As this roller-coaster of a year winds down – and up and down, and up and down again…until the clock ticks midnight on December 31 – I find myself once again reflecting on the viciously destructive psychological impact of this pandemic.

As I write, I am sitting inside a coffee shop in Arlington. And I am being smoked out. The door has just been propped open in an obvious effort to dissuade those of us who have pilgrimmaged to this rare open indoor seating area from staying much longer. I’ve been here for four hours, two others in the corners were here before me and are still working on their laptops. I hope I’m not losing friends by admitting that I left my house to spend time at an indoor, public space.

I’m diligently wearing my mask and the tables are widely socially distanced. And now the door is open, so they have upped the game when it comes to air circulation. All that is well and good, and I can’t complain. Please understand, I’m not complaining and am totally okay with being moved along at this point. I’ve gotten my four hours in. And they were WONDERFUL.

I remember how great it felt when coffee shops reopened with extremely socially distanced seating sometime over the summer, it was like a lifeline for me, perhaps sad but true. As someone who lost employment in March I have become a stay-at-home mother of a remarkable child, Eva (age 6 going on 16) with unique special needs – and a hell of a strong personality. I am lucky and privileged to have some hours to myself thanks to a dedicated nanny, but the catch is I cannot stay at home during this blessed respite. Eva doesn’t do well with divided authority. Thus, I have been on the run off and on since spring, cruising Arlington for places I can take my laptop and feel some sense of normality during this wild year. There have been closings and reopenings. And more closings and reopenings. I’ve called around to many a Starbucks to ask if that day they had seating. I’ve utilized outdoor seating as much as possible.

In the heat of summer, as now in the cold of near-winter, I’ve done a lot of living – i.e. insurance claim submitting/arguing, bill paying, checking on family/friends by phone, reading and trying to work on writing – in my car. But I must admit, when I can get to a socially-distanced, mask-required coffee shop that allows me to sit awhile, I guiltily celebrate. Coffee shop time allows me to physically separate from my house, take a much needed emotional break from special needs parenting, and enjoy some sense of social connection, however diminished it may be. And yes, I know how blessed and privileged I am on so many levels, to still be healthy, to have the means to employ a nanny and drink expensive coffee. To have a home, a car, and food. So many others are unfairly suffering in almost unimaginable ways.

As we try to round the current – and hopefully last – virus spike, I know I am not alone as I realize in ways never before how profoundly important public spaces are to mental health. I know that by coming here today, I have given myself a psychological boost that will very likely last me through the week. Entering this morning into a warm, cozy coffee shop where others were engaging in intellectual pursuits, not beside me but from across the room, brought a tremendous amount of comfort. Now, as the freezing air permeates the place, I understand and accept that I need to leave. But I wanted to get these thoughts and a poem down, that keeps surfacing in my head these past few weeks, to record for posterity how antithetical to psychological well-being this pandemic has been. And please understand that I am fully in support of all public health measures, including masking, social distancing and vaccinating. My greatest gratitude goes out to the healthcare workers and former colleagues who never signed up for this and have risen to the occasion beyond what could be reasonably expected. I am only angry with the virus.

2020

It’s 2020. Whatever you do, don’t be human.

If you see someone, walk away.

Treat them as those many years ago would have treated a leper. They are likely contagious.

They could kill you or someone you love, even if they are someone you love.

Don’t let them see your face or hear your voice fully. Mask up.

A person too close or without a mask may feel like someone pointing a loaded gun at you.

Don’t touch or hug – human contact is the danger.

When you see an opening, it will only remotely resemble how you remembered it Before.

It will be a watered down, sterile, institutional-like experience fraught with safety concerns.

Tread carefully. The ground will fall through again. And again.

Don’t complain. You have no rulebook, anyways, to cite to prove an injury.

The rulebook has been thrown out.

There is no place for fear in this shared storm.

So many others are suffering so much more.

Up is down and down is up.

Learn to tolerate. Grow used to the smell of hand sanitizer and cleaning supplies.

Don’t look to the federal government. There will be no coordinated, national response in this war.

Look to the scientists.

Don’t get sick, the hospitals may not have room for you.

Put your life on the line for your work, if you still have work.

Stay in your house, if you still have a house.

Stay in your car, if you still have a car.

Whatever you do, don’t be human.

###

Okay…that was dark. There has been intense light too, in the form of way overdue social change. BLACK LIVES MATTER. Incidentally, we have also kept our democracy in the face of unparalleled threats from within. More light is coming. If you’re still reading, I wish you a much healthier, and happier, 2021.

