I wrote a lot when Miles was born and during the first month of his life. Then, three months after he was born, the pandemic hit and took over the whole world.
Then I went back to work, which was 1) a relief, 2) totally overwhelming, 3) completely different than before because I now work from home full time.
I often say that literally everything in my life has changed since Miles was born. But because I hate the misuse of the word literally as much as the next gal, I’ll admit that not everything in my life changed. But a lot has changed from December 27, 2019 to February 2021. To put it in two words, 2020 happened.
And for me, “2020 happened” means:
- I became a mother. (Technically that happened in 2019, but I mean, December 27…).
- I started getting less sleep.
- I didn’t get laid off or furloughed from my job, for which I’m grateful.
- I started working from home full time.
- Because of the pandemic, stay-home orders and social distancing, I stopped seeing my friends nearly as much — and when I did see them, it was usually for socially distanced walks. I know that’s true for most people — at least responsible people who take the pandemic seriously — but I’m mentioning it here because it is something that significantly changed my life.
- I stopped traveling. Same note as above re: the pandemic. That one was really hard because a lot of my friends live in a different state, and even now, 14 months after my son was born, many of my close friends haven’t met him.
- I started worrying more. That’s mostly because of the pandemic, worrying about the state of the world, stress over the 2020 presidential election…
- I moved from a townhouse in the city to a single-family home in the suburbs (we also renovated the new house, which is a whole other story).
- Aaaaand allow me to bury the lede: I got pregnant with my second child(!), which is a blessing…. A blessing that, for me, comes with about four months of nausea and vomiting.
I didn’t make the list above to complain and I hope it doesn’t come across that way. As I’ve said often during the pandemic, I know I’m lucky. I haven’t gotten sick (so far – knock on wood), none of my close friends or family members have gotten sick, I have a job, my husband has a job, I have a beautiful baby boy and a sweet baby girl(!) on the way. But the fact that circumstances are a lot worse for other people doesn’t make what’s going on in my life any less real.
I guess my point is that this year has been overwhelming and totally different from anything I’ve ever experienced, and I have a feeling the next few years are going to be much the same. That’s why I’m getting back to writing about it.