This week, Tanya at Salted Caramel has challenged to list 5 Feeling and Emotions we were experiencing during the Pandemic, which, unfortunately, is still happening.

I must admit that most of these emotions were not the result of the pandemic but of everyday life and the stupid stuff that were happening at work.

Anxiety

Anxiety was and is my number one enemy.

I’m anxious about work – about all the incoming emails, about the fact that I’m always behind on my credit card reconciliation.

I’m anxious about life – about whether I’d be able to pay all the bills and still have a net positive or would I need to move funds around.

At the beginning of the Pandemic (around March 2020), the uncertainty was making me anxious – is the world going to end? Am I facing the apocalypse? What’s going to happen?

Anger

I was angry being trapped in the house but mainly, I was angry at mom for always pointing every little flaw. I was angry at her for always criticizing me despite what we were facing.

Annoyed

I still feel annoyed but I felt especially during the pandemic when mom would have YouTube playing 24/7 to the point where I stopped watching TV because I couldn’t hear anything except whatever YouTube video was playing on her tablet at full volume. I bought a pair of expensive noise-cancelling earbuds but that did nothing.

I had to constantly mute myself during meetings as mom would often walk around the house with her tablet cradled in her arms like a child. I was also annoyed because a lot of things have switched to virtual – doctor’s appointment, counseling appointment, dietitian appointments – there’s no way I can do counseling at home as I don’t have privacy. Mom could be listening on the other side of my bedroom door or she could burst in at any moment.

Depressed

I think I felt depressed because I was cooped up in the house. Sure, I read a lot but still.

Most of all, I think I felt depressed because mom was constantly (even now) making me feel useless and worthless as a human being like no matter what I do or how hard I tried to help, it’s not good enough. I tried to overcome it by picking up hobbies but every hobby I picked up, mom made me feel worse but saying things like “why do you go find trouble?” or “why do you pick such useless hobbies?”

Tired

I was burned out because of the constant overtime at work. Since I started my current job in 2018, I haven’t stopped working overtime and the pandemic made things worse because once I began working from home, I couldn’t stop working.

There was no leaving work behind at the end of the day. There’s no commute. Email was constantly open. There were weeks when I could finally walk away after almost 50 hours. I needed time off but mom wouldn’t let me, saying I’d just waste it as there’s nowhere to go. There are still days when I’m like a zombie – emotionless – slowly getting by.