New beginnings after COVID-19, Mum's passing and me crawling out of the depths of despair.
The last few years haven't been easy for me. I finally decided to get out of a toxic and dead-end marriage of 20 years. Two years ago, I moved out of my marital home into a little place of my own. That was a huge step for me. My daughter moved with me. A week later, my mum was diagnosed with stage 4 ovarian cancer. I had to fly down to India but I had no money, having spent every cent I had on moving into my place. I had to beg and borrow and with the help of friends and good Samaritans, was able to scrape together a return ticket and some money for mum's hospital expenses. I flew down and did what I had to do, Mum's Paranoid Schizophrenia was acting up and she refused the palliative care that I had managed to secure for her. The doctors said that she had stage 4 Ovarian cancer and it had spread to her lungs and liver. She was physically too weak to withstand the rigours of chemotherapy or surgery and the doctors gave her 3 to six months to live. Mum needed to get palliative care during this time due to the symptoms of this cancer; her abdomen kept filling up with fluid and it had to be tapped every 4 to 5 weeks. Plus, she needed someone to care for her daily. She was adamant about not staying in the facility and wanted to go on her way. Nothing I could do about it except let her go and I had to fly back to New Zealand to my job, daughter, and life. This was the end of 2018.
Being on my own at the age of 45 was a shock, but I was adjusting and mostly having difficulty with managing my finances as I do not earn much. The other issue was dealing with my daughter acting up. She was understandably upset about her parent separating and was channelling her anger, hurt and discontent towards me. I was her sounding board. Only I was having enough to deal with on my own. I kept looking for ways to earn more money. I started driving for Uber eats, delivering food for a few hours each day about 3 or 4 times a week; after an 8 hour day at my day job. This was not too rewarding and extremely exhausting. However, the extra money did help. Soon, there were too many Uber eats drivers and I was getting fewer orders, so I stopped doing it. I interviewed for another role in the company I work for and got it. The pay was a little more than I was earning previously. Life started to look up a little. I was exploring the options of buying my first home.
Cut to March 2020. Covid19 was in full swing. Italy and Spain were suffering and losing hundreds of people to this virus every day. New Zealand started seeing the case numbers picking up. We went into complete lockdown for 5 weeks. Our lives were not as we knew it anymore. We were confined to our homes, allowed out for 1 hour of fresh air and exercise every day and could only otherwise go out for essentials like groceries and doctor's visits. I, along with thousands of others were working from home. My daughter's university was having online lessons and that became our new normal.
I called my mum on April 3rd to wish her for her birthday and she sounded cheerful. This was roughly 18 months after the doctors gave their prediction of 3 to 6 months that she had left. I asked her how she was doing, and she said that she needed to go to the hospital. I told her to let me know what the outcome of the hospital visit was. I hadn't heard from her the next day so I called her a few days later – probably the 7th or 8th of April. She said that she needed to go in for emergency surgery, that the tumour had grown and now needed to be removed. She wanted me to send her some money. I told her that I barely had any money for myself but would see if I could do something. I asked her to send me some more details about what was wrong, and I needed to speak to the doctor. I called her a few days later and she said that she had had the surgery and was in palliative care and was feeling good. I asked her what surgery she had, and the details were sketchy. And then she got distracted and was talking to someone else about medicine and tablets, I could hear brief snippets of the conversation on the other end of the phone. I tried to draw her attention by yelling on the phone, but I guess she could not hear me. So, I hung up. I tried calling her the next day and got no response.
