ANTICIPATION

In a recent conversation with my daughter I discovered one of the losses that many are experiencing in this time of COVID 19. She talked about a feeling of let-down after Easter. In this time when so much of what is familiar about holidays has been stolen from us, she tried to keep some pattern.  Got a ham.  Cooked a special brunch. Hid Easter eggs. Church on line. A remnant of normal.

But then the day after.  A let down. And then, “What do we have to look forward to? School activities for her boys? Graduation? Church Camp? Family vacations?  Who knows?”

In this conversation I was reminded  of a sermon I heard almost 60 years ago in a chapel service in college. The speaker (Fred Craddock) told us college students to never surprise our parents by going home unannounced. He told us that by doing so we rob our parents of one of the greatest joys in life, “Anticipation of your coming home.”

And that is one of the losses in this crisis: anticipation.  We find so much joy in life planning ahead and then looking forward to the forthcoming event. We make a date for next week and then enjoy looking forward to it.  We plan a trip and then anticipate it. So much of the joy of our lives is anticipation.  

But right now, we can’t fill that empty future with plans. There are too many uncertainties. We don’t know when it will be safe to hug people, to shake hands, to gather in groups, to go to work, to go to church.  And not only do we not know when, we don’t know how this will happen. There are projections, but we don’t know for sure if immunity follows for those who have had the virus or what medicines might treat it. We don’t know when a vaccine will come online.

So, instead of filling the future with plans and exciting celebrations to look forward to, we fill that empty space with troubling scenarios that cause fear and anxiety. It is the absence of these anticipated pleasures that leaves space for feared threats. For a while we have to live with the loss of longer term plans. We feel sad, disappointed, empty, let down.

In the absence of anticipation that brings us so much joy in life, maybe we can make plans for each day instead of several months down the road. We can plan to call a couple of friends today. Plan to do a video chat with family members who are far away. And maybe, rather than surprising others with a call, set an appointment with them. Put it on both calendars so that you can each look forward to it. One family I know plans movie nights with different members making their choice for all to watch. Another mother is planning to cook a dinner with her young daughter.

We don’t have to live entirely without anticipated pleasure. We can plan enjoyable activities for which we can look forward. That way we can fill the empty future with some joyful anticipation rather than just empty dread.

FAMILY

During these COVID 19 days, many of us are spending much more time than usual with our families. Certainly there are some who are alone, and that has its own peculiar challenges. But, today I am thinking about those who are sheltering in place with several other people. Many of those families include adults and children.

Some are discovering that togetherness can be stressful. Families normally have some rhythm of intimacy and distance. We create patterns of coming together for some activities and then separating for other activities.  Each family has its patterns which make it possible to tend to our need to love and nurture others and our desire to care for our own unique needs.

But now, forced togetherness places unusual stress on the family. Families are systems. They are a gathering of people in which each plays her/his role. Each person’s actions impact the feelings of others.  When one person is anxious others in the system pick up on that vibration. In these days of forced separation from our normal patterns, our friends, our dreams, our activities, almost everyone in the family system has anxiety.  We worry and are fearful of what is happening in our world. Plans have been scuttled, dreams lost and hopes delayed.

When family systems vibrate with anxiety it is hard to feel the comfort and security that we have often felt from our family unit. The loss of life as we have known it takes a toll on our coping skills. When everyone in the family is adapting to new patterns and new limits, stress will inevitably mount. Sometimes it might even overflow and things are said and actions are taken that we would regret in less stressful times. Loss of comfort and security simply intensifies anxiety.

Unfortunately no instruction manuals came with this crisis. Each individual and each family is making it up as we go. How can we reduce our family anxiety?

A couple of things come to mind. 

Count to 10

One is “count to 10.” When we are anxious and our fuse is shorter than usual, it sometimes helps to give some space between our immediate feelings and our response to those feelings. Counting gives us time to remember that the other people in the house are also trying to figure out how to live these days. Maybe we can think about the grace we want for ourselves when we are confused and scared and offer that grace to the others. We will all make mistakes. Forgiveness might be healing. This is not always easy but it might help us not add to the anxiety and tension by reactions that we might later regret.

Go Short

We might also need to shorten our perspective for a while. Most of time we plan ahead and anticipate what is coming down the road. But we don’t know what that is going to be. We fill that empty space with things we fear. We become scared. So, it might help to reduce stress to shorten your vision to more “here and now.”  “What can we do right now to live together in loving relationships. What are our choices for this hour or this day.” This perspective may moderate our anxiety for a while.

Expect Less

And maybe we can lower our expectations of ourselves and each other. What worked in normal times might not work now. We will do some things that work well and others that turn out to be disasters.  Maybe we can access our sense of humor and ignite some laughter at ourselves. When we are not sure what is the right thing to do, we will have to try, stumble, fall, pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off and try something else.

Since we are all making this up as we go, we need companions on this journey. So, reach out to other parents. Share your successes and failures. If we are in this together we need to help each other write some operations manual to get us through. 

PATIENCE

Each day is a new day in COVID 19 time. What we heard yesterday shifts and changes. Projections of illness and death increase. The changes escalate as new data is evaluated. Some talk of the coming of a new normal.  Right now, “normal” does’t last long enough to qualify for that moniker. These are indeed liquid times.

And we don’t know how long this liquid time will last. Dreams of Easter are smashed on the rocks of reality. Schools stop and will begin . . . no one knows. Jobs have screeched to a halt and no one knows what work will be coming and when. Fear of the unknown runs like an undercurrent as we try to get our balance.

