Sunday 10th May 2020 is the ten-year anniversary of the day I started my new career. I like to celebrate these anniversaries, like the anniversary of the day I moved to Manchester: these events changed my life for the better. Unfortunately, I’m not really in the mood to celebrate.
For many people, the tragic story of COVID-19 is set to continue for a long time. Frontline health workers and others who have experienced the worst of this pandemic may never fully recover from the trauma. For some, the financial fallout may affect the rest of their lives. I feel deeply sorry for anyone who has lost loved ones or is traumatised by their work on the front line and is also set to suffer financially as a result of the economic consequences.
I am relatively lucky. So far, we haven't had any serious cases amongst close family or friends and at the moment, we are still working and are able to do so in shifts so that we can also look after and teach our son. Our close family are all in the UK, so we don't have the awful situation of being separated from our loved ones due to border controls or work and visa issues as, sadly, many people are having to deal with right now.
I can only imagine how difficult things must be for people whose circumstances are worse than ours because I'm struggling.
I have experienced anxiety and depression since I was a very young child - although it was only diagnosed well into adulthood and I'm still learning about these issues and developing ways to manage my mental health. Whilst I do experience anxiety on a daily basis and can struggle with low mood fairly constantly, the upside of managing these conditions for so long means I have developed ways of coping and, mostly, it's just normal for me. Generally, I get by ok but when I'm presented with a particularly big hurdle, I find myself burdened with a thousand dormant worries that keep me from even attempting to clear it.
In 2008, at the age of 30 and with almost ten years' experience in one industry, the financial crash brought an abrupt end to my career. We had a mortgage on a modest flat but fortunately then, no other responsibilities. I scratched around for freelance work and other bits and tried to keep my sanity in check while staring out at a bleak future.
For a long time I was low. I toyed vaguely with the worst option but couldn't do it to my partner (now my wife) who was singlehandedly holding me up straight. It was in this period I was diagnosed with anxiety and depression and some six months later, I had a few sessions of Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT).
Sometimes I don't know where the anxiety ends and the depression begins. They're a dynamic duo: the anxiety makes me worry I'm not good enough; the depression makes it so. The depression makes it really hard to get up, washed, dressed and to eat; the anxiety tries to stop me from doing anything more than that. The depression highlights all of the negative feelings I hold about myself (plenty to choose from); the anxiety makes me dismiss any positive ones.
Eventually, when I was 32, I was presented with half a chance to create a new career from the very bottom. I was terrified of showing how incapable I was but I didn’t really have any pride left to lose, so I grabbed it. I was on a low-level agency temp wage but I worked unpaid overtime while I worked out how to do the job. I took on any extra responsibilities that were up for grabs (which were coming thick and fast: the ‘old guard’ of comfortable permanent staff sat doing the same few tasks while the precariat buzzed around them, hoping for a sniff of a proper contract) and blagged it convincingly enough that I was offered a short contract. I took on even more responsibilities and was given another contract. I continued to develop and prove my worth and I was offered a permanent contract. I even gained a promotion. Now, having replicated those efforts in other roles, I’m 42, 10 years into this second career and probably finally ahead of where I was before the financial crash.
I try to tell myself that I’ve shown impressive resilience to battle a crippling lack of confidence and some pretty rotten circumstances and come out the other end with a family, a relatively respectable career, and a house. Of course, the depression and anxiety over-rule my attempt at positivity and remind me that most of my peers are better paid and more accomplished and get extensions to their houses and go on expensive holidays while we have to juggle money around to afford a modest week self-catering in the UK.
I’m a socialist. I only care about the economy in terms of how it works for the poorest. Unfortunately, every UK (and US) government of the last 40 years have subscribed to an economic ideology that, throughout its evolution, has only ever increased the gap between the wealthy and the poor. Potential alternatives have been stopped in their tracks by the billionaire-owned media (it is clear that even public service broadcasters subscribe to the same ideology, when you see the revolving door between government advisors and political editors) and even from within their own dysfunctional political parties. So although the economy really isn’t my biggest concern right now, I fear this crisis and the economic consequences of it will once again hit the poorest hardest. And I may once again find myself at the end of a career I’ve worked so hard to build, through no fault of my own.
This time I possibly have more transferable skills but I’m also older, I’m a parent and I have more financial responsibilities. Who knows how long this crisis will last? We don’t know if it will ever really go away. We don’t know how big the economic collapse could be but we are prepared for it to be bigger than the financial crash. We should be using this time to start afresh: to rebuild our economy both metaphorically and physically, like we did in the 1940s but I fear we will not. Since 2010, progressives have made significant inroads and brought real alternative ideas much closer to the mainstream. But for now political power, whether elected or not, sits on the political right and will no doubt be demanding bailouts for big businesses and even deeper austerity for the rest.
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In times of crisis, sometimes those who understand how to deal with anxiety can seem to handle it better and it was certainly like that back in February and early March, as others came to terms with a new wariness that for me felt fairly normal. But what was previously mild annoyance at issues with my contract quickly ramped up into full-blown panic as it became clear my employer would be dealing with the expected financial burden the only way they know how: to first of all cut loose as many insecure workers as they can and then work out who is left and how many of those they can get rid of too.
Now, again, I’m struggling. Struggling to focus, struggling to sleep at night, struggling to motivate myself to get exercise or do anything other than the minimum. I find momentary comfort in unhealthy choices and then feel guilty about that. My patience is strained and my constant battle to keep it together around my family is under even greater pressure due to sharing our family home with a five-year-old who is doing his best to cope with the lockdown.
In some ways, enforced isolation suits me. When I’m really struggling, I can often be found hiding under a blanket: it’s obvious I’m there but I don’t want to be seen. It sounds ridiculous and pathetic. When the lockdown began, it had already been five months since I’d seen friends socially, having pulled out of our planned Christmas gathering due to my mental health at the time.
But my job looks certain to be coming to an end. So at some point soon I’m going to have to not only face the world but far more besides. I will have to drown out the inner doubt and feign confidence; ignore the self-loathing and push myself; see through the noisy, chaotic rabble inside my head and sell myself.
Wish me luck. I’m going to need it.
