Quote:
Originally Posted by rjolley
I took other comments that he's made over the last few weeks as he and his family were following social distancing, which means he agrees with the orders at least somewhat. The stricter orders could be a step too far...
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This probably warrants a little explanation, so I'm gonna attempt that.
2-3 factors play into that "social distancing observance" you noted. Some are known to some of you, some may be entirely unknown, I ain't gonna try to guess which is which so I'll just hit 'em all
1) My wife is an elevated risk category, as a lung cancer survivor. Not because of any immune system issues (she's long since cleared from that kinda stuff) but rather because she has roughly 1.3 lungs left after the surgery that entailed. Pretty much
any respiratory ailment for her is an elevated risk, and tougher to get through.
2) My mother-in-law lives just across town from us, she's 91. Hello elevated risk. We put her on lockdown in the early stages of all this mess, have handled her supplies, etc etc etc. She's literally been out of her house past the driveway once in ... two months? ... and that was for a doctor appointment.
*Let me note here that I can't put specific dates on my/our various behaviors cause, well, at this point I do well to figure out what day of the week it is without checking my computer clock, much less tell you dates & such. I'd tell you if I could but not even Googling a timeline let me pin it down very well. Sorry, that's just how it is.
So those two things combined for some "stages" of our behavior. Basically for 2? 3? weeks I handled about 98% of the various outings for food, supplies, etc. I was the lowest risk option available, simple as that.
Which brings me to the third factor which really represents the current stage / change in behavior, whatever you wanna call it
3) There ain't a helluva lot open around here. Athens went fairly hardcore on shuttering places independently of the (eventual) statewide stuff, give or take maybe 3 weeks ahead (the state order actually reduced some of that). A recent change we've made like switching to more delivery / less self-shopping has virtually nothing to do with health concerns and far far more to do with the practical limitations of self-shopping.
With the steady stream of trips I was making, to cover the needs of two households -- I know the Great Toilet Paper Search involved at least 11 stores over a 3 day period before FINALLY hitting the jackpot -- the constant drip-drip-drip of "will it be on the shelves or no" that came with every single turn of the aisle was getting to me.
My stress from that was getting to the level that I was conscious of it getting steadily worse, I was doing it with every item on the list large or small. That, plus the absurd conditions of trying to shop in person right now (Walmart parking lot looks like the last Saturday before Christmas), is why delivery became a higher priority option, not because I had any significant concerns about beer flu.
I think, maybe, that covers the subject about 50x more than anyone ever wanted to know.
But it's a mental health thread, right? Maybe it was ... theraputic for me in some way to actually put it into words, and in sequence. And I don't mean that facetiously. I am, daily, very aware of how little anybody anywhere wants to hear me bitch, since everybody is doing their own version of the same shit. And I'm trying REALLY hard to avoid it, so even talking about this level of detail MAY legit be useful, even if it falls short of cathartic.