Tag: Covid 19

What’s Your COVID IQ? -Simple Steps To Winning The Fatigue Battle

My five-year-old son would encourage his younger brother to help clean the playroom when they were little. The three-year-old would often answer, “I can’t, Jaysaynnn. I have a headache in my back.”

 That sounds like a common disease for 2020 and the beginning of 2021. My headache in my back has been COVID fatigue, political unrest, isolation…the list goes on. It has been several weeks since I have written anything. I find myself losing track of the date and the days of the week. It is time to get over it!

Do you have a “headache in your back?”

Here are some suggestions for a cure:

  • Find a way to exercise. Walk outside if possible, or go to an indoor track or gym. Do chair exercises. Get your body moving.
  • Write something on the calendar to do each day. Send a card, write a letter, call a friend. Check your goal each day, and then follow through.
  • Find a source of spiritual renewal. If you are reading this, you have access to podcasts, books, and blogs. Many churches have their services online. Many book agencies offer free or very inexpensive e-books from major book dealers. Google their names.
  • Keep a daily journal. Detail what you have done at the end of each day. If you see you have fallen into the trap of doing the same thing every day, change your routine. Take on a new hobby or resume an old one. You can order anything you need without leaving your home, and how-to videos abound.
  • Tell yourself that nothing lasts forever. Someday we will look back and see this period as just a part of our journey.
  • Be sure you tell someone that you love them every day. We have all suffered loss and heartache in the past months. The opportunity may never come again.
  • Count your blessings.

I hope these will awaken other cures for your “headache” to your mind. Remember, together with God’s help, we will undoubtedly make it through because He is faithful,we always have.

“I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.”

Philippians 4:13 NIV

The Sixth Commandment

About the fourth year I taught school, the seniors decided to take a skip day. Only three of about thirty students came to school that day. Teenagers are sometimes unkind so I knew the class had not asked one of the two boys because he was not in their “group.” I decided to ask the other two why they had not gone.

One, a popular boy, said, “Awww, Mrs. Sims. I get in enough trouble on my own without inviting it.”

I have remembered the words of the young lady who was very much a part of the “group” and whose parents worked for the school. She simply said, “I would never embarrass my dad like that.”

I attempted to instill that in my own children, and for the most part, that was the standard they lived by. They are good words to live by. Honoring one’s father and mother is obviously so important to God that it is included in the ten commandments.

In this crazy COVID 19 world, that commandment may have more importance than ever before. Senior adults are closed off from the world they knew. Many do not leave their homes because the death rate for senior citizens has been so high. They are either wise or afraid. It’s not up to you to judge. Even if they leave their homes, they hunger for contact with their children or other caring young people.

Let me encourage you to honor your parents during this time. Visit if possible but use wise social distancing. Drop a card in the mail, but include a handwritten note. Pick up the phone and call because they long to hear your voice. Texting is the current means of communication, but nothing can replace the sound of a loved one’s voice. Invest in their lives as they invested in yours. And, if you know senior adults who have no family, even if no relation to you, practice kindness and reach out to them. Many of us were privileged to have these people as significant others in our lives.

As a side note, I have remained friends with the young woman mentioned above for a number of years. There is no greater example of how this commandment should be lived out. She still meets her parents’ needs and many of their wants forty years after that day in high school. She is one of my heroes.

“Honor your father and mother – which is the first commandment with promise. Ephesians 6:2 NIV