Ask HN: How are you holding up?

Ohh dear..that page is really shocking. What a sorry, shameful history.

Well, seems like we're living in interesting times, but as a curse, doesn't seem so bad.

Having a relatively secure job makes a lot of difference I think. Mine has stayed consistent, with a few months of working at home, and now back in the office with a skeleton crew.

Thing is, I never swung for the fences. I've stayed in jobs that didn't pay as much as I might have left for, but they were secure, and allowed me to build up, so now in my early 50's I make at least 1/2 as much from investments each year as salary (total 200K+ a year living outside of a major metropolitan area). My spouse did the same, so together we're doing fine financially, and I think that security helps our piece of mind a lot. We've always been saving for the rainy day, and now that it's here, we're coasting a bit.

So we do what we did before anyway - head out to the woods, bike, hike, play board games, the random video game, and keep up our garden and yard. We're simple people with simple needs so we're easy to please. Probably the only thing we miss is travel - we used to head south to Mexico or South America every two years, and that's on hold, of course.

Oh, and zero, zero, zero social media and mainstream news. I mean none. I think that helps me a lot. I don't even enjoy NPR. If it's not something in depth and reasoned, I don't even bother. The world at large really holds very little for me, except places like here (HN) where there is technically interesting ideas to explore.

I feel for the folks that are struggling, though. I can completely see the "There but by the grace of God go I." I really like seeing people step up to help in this thread. You're my heroes for the day. Thank you.

The US scares me both in Corona terms (cases seem to be moving up whereas in most of the world they've been going down a lot), and in terms of what looks to me like extreme entitlement of the police forces, literally demanding the right to kill people, rejecting any attempt at accountability, and attacking peaceful protesters against police violence.

Several US police forces make it look like the only way forward is to completely abandon existing police forces and start over. I really hope the protesters win this, otherwise it seems to me you're basically accepting a police state.

I feel you. Try not to put too much pressure on yourself. I've been having a lot of ups and downs myself. Not having anyone to talk to I've been almost by myself for four months with occassional walks with a friend. But the sum total of my human face to face contact is about 4-5 hours a month. This is just not enough for most humans.

Plus there is the added stress that if you slip too much you could end up back into a bad job market. The only thing one can do is to find other healthy diversions and keep diet / sleep / exercise on track.

I hope my managers understand and won't judge my performance at this time.

Right now - really good. WFH has been amazing for myself and my staff's productivity and teamwork. Everyone is comfortable. Everyone feels more at ease to 'bring themselves to their work' and it's having a definite positive impact on our outcomes.

In about a week - terrible. As I have stated in other threads, my work has banned all remote work once we're forced back next week. Banned. Outright. So those of us with children and no childcare, or those with comorbidities are just screwed. The anxiety about that is building. Luckily, I have a neighbor that can watch my child until school is back in session. But I honestly don't know what I'm going to do in August. Our daycare has been and will remain limited in the number of kids it can take. The school is looking at a 2 day/week schedule to reduce the number of kids in the building. If that happens, I have a 7 year old with zero options for daytime care. I do not have enough PTO to take those days off, nor could I and keep my job, even if I had the time.

Hopelessness is starting to creep in.