Well, as should not be at all unexpected for the year 2020, hell has finally frozen over in my world. Eva kicked me out of the house for a night in exchange for a “sleepover with daddy.” I could not be more thrilled, for two reasons, the first being that I can count on one hand the total number of nights I’ve spent away from my amazing six-year-old during her lifetime. The second, and more deeply significant, reason is the miraculous wonder of development, as Eva has come into her independence at long last. Granted, the total amount of my time off was about 14 hours. Being my controlling self (yeah, I’m owning it), I had to get everything up through dinner done and leave a massive amount of instructions before leaving around 6:30 p.m. and then had to return by 8:00 a.m. sharp so that my husband could get on a work call. But it was still totally awesome.

Of course, in the time of coronavirus, it was also kind of bizarre. For my special night, I returned to the same hotel we stayed in as a family one night in early March due to mold remediation in our house. The Westin Arlington has the best (“Heavenly”) beds in the world, that has not changed. Neither have the fantastically relaxing rainfall shower heads. But pretty much everything else has. Driving up to the hotel last night, the front entrance was dark and the valet stand abandoned. After self-parking in the garage, I ascended by elevator to emerge, mask on, into an empty, ghostlike lobby. It was downright eerie compared to how it had been the last time I was there. Only one concierge stood at the front desk, and seem surprised when I approached to check in. The small convenience store adjacent to the desk was thankfully still open, so I was able to purchase a mini-bottle of Prosecco and Perrier, feeling blessed that I had been left with just enough to maintain some quality of life in the desert of this year. I politely declined when the concierge asked me if I wanted a bag for my items. I packed them into my overnight bag and remarked, “It’s 2020, right? This is how I roll.”

The pool and decadent hot tub that we enjoyed months ago were now closed, as was the incredibly convenient Starbucks adjacent to the lobby. I wasn’t sure about the possibility of room service, but doubted it’s availability after seeing that all glassware – including wine glasses – had been removed from the my room. I also hadn’t seen staff, or any other people for that matter, anywhere in the building so calling down for a hamburger didn’t seem like an option. If it wasn’t for the unceasing presence of P.F. Chang’s across the street, I probably would have starved. As things were, I proceeded to have a few rather unprecedented hours in the evening to myself. How did I spend them? Drinking Prosecco out of a plastic cup while Zoom chatting with my best friend who lives in Los Angeles. I also enjoyed watching MSNBC coverage of the breaking news coming from The New York Times, revealing Trump’s basically criminal tax returns. It was calm and comforting, more truth coming to light.

Around midnight I drifted off into a beautiful seven hours of uninterrupted sleep. As I closed my eyes, a vivid memory from our March hotel stay in an identical room jumped into my mind. We must have had the news on at some point, probably on mute, not realizing that Eva was as proficient a reader as she had become. I remembered her sitting on the fluffy hotel bed, turning to me and saying in a serious tone, “The coronavirus is everywhere, everyone’s going to get it.” It being early, and not yet mid-March, I quickly replied with what I thought was an honest answer at the time -“Don’t worry, honey – no it won’t. Everything’s going to be fine.” I couldn’t have imagined what the next six months would bring. Of course, at that time, I also couldn’t have imagined Eva allowing, much less wanting, me to spend a night away from her given her intense separation anxiety. Time, indeed, marches on. Understandably, given the rollar-coaster experience of this year, we are all probably somewhat anxious to find out what’s next around the corner. But recognizing more fully how we have little to no control over how things unfold in life can also be oddly reassuring.

Greetings to all! Is your life as hard as mine right now? Actually, no need to answer that question, it’s purely rhetorical. I already know your life now sucks in ways you never would have imagined just months ago. If you’ve been grasping for silver linings, join the club. On good days, I can find them all around – this is a change for our planet to raise its energy vibration, for all of us to learn better compassion, for social changes we didn’t think possible, to reimagine our societies as well as personal lives, etc. On bad days, just getting through a consecutive morning, afternoon and evening feels like an insurmountable challenge. I look back on my last post from when all of this was just starting and can’t help but shake my head in pity. I had no idea how long this was going to be, how unyielding the new world of mask-wearing and social distancing would be. Now, please don’t take me the wrong way – I am extraordinarily grateful that nobody in my life has been sickened by coronavirus in a life-threatening way. Yet. And I pray not ever. But I need to say this because it’s driving me nuts how absent standpoints like this are from our civil discourse right now. I strongly believe that while being imperatively protective of physical health, social distancing / isolation mandates are profoundly harmful to mental and spiritual health. That’s not an argument against social distancing – those are stupid. I mean, obviously we have to do it from a public health perspective, the same with mask-wearing. At the public health level, these measures should have been mandated back in January, if we had any real federal leadership…but that’s another column. Seriously, though, I wish there was a deeper understanding of how damaging this is to the psyche, and don’t get me started on how children are being impacted developmentally.