As we deal with the loss of the world that we once knew, we want to some information that will help us make plans. As humans who must figure out how to live and thrive, we need to have some information that will help us give shape to future possibilities. When the information is constantly changing we feel adrift and anxious because we can’t figure out what to do next.

So, I am finding that my patience is being stretched. I wouldn’t call myself a patient man anyway, but this is a real strain. The word patience comes from Latin patientia "the quality of suffering or enduring; submission," also "indulgence, leniency; humility; submissiveness (Online Etymology Dictionary). Enduring suffering can be really difficult. My suffering is minimal. I have lost much physical contact with friends and family whom I love.  Planed travel has been scrapped. Getting groceries and supplies is more of a challenge.

But, the suffering of the world  weighs heavily on my soul. My losses pale in comparison to the losses of hundreds of thousands. . .  millions. The spiritual, psychological, emotional and economic losses cascade like a raging water fall. Where do we get patience? How do we endure?

I am not sure you can manufacture it. For me there are couple of things that help.  One is perspective. I can find patience if I moderate my expectations. If I think this will be over and “life will go back to normal” in a couple of weeks, I will be impatient when it takes several months and normal is something else from what I expected.  If I expect it to take longer I can endure and suffer with less urgency. 

And it helps me to know that loss is the soil for new life rather than a return to old life. Normal will be something different. Some of the old ways of relating are not possible now. And I am frustrated and sometimes sad. And I am also discovering ways of relating with the same people that are fun.  So, what I am learning now might help me discover the good in the new life that will emerge after.

“Patience is a virtue,” my mother used to say.  Her voice sings its song of encouragement in my mind these days. Now if I could only be virtuous in that way.

ANGER

I find that I have a shorter fuse than normal. Edginess roils at my stomach. Anger leaks out. I swear more. I am more impatient. I don’t think I am alone. Much of what I read in the news, much of what is shared in the social media, is anger. Attacks and counter attacks. Accusations and blame. Conflict and confusion. Worry and stress.

And I am reminded that anger, whatever else one can say about it, is a response to threat. When we feel threatened, when we are confronted with the possibility of loss of what we value in life, our bodies react. Adrenaline is released into the body as energy. That energy is designed to give the body the capacity to protect itself. As animals, our frequent strategy for protecting ourselves is to fight (lash out), flee (run away) or freeze (zone out, numb down).

And I find myself doing each of these things at different times during any given day. In the grip of our COVID 19 crisis. one of the problems is that we don’t know what to do with that energy. The threat (enemy) is amorphous. It is lurking in so many unknown corners of our lives that we don’t know where to focus our resistance. And we then try to find somewhere to focus the energy. Thus, attack and accusation. Or flight and escape. Or numbing down.

Another problem is that, when we don’t know where to focus our angry energy, we sometimes focus it on those closest to us. Since we are isolated and living in small circles of contagion, we unintentionally release our anger on those we love the most. Tension can mount in these times because of our fear of the losses we are experiencing.

But, we can moderate our response to this threat. As human animals, we do have some capacity to choose. We don’t have to simply impulsively strike out at others, or hide emotionally or freeze others out. We can decide what to do what that energy and turn it into power for the living in these days.

I know some people use the energy to do yard work—work that needed doing but their lives have been so busy with work and kids that they couldn’t get around to it. Others have cleared out closets. Some have spent time walking and picking up litter. Physical activity is one way to express that energy.

Others may be less physical in their activity but just as focused with energy. They are making cards and sending them to others, making phone calls to isolated people, painting pictures, creating stories, feeding the food insecure. Some seek new ways to help and contribute to the good of others.

Now don’t get me wrong. I am not saying, “don’t get angry.” As long as this virus threatens so much of what is important to us, our body will produce adrenaline to give us energy to find ways to protect ourselves. I am simply encouraging us to work to find some ways to use that energy to enrich our lives and the lives of others rather than allow it to roam among us, causing us to fight each other, to freeze each other out or to sink into constant numbing of our feelings.

TIRED?

Sometimes we think that a break from our routine would give us a chance to rest and catch up on our sleep. All we need is an extra day after the weekend—or maybe a snow day where we can sleep in, stay in our pajamas all day and just read.

We may be projecting these expectations onto the changes we have had to endure as we are now a few weeks into the COVID 19 crisis. We now have those days. One after another. And strangely enough, we don’t necessarily feel rejuvenated. Some feel more tired than they did when they were in their routine.

I think this may be because the process of grieving loss is fraught with decisions about what to do now. When we have lost something significant we have to live without its orientating presence in our lives. If we are accustomed to spending 40 or 50 hours a week focused on work or school we have developed routines. Routines require less thought. We don’t have to make as many decisions.

But when we are learning to live without important realities in our lives, we have to make more decisions. And the word, decide means “to cut off.” Every choice for one actions cuts off other options that we cannot accomplish. When we cut off an options, we have to learn to live without them. Making decisions all day long in the absence of the routine that we have come to count on takes a lot of energy.

And this is especially an issue in this time of uncertainty. We have continually shifting input from experts about what might be the best decision. Everyone is trying to figure out the best way forward. We don’t know when or if “normal” as we have known it will return. Making our decisions in this context is even more exhausting than in other losses where the world around us hasn’t changed that much.

That may be why we are more tired in this time than we are under normal circumstances of routine work. Grieving the loss of the world the way it was requires much more energy in making decisions. So, you may be using much more energy than you realize.

So, take it easy on yourself. If and when can, rest. Develop routines in the present situation what you can count on. In so far as possible, sleep at the times that are normal. Expand your time of playing or listening to music. Allow a blooming flower to consume you. Savor the cup of tea. Your longterm health is important for your future.