My husband recently bought something and let me tell you: it is worth its weight in gold. It’s such a funny thing in a way, and I feel it says a lot about life at home during a pandemic. The wonderful thing he bought?

Drum roll.
Music.
Here goes:

A silent mechanical keyboard.

Yes, you read it right. My husband bought a keyboard for his computer which is mechanical (I have understood there is no other option in the tech-world) but still silent when you press its buttons. And as I wrote: this thing is such gift, I cannot be happier.

To frame it for you: I live in a house together with my husband, two teenagers and our house has a pretty open layout. This means that the top floor, where my husband has been working fulltime behind his computer since March 2020, is an open space directly connected to our living room. And consequentially I have been hearing about a gazillion keyboard-punches while lying on my couch in our living room Long Covid-style for the past 10 months. It has sounded like a loud woodpecker rattling on, for hours on end. Tick-tick-tick-tick-tick-tick-tick in superspeed. And when the keyboard was silent for a while, oftentimes the business-meeting-Zoom-Meet-Teams-talking began. Introducing the next best thing in a pandemic-times-household:

Drum roll.
Music.

A noise-cancelling headphone.

OMG I love my Bose headphone so much! Noise-cancelling and Bluetooth, it has been such a wonderful thing to fade out the keyboard-rattling and endless business talk at home.

The things I rejoice about these days! It’s funny, really, and I’m sure many of you can recognize this from your own homes. Already in the first week I made a conscious decision to not let it get to me, the fact that my husband now was forced to work from home and the kids mostly had homeschooling while I was confined to the couch. No point in getting frustrated about it, I feel. We’re all in the same boat and it’s part of this extraordinary time in our lives. I know someone who lives in a small apartment in the city who works from his son’s bedroom and has been conducting business meetings among Toy Story-figures, dinosaurs and teddy bears five days/week for months on end. We all have to make the best out of the situation we find ourselves in during this pandemic, it just is like that.

I’m so impressed by my husband and I love him so much. Mind you, he has been working (more than) fulltime while having a wife totally incapable of doing anything, for so many months. So besides his work, he has bought all the food, cooked all the meals and generally fixed everything that needed to be fixed. Not once has he complained, neither to me nor anyone else. Not once has he yelled at me for not getting better. He’s been a rock, and still is. What a man, I am so grateful to spend my life with him!

Life in our house is about to get even more interesting: first we have our teenagers (17 and 16YO) still fulltime at home, struggling with online-classes and homework in their bedrooms. As if being a teenager with lots of hormones and pressure from peers, school and social media isn’t enough?! Naturally this results in frustration, irritation and wariness in them. I can’t blame them. But as a parent, it is quite challenging to manage on a daily basis as I’m sure many of you who are parents also will recognize. But I feel lucky anyway; I can only imagine how it is to homeschool smaller children yourself while managing your own job at the same time. Or to be ill and live alone. How do people do it?

And to top it off, gosh, in a few days we will start the project of total renovation of our bathroom. I would never (ever!) have started such an invasive project in my house right now but it’s a real necessity unfortunately as it turned out this bathroom wasn’t built properly by the construction company who built the house, resulting in cracked tiles and possible water damage behind it. So now we must renovate the whole bathroom, in the middle of the winter, snow outside, four people at home fulltime, of which three people need to concentrate on work and school while a construction company renovates our bathroom for at least 5-6 weeks.

Except for me, the fourth member of this household here in the suburbs of Stockholm: I still haven’t started my work. Since I last wrote (Week 40 of Long Covid) I have been quite ill again for about three weeks. It felt like a flu/cold where all symptoms were exaggerated by Long Covid. It was a real challenge to manage, also mentally. However for the past week I have been feeling much, much better! My body finally does not crave salt anymore. I can sleep much more calmly. My heart has stabilized itself and I do not have the underlying feeling of physical anxiety anymore that has been a constant 24/7 current through my system for almost 10 months. Also, I have more energy which I notice especially during the evening. For months I was floored already at around 18.00 and had to force myself to stay awake until 21.00 (I did not want to rub my night sleep by going to bed at six in the evening). But now I can catch myself looking at the clock in the evening and noticing it’s 22.00 already and I don’t feel like a complete wreck. All of these things feel absolutely amazing and strengthen me in my confidence that I WILL completely recover. I still have trouble with my lungs/chest, but also this is slowly improving, going back and forth a bit. Many reasons to celebrate my body!

Mentally I can still feel overwhelmed pretty easily in my life. The way we live in these times is very challenging, it just is, as I’m sure you will agree. I notice that news items affect me deeply, such as the recent storming of the Capitol building in the US for example. And I still feel quite exhausted by all the things I have experienced since I got ill. Just looking at my Corona Chronicles on this blog is a reminder of my long and challenging journey. I often find myself just sitting and staring out the window. Just being, oftentimes feels like enough for me. Or watching TV, to escape for a while. I need more time to integrate what has happened in my life, I feel that clearly. Sometimes (still) I feel frustrated because I feel people don’t get it. But then I remember my writing: my Corona Chronicles are my way of conveying to other people how Long Covid feels for me and it’s out there for everyone to read and/or share if they want. I know it is a resource for other people and that means the world to me.

Spiritually I feel a calmness and inner peace in my being, as well as power. Not the aggressive kind of power, but a form of still power that feels completely effortless. Like I can move mountains without breaking a sweat. I long for the Universe (or whatever you want to call it) to show me more clearly how to channel this power in my life and what to manifest next. It’ll come in its own time, I’m sure of it. One thing I know for sure already now: I will keep on writing as it truly feeds my soul. So to sum up: I feel alive!

A new year. A vaccine. A silent keyboard. And most of all: a body that I slowly start to recognize again.
Much to be grateful for!

To be continued…

Photo: John Petalcurin – unsplash.com

This writing is part of what I call my Corona Chronicles. On this page you can find an overview of my stories since March 2020.