The Shutdown made me Slow Down….
For as long as far back as I can remember Ive always loved to journal my feelings, thoughts and experiences . I kid you not I go through a few 200 page journals a year. I will spare you the boring stuff and jump right in to where things fell into perspective. as an essential worker, ive been working non-stop after grad school in 2016. I pushed through and obtained licensure in 2019 which was exciting but was short lived and soon thereafter came the global pandemic. Guess, what as a Clinical Social Worker that didn’t mean squat! It was buisness per usual for my colleagues and I. Which meant we still had to show to the office, complete field visits and write clinical progress notes with mandated adherence to Personal Protective Equipment (PPE). PPE an acronym that will be forever embedded in my mind, not only was it annoying We just had to be extra careful out in the community. As a Behavioral and Crisis Response clinician that meant extra PPE shorter commute.
Over the past few years Ive been operating on auto-pilot. There is one thing I appreciate the global shutdown for! It forced me to slow down mentally. As a super communter I’m was and constantly on the go from the moment I awake to the moment its time to shut my eyes. Literally, no time for anything. Another harsh reality I had to face during the pandemic was grief and loss. In the span of four years I lost 7 very close family members. To stay in line with the intent for this blog will expand deeper on Resiliency and Grief.