How were the lockdowns for you?

[cvjw]

Most non-essential businesses here closed for 6 months...things like barber shops. Then they could reopen with very tight restrictions. I got my hair cut last week and the barbers are still wearing masks, and they have eliminated walk in hair cuts, you have to have an appointment. Oh, and their prices went from $12 to $17 for a hair cut. The barbers said they survived just find since the covid relief unemployment benefits were more than they would have made working.....$1,150 a week.
My company had about 30 people who had to report to the building, the remaining 100 or so were virtual for at least 15 months. The sales and business office folks stayed virtual for 17 months. 2 people I know of were terminated for refusing to get vaccinated. No deaths among our staff, but one co-worker lost 6 family members to covid.
My wife's job classification never went virtual, but to keep the head count down in the building, she worked 4 days a week in the building, and had one day off "on call" with full pay.
Over all, it was probably the best working situation in my 42 year career. I retired 5 weeks after I returned to the building to work. But I do know several co-workers who had serious issues with having to work from home. They really needed the in person interaction. But IMHO, their work was much better quality from home.

I had my hair cut and colored in May of 2020. In the salon. With other people in every styling chair. We did have to wear a mask, which was annoying.

 

[Jennasis]

We did pretty well. Our business shuttered for one month while figured things out, then we hit into high gear and did very well. I was let go from my part time job for a few months but brought back in late August 2020. We are homebodies by nature so didn't mind staying away from people. DH worked every day as essential personnel.

 

[dez1978]

I work in a 24/7 mental hospital so I worked as normal. I just had the added stress of trying to homeschool my kids after I got home and cooking dinner and trying to figure out when to get groceries. None of our stores in town did curbside or delivery, so I either had to drive 40 min each way or go into the store after work. Thankfully, it only lasted a couple of months in our state and we were back to school in august. My kids daycare remained open the whole time. We had some other issues in the family that we not pandemic related but were much more stressful and awful for our family and kids than anything else that happened in 2020. When you combine the 2, it was the worst time in my life so far. There was not enough wine for 2020 lol

Our restaraunts are still trying to get back to normal here though

 

[tvguy]

I had my hair cut and colored in May of 2020. In the salon. With other people in every styling chair. We did have to wear a mask, which was annoying.

I went from March 2020 until November 2020 without a hair cut. Yup, covid hair style. My wife bought a home barber kit and she and my daughter cut my hair out on the back porch right before Thanksgiving. I actually had to report into the building for work the week before the general election, the week of the general election and the week after, so I have great shaggy hair pictures at work. Boss thought there were going to be riots related to the election so she wanted extra staff in the newsroom.. They didn't happen.

 

[tvguy]

That's terrible.
I'm an employer, and we were in a position to offer all of our employees the opportunity to vaccinate before it was opened up for the general public and I was surprised how few of them took us up on it, and I watched as ardent anti-vax folks who worked for me got it, one's husband was hospitalized for 2 weeks but I'd NEVER terminate someone for making the choice for themselves. Now we do have different protocols for those who have exposures/covid that is dependent on if they are vaccinated or not. But fire someone? No.

Vaccinations are a pretty standard job requirement. I am talking about major corporations with thousands of employees that operate locations across the nation.

 

[Beezle2]

I worked full time as an essential worker in a very busy retail setting. We were abused daily by every nitwit with a damn opinion. Bullies, weirdos and religious nuts abounded. I left after about 18 months and feel like I will never return to front facing customer service. I have some really shocking stories and trauma from both people and our company. That time period is surreal..the crowds the day we got the first case in our state was wild. The day they closed the border, the day they closed Disney World.

 

[RoseBen009]

I worked full time as an essential worker in a very busy retail setting. We were abused daily by every nitwit with a damn opinion. Bullies, weirdos and religious nuts abounded. I left after about 18 months and feel like I will never return to front facing customer service. I have some really shocking stories and trauma from both people and our company. That time period is surreal..the crowds the day we got the first case in our state was wild. The day they closed the border, the day they closed Disney World.