On April 21st I saw a missed call on my phone at about 5 pm. It was a Bangalore number. I called back. It was a doctor from Kidwai hospital. He informed me that my mother had died the day before. He said that according to her wishes her body had been donated to science. I had known that this was her wish and had signed the waiver when I was on a visit in 2014. The news of her death came like a bolt out of the blue for me. Here we were in the middle of lockdown and no flights out of New Zealand. Our borders were shut. I was feeling rotten that I couldn't be by her side in her last moments or give her a fitting send-off. I was stunned. I knew that my mother was on borrowed time, but for some strange reason, I did not think she'd die. The mother from my childhood was always a strong woman and nothing could shake her. She was a woman who took on jobs most men would crumble from and she was always ready for an adventure. Always ready for a challenge and she worked damn hard all her life. She gave all her money away to charity and lived a frugal existence herself. She constantly thought about helping people, especially children. Now she had died all alone in a strange place, surrounded by strangers. And no funeral, no mourners and probably lying in a cold freezer at the medical research facility having God knows what done to her body. No flowers, Arum lilies were her favourite flowers and I would have loved to have been able to place a bunch of them on her coffin. There is no grave either, and that makes me sad. It would be nice to have a grave to go and sit at and place Arum lilies on when I need to connect with her. A place to go to feel close to her. Al I could do was sit in my home and weep. Due to lockdown and restrictions, no one could visit me. My ex-husband came and spent 3 days at my place, and it was comforting to have him here.
Right through lockdown, my company kept reassuring us that our jobs were safe, and we had nothing to worry about. Then came the blow in May. By this time, lockdown restrictions had eased, and we were able to move around more freely and return to the office. Stores were opened and business was getting back to normal. The company announced a massive re-structure at the Support Office, where I work. They disestablished every role, and everyone had to apply for a new role in the new structure. All in all, there would be 130 job cut. So, 130 roles less for us to apply for. The consultation process began, the roles were advertised internally. We could apply for 3 roles if we so wished. I read through all the job descriptions and prepared my resume according to each role. On the day that the applications were opened to us, I applied for the roles I'd chosen.
We were supposed to hear about potential interviews in 2 weeks. When the time came, we were informed that the timeline had been pushed out by a week. I finally had my interviews. The first one was not that great, and I came away feeling like I'd bombed it. A few days later I had the next interview. I felt it went well and came away feeling quite good about myself. We were told that we would hear about the outcome in a week. Fast forward to a week later and we were told that there were numerous applications and that when they sat down and did the costing, they realised that the yearly salary budget couldn't accommodate so many people. So, they proposed a further 23 jobs being cut. And this started a re-consultation process which would take another week.
The level of stress and trauma this has caused all of us is immeasurable, but also measurable in terms of loss of productivity. I for one, have not been able to focus on any work in a week. I just cannot bring myself to sit at my work computer and do anything productive. So, I've been sitting in front of the TV and binge-watching Netflix. The last few days, I've taken sick leave because I feel guilty about not working when I'm being paid to do so. The company is trying to help us as best they can by providing free counselling for up to 6 sessions with a trained counsellor. I met with one of them at the office on Thursday. It's all very well to have this service available and it will help us to cope with this situation, but why put us through this in the first place? Point 1: Why have a restructure right when we are coming out of COVID–19 lockdown? Everybody is already stressed from dealing with the pressures of the virus circulating in our community, the loss of loved ones and the cost of living through something like this. The job market is reeling from other companies laying off staff. Air New Zealand alone laid off 3000 people. The job market is so bad right now that for every job advertised, recruiters are receiving 500+ applications. I've been applying for jobs all over New Zealand and haven't heard back from a single one.
It's a tough market out there and this company claims to look after us. How is this looking after us? Point 2: When you announce a restructure, you're putting a lot of stress on your employees. Get your shit together! Do your planning, stick to your timelines, and get things done. Don't drag things on and keep postponing the results. You're just putting undue strain on an already strained employee base. The people who have been making these decisions are the ones who have either not been affected by the re-structure or are the ones who have been able to secure roles in the new structure. So where is the sense of urgency for them? Their jobs are secure, they're assured of their fat pay packets that will allow them to feed their families and indulge in their rich people hobbies and pastimes, while the rest of us are struggling to survive.
I had another session with a therapist at his office yesterday. I honestly came away feeling lighter. I felt that I was listened to, He was compassionate and kind and came away with some great tools to help me during this period of waiting for my company to deem it fit to let me know whether I've been selected for a role, or not. It's this period of waiting and then being told that we have to wait some more that is killing me. It's psychological trauma.
