How 2020 Has Numbed My Emotions & Killed My Positivity

The world has been mentally exhausting for a while now and I know a lot of us are feeling it. Between the fight of humanity and Covid-19, the lack of social interactions, losing faith in humanity, and not being able to escape any of it ...we're all under more stress then we ever could have imagined and I'm no exception. I'm trying my best to stay positive, I try to fight the negative thoughts that swamp my brain on the daily and remain as positive as possible. I look for the fun and excitement as I prepare to welcome our final child into the world but all I want to do is shut down and cry or yell and scream. There has been so many days where I've wished the bed would just open up and eat me whole. There has been so many days where I've wished I could run away from it all. So many days where I wake up and forget for just a second that this is the world we live in. I'm sick of saying I'm sick of the stress. I'm sick of saying I wish it was all over. I'm sick of saying I wish I could hug someone or that I could see some of my distant family again. and I'm sick of feeling like no one gives a damn about me. I know it isn't true, I know that I'm loved and have people around me who care for me... but the thing about all of this is, when you can't see your friends and family, you start to forget what being cared about feels like. I think we're all facing these feelings and I think we're all exhausted, which is exactly why we're seeing a rise in numbers. We all want to fight being alone because we've been alone for so long, so some are choosing to forget whats going on, block it out and do what they want. This just adds fear to the mix... fear that the company I work for that was shut down for 4 months is going to get shut down again... fear that I'm not going to get to see my friends and family for even longer... and fear that I wont be able to handle it anymore. The more people I talk to, the more mental exhaustion I see. Everyone is tired and fearful, no one is getting those things in life that we need to stay sane, everyone is diving into work because well... what else is there to do? I've been staying pretty positive this whole time, but life doesn't just stop because there's a pandemic. The normal stresses are still present and looming, the drama with family, money stress, work stress... these things are all still present and become overwhelming when there's already a pandemic in play that's forcing us to stay away from the things we enjoy and can do with our free time. Staying positive has become almost impossible, it feels like there's nothing I can do to help anything that's going on in my life right now except breathe and hope for the best. Every time I hear a fight break out, or someone tell me that this is going to go on forever... the dark cloud above my head grows. "How are you today?" they ask. "Alive," I say, and most nod in understanding. The more negative that creeps it's way in, the more stress that's put upon my shoulders... the more numb I feel and without the help of outside fun and interaction with friends... without those things I love to do... the harder it becomes to get out of bed in the morning. So what do we do about it? How do we get past this? How do we deal with the fear of interaction with others due to possibly contracting a virus or seeing a true side of them that no one wants to see? Honestly, I don't know... maybe just knowing that we're not alone in this will help. Maybe making an effort to check in on others will help us all know that we're not the only ones fighting this battle. I know that writing brings me joy and I know these emotions have stopped be from finding that joy currently... so maybe I need to write more blogs and designate less time scrolling tik tok and more time writing out my feelings... even if no one is listening. I hope you're surviving during all this. I hope you're finding some sort of positive during all this stress and uncertainty. And I hope you read this and realized that we're all in it together... we're all battling these feelings and trying to dig ourselves out of hopelessness. So try to remember that the next time your stress takes over and you want to scream at your neighbour, they probably have a lot going on in their home and mind as well. And most importantly... remind yourself that you're not fucking alone because right now, it feels like we all are.

Stay strong friends, we may have quite the journey ahead of us but the only thing we can truly do is remain understanding and hopeful... no matter how hard that may be.