How to Cure a Case of Novemberitis (and Coviditis)

Every November I post my blog about Novemberitis. This year I have updated it to include the new affliction of Coviditis….

Ah November! Such an in between time of the year.
Winter (or summer) has left and summer (or winter) hasn’t arrived.
The current year is almost over and the new year hasn’t yet begun.
It feels too late to start anything and too early to stop everything.

With two confusing and unsettling months until the end of the year, this is the time when so many of us contract what I call Novemberitis. When we have Novemberitis, we are neither here nor there, don’t know if we are coming or going, aren’t fully present or engaged. We are often tired, stressed and stretched. We experience many of the symptoms of burnout.

This year, our Novemberitis is exacerbated by the Covid-19 crisis, and the anxiety, overwhelm, exhaustion, frustration and fear that accompanies it. The set of responses and experiences that I call Coviditis (previously known as Covid Fatigue) include:

• Emotions that are amplified (what used to irritate us now sends us into a rage) and erratic (we can go from happy to sad to furious to despondent to optimistic to despairing in the course of a couple of hours)
• Concentration that is impacted. We experience brain fog, we can’t concentrate as well as for as long as we used to be able to (In the ‘olden days’), it takes us much longer to complete tasks.
• We don’t just want but neeeeed sugar, carbs, caffeine, chocolate to get us through the day.
• Many of the clients I am coaching are undergoing what I call an “existential emergency” and are questioning their life choices and what gives them meaning.
• Feeling exhausted all the time. Minor exertion, both physical and mental, is very tiring for lots of us, and is worsened by the sleep disturbances that are a major side effect of living in the time of Covid. Many people are sleeping more or less or are experiencing terrible nightmares.

If you are feeling absent-minded and forgetful, irritable, emotional, fragmented and frayed around the edges, disinvested from things that used to feel valuable to you – generally dazed and confused – you are probably in the grips of Novemberitis, Coviditis or both. Neither of these conditions are permanent. With the right treatment, both are reversible.

If you do have Novemberitis and/or Coviditis, please don’t panic; this, too, shall pass. You will get to the finish line of 2020 and off the starting blocks of 2021.

Here are some things you can do to help you get to the finish line:

• Have compassion for yourself when you make a mistake.
• Lower your expectations – not for yourself but of yourself and those around you.
• Ask for help wherever and whenever you can.
• Say no wherever and whenever possible.
• Acknowledge and rejoice in your achievements.
• Get some gentle exercise in the fresh air and sunshine every day.
• Remember to breathe.
• Get enough rest.
• Eat well.
• Drink lots of water.

Most importantly, proceed gently and cut yourself some slack during these next few weeks. The kinder you are to yourself now, the more strongly you will be able to start the new year.

Keep on keeping kindly on!

Love,
Judy x

Tags: ask for help | boundaries | burnout | covid19 | energy | exhaustion | holidays | just say no | overwhelm | time management