As with any rules, there are always exceptions. No, such exceptions should not be made for Trump supporters at rallies. Somebody’s ignorance about infectious disease and epidemiological realities is not the type of thing that should qualify as an exception. What SHOULD qualify are things like, for example, sensory and neurodevelopmental disabilities…you know where I’m going with this. No, Eva can’t tolerate the freaking mask! And I’ve got news for all of you who look askance at me when I’m out walking with her around the neighborhood – that is not going to change any time soon. Since she was a baby, the rather remarkable exception to Eva’s proprioceptive issues and frequent lack of body awareness has been when we try to put anything on her face or in her hair. Sunglasses, hats, hairclips, even headphones – you name it – they don’t stay on for more than three seconds. I have to think she will be able to get past this at some point soon, but I know for sure that pressuring her will only lengthen the time it takes for her to grapple with this issue. Children with profound sensory and anxiety issues are great examples of who SHOULD be exceptions to the rules of mask-wearing. Eva will have no access to the public world, at a core time for social development, without this exception being made. And it will matter how it is made – for example, if people pressure her to try even in the slightest, her already full anxiety bucket will overflow and we will be in meltdown city. Unfortunately, mask wearing for her has now become a flashpoint for declaring and defending her disability to the world. I’m sure there are many others out there facing similar circumstances, and what pisses me off, frankly, is that children in general being immensely pressured to comply with these requirements on top of already heightened anxiety levels across the board. This, despite the fact that masks are only recommended, not required, for children under age 10. Can we please give children a break? And not just autistic children. Children everywhere, who should be allowed to go to playgrounds if their families feel comfortable with them doing so, with loads of hand sanitizer available. Children who should be allowed, with sufficient but not ridiculous spacing, in swimming pools with ample levels of chlorine. Children who should not be pressured into wearing a mask if they truly cannot tolerate it. They are already getting the short end of the deal with all of this. We have a duty to try to mitigate the psychic and developmental consequences for this generation. So I say, continue to formally require all smart public health measures – six feet apart, social distancing, required mask-wearing indoors – which should be applied and enforced broadly. But please, be flexible with appropriate exceptions, especially for children.

If you would have told me three weeks ago – heck, even two weeks ago – that on what is normally my much-cherished work day at the hospital, I would instead be driving from park/outdoor space to park/outdoor space with my laptop in Arlington looking for an illicit place to set up some sort of mobile wi-fi, then looking for a bush to pee in after drinking my Venti Iced Latte that I waited 30 minutes in a parking lot for at the mandated Drive-Thru Only version of “America’s Third Place,” – all the while stiffly turning my head like Joan Cusack with her neckgear in the ’80’s totally un-PC film classic “Sixteen Candles” due a strained neck arising my appeasing my 40+-pound daughter in her insistence I carry her home from a far corner of our neighborhood yesterday – of course I would not have believed it. But here we are, world. I can only imagine the millions of other incredulous stories everyone would have if writing this sentence for themselves “If you would have told me three weeks ago…” Shocking. Stunning. Numbing. Still unbelievable. And more, much more, we are told is coming. It seems as if I write mainly as an outlet, I will post a blog entry because frankly, sitting here in a parked car on a residential street in Arlington, eyeing the last half hour of my childcare-covered free time, there is nothing else that I can do. Nothing that could perhaps be as therapeutically effective for me mentally than writing a blog post, trying to share and somehow make sense of this world as the foundation beneath us crumbles by the minute, upending one coping mechanism after another until the fractured material we are standing on is unrecognizably and alarmingly unstable. I’ve seen the comparisons of what we are going through to the formal stages of grief, and that resonates strongly with me. Last week, I went through denial, then anger, then bargaining – embarrassingly, I will admit that tears streamed down my face when the Starbucks barista informed me the chain would be closing indefinitely, THAT was my breaking point – followed by sadness and finally reached acceptance a week ago. The first few stages are occasionally and consistently bubbling up, but acceptance then gently pushes them back down. Acceptance is a good place, and a new one as well. As someone who has struggled with an anxiety disorder my whole life, one silver lining of all of this is certainly the shattering of the illusion of control we generally carry in our everyday lives. In a weird way, being forced to realize you have no control over so many aspects of life can bring a humbled – I try not to think if it as resigned – peace. I will still do my best to be there for my daughter, as she melts down and acts out worse than ever under the stress of all this. I will still try to support my husband as he fights to keep his job, a job he only just started but loves so much already. I even suspect I’m actually a profoundly better listener and spouse than I was a few weeks ago. I will still try to be there for my friends, so many of whom are in harm’s way because they, unlike me (I had to take a break from working in the hospital due to having asthma – another huge loss) work in healthcare. And I will read the stack of books that have been waiting years for me to get to them, and spend the time I always wanted to on writing. But I have a sense of calm, an eye of the storm within me, knowing that the world is not in my control and it never, ever was. I will do what I can do. No more, no less. For an anxiety-ridden perfectionist, that’s actually kind of miraculous. Stay safe, everyone.