One of the tools that the therapist mentioned yesterday is Morning Pages. He gave me a brief outline about what it is, and I came home and looked it up online. It's a habit that you cultivate over time by waking up every morning and writing down your thoughts. First thing every morning before you make your coffee or tea, before anything else. You must write this down on paper in longhand. Since I love writing so much, on my way home from the therapist, I stopped and bought a new notebook. This was even before I fully knew what Morning Pages were. I was sold from the first mention of it because I love writing. I set my alarm for 4 a.m. this morning, set my notebook and pen on my bedside table and went to bed. When the alarm went off at 4 a.m. today, I got up, went to the bathroom, and then sat on my bed and started writing. You're supposed to write 3 A4 pages a day.
Morning Pages is a tool designed by Julie Cameron. She wrote a book called The Artist's Way and it full of tools to help all people, not just artists, to channel their creative side. She believes that everybody has a creative side whether you paint, write, cook, dance, walk, breathe…. I was so inspired by what I read about Morning Pages that I bought The Artist's Way and downloaded it on my Kindle. I started reading it last night and I get the feeling that she is talking to my soul. I haven't gotten very far yet, but she asks you to commit to Morning Pages, the Artist's Date (haven't got to that part yet) and a weekly schedule she outlines in the book, for next 12 weeks. I figured I'd give it a try. I am always up for a challenge. And frankly, I could use a distraction from the current situation. Julia mentions that this book and its tools will help you recover or discover your creative side and let your Artist Brain be more involved with your decision making and life choices along with your Logic Brain. I am excited about this and something I've not felt in a long, long time.
So after giving you a (not so brief) history of what led me to this point, I have decided to write a blog about Morning Pages and how I'm getting along with keeping to the schedule of writing those three pages first thing every morning and if and how I can see my life changing through the process. I will try and write this blog every day for the first few weeks or months and that will keep me honest about doing the Morning Pages every morning; and I will write this blog every evening, trying to decipher what changes I've noticed since starting this exercise. Maybe this is too early to say, but after my first Morning Pages this morning, for the first time in ages, I have sat down to write this blog and as I'm typing this, I've got 2349 works on the page. That hasn't happened in so long, I can't even remember when the last time was.
Another thing that my therapist mentioned was that I need to keep a schedule. My schedule went out the window once we went into lockdown. My regular schedule used be waking up, having a cup of tea, showering and dressing and heading to the office for 8 and a half hours. I'd come back home, make a cup of tea, drink it while prepping dinner and then head off to the beach with the dog for a walk. I'm come home, feed the pets, and sit down to watch the 6 o'clock news. Dinner at 7 p.m., watch some TV for an hour and go to bed at 8:30. When we went into lockdown, all schedule and structure went out of my day. Also, I was working from home and at home all the time. So, while I had a shower every morning and got to my desk by 6:30 a.m., I was dressing in track pants and a t-shirt. And since I was home, the lines blurred between my professional life and personal time.
The fact that I was wearing track pants and t-shirts every day also probably contributed to the decline in my mental health. I love dressing up. I'm not a designer brand clothes horse, the only places I can afford to shop on my budget are The Warehouse and Kmart. In saying that, it is possible to pick up some nice clothing from these stores and if you accessorize them well, you can look like a million bucks. And I love that! So, after the talk with my therapist, he made me realise that I need to bring the structure back into my life. After I did my Morning Pages today, the next thing I did was open the calendar on my iPad and put a structure in place for every day of the week, including the time to take a brief walk during my workday. Nothing too overwhelming, but it's a start. I've set up alerts so when I'm busy through my workday, the alert will go off to let me know it's time to get up and go for a walk.
I've also scheduled time in for my Morning Pages and time every evening to blog about how the Morning Pages routine is helping me. Or if I recognise that new thought, idea, feeling, sensation, activity is triggered by the Morning Pages habit. So here goes. Time for me to get out of this funk and open my life up to new possibilities. I'll also let you know as I read the book, and post my progress with the exercises.
