low. She’s still responsive to us but in a grumpy detached sort of way. She doesn’t follow me around half as much as she was doing last month. Her walks are much shorter and a little less frequent, by her preference. She doesn’t like to sunbathe when it’s warm anymore, she prefers when it’s cold. It feels like a lot of these changes developed in the past two weeks. I’m hoping that my gut instinct is right. I’m hoping she’s just exhausted from months of treatment, twice monthly pokes for bloodwork, six walks a day, etc, and needs more time to bounce back. Hell, I’m exhausted from all of this and I’m not the sick one. So I try to hug her and rub her ears as often as I’m tending to her and hope really hard she’s going to come back from this.

Year 5, Day 23: This Ask a Manager post reminds me of my regular musing about retirement (whenever it is, early or not). Will I have enough to occupy my time by then? It really depends on where we are in life by that point. I have friends who retired early who are busier than they were when they worked. We currently have young kids and an aging dog, and that makes us REALLY busy because their needs are so high now but that’ll change. Who knows what that’ll look like ten years from now. And who knows what my community and friendships will look like ten years from now. I’m terminally online socially because I can handle that. Socializing in person, even with people I like a lot, leaves me so very drained.

In other news, I’m so frustrated with these work people who are actively obstructive. Driving home in an empty car, a rarity, I made like Orro and screamed my frustration to the heavens. I did not claw the air, though I wanted to, both hands on the wheel. It helped a little. Like a tea kettle venting steam. Nothing has changed but at least I don’t feel like I’m going to burst with the pressure of keeping it all in.

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