I’m trying to get ready for big changes amid uncertainty
At the beginning of July, I thought my plans for the rest of the year were pretty set.
I thought vaccinations were going up, cases were going down and some sense of normalcy was returning. I was planning to travel for weddings, return to pre-pandemic activities like Broadway shows and ease my anxiety. I was also planning for a relatively easy time as I got ready for the birth of my first child, due in November (surprise! I’m pregnant).
Of course, the Delta variant and vaccine hesitancy have significantly altered my fall plans, like they have for so many of you. I’m also faced with the dread of uncertainty as I face the biggest change yet in my life: becoming a parent.
I wrote for another USA TODAY newsletter, This Is America, about my frustrations as a pregnant person waiting for vaccinated life to begin, and the anger and fear I feel at the current surge. In addition to emotional challenges, the pandemic presents a host of logistical hurdles. Will I be able to get support from friends and family? Should we even bother looking for daycare?
Data and circumstances change, public health advice has to adapt to an evolving virus and our lives are more in flux than we ever wanted them to be. When I feel myself being buried under the anxiety about the future, I try to take a step back and practice some coping tools to help. I’m prone to catastrophizing – envisioning a future where everything goes wrong. It can be helpful to draw my fears to their logical conclusions and realize I can handle them. So many parents gave birth and raised babies so far in the pandemic, and I know I can too.
here. Be safe when returning to the dating pool!
Today’s reads
- Looking for a late summer read? Oprah’s next book club pick: ‘The Love Songs of W.E.B. Du Bois’ by Honorée Fanonne Jeffers.
- No but seriously, why is the Pfizer COVID-19 vaccine now called Comirnaty?
- Ready to get outside? National Park Service is celebrating its birthday with free admission to all of its sites.
- I wrote about how the search for a “Jeopardy!” host went so very wrong.
- The feel good story of the day: How one woman vaccinated more than 94% of her townand brought attention to rural Alabama. Meet Dorothy Oliver.
Today’s pet
Meet Bootsy and Otto, two brothers who love a good cuddle.
“I’m 56 and I’ve never had a dog before,” says Bootsy and Otto’s owner Matt Hill. “Boy, do they change your life. Here are Bootsy and Otto, brother and sister. They fight with each other everyday. And, they’re best friends.”
The best sibling relationships are usually that way, aren’t they?
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