The last few weeks have already been terrible due to the spread of the stupid COVID-19 virus. The last 2 weeks my kids have been out of school and “bored”, nothing is enough. I have MS, and not the kind that you wouldn’t notice unless someone tells you. My MS is very present and seen if I make the misguided decision to vacuum the living room carpet, I literally cannot walk upright if I vacuum.

Last night my back was killing me, so much. It felt like a jack hammer going at my spine while tiny hands with claws were trying to pull the muscles out of my skin. I fell asleep briefly and was up from 11 pm until sometime around 2:30 in the morning feeling so sick. My body ached, my stomach felt like I had food poisoning and there was so much pressure in my skull. I barely slept, and what little sleep I got contained nightmarish scenes of the corona virus version of The Walking Dead.

I gave myself the day off of trying to home school the kids, which really cannot compare to what the actual educators of my kids do and I have no clue how they manage every day for 8 hours because I am ready to wave the whit flag and sleep the rest of the day after 90 minutes. The boys were only upset by not having “class” because I told them it was a no video game day so they had to figure out how to entertain themselves without consoles while I attempted rest.

Rest was not received by me, in case you think I have magically children who can manage a couple of hours entertaining themselves. The oldest is OK because he calls his friends and reads books for fun (I know it’s amazing). The youngest misses his friends. I tried to set up a Zoom meeting so they could see each other and talk, I set up kids messenger through Facebook hoping they could connect that way. It all fell through, he is still upset as I locked myself in my office listening to Scottish musicians from the 90s because I can’t handle any more today.

I tried, I tried really hard, I feel like I am on the verge of physical death and I even went out to the post office to pick up a package the youngest had been waiting for hoping that would help. Even though that means disinfecting EVERYTHING from the moment I enter the car after leaving the post office until everything has been scrubbed clean, clothes worn out in an out of the way area because I have no immune system and the last thing I need on top of all of this shit is getting this virus.

So today is a terrible day, and I am going to have to live with that, try and get some sleep tonight. Try and rest better tomorrow, which will probably mean giving my kids video games because my last working nerve is frayed and missing myelin (MS reference, come on, it’s funny). I may even turn my phone off because I am annoyed at everything right now and having a hard time figuring out how to manage stress while being bombarded with terrible information, overwhelming sensory information, kids who are bored because they want to physically play with their friends and a service dog who is depressed because he can’t go out an work because we are on lock down.