Sleeplessness

When I was struggling  with anxiety a few years back, there were two symptoms, among others, that troubled me the most. One was light-headedness, the other was insomnia. I have never been a big sleeper, but this was something else. Sometimes, as soon as I fell asleep I would feel I was falling down and wake up with a start. Other nights, I would struggle to fall sleep or wake up in the middle of the night feeling anxious and struggle to go back to sleep. Getting caught in the cycle of sleeplessness is quite frustrating, because the more you stress about sleep, the more difficult it is to sleep well. There have been a few nights when I didn't sleep a wink. The days that followed those nights were horrible: I would feel groggy, have blurry vision and apart from feeling tired and anxious.
Till a few nights ago, I hadn't had trouble sleeping, apart from the odd bad night. I have slept quite poorly over the past few days. What's the reason?Take your pick--a nail infection I was stressing about, an electricity problem in my shared house, and a pandemic which is killing a few thousand people in the world everyday. I thought I was dealing with the crisis quite well, but turns out my victory lap was premature.
Sleeplessness is unnerving, but it is a devil known to me. And, I am sure countless others are having the same problem as our world faces the biggest crisis in generations. I am trying to do the best I can in the circumstances and that is all I can do. I have tamped down my fitness routine (although I might have to tamp it down further); and despite all the fear and anxiety about my own health and those of my loved ones, with my housemates every cough sending chills down my spine, I am managing to work on my thesis, blog regularly, eat healthy, do yoga regularly.
More pain, fear and anxiety might be in store for us over the next few weeks. There might be sleeplessness nights, numerous anxious moments, I or my friends, family or housemates might catch Covid-19. I might contemplate my mortality so many times that I would get sick of it. And, I will discover reserves of love, kindness, hope, wisdom and fortitude that I never knew I had. It will be an intense few weeks. I will feel emotions I have never felt before, gain new insights, become wiser, just like countless others. I will try to acknowledge and accept all that I feel--the good, the bad and the ugly--even if I can't bring myself to embrace it. 

BoJo in Hospital

Ever since it was reported that Boris Johnson was in hospital, I have been feeling more uneasy than usual. When he didn't end his self-isolation on Friday, I got the feeling his symptoms weren't mild, and now he is intensive care. It turns out many on the left like me have been feeling similarly distressed although all of us detest Boris Johnson.

A week ago, if you had asked me how I would react to such a development, my response would have been with indifference. But, that is not how it has turned out. I feel empathy for him and his family. Maybe it is because he is the Prime Minister of the country, the most powerful person in the UK, and seeing him struggling for his life makes one feel even more powerless and vulnerable. Maybe it is because  he is the first and most famous person I know who is in intensive care. Maybe it is the fact that however he is as a person or a politician, he is someone's son, dad, uncle, nephew, etc. 

Whatever it is, his sickness has shaken me, and a lot of people up. Plans of leaving the lockdown buffed up and having achieved a lot of progress on my PhD thesis seem fanciful. A lockdown as a natural habitat for introverts feels like a perverse thought. 

 But, it is important to remember that one swallow doesn't make a summer. It is important to take every day as it comes and treat oneself with limitless kindness. Today, I am proud that I managed to have a productive day at work despite all the distressing distractions. All I can do is my best.

Mood Swings

I slept quite badly last night, struggled through my exercise routine and was feeling blue after reading the news in the morning. My housemates coughing and blowing his noise heavily did nothing to soothe my frayed nerves/
 My mood brightened after I got a new idea for my research, which could potentially get me out of the rut I am stuck in. The good mood continued through the day, but towards the evening that the clouds darkened again after I read a journalist's account of her 'mild' Covid-19 symptoms, which sounded pretty horrible.
I realize this is going to be a long struggle. By the end of it, it is possible that someone I know or know of will be affected. If someone in my house gets it before me, I will have to listen to them cough their lungs out while eyeing the sword of sickness hanging above me. Fear for my own health, fear for the health of my loved ones, fear of fear. At the same time, the awareness that I don't want the world to go back to how it was before the crisis. The old world is dying and the new one hasn't yet been born, as someone wise (I don't remember who) said. 

