RealGoodFresh.com

I found this piece by Washington Post’s Ron Charles to be interesting. It’s a cute take on the notion that Henry David Thoreau’s two years of solitude at Walden Pond was the most famous act of “social distancing.”

But what really struck me was the end of Ron’s piece – here it is:

The coronavirus quarantine draws me back almost 30 years to when our first daughter was born with cerebral palsy after a terrifying labor. We spent 10 timeless days in the neonatal ICU before the doctors wished us luck and sent us home. My wife and I were in our 20s, struggling to make sense of what had happened to us, fearing what lay ahead for our child. We lived in a tiny house in a remote village along the Mississippi River. We cycled through fits of optimism and dread.

I had been raised at a time when people still whispered words like “divorce” and “cancer.” The only children with disabilities I had seen were on Jerry Lewis’s maudlin TV fundraisers. I had no language to describe what had befallen us. Unsure how to behave, my wife and I hunkered down in that little house and chose to see almost no one, convinced isolation was easier than enduring anyone’s fake cooing over our baby. The loneliness was so intense I thought it would kill me. When we saw other people, we were all smiles and abstract optimism. We lived in the Milky Way.

Years later, in a moment of extraordinary candor, a friend told us, “I sensed something was wrong, so I didn’t call.”

We didn’t blame him; we knew exactly what he meant. Others’ solitude can seem so sacrosanct, so proud and neatly sealed. Who’d want to disturb that? But now whenever my wife and I find ourselves reluctant to risk intruding on the privacy of someone in distress, we remind each other of that cruel hesitancy.

“I sensed something was wrong, so I didn’t call.” Wow. But I can relate. (Note that I say this with the clear intention of not comparing myself to Ron’s terrifying experience after his daughter’s birth; a blog about the dangers of comparative suffering coming soon).

I was one of the first people I know to have gotten something akin to the virus. I say “akin” because I never got tested – but starting in the second week of March, I had ten days of fatigue that turned into a week of fever, migraines, body aches and that very scary symptom, shortness of breath. Could barely get out of bed that week. After that, it was a gradual recovery. I’m fully recovered now except perhaps some slight lung scarring.

It was interesting to see how different people reacted differently to my illness. Of course, my family was there for me. Many friends showed deep concern. But I still haven’t seen a text from a handful of close friends even though I know they’ve heard about my situation. Perhaps they’re afraid to mention it – or they don’t have the capacity for that type of language. I feel for them.

My other challenge was overcoming the misinformation that people were receiving at the time, particularly around testing. A month ago, many hadn’t heard yet that being tested was a challenging feat. And since I hadn’t been tested, some spent their energies about pushing me in that direction rather than offering emotional support. Besides the fact that tests weren’t available – my wife tried – I wasn’t feeling well enough to go through the rigmarole involved. Not to mention there isn’t anything the doctors can do if you test positive, unless you’re so sick that you need to be hospitalized.

Now that I’m healthy, I’m bubbling with a “happy to be alive” mindset. I’ve been redoubling my efforts to connect with people. Hosting Zoom calls with groups of old friends. A huge family reunion. Yes, I’m doing that to ensure the people in my life feel connected. But I’m also doing that for myself. I need the connection too. That’s one of the reasons why I launched this site…