Week 3 of the #StayAtHomeChallenge: Dealing with Loss During Covid-19 and Using A Goal Planner to Get Back on Track

I’m happy to report that our time at home this week was better than last. As I noted in my prior post, my kids and I were struggling last week. Me with anxiety about the virus and them with the transition to at-home and virtual school. (Remember, for accurate and updated information about the Coronavirus, please go to the CDC website linked here).

After I posted that last blog entry, I started to reevaluate why I was feeling so unsettled, beyond the obvious change and what everyone is calling the “new normal.” To do this, last Sunday night I wrote a few short lists in my bedtime journal.

The first on my list was “self-care habits that keep me sane.” The second was “things that have gotten me off track.” And, the third was “a better evening routine,” to go with my morning routine. As I said last week,my plan was to use this as I reevaluated my goals in my PowerSheets planner.

My Aha! Moment

Making those lists was a really helpful exercise, but I knew it was only the beginning. This Monday, I had an appointment scheduled with my therapist, and she put into words what I have been feeling all week- I’m experiencing grief.

This is such a no-brainer, I don’t know why it didn’t occur to me sooner. The one thing this whole pandemic has done for each of us is to introduce change into our lives. While a little change can be challenging, this situation has brought a lot of change in a short period of time.

Change is always hard, but when it results in a loss, it can be even harder. And, as my therapist explained, we have all lost a lot during this time.

So, although we have a lot to be thankful for (trust me, I know that that I have so much to be grateful for right now), we all need to find ways to acknowledge those feelings of loss and work through them.

What am I grieving at the moment?

After I gave it some thought, I realized that there is so much that I’m grieving right now, and it helped to list them out. Here is some of what I listed, in no particular order:

• My routine. As a creature of habit (and a planner addict), I thrive on structure and routines, and it took a lot of trial and error to come up with the one that had been working for me before social distancing. My routine, which always provided a sense of security, has been completely thrown off by this, and I can feel the effects.
• My kids’ routines. I know that most kids gripe about everything, and mine are no different. Whether it be school, instrument practice, or attending church, they are always looking for a break from those activities. And, while a break can be good, three weeks without their normal routine (with no end in sight) has been hard on my kids. I see how much they miss their friends, schools, activities, and church fellowship.
• My work office. First, I miss having co-workers and students just a few paces away to chat with and brainstorm cases. I also miss my workspace. In order to keep an eye on the kids, I have set up the dining room as a community work area. I sit at the head of the table, while each child sits across from one another. But, I miss having a private space set up with all the things I need to easily do my job. I am working off a tiny tablet laptop, instead of having my dual computer screens to toggle between. Once using a desk and credenza to organize my books and documents, I now have part of a flat surface and am working out of a couple of briefcases to try to stay organized. Also, I had decorated my office with my own artwork and always kept my desk clear so the space would be open and inviting. My current space, no matter how hard I try, feels more chaotic.
• My personal space. Even though we have a good-sized home and my kids are not little, I am still a mom, which means I am always on call when we’re at home together. Over the first couple of weeks, I was not doing a good job of reserving space and time for myself. I think I just didn’t have a good routine for it. And, it doesn’t help that when you’re home with the kids, you are take on every roll. I have been the scheduler, teacher, computer systems administrator, nurse, cook, etc. Even when I tried to sit in my room by myself, someone would eventually seek me out and have a legitimate reason to draw me out of my personal time.
• Our church. I’ve mentioned this before, and I’ll say it again- we are really fortunate to belong to a great church with caring people. It’s also a really active church, so in a given week, I may be there three nights during the week as well as on Sunday (or even Saturday if we’re setting up for an event). The loss of that regular fellowship time has been hard, and Zoom doesn’t entirely fill the void.
• Cancelled plans. What has taken a major toll on us and our feelings about the situation is the loss of activities and things we were really looking forward to. I have had book club cancelled, my beloved annual church retreat (a weekend at the beach with women from my church), an overnight school trip I was going to chaperone for my daughter, concerts, end-of-year shows, vacations, and family gatherings. My daughter is particularly sad as this was her last year of elementary school, and she can no longer sing in the school choir, serve on the leadership team or safety patrol, and she worries that they will cancel her graduation ceremony.
• My commute. Yeah, this is a tough one to admit, but I’m one of the few people who actually enjoyed the 20-30 minutes each way in the car by myself. It was my time to listen to audiobooks, podcasts, or the latest Green Day album.
• Time. I noted this in my last post). Even though all of our family’s outside-the-home weekly activities were cancelled, I felt like I had less time than usual for myself. This is because I’m having to work a full-time schedule and take a bunch of breaks to help and be there for my kids.

What I’m Doing to Get Back On Track

My therapist wisely suggested that now is the time to go back to doing things that have served me well in the past when I’ve been sad or anxious. She was pleased that I had inadvertently started this process with my Sunday night list-making session in my journal. And, I saw that this was my opportunity to get back on track.

I had basically been praying to God for some guidance on how to regroup and make it through this completely different time in my life. And, I got some helpful answers.

First, I remembered that my PowerSheets Goal Planner not only has a new tending list for each month (and April just started this week), it also has a seasonal refresher, with the spring refresher scheduled before April. What better way to get back on track, than to use my goal planner to help me? The timing for this could not have been more perfect!

