Nothing like mostly being stuck in your home to make it painfully more obvious how empty your bed is at night. When things were normal, your married friends may have envied your freedom to come and go and hang out with who you please. Now that everyone is socially distanced and isolated, those who had built-in company in their home already seem to have the advantage. Although a confinement buddy sounds nice, here’s how forced time alone has overall been a plus for me.
- I haven’t had to endure useless bickering. No matter how much you love someone, we all need occasional space. I do not want to be the recipient of displaced aggression due to frustration over being cooped up or general anxiety about the world’s situation. Although I’m getting a lot of space right now, too much breathing room may be better than none with another person’s fluctuating emotions.
- I don’t have a quarantine baby in the works. I mean, if you’re actively trying to grow your family, then kudos to you the time is now to get to it. But since I’m not in any type of committed relationship, I appreciate the lack of immediate temptation to pass the extra free time by taking some risks in the bedroom. Caution will not be thrown to the fertile wind in my home and I don’t need a souvenir from my first global pandemic experience.
- It’s giving me a chance to reflect. Silence can be deafening when you’re without adult conversation for days on end, but at least it leaves plenty of opportunity for introspection. When all this is said and done, what do I want to say for how I passed the time? How do I want life, in general, to look different once it’s “back to normal”? What has this time shown me about who was most important in my life (who did I miss versus who I did better without)? Being lost in your thoughts isn’t always a bad thing and sometimes when we’re in our usual routine, we don’t get a moment to slow down to do so.
- It ended a bad fling. Staying safe at home forced me to evaluate what and who matters the most. It was easy to get along with my casual boo when it was mostly fun and games, but when life got real our relationship wasn’t exactly equipped to get serious along with it. Realizing that we weren’t able to withstand any type of adversity showed me how much time I was wasting with that person and allowed me to move on faster than I probably would have had we just been doing our usual before all this. Not only that, I surprisingly haven’t had any exes come out the woodwork either, which only shows me they want to do pop-ups when they think I’m happy and moved on and not when I might actually need support or checked on. It’s put peoples’ roles in my life in perspective.
- I’m setting and accomplishing goals. Whether we like it or not, this global crisis has been forced upon us. In times of stress, it’s applaudable to just get through it, but it was important to me to aim for more. Since I’m fortunate enough to not be sick or dealing with any loved ones affected by the illness, I thought I could at least have something to say for this mandatory down-time. I made a new vision board including professional and personal goals and within 24 hours of hanging it one of my goals was met already.
- I’m re-evaluating my standards and boundaries. For better and worse, quarantine dating has been a different ballpark. Having more guys to talk to, fewer activities tying me up, but not being able to meet in person has forced me to strategize in a new way when it comes to evaluating someone’s integrity and assessing what they bring to the relationship table. It’s been a little more fun than the run-of-the-mill dinner and movie dates from before, but also an eye-opening learning experience.
- I’m taking a much-needed break from maintenance. If I’m not out in public, why would I want to be burdened with personal upkeep just for the sake of one guy here at home? Since I truly have a literal no one to impress now, I can enjoy a temporary respite from the grueling tweezing, plucking, arching, and waxing it takes to stay glam. We’re doing no-shave quarantine over here, baby.
- I have one less responsibility. It’s hard enough having to manage working from home and parenting without childcare without also having to add maintaining a relationship to the mix. Although relationships have many perks, they still require upkeep to stay afloat. My attention is spread thin right now as it is so at least I don’t have to worry about considering an extra person during all of this.
