GETTING BACK TO NORMAL.
By Mary Coen
The good news is we're
getting back to normal: the CDC has lifted the mask mandate for all those who
have been fully vaccinated and are two weeks beyond it. So the news this week
goes, but.....some caution may be appropriate here and not just about throwing
away all of our masks and hugging everyone we see. Along with our euphoria
there may be some confusion, discomfort and even anxiety. Recognizing these as
normal in ourselves and in others, especially in our children, can help us
weather these unusual times.
We have just spent 14
months covering half of our faces and avoiding crowds. We may cognitively
accept that it is now safe to be surrounded closely by people with their full
faces exposed but be emotionally disconcerted by it. When we see full faces, we
are exposed to the full range of human emotions, to welcomes and smiles, but
also to less positive ones. We have learned over time to shield ourselves from
too much input and that skill may have become rusty for some of us. Young
children, for instance, may find this somewhat off-putting at first. Dealing
again with crowds in many public places may try all of our patience.
During the last year we
have learned to connect with the outside world primarily through devices, our
phones, computers, etc. While this may have been confining and exasperating it
did not require much purely physical output. But going outside and getting into
a car or bus, traveling somewhere, then walking through a large grocery store
and/or completing other numerous errands require some physical output. For some
of us, especially those with age or medical conditions, this may be harder at
first than we expect. We may also be once again at the mercy of outside
expectations in filling up our calendars. Some activities that we have
discovered or re-discovered while at home -gardening, cooking, playing with
children, may be at risk of being squeezed out of our daily routine again.
Caution: getting back to our pre-Covid pace of living may cause STRESS.
And then there is the
"normal" part of getting back to normal: it won't be last year's
normal. It will be a new one. While we were home many things out there changed
and we may have to deal with some losses. Many stores, especially small specialty
stores have gone out of business, and not all of their wares can be
successfully substituted at Amazon. The joy of shopping (for some people this
is a favorite pastime) is not likely to be the same as malls and down-town
areas have lots of empty spaces. For people who still had to navigate the roads
during the height of the pandemic one of the perks was less traffic. That
is wistful memory once again. And going from no travel to daily traffic
congestion for those of us recently released from home is big-time STRESS.
The upshot of COVID
restrictions being relaxed is that all big changes, even those
greatly-to-be-desired, can be hard to navigate. For all of us. There are
uncertainties about the actual timing of rules being changed (Illinois
restriction relaxation is pending), issues with medical directives as well as
all the personal and familial scheduling changes coming. In this month of
mental health awareness, it would be useful for all of us to understand that
even good change can need caution. Take things slowly and watch for
frustrations and anxieties and just plain tiredness in ourselves and those
around us. Don't set expectations so high that the inevitable setbacks become
major downers. Recognize that whatever activities you found solace in during
the last year are still valuable, and don't apologize for making them a
priority going forward.