Be kind and Cheers 😊
The last few years haven't been easy for me. I finally decided to get out of a toxic and dead-end marriage of 20 years. Two years ago, I moved out of my marital home into a little place of my own. That was a huge step for me. My daughter moved with me. A week later, my mum was diagnosed with stage 4 ovarian cancer. I had to fly down to India but I had no money, having spent every cent I had on moving into my place. I had to beg and borrow and with the help of friends and good Samaritans, was able to scrape together a return ticket and some money for mum's hospital expenses. I flew down and did what I had to do, Mum's Paranoid Schizophrenia was acting up and she refused the palliative care that I had managed to secure for her. The doctors said that she had stage 4 Ovarian cancer and it had spread to her lungs and liver. She was physically too weak to withstand the rigours of chemotherapy or surgery and the doctors gave her 3 to six months to live. Mum needed to get palliative care during this time due to the symptoms of this cancer; her abdomen kept filling up with fluid and it had to be tapped every 4 to 5 weeks. Plus, she needed someone to care for her daily. She was adamant about not staying in the facility and wanted to go on her way. Nothing I could do about it except let her go and I had to fly back to New Zealand to my job, daughter, and life. This was the end of 2018.
Being on my own at the age of 45 was a shock, but I was adjusting and mostly having difficulty with managing my finances as I do not earn much. The other issue was dealing with my daughter acting up. She was understandably upset about her parent separating and was channelling her anger, hurt and discontent towards me. I was her sounding board. Only I was having enough to deal with on my own. I kept looking for ways to earn more money. I started driving for Uber eats, delivering food for a few hours each day about 3 or 4 times a week; after an 8 hour day at my day job. This was not too rewarding and extremely exhausting. However, the extra money did help. Soon, there were too many Uber eats drivers and I was getting fewer orders, so I stopped doing it. I interviewed for another role in the company I work for and got it. The pay was a little more than I was earning previously. Life started to look up a little. I was exploring the options of buying my first home.
Cut to March 2020. Covid19 was in full swing. Italy and Spain were suffering and losing hundreds of people to this virus every day. New Zealand started seeing the case numbers picking up. We went into complete lockdown for 5 weeks. Our lives were not as we knew it anymore. We were confined to our homes, allowed out for 1 hour of fresh air and exercise every day and could only otherwise go out for essentials like groceries and doctor's visits. I, along with thousands of others were working from home. My daughter's university was having online lessons and that became our new normal.
I called my mum on April 3rd to wish her for her birthday and she sounded cheerful. This was roughly 18 months after the doctors gave their prediction of 3 to 6 months that she had left. I asked her how she was doing, and she said that she needed to go to the hospital. I told her to let me know what the outcome of the hospital visit was. I hadn't heard from her the next day so I called her a few days later – probably the 7th or 8th of April. She said that she needed to go in for emergency surgery, that the tumour had grown and now needed to be removed. She wanted me to send her some money. I told her that I barely had any money for myself but would see if I could do something. I asked her to send me some more details about what was wrong, and I needed to speak to the doctor. I called her a few days later and she said that she had had the surgery and was in palliative care and was feeling good. I asked her what surgery she had, and the details were sketchy. And then she got distracted and was talking to someone else about medicine and tablets, I could hear brief snippets of the conversation on the other end of the phone. I tried to draw her attention by yelling on the phone, but I guess she could not hear me. So, I hung up. I tried calling her the next day and got no response.
