Pandemic diary – October 2021 notes

Saturday, 2 October 2021
7-day average of new infections exceeds 1,000 in Poland (in 2020 it hit the mark on 25 September, 7 days earlier), but is 37% lower than on 2 October in 2020. I sadly predict the 2,000 hurdle will be crossed on 13 October. I will resume the pandemic diary published in bi-weekly intervals once it reaches 3,800 (i.e. 1 infection per 10,000 citizen detected daily).

Tuesday, 5 October 2021
According to my estimations (no exact figures available) 80% of Warsaw’s 80+ population have received at least one dose of any vaccine against COVID-19. The calculations do not take into account inhabitants of the city registered (zameldowani) is their home towns. Nevertheless, new infections keep rising in Warsaw, albeit not as fast as in a poorly vaccinated Lubelszczyzna province.

Sunday, 10 October 2021
The Polish government seems to aim at possibly many people getting immunity naturally, or encouraging people to get vaccinated by letting them see other unvaccinated people seriously ill or dying.
In 2020 on masks became mandatory outdoors. Let’s cherish the lack of that senseless obligation, at least for the time being.

Thursday, 14 October 2021
I get it wrong, by just one day. 7-day average of new infections exceeds 2,000 (in 2020 it hit the mark on 6 October, 8 days earlier), but is 59% lower than on 14 October 2020. I predict the 3,000 hurdle will be crossed on 22 October.

Saturday, 16 October 2021
The Baltic countries reported around 1 case per 1,000 citizens in recent days. The pandemic seems to be in overdrive there. With appropriate testing (a daydream) Poland can conceivably reach the same level.

Wednesday, 20 October 2021
New infections in Poland up by 111% week-on-week. I get in wrong again, this time the 7-day average of new infections exceeds 3,000 (in 2020 it hit the mark on 10 October, 10 days earlier), but is 61% lower than on 20 October 2020. I make no more predictions, but believe the 7-day average crosses 5,000 before the end of October. The wave is bearing down on Warsaw.

Thursday, 21 October 2021
Latvia is the first European country to go into lockdown this autumn. Schools, HoReCa and entertainment sector will be closed for everyone until 15 November. Then they will be reopened, but only to Green Pass holders.

Friday, 22 October 2021
7-day average of new infections gets above 3,800, i.e. above 1 detected infection per 10,000 citizens daily. Time to resume to timeline and brace for the bad times.

Saturday, 23 October 2021
The Polish government was very intent on imposing restrictions during the previous waves. These days it takes a wait-and-see approach and only steps up enforcing the indoor masking mandate. Even in districts where 1 in 1,000 citizens is tested positive daily no measures are taken. A disaster looms ahead.

Sunday, 24 October 2021
Romania and Bulgaria, the least vaccinated countries in the EU, resort to use of Green Passes as obligatory to enter public facilities. According to their governments, the moves are necessitated by spikes in new infections in both countries. Long queues are witnessed outside vaccination centres.

Monday, 25 October 2021
Romania, Ukraine, Baltic Countries – in all those poorly vaccinated post Soviet countries the current wave is higher and deadlier than previous ones. Poland is in for the same fate.

Tuesday, 26 October 2021
The 7-day average of new infections exceeds 5,000 (in 2020 it hit the mark on 15 October, 11 days earlier), but is 54% lower than on 26 October 2020. I predict the 10,000 hurdle will be crossed on 4 November (due to limited tested around All Saints’ Day).

Wednesday, 27 October 2021
In some districts in eastern Poland more than 12 new infections per 10,000 residents are reported, which means around 1 in 800 person is tested positively daily. No new restrictions are there in place, locals have not got convinced to get vaxxed. How long before the wave burns out.

Thursday, 28 October 2021
A good day. My parents receive a booster. They will be safer during the awful weeks ahead.

Friday, 29 October 2021
On 19 March 2021 I predicted the total number of infections in Poland would hit 3,000,000 on 8 May 2021. Fortunately, I was wrong, by some 170,800 cases, or by 174 days. Hereby I predict the number of new registered infections hits 4,000,000 on 26 January 2022.

Saturday, 30 October 2021
The worldwide official death toll hits 5,000,000. A round number has little to do with reality, as actual the number of fatalities of COVID-19 hit eight digits months ago.

Sunday, 31 October 2021
And customary month-end report of the sluggish pace of vaccinations in Poland.

