Highs, Lows and Inbetweens

Since my last post, things in the world have changed a little bit.

I first heard about the Coronavirus coming from China in early February.
If I'm being completely honest, it wasn't something I was immediately concerned about.

Since then, it has slowly begun taking over the world in its own horrible way and the UK has, officially, been in lockdown since last Monday.

This has come with some surprising challenges.
I know there are a large amount of personal challenges everyone's having to deal with but the main one I'm trying to navigate has to do with my relationship.

Danny (Still not his real name) and I were together when lockdown happened and we've been together for the last week and a half now.

This has been challenging for a number of reasons.

1. Danny and I don't live together. I still have my flat in Newington and he lives in Leith.
2. We are absolutely not used to spending this much time with each other.
3. We needed to have conversations we never would have had to before.

There have been some growing pains.
He's obsessed with playing this game with his friend every night which has caused me to moan at him a couple of times because I've felt like I'm being ignored for a stupid game.
I experienced the loss of a family member recently and that on top of the coronavirus and work has put a large amount of stress on me, which has been difficult to deal with.

We had a conversation about it yesterday to figure out what we should do.
Do we continue living together during this situation even though we're not ready to live with each other?
Do we commit to being apart during lockdown and live in our separate flats for the next few weeks (months?)?

Either option sounds horrible and I know we're lucky to have the choice when lots of people don't but it's still stressful.

If we stay together, will we drive each other nuts because we're both used to having space?
If we're apart for this, will we be miserable?

Ugrh.

Why is there no easy option?

A magical option number three which enables us to go back to seeing each other for half the week?

In reality, our situation is not the worst out there.

We can't see our families, like lots of other people, and we do have each other for the moment.

Whatever happens, we will get through it together - whether we're physically together or not - and that's good enough for me for now.

Taking it day by day is the best we can do.

I hope everyone else out there in similar, worse or better situations is coping as best they can.

That's all we can do really.

Cope as best as we can.

And we will.

Britain has faced different obstacles over the years and we've always managed to get through it.

The amount of kindness I'm seeing from people all over the world, despite the virus, has me remaining hopeful.

Love,
Jessica
xoxo