Isolation and social distance is not just for a pandemic, for some it is just life

I am a 40 something mum of a 14 year old with an Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) diagnosis with a Pathological Demand Avoidant (PDA) profile, resulting in her suffering with extreme anxiety. We live together with our crazy dog, 2 rats and a fish. Due to the level of Bs anxiety we have been socially isolated for over a year.  I no longer have a job and B hasn’t been in school for over a year. She can't socialise face to face with anyone, spending most of every day in her room away from the world and me.


This blog is not a survival guide for isolation.  It is an honest description of the impact of long term isolation and social distance in a world that doesn’t see, from my personal experience. My thoughts and views may be different to yours, but that is ok because I am not you and your experiences are not mine.  What I hope to achieve with these ramblings is a wider understanding of the invisible struggles and pain that many live daily and to hopefully offer a sense of belonging to those living a life from within their own bubble of isolation for whatever reason.

I thought I knew but I was wrong

Shifting sands, rocks and barely balanced pebbles 

Isolation and loneliness is something that I never saw coming. It’s like so many other life situations and happenings, that only happen to other people, not me surely. I would go as far as saying that I never really understood what loneliness was. I knew the definition and had used it to describe how I was feeling on occasion, but in reality I had no real concept of what it actually was. I had been spared the rawness of prolonged loneliness and isolation. 

It is true, that you can feel lonely in a crowd. I have over the years and through previous episodes of mental unhealth, felt that desperate disconnection from my fellow humans and spent huge amounts of energy filling my time with things and stuff to distract and convince myself that i was fine, the disconnect was all in my head.  Now, living a life in an isolation bubble i am being forced to sit with the disconnect and look it in the eye with no escape hatch or ejector seat.

I know tat i am incredibly fortunate in the friends i have and support, both emotional and practical that they and my family provide, but even this can be a source of distress at my lowest points.  My inner default is to believe that i should be able to do ‘this’ alone.  Acknowledging that i can’t, is a mixture of liberation and conformational my weakness and unworthiness.

I am aware that this sounds very deep and depressing, and sometimes that is a very accurate description of my existence, but not always.  I am a positive person on the whole and i am hugely grateful for the blessings that i do have, no matter how small they may seem to others.  Things like B making it into the car, or the beauty of the sun shining on my newly cut grass, or the silly conversations and laughs that B and i have late at night waiting for her to be ready to sleep.  I get a lot of strength from my faith in God, knowing he is beside me through all situations in my life, holding me upright when it feels like i cannot hold my own weight.  I know that this is not the experience or belief of everyone but it is a part of my life and my experience.  I hope that the inclusion of my faith in God in this item does not make you want to stop reading.  I feel strongly that this should be an honest account of my experience and as such all aspects of my inner world will be acknowledged in as safe a way as possible.

I sincerely hope that this mass isolation and social distancing that is happening all over the country will foster a greater understanding and empathy for those whose lives are already like this.  It is  not laziness, or lack of trying that keeps us in.  It is extreme anxiety, physical illness and disabilities, ageing and being a carer, the list could go in.  It may look  and feel like the person doesn’t want to connect or engage, when in fact they can’t. 

Sympathy and empathy are not the same. Sympathy is seeing my plight or pain and thinking “thats terrible, how awful for you” and then offering me a crisp as you walk past.  Empathy on the other hand is seeing my pain and acknowledging it with understanding and without judgment.  Then sitting down beside me in the pain. No need to talk unless I do.  No need to fix what cannot be fixed.  If i can bare to sit with my distress, please allow me to. It will benefit me to be really seen without having to hide the pain inside as usual.  Remember, if someone shows you their true inner world, don’t shut them down to make you feel better, witness what they are sharing and honour the trust they have in you.

 Writing this blog is a very new and scary thing for me and I’m not sure where i will be going with it.  I think that i will probably 
write when i want to be heard, or feeling really strongly about an issue or simply wanting to connect with the world.

Thank you for reading