Well, our family of three just returned from our annual week at Bethany Beach. This year we were blessed with the most beautiful, spacious house a mere block from the beach and boardwalk. Other family members originally planned on joining and pitched in to help us afford this glorious rental, but then couldn’t make it after all, leaving us with a gorgeous five-bedroom home all to ourselves. The house was immaculate, with beautiful indoor and outdoor spaces – spacious screened-in porch, rooftop deck, comfortable beds, flat-screen TVs in all of the bedrooms – all of the little details were thought of – they even had Williams-Sonoma kitchenware enough for an entire catered dinner party of 12 for God’s sake! What could be better? It turns out a lot of things.

I know I risk sounding hugely ungrateful – and please, don’t get me wrong, I have major gratitude for being able to spend this week at the beach – we had so many wonderful moments. Eva running in the water, digging in the sand, exploring seashells, playing on the deck, gazing at the stars on calm, quiet, sea-scented evenings. But I am also going to confess that much of this “vacation” week was absolute hell for me. The first few days it was just Eva and me; for work/family reasons my husband couldn’t join us until mid-week. Eva and me. All alone in a four-hour, traffic-filled car ride to the Eastern Shore. Eva and me. Joined at the hip to go anywhere or do anything. This is where it gets tough.

I love my beautiful 5-year-old daughter with high-functioning autism and PDA behavioral profile (see http://www.pdasociety.org.uk for more info) more than anything in the whole world. No offense to my husband, but before she was born I honestly never knew a love like this could exist on earth. It is so intense it is unnerving at times, and as many parents will attest, terrifying to love someone so much. It makes you incredibly vulnerable, like your heart beating outside of your body. Having said that, how can I possibly explain how tortuous my time with her can feel at times? Yes, tortuous. Which makes me feel incredibly sad and guilty. But it’s the truth sometimes. In short, when she is dysregulated – which is a significant amount of the time, especially when we are doing exciting things out of routine, such as traveling – I am a mess. I have suffered from Generalized Anxiety Disorder pretty much my whole life, but my anxiety has reached new heights in the past few years in the context of Eva’s neurodevelopmental issues and behavioral problems, i.e. autism. A child whose moods do not ebb and flow like the tide, but escalate unpredictably like the waves coming towards you as you wade out into the ocean. You might begin to feel relaxed, enjoying the cool surf when – WHAM! – an unexpectedly large crest loops over you, crashing you to the ground. A child who wakes up and within seconds begins obsessively playing inside an imaginary world that you must join and understand, or the penalty is a mini-meltdown of screaming, throwing things, banging her fists on her head – or you. A child whose nervous system is so fragile, and whose sensory diet is so strict that more just one activity outside the house a day can push her to the limit. A child who is both interested in other people, wants to play with others but at the same time feels threatened by faces and frequently misinterprets the actions of others, which sometimes resulting in lashing out and alienating the very people she wants to connect with. I imagine her experience of the world much of the time is a bit like being Alice in Wonderland. And that makes me grieve for her, as well as myself. But most of the time I am able to focus on the positive, when she is in her routine and more regulated, I think “we can get through this,” “she will be okay” and marvel at her incredibly creativity and loving heart.

