Bardacious

Hi, Dr. Santos. I'm normally a highly motivated, fairly fulfilled person who enjoys it when I get a lot done. With the quarantine, I'm luckier than a lot of people and try to focus on gratitude about that, but my unhappiness and underlying anger are getting worse and worse. I find I'm losing more and more of my ability to accomplish anything, care about anything, meet any of my self-imposed deadlines, etc. There's a lot I WANT to do, and NEED to do, but I find I can barely get up before noon, and once I'm up I'm without focus and wind up watching a lot of TV and hating everything. I'm miserable. I've read all kinds of "helpful" stuff about how to make it through this time, but none of them have helped me make a difference, and I feel so selfish for being so unhappy, which make it worse. Can you explain how/why this happens--sadness without structure--and if there's any actual way to re-energize oneself when you're inexorably turning to grumpy mush?

I appreciate all the responses so much. I also just had a tele-therapy session with my counselor, turns out I'm extremely angry about a lot of stuff throughout my life, and this isolation period is putting my nose right in it. Aha! It helped so much to realize that I'm suppressing a lot, a whole lot, and I never knew it. The TV time is a big part of what I've been falling into--distraction after distraction--so I don't have to face what's churning underneath. Dr. Santos, when you suggested loving-kindness meditation, my first response was, "WELL SCREW THAT!"--and then I thought, hmmmmm sounds like something else is going on inside here, huh? :-D So... still a long road to walk down, but this has helped uncork the bottle (mixed metaphors r us), and now I have at least a little direction for moving forward. Practicing gratitude, grrrr, gratitude, grrrr, gratitude, grrrr, rinse/repeat, and doing all I can. Courage!