This year as the country went into lockdown, it saw relationships put under all kinds pressures we’ve never experienced before. With limited space, overdue haircuts and no football, it’s hardly surprising that there has been a record number of breakups in 2020.
For me and Stu though, still “relatively” new in our relationship, lockdown was an interesting experience. If you’ve made the mistake of reading my blog more than once, you’ll probably already know that me and Stu only bought our house in November and this was our first time living together.
Before moving in with Stu, people told me that the first year of living together is the hardest…particularly if you’re someone like me who has lived by themself for pretty much 10 years, causing them to develop weird habits like staying up late entering competitions then getting up at the crack of dawn to go for runs.
So, when I found out that just a few months in that we were going to be in quarantine together, I’m not going to lie I was a little bit anxious about how we were going to cope.
However, the reality of our lockdown was a lot less scary than I thought and actually brought us a lot closer together. Instead of me going stir crazy in the house without being able to book our weekends up seeing friends or getting up early to go the gym, we were able to have guilt free quality time together.
As the lockdown continued and I went on furlough, our whole routine changed and we enjoyed staying up late together watching box sets. We loved the longer lie ins and shorter / no work commutes.
Don’t get me wrong, there definitely were still arguments, I mean even in chilled mode you can disagree over what boxset you’re going to watch or who gets the last choc ice you had to que up for an hour in Tesco to get…but overall our lockdown experience, if anything brought us closer together.
Sadly, like I said in my last blog, that furlough holiday had to come to an end at some point and that was last week.
Going back to work I was really anxious but Stu couldn’t have been more amazing, giving me pep talks, getting my car ready, even treating me to a new outfit!
After that first day, we both couldn’t believe how much we missed each other ( apologies for the sickly content but it’s true!) but it was okay because the next day I was working from home and so was Stu and it still felt a bit like our furlough bubble.
This week, we got another reality hit though when Stu got told by his work he had to go back into the office. This meant I faced a whole day working from home alone…this sounds ridiculous because I was so busy with work, I had at least three teams calls, I saw my sister for a walk, had the standard mum call and I went for a run that morning, but without Stu I suddenly felt so lonely.
When Stu finally returned home, not used to the commute he was obviously tired, I was a mixture of tired from my day, still getting used to work, but also desperate to see him, putting us both in irritable moods. That night we both wanted to stay up late and watch boxsets like we’d done before but we were both so tired and grumpy we ended up having an early night…the furlough dream was definitely over.
The next day Stu returned to work and despite the grumpy eve I began to miss him again ( note as I write this I do know how needy this makes me sound so please don’t judge me!) It’s so strange because BC (before corona) like I said I really needed my own space and the thought of being trapped with Stu was so scary. And while I still love (and definitely need my own space) this new work schedule was a definite shock.
When Stu got home we were okay but as Stu asked me how I was and I said I was fine, I knew I wasn’t. I didn’t want to admit how much I’d missed him for fear of sounding too needy or that while I was loving being back at work, all the changes to our routine had been a bit of a reality check.
Thankfully, like all guys, Stu knew when a girl says she’s fine, she isn’t actually fine. And he explained how much he’d been missing me too (he might of been just saying this to make me feel better but either way it helped) and it was only natural for me to feel a bit down this week because I was so tired and I shouldn’t beat myself up about it.
After our talk we then went on to probably have one of the most fun weekends we’ve had throughout lockdown, because with us both being back more at work it really felt like a weekend.
So, now as we slip back into our new working routine, we know there will definitely be more stresses ( and we probably will have to have a few more early nights!) I know we’ll adjust to it in the same way we did before – and at least now he won’t be upset about the football not being on and I’ll be able to escape to get my nails done!
alanaburnett 