1. Vaccine uptake in age groups – I believe the data reported by ECDC are wrong, since booster doses are reported as first doses, hence high first dose uptakes in 80+ and 70-79 age groups. I hope by the end of November it gets sorted out.

2. Vaccination status in the entire population of Poland

The Asperger syndrome – diagnosed

Since early childhood I have felt a kind of different. I have long felt my perception of the world differs from the way the surrounding reality is seen by other people. Years went by, the sense of difference has lingered, yet no longer bothered me. In the adulthood I have been mature enough to foster my distinct personality and learnt not to try hard to fit in where I do not.

With hindsight I believe this blog, which I run mostly for myself and for posterity rather than for a handful of readers, also reflects the syndrome I have.

At the beginning of the relationship with my girlfriend I told her I considered myself a weirdo (dziwadło). It got on her nerves when I called myself a weirdo, yet she noticed in some ways I am unlike other people. She spent hours digging up the Internet and her supposition fell on mild autism or Asperger syndrome. To cut the long story short, I went through a comprehensive (and not inexpensive) diagnosis and have been officially diagnosed with Asperger syndrome.

If you know me well, how would you recognise I am afflicted with this inborn and incurable syndrome (I prefer not to use the word “disorder”)? I am fascinated with everything which can be described with numbers (including the pandemic), memorise them easily, have strong analytical and problem-solving skills, I have specific uncanny interests (recall my winter timelines?), tend to focus on ideas and am guided by principles. Unlike most people with the syndrome, I have no major problems with communication, empathy, recognising emotions or fostering relationships, nevertheless I tend to get stressed when facing new situations or people too intensely.

The team who have diagnosed me told I me I was doing reasonably well and actually did not need therapy to function well in the society. I just have the Asperger syndrome and need to get on with it. They claim I have put in a lot of hard work to develop social skills which come naturally to other people, but for an observer unfamiliar with the syndrome the difference between me and a neurotypical person is hard to grasp.

I should not attempt to change myself, rather embrace myself with all skills and deficiencies which are a part of me. I only somewhat fear my children might inherit the syndrome as forms of autism are generally hereditary.

Frankly speaking, I am still coming to terms with the diagnosis, climbing into a higher level of self-awareness and self-development.

Rome – some snaps from the eternal city

Time to share a part of the photo coverage of the recent foray to Rome.

Starting out with hints for travellers planning to visit the capital of Italy:
1. Buy (cheap = WizzAir) airline tickets for weekdays rather than extend the weekend – we flew there on Sunday and came back on Thursday and the cost was some 50% in comparison to an extended weekend. Another advantage of such slot is the lower number of tourists during the working week.
2. Four days are an ideal duration of your stay in Rome, unless you are a museum freak; this also lets you take hand luggage only and save on baggage charges.
3. Take SitBus shuttle from and to the airport – maybe the fastest, but the cheapest way to get to the centre of Rome (a return ticket for an adult for mere 13 Euro).
4. Unless you are a museum freak, do not buy Roma Pass – cost-wise it makes no sense.
5. Do not even dare to hire a car! Italians drive like lunatics. Plus cost-wise and convenience-wise it also makes no sense.
6. Buy bus tickets and museum entry tickets online and have QR codes in your phone to avoid wasting time queuing up.
7. AirBnB offers a wide range of affordable dwellings in cosy neighbourhoods in which you can feel the climate of Rome.

Before setting off, I weighed up whether to take my nine-year-old Olympus camera, or to just take shots with my smartphone. I compared photo quality from the two devices and eventually picked the camera. However once I get upgraded to a new Samsung S20FE (due to be delivered by a courier by the end of October), the photo quality is likely to be comparable.

First snap, taken from the Palatine hill shows the panorama of a part of Rome and underscores the undulating sites on which the city was built. It does take some fitness to walk uphill and downhill while wandering around the city. As the pic was taken, temperature topped +28C.

The Victor Emmanuel Monument is said to be the blot on the landscape of the capital of Rome as it totally does not fit the surrounding buildings. Note the lack of lanes marked out at Piazza Venezia – here law of the jungle is in force, yet Italian drivers find themselves well in such traffic chaos.

The Roman Forum looks best if you watch it from the distance and slightly from above. The ruins are constantly restored, but one feels the scent of the past at the scene. Note the yawning (or screaming) lad at the right edge!

