6 Stages Of Isolation 😱😩🤪😞🙃😬

I’m not a scientist. And I don’t know this for a fact but I suspect that: 

…just like the five stages of grief there are also (at least) five stages of coping with the emotional changes we’re going through right now because of social isolation and distancing. Furthermore, I believe we’re all more or less going through the stages together! 

I say this because during our first week of sheltering in place every time something occurred to me (the feeling of it being Groundhog Day, the idea of having a virtual cocktail party, the never getting out of our sweat pants) I’d put it out there on FB and I’d notice that the same idea was occurring to all of us within days of each other. And similar notions simultaneously a week later, and so on…

And that makes sense. We are of the same species with the same unfathomable crisis disrupting our lives. 

Here’s my take on the stages…

Shortly after we realized the “lockdowns” weren’t rumor we went into…

1- Shock 

How would this affect our work, our job, our friends, our kids? Our vacation. Our bank account. Our morning Starbucks. Our sanity. Will we get sick? Will someone we love get sick?

2- Denial 

OMG, they must be joking. This has to be a dream. A nightmare. Finally, some fake news we can appreciate. How can they expect us to lockdown? Plus… THIS IS AMERICA! We will NEVER run out of toilet paper. 

3- Panic. 

We’ve run out of toilet paper!

4- Humor 

The endless memes and parodies. Humor is a powerful and necessary tool. But then I got sick of it. Did you? We no longer need to be in the Zoom where it happens. We don’t want to live in a strictly virtual world. I mean as an add-on it’s excellent. But now we have no option. It’s the only game in town if we want to see each others’ faces. To be honest, personally I’m starting to feel...

5- Depression 

The humor was a band-aid. How long is this REALLY going last? Plus, new companies are popping up to obviously take advantage of the situation. ie Houseparty, a cleverly branded (less businessy-than-ZOOM) social networking APP that’s targeting hormonally frustrated house-bound millennials who appear in their respective boxes camera-ready and a little too happy (exhilarated even) under the circumstances. 

OMG, I’m mad at Houseparty!  

6-Enlightenment

I forget about Houseparty! Who cares? I imagine the silver linings, the bright sides. I’m calm. Accepting. This is all happening for a reason. We’re over-scheduled. We’re so busy. The Universe is correcting itself. The world will never be the same. Nor should it. Maybe that’s a good thing. (But definitely not worth the casualties.)

But then a strange thing happens. I experience a relapse of depression. I go back under the covers. And then another wave of enlightenment. I’m motivated. Reading. Cooking. I have more creative energy than I’ve had in years. I start writing 3 new songs. My voice memos to myself are out of control. I come up with an idea for another book! There’s not enough time in the day.

Thing is, though, if you’re anything like me (and if you recall, I suspect you are), I have a feeling those last 2 stages (depression & enlightenment) are going to toggle until this thing is over. If we’re currently on a high my prediction is we’re going to crash again soon. And then we’ll bounce back and the toggling will continue. Hopefully the waves of depression will get shorter and shorter and the enlightenment longer and longer until we’re told we can go back in the water. And then…

We’ll miss this time alone. The empty calendars.

We’ll wonder why we didn’t appreciate it more when we had it.  

There are many more stages to this madness than we know. How can we know? We’ve never been here before. We haven’t been tested (no pun). 

But this IS a test. 

 A test of our emotional broadcast systems.

It’s far from the end of the story. 

Stay Safe.

😷

#Houseparty

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