On April 21st I saw a missed call on my phone at about 5 pm. It was a Bangalore number. I called back. It was a doctor from Kidwai hospital. He informed me that my mother had died the day before. He said that according to her wishes her body had been donated to science. I had known that this was her wish and had signed the waiver when I was on a visit in 2014. The news of her death came like a bolt out of the blue for me. Here we were in the middle of lockdown and no flights out of New Zealand. Our borders were shut. I was feeling rotten that I couldn't be by her side in her last moments or give her a fitting send-off. I was stunned. I knew that my mother was on borrowed time, but for some strange reason, I did not think she'd die. The mother from my childhood was always a strong woman and nothing could shake her. She was a woman who took on jobs most men would crumble from and she was always ready for an adventure. Always ready for a challenge and she worked damn hard all her life. She gave all her money away to charity and lived a frugal existence herself. She constantly thought about helping people, especially children. Now she had died all alone in a strange place, surrounded by strangers. And no funeral, no mourners and probably lying in a cold freezer at the medical research facility having God knows what done to her body. No flowers, Arum lilies were her favourite flowers and I would have loved to have been able to place a bunch of them on her coffin. There is no grave either, and that makes me sad. It would be nice to have a grave to go and sit at and place Arum lilies on when I need to connect with her. A place to go to feel close to her. Al I could do was sit in my home and weep. Due to lockdown and restrictions, no one could visit me. My ex-husband came and spent 3 days at my place, and it was comforting to have him here.
Right through lockdown, my company kept reassuring us that our jobs were safe, and we had nothing to worry about. Then came the blow in May. By this time, lockdown restrictions had eased, and we were able to move around more freely and return to the office. Stores were opened and business was getting back to normal. The company announced a massive re-structure at the Support Office, where I work. They disestablished every role, and everyone had to apply for a new role in the new structure. All in all, there would be 130 job cut. So, 130 roles less for us to apply for. The consultation process began, the roles were advertised internally. We could apply for 3 roles if we so wished. I read through all the job descriptions and prepared my resume according to each role. On the day that the applications were opened to us, I applied for the roles I'd chosen.
We were supposed to hear about potential interviews in 2 weeks. When the time came, we were informed that the timeline had been pushed out by a week. I finally had my interviews. The first one was not that great, and I came away feeling like I'd bombed it. A few days later I had the next interview. I felt it went well and came away feeling quite good about myself. We were told that we would hear about the outcome in a week. Fast forward to a week later and we were told that there were numerous applications and that when they sat down and did the costing, they realised that the yearly salary budget couldn't accommodate so many people. So, they proposed a further 23 jobs being cut. And this started a re-consultation process which would take another week.
The level of stress and trauma this has caused all of us is immeasurable, but also measurable in terms of loss of productivity. I for one, have not been able to focus on any work in a week. I just cannot bring myself to sit at my work computer and do anything productive. So, I've been sitting in front of the TV and binge-watching Netflix. The last few days, I've taken sick leave because I feel guilty about not working when I'm being paid to do so. The company is trying to help us as best they can by providing free counselling for up to 6 sessions with a trained counsellor. I met with one of them at the office on Thursday. It's all very well to have this service available and it will help us to cope with this situation, but why put us through this in the first place? Point 1: Why have a restructure right when we are coming out of COVID–19 lockdown? Everybody is already stressed from dealing with the pressures of the virus circulating in our community, the loss of loved ones and the cost of living through something like this. The job market is reeling from other companies laying off staff. Air New Zealand alone laid off 3000 people. The job market is so bad right now that for every job advertised, recruiters are receiving 500+ applications. I've been applying for jobs all over New Zealand and haven't heard back from a single one.
It's a tough market out there and this company claims to look after us. How is this looking after us? Point 2: When you announce a restructure, you're putting a lot of stress on your employees. Get your shit together! Do your planning, stick to your timelines, and get things done. Don't drag things on and keep postponing the results. You're just putting undue strain on an already strained employee base. The people who have been making these decisions are the ones who have either not been affected by the re-structure or are the ones who have been able to secure roles in the new structure. So where is the sense of urgency for them? Their jobs are secure, they're assured of their fat pay packets that will allow them to feed their families and indulge in their rich people hobbies and pastimes, while the rest of us are struggling to survive.
I had another session with a therapist at his office yesterday. I honestly came away feeling lighter. I felt that I was listened to, He was compassionate and kind and came away with some great tools to help me during this period of waiting for my company to deem it fit to let me know whether I've been selected for a role, or not. It's this period of waiting and then being told that we have to wait some more that is killing me. It's psychological trauma.
