Self-isolation week 2: pause and think.

Hi there, I'm writing this from Edinburgh again. It's my second week here now. I somehow thought life might be quite different, just because things changed so much over the first one. But life seems to have come to a halt. Like the world needed a break. A pause. It's been 10 days.

I think I got that pause.

The past week has been a weird mix of me trying to get into a routine, trying to avoid the news, and intermittent periods of me breaking down over the phone to my mother or my friends. My mind is like a rollercoaster, constantly going up and then down. Panicking and relaxing. One extreme to the other.

So what am I doing to flatten the curve? Stop the ride? Try and achieve a sense of normality? Even if it is just temporary?

I've been searching for calm in the nature around me. I know that sounds quite cheesy, but it's been working.

There were a couple of moments this week where I felt like the walls around me had started to crumble. A few events that triggered my insides to start melting.

My university finally released the assessments we're meant to be doing to replace the original ones designed for our end of term. While the deadlines have been extended, and the lecturers assure us they did everything they could to make this time throughout the pandemic as easy as possible - they seem to have executed the exact opposite. Keeping one's mind occupied during a time of crisis like this is very important. But overloading it, that's another thing altogether.

Another trigger that seems to get me is every time I talk to my parents on the phone. And as sad as it is, I've started doing it less and less as a consequence of this. In the heart of it all, my parents and sister are seeing the effects of Covid-19 three weeks ahead of myself and the rest of the UK - and they don't have a very optimistic outlook on it at all.

Things with the virus seem to be escalating every day, every hour, every second, and the worse they get, the sadder my phone calls with them. Because the less and less likely my return home becomes. It's funny because if it wasn't for any of this - I probably wouldn't even be wanting to go home right now. Living in London had recently become so easy, and I can say that remaining independent from my parents had finally become completely possible in the past couple months. But then the coronavirus struck. And that changed everything.

I guess that a world health crisis has the power to do so much more than put wellbeing at risk - it makes everyone want to be with their loved ones, it brings out our weaknesses and it forces us to feel completely vulnerable when our needs can't be met.

Human beings need eight hugs a day. That is the minimum in order to maintain. When this can't be met, our mental health won't necessarily be impacted straight away, but after weeks of no contact this can have a sever impact. I haven't hugged anyone in almost 10 days.

Anyone who knows me will know that I don't crave human contact the way most do. But at a time like this. A time like I described above. It seems human contact is all that I crave. Each time I have been triggered this week, I have searched for a little escape in nature. And somehow it really seems to work.

I'm lucky here because I'm less than 500 metres away from the beachfront. There is nothing more soothing than the sound of the waves, the feeling of soft sand between your toes and the smell of fresh salt in the air. Even if it is eight degrees and raining. So going out for my hour a day, down here by the sea, where other people seem to be coming less and less - I can cry, I can sing, I can just stare out at the waves. Sometimes I'll call my mum, or my sister, or a friend. Sharing the beauty of Scotland's east coast with someone you care about can be just as good for your mind as listening to a good playlist or practicing some yoga.

Today was a good day.

I decided to take my isolation adventure a little further and walked up Edinburgh's highest peak - Arthur's Seat. While the bottom of the trail was tranquil and easy, met with blue skies and a soft breeze - the sky darkened for every step I took. By the time I reached the peak, it looked like a very different day, and my jacket began to collect pieces of frozen rain, baby hail I guess you could call it. I tried to take a breath in, a breath out, trying to embrace the fact that even in the midst of a pandemic, I was still able to go out, take in nature and feel clean, fresh air floating in and out of my lungs.

For a moment, I tried to embrace the fact that I am alive. Everyone I love is alive. And life, whether we want it to or not, will keep going even after the worst of Covid-19 is over.

On my way back down, I crossed paths with a tiny ladybird. It was sitting right in the middle of the trail, where any other trekkers could easily take its life. I moved it, of course, but not after picking it up and admiring just how beautiful yet tiny it was. It made me realise how insignificant we are. How people are nothing but tiny specks on this mammoth of a planet, in this vast universe. If the coronavirus were to in fact wipe us out, this ladybird would probably be better off. This planet would be better off. And this universe wouldn't even feel our absence.

And somehow that made me happy.

Because I know that either way, the outcome is good. If we survive, we get to keep living. If we don't, other species do. So it's a win-win really.