Ugh, that is awful, I'm so sorry you had to deal with that! I don't blame you one bit for never wanting to work a service job again - it feels like people are becoming more entitled and rude, unfortunately.

 

[RoseBen009]

I work in a 24/7 mental hospital so I worked as normal. I just had the added stress of trying to homeschool my kids after I got home and cooking dinner and trying to figure out when to get groceries. None of our stores in town did curbside or delivery, so I either had to drive 40 min each way or go into the store after work. Thankfully, it only lasted a couple of months in our state and we were back to school in august. My kids daycare remained open the whole time. We had some other issues in the family that we not pandemic related but were much more stressful and awful for our family and kids than anything else that happened in 2020. When you combine the 2, it was the worst time in my life so far. There was not enough wine for 2020 lol

Our restaraunts are still trying to get back to normal here though

Oh my gosh you poor woman! Glad you made it through to the other side!

 

[RoseBen009]

I know it’s horrible but I’ll always look back on at least that part of covid fondly. My kids were ALL home ALL the time and that never happens. We had fun watching movies, playing games, swimming, etc. It was a time of “forced togetherness” that was really nice. I miss it sometimes. Just the togetherness part of it

I have those same feelings. I was able to work from home for 2 years and have time with my kids I NEVER would have had otherwise. Covid has been truly awful, but the ability to spend time together was a gift for me in a way. When I had to go back to work in person full time, I ended up applying for and taking a different job that allows me to work hybrid, which I never would have done otherwise.

 

[Beezle2]

I work in a 24/7 mental hospital so I worked as normal. I just had the added stress of trying to homeschool my kids after I got home and cooking dinner and trying to figure out when to get groceries. None of our stores in town did curbside or delivery, so I either had to drive 40 min each way or go into the store after work. Thankfully, it only lasted a couple of months in our state and we were back to school in august. My kids daycare remained open the whole time. We had some other issues in the family that we not pandemic related but were much more stressful and awful for our family and kids than anything else that happened in 2020. When you combine the 2, it was the worst time in my life so far. There was not enough wine for 2020 lol

Our restaraunts are still trying to get back to normal here though

My sympathies were totally with the parents trying to juggle it all.

 

[Beezle2]

I have those same feelings. I was able to work from home for 2 years and have time with my kids I NEVER would have had otherwise. Covid has been truly awful, but the ability to spend time together was a gift for me in a way. When I had to go back to work in person full time, I ended up applying for and taking a different job that allows me to work hybrid, which I never would have done otherwise.

I think a lot of people finally had time to slow down a bit a see their lives differently. The lockdown was good for some people in that way and I am glad for them.

 

[superme80]

We lasted 1 month in lockdown. I opened my house up to family and friends by the beginning of May. I am an extrovert by nature, and the lack of physical interaction was horrible on my mental health. I was thankful we live in an area where they did not take the lockdown restrictions too seriously. We had minimal covid deaths, and most of the cases came from the schools. My husband lost his job for refusing to be vaccinated. Thankfully 6 weeks later he found a job with less stress and better pay.

 

[mikehn]

Lots of lessons were learned. The good news, there will never be another lock down.

 

[tinkerbellandpeterpan]

I lost my job as a result of Covid and it took 8 months to resolve unemployment because of something ridiculous that was neither my fault nor the fault of my former employer so that was extremely stressful.

Also differing feelings about how to handle Covid caused a serious rift with my brother and his family I don't think things will ever go back to the way they were unfortunately. Thankfully I did not personally know anyone who was hospitalized or passed from Covid and I'm very grateful for that. We missed out on the early months of our new niece and nephew's lives (different sides of the family) which was heartbreaking for everyone.

Thankfully DH and I came through it all okay, but it was a tough time for sure and one I would not care to repeat.