One of the tools that the therapist mentioned yesterday is Morning Pages. He gave me a brief outline about what it is, and I came home and looked it up online. It's a habit that you cultivate over time by waking up every morning and writing down your thoughts. First thing every morning before you make your coffee or tea, before anything else. You must write this down on paper in longhand. Since I love writing so much, on my way home from the therapist, I stopped and bought a new notebook. This was even before I fully knew what Morning Pages were. I was sold from the first mention of it because I love writing. I set my alarm for 4 a.m. this morning, set my notebook and pen on my bedside table and went to bed. When the alarm went off at 4 a.m. today, I got up, went to the bathroom, and then sat on my bed and started writing. You're supposed to write 3 A4 pages a day.
Morning Pages is a tool designed by Julie Cameron. She wrote a book called The Artist's Way and it full of tools to help all people, not just artists, to channel their creative side. She believes that everybody has a creative side whether you paint, write, cook, dance, walk, breathe…. I was so inspired by what I read about Morning Pages that I bought The Artist's Way and downloaded it on my Kindle. I started reading it last night and I get the feeling that she is talking to my soul. I haven't gotten very far yet, but she asks you to commit to Morning Pages, the Artist's Date (haven't got to that part yet) and a weekly schedule she outlines in the book, for next 12 weeks. I figured I'd give it a try. I am always up for a challenge. And frankly, I could use a distraction from the current situation. Julia mentions that this book and its tools will help you recover or discover your creative side and let your Artist Brain be more involved with your decision making and life choices along with your Logic Brain. I am excited about this and something I've not felt in a long, long time.
So after giving you a (not so brief) history of what led me to this point, I have decided to write a blog about Morning Pages and how I'm getting along with keeping to the schedule of writing those three pages first thing every morning and if and how I can see my life changing through the process. I will try and write this blog every day for the first few weeks or months and that will keep me honest about doing the Morning Pages every morning; and I will write this blog every evening, trying to decipher what changes I've noticed since starting this exercise. Maybe this is too early to say, but after my first Morning Pages this morning, for the first time in ages, I have sat down to write this blog and as I'm typing this, I've got 2349 works on the page. That hasn't happened in so long, I can't even remember when the last time was.
Another thing that my therapist mentioned was that I need to keep a schedule. My schedule went out the window once we went into lockdown. My regular schedule used be waking up, having a cup of tea, showering and dressing and heading to the office for 8 and a half hours. I'd come back home, make a cup of tea, drink it while prepping dinner and then head off to the beach with the dog for a walk. I'm come home, feed the pets, and sit down to watch the 6 o'clock news. Dinner at 7 p.m., watch some TV for an hour and go to bed at 8:30. When we went into lockdown, all schedule and structure went out of my day. Also, I was working from home and at home all the time. So, while I had a shower every morning and got to my desk by 6:30 a.m., I was dressing in track pants and a t-shirt. And since I was home, the lines blurred between my professional life and personal time.
The fact that I was wearing track pants and t-shirts every day also probably contributed to the decline in my mental health. I love dressing up. I'm not a designer brand clothes horse, the only places I can afford to shop on my budget are The Warehouse and Kmart. In saying that, it is possible to pick up some nice clothing from these stores and if you accessorize them well, you can look like a million bucks. And I love that! So, after the talk with my therapist, he made me realise that I need to bring the structure back into my life. After I did my Morning Pages today, the next thing I did was open the calendar on my iPad and put a structure in place for every day of the week, including the time to take a brief walk during my workday. Nothing too overwhelming, but it's a start. I've set up alerts so when I'm busy through my workday, the alert will go off to let me know it's time to get up and go for a walk.
I've also scheduled time in for my Morning Pages and time every evening to blog about how the Morning Pages routine is helping me. Or if I recognise that new thought, idea, feeling, sensation, activity is triggered by the Morning Pages habit. So here goes. Time for me to get out of this funk and open my life up to new possibilities. I'll also let you know as I read the book, and post my progress with the exercises.
Be kind and Cheers 😊
