Dr Kristopher Lovell

24 June

Things have been… easier? Lately. Easier feels like a bad word, life still isn’t easy. But I’ve adjusted. It took 3 months but I am more settled with homeworking now. The problem is everyone else I work with is getting to normal speed, and I feel like it took me until now just to not cry everyday. Everyone else is so much better than I am. I feel like everyone will finally know I’m a fraud. I’m scared I’m going to get into trouble or called a slacker, when I really really am trying, I am just not good enough.

I started going outside. Other than 5 minutes to the local shop. I did a “test walk” going twenty minutes away. Then I went 30 and met a friend. It changed everything. I didn’t realise how starved and lonely I’d been feeling. You think the online chats and calls make up for it, but just hearing an actual voice, seeing a physical person who actually cares about me and wanted to check I was OK and hang out, was so good. Since then I’ve seen some other friends – all in sensible socially distant ways. We’re all a bit of a nervy bunch, so it works!

It’s weird, to be glad that I can kinda see people, but also feel terrified that it’s all happening too soon. I don’t trust the government with people’s wellbeing.

I still can’t see my family in other parts of the UK. It’s difficult having not seen them for so long. I know everyone is in the same boat, but if I lived close to my family hy now I could pop down and sit in the garden. Can’t exactly pop 200 miles to my mother’s house.

I hope this project gets published in some way. I have found relief in reading these entries over the course of the lockdown- thank you for providing that.