Having covid made me feel lonelier than ever

Photo by Lux Graves on Unsplash

[Written in bed] The past few days have been pretty brutal. A irritating throat itch began on Saturday, but I tested negative for covid. Then I woke up with a full blown fever and headache the next day, barely able to get out of bed to use the restroom because every joint and muscle ached with pain.

It was strange for someone like me to be bedridden for the past three days, unable to really do anything, but to doze in and out of sleep, sometimes weakly checking my phone, and stare at the bedroom ceiling when I couldn’t fall asleep due to the migraines. I’ve been “on-the-go” for the past two years and never really slowed down. It’s like my whole world have been put on pause, and I was finally being forced to rest.

There was a lot of coughing, a lot of self pity, and a lot of crying and sniffling into my pillow, which is funny because I cry when I’m frustrated, not sad. But I just felt sad.

I was forced to face my thoughts for three days bedridden and all—it was rough and my thoughts made me cry. Even more so, I was just pitying myself on being alone and weak, and hating to bother anyone. Ordering takeout through a a phone app on Sunday sapped all my energy. On day two, I was also thinking about how nice it’d be to have a partner taking care of me so I didn’t have to go through the torture of dragging myself to 7/11 for coconut water.

Being bedridden for three days gave me time to think—it was that there was a lot of misalignment in my life and I needed to address it:

1. I am a community person at heart, but recently I’ve felt more disassociated with it. I feel burnt out and exhausted from all the social interactions and giving guidance of what people should do. I sometimes feel used and have been giving more of myself to others—people want to ask questions and have a chat, only to disappear after they’ve gotten what they needed. Sometimes I get angry and think, “Can’t you just google it?” I need to figure out how to ensure I protect my energies and maintain certain boundaries. Community people are some of the most giving, kindest people I know, but they’re also some of the most burnt out people I know too. I wonder how to strike a better balance because I still love connecting and helping people, but I also need to help myself first.
2. I don’t need or want to have so many friends. Instead, I want deeper, meaningful friendships and connections with people I like to surround myself with. I recently met someone new at a dinner who made me feel stupid for not knowing a famous singer’s name—I remember her looking at me incredulously and with a raised eyebrow. I definitely would not hangout with her again. I also find it tacky to purposely find people who will up level your status, which I see a lot of people do in Singapore. There’s a lot of name dropping, brand association, and elitism in the people you know or hang out with. I want to find authentic people who are smarter than me, who can teach me something, who I can trust, and has good vibes.
3. “Show me your friends and I’ll show you your future.” I hate to say this, but I also feel like there’s been a misalignment sometimes of the new people I’ve been spending time with. I have a handful group of friends that I love dearly and I know those are people I will continue to spend time with. But I don’t need to make new friends for socialization. I want to meet entrepreneurs, creators, and indie builders—I want to surround myself with the kinds of people I want to become. Because of this, I have slowly made an effort to meet new people like that, and also listening to more podcasts or video interviews with personalities, such the like as Pieter Levels. I’ve had a hard time finding them in real life, so I’ve surrounded myself with them through media.
4. I don’t want to fix people’s problems. I want to build things. Not to share more, but I realized I’m not a fixer, I’m a creator. I am exhausted from fixing people’s shit and their emotional baggage—I’m not God and I’m not your therapist. I want to build things alongside with other people.

These past months, I’ve been stuck at a perpetual happiness level of four
(out of ten, by the way). I don’t think you can call it happiness.

It is just existing—I am just existing. I’ve done a good job fabricating parts of my life that I want to be perceived as happy, but internally, I feel bewildered and lost, and a part of me is strangely depressed and withdrawn. I find that sometimes I’d prefer to be alone, running along the water near the Kallang Stadium. I think it is because I have control—I can control my headspace and running path. That’s why I started running more. Running gives me a sense of control of my time, where I’m headed, how much I am willing to push myself, and to find a beautiful scenic spot to sit and stretch at.

I don’t understand why I’m still so unhappy; I feel guilty almost because I worked hard to get here and there is privilege in having the opportunities I have now. But then I know I can do anything I want—I believe in myself that much. That’s my tenacity. There’s an inflection point happening here and I need to align everything back together. The past two years, I have mostly learning and absorbing.

The next two years, I will be building and creating.