I sat down on Monday night, tuned in to the PowerSheets PreCast (you can find the link for April’s prepcase here) and worked through the goal refresh pages (87-91) while listening to Lara Casey provide some guidance. It was really helpful to have someone walk through the pages with me.

I completely reevaluated my goals in light of Covid-19, and I decided to bring the focus right back to self-care. PowerSheets are perfect for self-care as the tending list allows me to track monthly, weekly and daily goals and habits.

Tuesday morning provided another answer to my prayers. I do a yoga video every morning on YouTube and in the suggested feed was a new video by Rachel Hollis, advertising a new, (FREE!) 90-day challenge, set up specifically to help us through this whole situation. This is what I needed! Some inspiration from one of my favorite motivational speakers!

I have read both of Rachel Hollis’s books and highly recommend them. For her general story and motivation, start with her first book, “Girl, Wash Your Face.”

For goal planning, try “Girl, Stop Apologizing.”

The challenge focuses on Rachel’s 5 to Thrive– drinking a lot of water daily, 30 days of giving up a food you know you shouldn’t be eating, exercising daily, waking up early to do things for yourself, and gratitude.

You can sign up for the free challenge here. Once you sign up there is a weekly video (coaching and inspiration) and a workout video. This week’s video is all about “perspective,” and is just what I needed to hear!

By Tuesday night, I was pumped and ready to work on my April PowerSheets calendar page and tending list. I finally decided to put the monthly calendar layout to use by writing down my daily wins. Big or small, whatever I’ve done that day to meet my goals, I will list one thing on the calendar. And, my tending list is back to being all about self-care.

Here’s how the week looked:

Saturday. After posting last week’s blog entry, I spent the day cooking an old family favorite- a creamy dilled carrot soup that we served with pumpkin bread and Havarti cheese. We also set up FaceTime calls with the grandparents so the kids could have some family time. Another plus was that my daughter had her first virtual violin lesson, which went surprisingly well despite the video-conference delay.

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Sunday. After feeling my plantar fasciitis flair up, I returned to doing a workout prescribed by my physical therapist, which really helped my feet! And, in addition to virtual church, our Sunday School class met for the first time in weeks. Although my iPad wouldn’t work and we had to participate using my iPhone, it was so great to see our classmates. After that, it was time use some of the veggies we ordered from our CSA. I got a lot of radishes, which I new would go bad quickly, so I decided to cut up some onions and make refrigerator pickles with them to be served on sandwiches and tacos. So pretty and pink!

Monday. After a weekend off, we were ready to get the school and workweek started. I also looked forward to the day, knowing that I had a therapist appointment set up. More inspired to get back to the things that help my self-care, I dug into my PowerSheets planner and did the Spring Goals Refresh pages. My kids were more social as well, with my son communicating more with his friends, and my daughter starting daily FaceTime chats with her friends.

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Tuesday. Learning about the #Next90Days Challenge, I was pretty stoked about getting myself in a new mindset for both the spring and the remainder of whatever this Covid-19 seasons is all about. I unearthed an old Nalgene water bottle to help keep track of how many ounces of water I’m drinking each day. I also tried the workout video provided in Rachel Hollis’s challenge webpage. It was short but definitely got my heart rate up. I also finished my tending list and closed out my Faith Planner (see my post on setting up a Faith Planner here) pages for March while setting up my April pages.

Wednesday. I was definitely feeling better by Wednesday and had managed to keep my energy and enthusiasm up. I got a good bit of work done for my office job and even kept the kids on task. That afternoon, my boss hosted a staff meeting via a conference call. It was reassuring to hear how things were progressing for the office despite our not physically working together. After this, I did my second physical therapy workout for the day.

Thursday. So, to be honest, we didn’t have the best energy levels that day. But, we tried to take it in stride and just do what we could. I scheduled a few calls that day to keep up with my interns, which helped the time pass more quickly. I also decided to go for a walk after work and chat with a friend, which also got my heart rate up.

Friday. We were in the home stretch for the week. I took it easy on the kids, just making sure that they were on top of whatever projects they had to get done that week. As for me, I had several conference calls that day, and I actually felt really productive. The day ended on a high note, as my supervisor at work organized a “virtual happy hour” on Zoom. It was so good to see my coworkers, relaxing at home, telling funny stories, and catching up.  I got in another call with a friend while walking, knocking out both the need to chat with someone and get in a workout.

Lessons learned from this week:

• Change up your self-care routine. Just in the few days since changing up my routine, I feel more focused and better about things. I’m even feeling like I have more time. Who knows? I may get used to this “new normal.”
• Use a Goal Planner to habit track your new routine. Using my goal planner used to seem like a way to hold myself accountable to a big “to do” list, but I’m now seeing it as a crucial part of my self-care routine.
• Be flexible. I’ve become way more flexible with the kids’ working from home as their schools have provided us with more structure during the day. And, I found that being more relaxed about the kids’ schedules has not only helped them but has made my days with them way more manageable.
• Set up more virtual meetups. As a friend told me during one of my walks, it shouldn’t be called “social distancing,” it should be called “physical distancing.” Having virtual, videoconference meetings is a great way to bridge the physical distance. I found that the meetings I had this week- from the online Sunday School class to the Happy Hour with my co-workers- were a purely joyful social experience.

Are you feeling off at this time? Could grief be part of what you’re feeling? I hope that you all are figuring out how to process this situation and have discovered ways to move forward and find the silver linings. Have tips to share? Leave a comment below!

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