Update | Quarantine, Anxiety, and Me

Hello, book friends!

I wanted to take a moment to kind of update everyone on my headspace and why I’ve been absent recently.

Obviously, this is an extremely stressful and sensitive time for everyone and I don’t want to take away from anyone else’s feelings or insult anyone by saying how hard this has been for me. I completely understand that I’m actually one of the fortunate ones right now. This is just my personal account of how I’m dealing with this strange and frightening time in our world.

It’s not easy to talk about my mental health. I share a lot of articles, memes, etc., about it, but I don’t talk about my own personal experiences a whole lot. There are several reasons for this, but mostly it’s that I don’t like feeling like I’m opening up such a private part of myself and leaving the door open to scrutiny and judgment. But since I’m part of a public forum within the book community, I feel like I would truly be doing myself a disservice if I don’t share a bit of what I’m going through. Particularly since I’m horribly behind in reviews and you all deserve to know the reason why.

If you’ve been following my reviews/blog for a while, then you probably know that last year totally threw me for a loop. This has had a huge effect on my life and truth be told, I’m still not quite 100% after my papaw died. Grief is a funny thing–sometimes you feel completely fine, and other times it hits you so hard that you feel like you can’t even breathe.

I actually started this year feeling pretty good, but then everything with this horrible virus started happening and the more I heard, the more anxious I became. I have severe anxiety–as well as depression–so while getting anxious isn’t a totally new thing for me, it’s been a long time since I’ve been stricken with such intense anxiety. Around this time I was also out of one of my anti-anxiety medications, and there were a couple of issues with getting it refilled. At this point, I had a panic attack so bad that I almost texted my husband to call me an ambulance. Basically, I was a mess.

This was also the first year I didn’t spend Easter with one of or both of my parents, which in the long run isn’t a huge thing, but it felt big to me. I’m extremely close to my parents and not being able to spend time together like we normally would is devastating.

And while I’m doing a bit better than I was, I’m still struggling. I’m still stuck in a rut of depression, and the anxiety, while improving, is still there. I’ve barely read anything in the last month–maybe two?–and what I have read, I can’t seem to find the motivation to write reviews for. My creativity has been zapped and I’ve been struggling to get by. I’ve also been working, since I do all my work from home anyway, so the stress has been high anyway, but knowing I’m behind on reviews has added to it tenfold. I’m trying to put things in perspective and just work on doing a little at a time so I’m not overwhelmed, but it’s hard when I’m constantly anxious and/or depressed.

If you’re an author to whom I owe a review, I deeply apologize for how late I am. I’m trying to contact each of you personally, but I’ll be honest; messaging has been one of the last things I’ve felt motivated to do. I would like to ask that you please be patient with me while I try to get my mental–and subsequently, physical–health back in order. I appreciate all of my dear friends in the book community and I want to thank you from the bottom of my heart for your kindness and understanding. I know this is such a hard time for all of us with seemingly no end in sight. Please know that my heart goes out to all of you who are struggling. You’re not alone <3

If you’ve read this whole post, then you deserve a cookie, lol. Thank you for your time and I promise I’ll do my best to get back to all things books soon <3 In the meantime, stay safe.

P.S. Huge shout-out to Animal Crossing, which has been a major lifesaver right now. It’s the perfect anxiety-free game that helps take me out of my mind for a while. If anyone’s playing and looking for a friend, let me know 😉

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