Rachel's Series: A high schooler's take on the height of the pandemic
Even though the COVID-19 pandemic started nearly two years ago, most people can vividly remember how the pandemic took a toll on their lives from the very beginning. This time is hard to forget for most people, especially how they felt at the onset of the pandemic. For students, some were excited to have two weeks off of school, until the weeks would escalate into months … and eventually years. “At the time I was thinking ‘oh my god, two weeks off of school!’ At first, I didn’t realize how serious the pandemic would be when it first started,” Kimberly Perez Zitina said.
Other students didn’t realize how the escalating “break” would affect the rest of their family. With most businesses shutting down completely at first, most households had to adjust to everyone being home at the same time. However, with some adults being considered “essential” workers, children had to get used to being alone once again, especially those with no siblings. “Life was very confusing at the time; it felt like time stopped,” Ally Turner lamented. “My parents were both essential workers, so they continued to live their lives, while I had to stay home every day. It felt like we were in such an unknown time, where anything could happen, and that gave me anxiety.”
For many, being alone can induce anxiety. With or without these anxious feelings, however, everyone can feel unsure when dealing with extended periods of isolation. COVID-19 was the first global pandemic the population has faced since the Spanish Flu outbreak, dating back to 1918. Nobody knew what this time would lead to or even how to cope with the pandemic in the beginning. At the start of the pandemic, social distancing and face coverings were considered to be the only known methods of protection against COVID-19. As a society, we were unsure of what activities could be done safely in the midst of the pandemic. “Like most people, I was super cautious at the beginning of the pandemic. I had limited contact with individuals who were outside of my ‘bubble,’” shared Arthur Johnson, “bubble,” referring to his close family members. “Fortunately, most of my friends felt the same way, and I was still able to maintain some level of normalcy in my social life...especially when it came to biking and running.”
For my sister and I, we felt like all we could do was sit in the house and do puzzles to pass the time. Of course, everyone felt like this at first. As time passed, people who weren’t considered to be immunocompromised felt safe to run necessary errands, with the protection of social distancing and face coverings of course. For those who were immunocompromised however, they felt like their lives would depend on staying inside a little longer. It was boring, but my sister and I knew that staying inside would benefit us in the long run. We just had to be creative when we wanted to pass the time, sometimes it was easier than others.
My parents advised me that my sister shouldn’t go anywhere for a while because of this. While this was boring, I know they were looking out for my best interest. My sister and I would sometimes get lonely, being at home alone. We would sometimes wish for our parents to be at home more often, even though we knew they couldn’t be. We understood how hard working through a pandemic was. We were actually grateful our parents were able to work through something that left many unable to work. This made some part of our parents’ lives feel normal in a way, at least to my sister and me.
Today, multiple vaccines and booster shots have been developed to fight COVID-19. Many people are fully vaccinated and boosted to protect themselves and their peers against COVID-19. Regardless of being vaccinated and/or boosted, some people continue to wear masks for the sake of others and their safety. Compared to almost two years ago, a lot has changed regarding safety practices and people being concerned with the pandemic. “It’s definitely toned down from what it used to be. Six feet was a lot more enforced back then. I never saw someone without a mask back then compared to now,” Zitina observed. “Every time you go into Walmart, it’s rare to see someone wearing a mask. There’s a lot of people I know who are still unvaccinated, despite what research says. I live with people who are unvaccinated and are very prone to catching COVID. I still wear my mask despite being fully vaccinated, to be safe.”
Janna Walker, who works for the Davidson County Health Department, recollected her knowledge of COVID-19 at the start of the pandemic. “This seems like a lifetime ago,” Walker recalled. “When we first learned about COVID-19 in early 2020, we didn’t know very much, other than this was a novel [new] Coronavirus that had been identified in Wuhan, China, in late 2019. We were hearing reports from other countries that the virus was spreading rapidly and that individuals with COVID-19 were experiencing extreme respiratory illness, hospitals were becoming overloaded and deaths were occurring. By the end of February of 2020, COVID-19 was the only topic of conversation and new developments were rapidly evolving. It was overwhelming.”
“Two years, wow. But truthfully, that isn’t a very long amount of time when you think about it,” Walker commented, regarding how much time has passed since the beginning of the pandemic. On March 19, 2020, the first confirmed case of COVID-19 in Davidson County was reported. In the time since, there have been recommendations to wear masks, COVID-19 tests evolved into testing at home, COVID-19 vaccines have rolled out and the development of COVID-19 therapeutics to treat individuals with severe illness are available. So much has been learned about SARS-CoV-2 (the virus that causes COVID-19), but research will be a continual learning process as the virus mutates and new variants are discovered. As the virus evolves, science will evolve; therefore, recommendations and guidance must evolve.
“I still think the pandemic is something we need to keep on our radar and have plans in place in case of another variant or surge of infection,” Johnson advised. “You cannot work in a public school and not have been impacted in some way by the Delta and Omicron variants.” Even though vaccines and booster shots have been developed, the pandemic is still very much real. I try my best to wear a mask in public whenever I can, especially in school. With such tight quarters and with so many people, COVID symptoms can spread like wildfire. I wear a mask in consideration of others, hoping it will be enough to finish my senior year in person.”
In the beginning of the pandemic, it felt like everything was lost. No school, no social interactions, nothing as we knew it would ever be the same again. Two years later, the pandemic isn’t even over, but things are slowly becoming “normal” again. “I think it’s crazy. We have been in this state for almost two years now, and I remember when it first happened,” Turner recounted. “We thought it was just going to be for a short time period, and yet here we are still.” Even though it feels like nothing can be set in stone these days, one thing is for certain. The beginning of the COVID-19 was tough, but we as a society proved we were tougher, simply by getting through it.