Zoom

I had two sessions on Zoom, the video-conferencing app today. The first was with my book club group, which didn't enjoy immensely. Maybe because it was a largish group with a number of new people, and watching myself on screen with a bunch of white middle-class women made me feel even more out of place. The chat about the book was interesting, but the background small talk was a real drag. And neither did I like the suggestion that we read any book that we liked for next time and jsut talk about it. I can't think of anything worse. I really don't want to hear about random books that I haven't read.
I am fond of my regular book club group but wouldn't count any of them as friends. The advantage of that is I can disappear and reappear without explanation.
But, the good thing about video meetings is you can tune out and read something else while giving the impression that you  are paying rapt attention to the meeting.
The second session a nearly two-hour-long video chat with my friends from school and it really lifted my mood. It felt like take a hot bath after being out in the cold. Of course, there were moments when  I tuned out but all in all, it felt good to be just silly.

Lights Out (Again)

One of the phases in my house has tripped a fuse, so I am writing this with my door open to let in light from the hallway. As the pandemic unfolds, I have often contemplated how I would cope if utilities went down. This is not outside the realm of possibility for the first time in my life in the West. Maybe this is a teaser of things to come? I hope not, because I am heavily reliant on the Internet for both work and leisure. But whatever happens I would at least be able to sleep comfortably at night, unlike in India. 

I remember when I lived shortly in Delhi when I was in my early 20s, the power would conk out at 11:30 in the night. Lying sweating in the dark, wondering whether the power would come back in 2 minutes or 2 hours, and also wondering if it would conk out again, is not a pleasant feeling. At least here, I can gaze out of my bedroom window if I have nothing else to do. Living in a crisis makes you glad for small joys.

Man As An Island

I just read a column by a young man afflicted with terminal cancer who is spending his last days alone in coronavirus quarantine. Maybe it is not a good idea to read stories about death and dying when you are self-isolating in a pandemic, but I feel drawn to them. This morning, I went to the GoFundMe page of a 13-year-old healthy boy who died of Covid-19 in London, becoming the UK's youngest victim. The donation target was 4,000 pounds, and when I checked about 70,000 pounds had been raised already.
Coming back to the column by the dying man, I felt a strange connection to him. He also seemed to be single, he was also close to his sister (who lived with him but was temporarily staying away as she worked for the NHS). And he said that before the disease he was very independent, seeing himself as an island. The disease changed all that very quickly.
Yes, independence and self-sufficiency are less a virtue and more a result of good luck. But, I don't strive to be independent to pat myself on the back. Being an island feels like a good way to live my life and particularly well-suited to my personality. A part of the process of becoming more comfortable with myself is accepting that I am a loner with a rich inner life. So, I could either bemoan my loner tendencies or try to cultivate a rich inner life which I am very open to sharing with the right people. 

Survival Instinct

So, the nail infection that has been bugging me for the past week or so reached an inflection point today. I sent a photo of my nail to a doctor friend in India and he recommended draining the pus and getting on anti-biotics. As I would need a prescription for them in the UK, I called up my surgery, who told me that a doctor would video-call me later that afternoon. When the call failed to materialize and my anxiety levels had started to rise, I learned from a friend that there was a NHS drop-in centre for minor ailments. The nurse there told me to look away so I missed the sight of blood and puss spurting out of my finger. She wrote me up a prescription and told me to take the antibiotics only if I needed them. But after consulting my Indian friend, I decided to take them anyway.
What I have realised is I have a pretty strong survival instinct. Maybe it is a hypochondriac thing, but while I do suffer from health anxiety, it is mild. I would like to think that I am good at self-care, both for the mind and the body. I eat healthy without starving myself, I am fitness conscious without being obsessive, and I make sure I get enough sleep. So, now that I know I have a strong survival isntinct maybe it is a reason to be less anxious about my health. Because I should find comfort in the knowledge that my survival instinct will kick quite quickly when I am I perceive that I am in danger.