At the beach, though, tied to her 24/7, I started to feel a bit trapped with little recourse. I couldn’t walk to the bookstore or go get coffee without taking her along, which could of course sabotage her sensory diet for the entire day. Everything was already so heightened for her just by virtue of the excitement of traveling. So we spent much of our time the first few days indoors, waiting for my husband. We ordered in, and she played in all of the bedrooms with her stuffed animals, insisting on me making all of the beds so that she and her “pets” could try out all of the rooms. Our few sojourns to the beach (in the middle of unseasonably cold and windy weather I should add) ended roughly, once with Eva becoming sensory overloaded and tossing sand over other children’s heads and another time ending in wracked sobs after a shell she had been holding was dropped and swept away by the tide. Nighttimes were equally difficult, with our usual bedtime routine completely disrupted by new surroundings, and rough play eventually dissolving into frustration and tears. By the time my husband joined us, the weather had moderately improved and the sun began to come out. But my anxiety was so heightened by that time that I found it difficult to enjoy our family time on the beach, so worried about whether Eva would become overwhelmed and perhaps act out with other children. Then there was the slime incident, during which Eva got slime all over the rental house’s expensive outdoor furniture and upholstery – that was partially my fault for giving it to her in the first place. We are still waiting to see if our rental insurance will cover it.

In the end, driving home yesterday was somewhat of a relief. Eva did amazing, playing dutifully on the iPad, happily engaged the whole time. And traffic was merciful this time. It was a sparkling, sunny day, the weather had turned, and we were headed in the right direction. Eva told me she was sad to leave the beach and that she had had a good time – she always describes this week as her favorite part of the year – and she asked me, “Did you like the beach?” I paused for a second, and knowing the joy she had gotten from trip, replied, “I did, honey. I had a great time.”

Okay, so maybe I shouldn’t have let my 5-year-old listen to Lizzo. Or Madonna. But please, she’s my child so she has to listen to Madonna.

I LOVE “Truth Hurts,” and honestly think the song has a great message of female empowerment. And anyone who knows me even a little knows about the pivotal role Madonna plays in my life. So how can I help it if Eva’s favorite track from Madame X is “B**** I’m Loca”? I have a very liberal attitude about language and always have. Bad words to me are modes of expression. I’m much more strict about violence or news of the latest shooting that takes place in our country – I block these things completely in our household. I haven’t worried so much about blocking bad words. I’ve taken an enlightened approach, bringing it to Eva’s awareness that these songs aren’t “kid-friendly” for summer camp but in our house, we can listen to them. It’s just the b-word, right? I like to think about the feminist aspects of these artists reclaiming the word, and how that will help empower Eva in our patriarchal society.

Flash forward to last night when I asked Eva to clean up her toys, and she smiled, looking straight at me as she delivered the words with an amused expression on her face, “Mommy, you’re a bad b****.” Clearly I am an idiot. For the record, I then had a talk with her about how Mommy made a mistake letting her hear bad language and if she wants to use those words (the cat is out of the bag after all) she can go into the bathroom and close the door. Alas, the next 20 minutes was spent with Eva making a “bad b**** smoothie” in the bathroom for her babydoll. Lesson learned.

It seems like I’ve been waiting forever to start a blog. Every year that has gone by since about 2010 I have told myself “This will be the year I will finally do it.” Well, it’s 2019, and I’m realizing that if I don’t start now, the wait could go on for 10 more years. Life has a way of accelerating as you get older. So, I’m 41 (41!) and just now getting to it. Better late than never. I’ve always had a lot to say – you can ask anyone who knows me, talking loudly and periodic word vomit is my thing – but now I have even more interesting experiences to draw from. My life in 2010 only slightly resembles my current existence. So I hope you’ll join me as I continue along my journey, navigating the challenges of having a daughter on the autism spectrum, attempting to write a novel (as well as a blog), and coping as many of you also are with the reality of how politically dysfunctional our country/culture has become in era of Trump. Did I mention that I used to work on the Hill and in government affairs here in DC? It feels like a million years ago, but still informs a lot of my present day thinking. Oh, and I will also somehow find a way to fit in gossip about certain celebrities (mostly icons from the 1990’s and early 2000’s from back when I was hip and current lol) and Real Housewives regularly. If it feels all over the map, that’s pretty much where I am these days. And I’m working super hard to embrace it. Thanks for joining me and I hope this blog is entertaining and maybe even occasionally insightful, if I should so dare to dream. Take care and talk soon.

Thanks for joining me!

Good company in a journey makes the way seem shorter. — Izaak Walton