Coronavirus lockdown guide

This morning 24th March 2020, Britain has woken up on an almost lockdown state, people ordered to not to leave their homes unless it’s absolutely necessary and has finally given police powers to break up gatherings in beaches, parks and in towns. The frightening part is the unknown, no one has ever gone through this before and people are scared, not so much of the virus itself, but of the unknown road that comes with it. This is a road that hasn’t been taken before, there’s no mile’s stones or signs posts telling anyone which way to go. It’s going to take a wee bit of time to Adjust to a new way of life and it is going to be hard, but not only can we adjust to this and survive, we can thrive as well.

For many, being locked away at home for 23 hours a day is a dream come true, to others they are already finding this difficult, especially for people who suffer from mental health issues, those with young families or family members to care for, the situation is scary, I get it however, but you know what I say? don’t waste a crisis, we are still imaginative people, we just have to look for the sliver lining in the clouds.

Just like the rest of you, I have found a lot more time on my hands now, thankfully for me after years of having a auto immune disease and having at times had to stay away from the outside world, its given me the time to teach myself how to keep myself entertained. While these are unprecedented times, there are a few things that I had done in the past that has helped me cope with the weeks I have spent at home away from the world, hopefully they will help you aswell.

Routine

Routine is key, when you think about it our lives have been largely built out of some sort of routine. We get up, wash, dress, go to work or school, come home, dinner, work, washing etc. Routines and keeping to these times of the day is what gets us through the day. When we leave our routine that’s when we lose sight of time and even days. It is tempting to spend all day every day in joggers and baggy jumpers and veg out on the sofa with a packet of biscuits watching Netflix, but this situation is not good for the long term. Build a new routine for the day, and get through one week at a time, taking each day as they come and building a new routine is what’s going to get us through the next few weeks.

Keeping a healthy diet.

Its so easy to comfort eat, try and avoid as much as possible. Try to keep in mind what your normal eating habits are and try to eat normally.

Now is a great time to learn to cook new and amazing meals think of it this way, have you always wanted to learn how to cook Indian, or Cajun meals? Now is a great time to learn something new, dig out those recipe books or those hand me down recipes that you have never got around to making and embrace the Jamie Oliver that’s screaming to get out.

Now is also the time to look around at the people who live around you, that vulnerable person down the road from you, could they use a home cooked meal, its better than throwing anything away and most people can cook an extra meal and not even notice.

Exercise.

At the moment people are still allowed to go for a run, walk or bike ride, but gyms and pools are now closed, its really imported to exercise, while we are still allowed to go out for exercise its important to do so. If you have a garden or roof top, make good use of it, if you don’t, make good use of the staircase, walking or running up and down the stairs.

Make good use of your living rooms and turn them into a mini keep fit room or virtual gyms for an hour a day, there are some amazing YouTube videos for keep fit and making use of every day items to keep you moving, its nice to practice with other people in a hall and for those who do like practicing with other people, there are virtual classes about.

Learn yoga, meditation Pilates or dance, the possibilities are endless.

Mental health support.

Depending who you are sharing your home with, being on lockdown is lonely. Its important for people not to lose sight of the support networks out there, even if you share your home with family.

It’s important not to have the news on 24 hours a day, set news time as apart of your daily routine, maybe watching the news with breakfast or the 5 o’clock news, but not to keep turning the news on all the time, the news isn’t going to change within the hour. The same goes for your social media feeds, there is a lot of misinformation out there and a lot of these posts are written to scare you, keep to the facts only. This is a hard one, but if you can shut of the news feed from your phones you should, taking yourself away from social media for a few hours a day is going to give you time to focus on other things. Face-time friends and family keep that connection going.

Keep contact with people. WhatsApp, face-timing, making a phone call. Keep in contact with family and friends. Human contact and communication is vital for our health and well-being. Don’t lose the contact with people.

Boosting your immune system

Your immune system is what is going to get you through this, that’s obvious, keeping a good diet, good nights sleep, cutting out the alcohol.

If you’re not sleeping, staying up all night playing online games, then getting up early than your immune system isn’t going to work. If you are eating unhealthily your immune system won’t work.

Stress damages the immune system, again, exercise is key to keeping your immune system safe, the more blood flows, the more your immune system is going to work.

Virtual coffee meetups, lunch and dinner dates.

Its not the same as human contact but it’s a good second best, its Taking the meetups to the next level and communicating over video chat while having dinner, how super modern is that?

Children and facts

With schools closed, our children are at home a lot more than normal, even in the summer holidays we can kick them out for a few hours, but that’s no longer the case. It’s a real difficult time for our kids. They want to know what’s going on, tell them but keep to the facts and not rumors.

Try not to do anymore home schooling than what is necessary. The schools have a back up plan and they are sending homework home, and most are using online media. So, our kids are already busy, anymore homework lessons you are going to give them is just going to overload them. Kids are using social media a lot and getting a lot of miss information which in turn is scaring them more than necessary, instead get them to check the NHS online or the world health organization rather than their social media feeds .

Social distancing

Keep 2 meters distance away, that means if someone coughs or sneezes you are not in the radius that the sneeze will fall on to. If you don’t meet or mix with groups of people you are not going to catch the virus and so you can’t pass it on, the bigger the distance the better.

Keeping a dairy

Keeping a dairy about whatever comes to mind, organising your thoughts for the day, every evening write down at least three good things that’s happened that day, people that you have called or who has called you, gossip, funny things that you remember from your childhood, how has this crisis affected you personally.

Read a book.

Be honest, how many books do you have sitting on your bookcase or in your kindle that you have been meaning to read but just haven’t had the time. What’s your excuse now? You have none. Amazon kindle, e-books, free books, classics, there are so many ways to get books theses days, or just pick up the paper back that you have been meaning to read for the last 10 years.

You could even start a book group on Facebook, a book a week with your friends and family.

Virtual world of learning,

No one knows how long this is going to last for, 6, 12 weeks maybe longer, now is the best time to start learning something new.

There are museums around the world offering virtual tours and art exhibits, watch some history documentaries, open learning has some great short courses.

Every wanted to learn a new language? YouTube have some great start up videos, there are also loads of apps like Duolingo that would help you with the basics.

The truth is, this is the road unknown and in so, this is most likely going to last longer than you think.

This is most likely going to last longer than you think it will, Spain initial announced that lockdown will be for 15 days, but it’s clear it’s going to last much longer, that doesn’t have anything to do with the authorities, it’s just the reality of things to day, we just don’t know, for many this could be 12 weeks, others even longer, what we do know is, this is going to last long enough for our lives to change at least for the next few months. Thinking that you can get through this because it’s only going to be for a few weeks is not going to work, it’s better to assume that this is a long haul and the sooner you make changes while you can.