 

[tvguy]

I think we just beginning to see some of the after effects. My son works for the State and has been on remote work since March 2020. In January 2021 the State announced everyone in his office was now permanently on remote work. The lease on their office expired, it was not renewed, it's gone.
But now they announced a mandatory in person meeting at what had been a satellite office 40 miles away from their old office. My son has moved 400 miles away and apparently he is not alone in not living anywhere close to the old or satellite office. There has been a huge push back, but so far, it appears he is going to have to fly into town, get a hotel and rent a car for a meeting, apparently all at his expense.
My old employer had a few holdout employees still on remote and it has said they have until the end of June to return to the office or be terminated. This is at the same time as they find they can't fill openings because the applicants only want remote work. Looking at the job ads on the web site, the company has been forced to do something they have done in over a decade. Pay relocation expenses. They discontinued the practice because they were able to find enough people willing to take a job and pay their own moving expenses. Not anymore.

 

[Kathryn Merteuil]

I really did fine with being locked down and working from home. I enjoyed the peace and quiet, and lack of dealing with people. I will of course address the issue that the reason for lockdowns is tragic beyond belief. The actual being locked down however worked well for me.

 

[bcwife76]

Our province had way less restrictions (or had them for less time when we did have them) than other parts of Canada. My kids only did virtual school from April to June of 2020 and even then they had the opportunity to go back to in person for part time in June 2020 ( I decided it wasn't worth the hassle and they finished the school year with virtual). They have been back in the classroom since Sept 2020, meanwhile other provinces did virtual off and on for way longer. Our restaurants, dentists, hair salons etc all reopened (with modifications) before the end of May 2020. Friends back east would message me saying they were jealous because we were at the movies or out for dinner and they were still under lots of restrictions in ON and such. My husband is a courier so he was super busy the first few months with all the online ordering, busier than Christmas.

To us travel was restricted a lot more as we had to quarantine when coming home so we didn't leave the country at all in 2020 (well, we went to Mexico in Jan 2020 and Hawaii at the beginning of March 2020) but it gave us an opportunity to visit some places in our own province that we hadn't been to before so we still had some fun summer trips. Finally leaving the country again in August 2021 (we went to the Dominican) felt kind of weird, but mostly fantastic

 

[AussieFan8]

I was fortunate that I was able to work from home for a year; I enjoyed it. It was very sad, though, to watch what it did to the end of my daughter’s senior year and her first year of college. She can’t get those experiences back. Not saying the lockdown was right or wrong, just unfortunate for her for sure.

Timely question for me - I just tested positive for COVID for the first time today. I just thought I had a cold until I woke up this morning and couldn’t smell anything. My aforementioned daughter and I were supposed to take a trip to NYC today and unfortunately had to cancel.

 

[Liz]

We did ok during the worst of Covid. We have two high risk family members in our home so we were very careful. The transition to working from home went well and continues today. That is the only benefit of that tragic time. I think it would have been much worse had it come years earlier when my extroverted people loving son still lived at home. It would have been very hard for him to be home all the time. Now that he is an adult the pandemic was hard for him in a different way as he was an ICU nurse at the time.

 

[SM1992]

I worked full time as an essential worker in a very busy retail setting. We were abused daily by every nitwit with a damn opinion. Bullies, weirdos and religious nuts abounded. I left after about 18 months and feel like I will never return to front facing customer service. I have some really shocking stories and trauma from both people and our company. That time period is surreal..the crowds the day we got the first case in our state was wild. The day they closed the border, the day they closed Disney World.

I was in the same boat. I worked in retail (supermarket) and the day that rumors started about a lockdown, my store was absolutely crazy! Lots of aggressive people hording toilet paper and Lysol spray. Worked every day wearing a mask and avoided close contact. Lasted two years like that then it was time to retire. My wife was semi-retired and was helping a neighbors business doing pet sitting and dog walking so not much contact with people. We missed a couple of holidays that were usually spent with family, and oh yeah had to cancel 2 different trips to DW. As far as we know we never had it.