Pandemic Expectations and Chronic Illness

Confession: This past year I have been spending a lot of time – A LOT – on binge watching shows on various streaming networks and playing games on my phone. And I’ve decided to be totally ok with this. Because I have multiple chronic illnesses and I’m living through an historic pandemic.

Something that I’ve been thinking about a lot over the past year and that has become more and more apparent in the pandemic is our society’s addiction to productivity. And placing value on people based on how much activity they can do, how much money they can make, how much they can produce. What a student’s grades are. Our worth in society is very much tied to how productive we are.

This is a big problem for those of us in the chronic illness community and has a dramatically negative impact on our sense of self-worth and self-acceptance. And it’s become a big problem for all of us in a pandemic. If someone had told me five years ago (pre-chronic illness) that I would be spending so much time binge watching shows and playing phone games, I would definitely be harshly judging myself. But here we are.

The pandemic has impacted all of us. Activities have been canceled, schools have closed, and many places are still closed or open in a limited capacity. At first everyone seemed relatively content to live a slower-paced life and spend more time at home. But very quickly, this idea wore off and most of us have longed to go back to “normalcy”.

But almost a year later things are still not normal. And they can’t be. Covid-19 is worse than ever in my area. Our local hospital is almost full to capacity. Multiple friends and acquaintances of mine have become very sick or died. This is very much not normal. And yet, many of us have reverted back to our “normal” expectations of productivity. While I am in no way minimizing the huge detrimental losses this pandemic has had on many people’s livelihoods and finances because it’s heartbreaking, I do want to talk about our society’s productivity expectations.

As our hospitals are dangerously close to overcapacity, schools in my area have reopened for in-person learning. The main reason stated? Kids have failing grades; kids are struggling. They are, truly. There is no question that kids are really struggling. But why? My thoughts? In large part because they’re not meeting “normal” expectations. And because “normal” expectations and productivity is considered so very important in our society, many are willing to risk safety to continue achieving them.

But we’re in a pandemic. People and kids especially are depressed and anxious and lonely. And all of these emotional struggles take up a lot of our mental and physical energies. “Normal” expectations are not achievable or realistic right now. And maybe they never were? We need to be kind and generous and loving to ourselves and our children. We need to have pandemic expectations. And a new, better, more healthy “normal”.

Chronic illness people need to be especially generous to ourselves in our thoughts and feelings and expectations during a pandemic. But also, always – even when the pandemic is over. It takes us chronic illness warriors at least 10 times (and for some more) the amount of energy to complete everyday tasks. Tasks that didn’t even take me a second thought five years ago. There is no way that I can currently meet my previous expectations for myself. And therefore, we need to ignore our society’s unrealistic expectations of productivity.

I think if we were all a bit more generous to ourselves and others, especially us chronic illness warriors, we would see dramatic improvements in our mental health. I am not lazy if I take a nap, watch TV, play phone games, skip my regular workout, take a day off from work, work less hours, let my kids play on their electronics past the recommended time limits, miss responding to texts or phone calls or emails right away, etc., etc. In fact, phone games actually play an important role for me sometimes in distracting me from my high pain levels.

I’m not talking about extremes such as neglecting your children – I was neglected as a child and it was very painful – or neglecting other important responsibilities. But just some healthier adjustments to our schedule and routines and expectations.

Productivity is not the highest goal. Let’s stop shaming ourselves and our children. Yes – unrealistic expectations right now are shaming even though that is not their intent. We’re surviving a pandemic. I’m surviving serious chronic illnesses. We’re all learning resilience. We’re all learning (hopefully) how to put others before ourselves. We’re all hopefully learning how to love ourselves and others better. Moving forward let’s find a better more healthy “normal”. Our current one is not really working for us.

I am still valuable and worthy even if all I did during a day is snuggle my 10-year-old while she watches her favorite shows. My worth and yours is not tied to how much we got done today. Love yourself. Love your kids. You and they are worth it.

Leave a comment and let me know how you’re being generous to yourself. What have you allowed yourself to do to recover or save mental and/or physical energy or cope with chronic pain during this pandemic?