As I waited in my car and caught up on the news, various articles and generally had some time to myself to think and reflect, it suddenly dawned on me how grateful I am for many things during this terrible time.

I am not going to lie I am not finding it easy. Skylar has been out of nursery earlier than the announcement from Boris Johnson because she was originally sent home with a cough. Beforehand, I literally kept thinking, it is not possible to work and look after a 22 month old and I found myself speaking and messaging people to say how hard I was going to find it being pregnant, working and looking after a toddler.

I am not one for “at leasts” as I know how that feels during years of hearing it as I battled with infertility but I was hearing people say, “at least you are getting to spend time with your family”, “at least you are not on your own”, “at least you have a garden”. Yes this are all true, but it doesn’t mean it is easy.  Once the mayhem kicked in at home, I didn’t see this as quality time with Skylar or James, but instead a frantic swap over with childcare on a daily basis. I was trying my best to look happy and smiley with our daughter all the while dropping behind at work whilst my young team had bags and bags of time to put the hours in. By the end of the second week, I even found myself feeling quite ill and stressed.

However, it dawned on me in the car, I had been looking to other people for sympathy when actually I should have just spent time giving myself some compassion. It’s amazing what you can realise when you get a few moments to yourself which is quite rare these days.

Since then, I have just re-assured myself and compassionately said “i’m ok”, “we’re ok”, “‘it’s just hard at the moment” and one thing that hit me the most that I read was “it isn’t supposed to be easy, if it was, there wouldn’t be any schools or nurseries would there?”. So true.

Although everything I write about above still stands, isolation is very hard at times. I am just more kind to myself and know that it’s hard.

I know that the truth of the matter is there are people during this crisis in a much much worse situation:

It is so sad to hear that there are people dying alone in hospitals and in care homes, without the comfort of their family to hold their hand and this in itself makes me well up. I think about my dad and I am so grateful that he was surrounded by his family throughout his last few days and that he has been spared of this terrible time.

I am so so grateful that I have a daughter who is happy and smiley and I think about all the couples that may have had their IVF slots cancelled or any treatment postponed. I remember when I had some tests for recurrent miscarriage at St Mary’s postponed for 3 months because of a staff strike back in 2016. I was so unbelievably disappointed. I know how it feels to desperately want a child and anything that gets in the way of that beyond your control is just so devastating.

Yes, part of me thinks it would have taken the stress out of childcare if one of us had been “furloughed” but then we are lucky and I am grateful we have been able to keep our jobs so far and receive full income.

We used to live in a flat in South West London that didn’t have a garden. I remember when the weather was nice we used to love spending time in the park. I am so grateful we now have a garden that we can play, eat and generally enjoy the fresh air, and really think of all those people that can’t get outside as easily.

This brings me onto the wonderful weather we have had since isolation began. I feel so grateful, that we have been able to get out for walks everyday and that I haven’t had to come up with a wet weather plan yet for Skylar.

I am so grateful that at the end of the day, even though it might be 10pm before I sit down due to catching up on work or doing chores, that I have company. I think of my mum who is now on her own since losing my dad 2 years ago and she is in her 70s. The evenings for her and so many other people must be terribly lonely.

I feel so grateful that I can get to the shops for essentials and we are not going through this in our 90s like our neighbours who we have been supporting with bits of food.

The list of gratitude could go on and on but all I know is, this time will go down in the history books and will never be forgotten. We will come out the other side in a different world and who knows what that might look like.

So 2 things I recommend to help you get through this very very strange time is:

1. Self Compassion – it’s ok to feel disappointed or feel a sense of loss (even though it might not be a loss of a person). Loss of freedom alone is enough to make anyone feel quite low and not seeing family and friends is really hard to cope with.
2. Gratitude – my list above is just a small list of what I feel grateful for. Right now, I could easily write down 3 things everyday. This is a good exercise to try if you haven’t done it before

If neither of those 2 things work for you then make sure you get some time to yourself to rest or just reflect or maybe just pause for a moment each day. This certainly helped me, albeit wasn’t particularly planned.

“It’s a funny thing about life, once you begin to take note of the things you are grateful for, you begin to lose sight of the things that you lack.” – Germany Kent

Rather than stay safe (which is obviously very important), I will end this blog with this:

Be kind to yourself

Sarah