A typical street in central Rome is narrow, laid with cobblestone, has restaurant gardens over most of the year and… has cars parked on it and brazenly disrupting pedestrian traffic. I have no idea why residents of Rome are so car-ridden. Cars occupy far too much space on the streets, mostly those parked everywhere.

The temple of Pantheon is one of entrance-free tourist attractions, hence a long and winding queue of tourists waiting up to get in. We decided not to queue there, but returned two days later in the evening, when the line turned out to be shorter and the wait lasted mere 20 minutes.

For some fans of classic automobiles, an original Fiat 126 (not confuse for Fiat 126p manufactured in Poland) on old, black number plates, sitting the in the downpour near Borghese gardens.

The Spanish stairs and the entire Piazza de Spagna are less breath-taking than on photos. Also the weather (it just ceased to rain) and the season of the year (in spring the stairs are adorned with flowers) probably have taken some gloss off it.

Di Trevi fountain, though magnificent, is squeezed between other buildings, hence the crampy site also spoils the atmosphere. I advise to pop over here around sunset, when the fountain is lit up. For some an ideal spot to pop the question.

When planning your trip, choose some uncanny places seldom visited by tourist. We ventured to the southern outskirts of Rome to see the remnants of an aqueduct which carried water to Rome two centuries ago.

A Polish accent in the Vatican Museum – the battle of Vienna, painted by Jan Matejko and handed as a gift to a pope in 1860s. The painting commemorates fending off Muslims at the gates of Europe and defending Christianity. Today it brings off ambiguous associations.

St Peter’s square in turn looks smaller than on photographs. To the left – St Peter’s basilique (entrance also for free, queuing lasted around 20 minutes), to the right – a building from which the Pope speaks every Sunday at noon. I had to use to search engine to learn he appears on the second-right window on the top floor.

A typical picture of squalid Rome. Rubbish scattered everywhere spoil the character of the city. One reason for this is the inadequate number of rubbish bins, the other are long-lasting problems with waste collection which plague several Italian cities.

Trastevere, the essential Rome and the most climatic part of the city is a must-see district. Here, a classic view of it – a narrow, cobblestone-laid street, scooters parked, laundry hung out to dry on strings above the street, flowerpots. The place I long to return to!

Unlike in Berlin, Paris or in Warsaw, the river banks are not the a popular hangout nor a nightlife spot. River banks have been laid with concrete, one can see few walkers, runners or cyclists (a bicycle is not a popular vehicle in Rome) there. Maybe the threat of flooding is the answer why the river banks remain undeveloped…

Rome – travelling in COVID times

I hereby reported I have returned from a foreign trip. My two recent holidays were in spent in homeland, either at the seaside or into the mountains. It was my first flight since the onset of the pandemic; I crossed the border of Poland for the first time since June 2019 and spent a few days abroad for the first time since May 2018 (which was a memorable journey).

The pandemic at first was associatied with a stay-at-home order and absolute ban on travels. Nineteen months into it, travelling has been tamed. It involves some limitations, but is utterly doable.

Some more hassle is necessary before you set out. Provided you have been fully vaccinated and can download the Green Pass, the only other formality which needs to be handled is filling in Passenger Locator Forms (PLFs) for everyone crossing borders on board of an aircraft. The one necessary to enter Italy is bothersome, the one filled before returning to Poland, less complex.

At the airport in Warsaw nobody bothered to check neither the Green Pass nor the Italian PLF. Consequently it seems anybody can enter Italy. At the Fiumicino airport in Rome also nobody took the trouble to inspect anything.

While in Rome, Green Passes came in useful five times – to enter Colosseum, Roman Forum, Pantheon, The Vatican Museums and St. Peter’s Basilica. Besides, I have seen no single eatery / restaurant where Green Passes were checked. The other story is that we always dined outdoor and walked in only to use toilets.

In terms of wearing masks indoors, the Italians exhibit exemplary discipline. In the underground less than 1% of passengers had their mouth and nose not properly covered, same in shops. In crowded outdoor places more than 50% wore masks. It seems the trauma of spring 2020 is still alive, although except for face-covering obligations and limits on number of people in various places, no other restrictions are in place in Italy. The locals live it up as before the pandemic, respecting the social distancing and masking rules. For such reason Italy has seen new infections dwindling from late August by over 50%, while in Poland they soared since then.

Back at the airport in Rome our Green Passes were controlled twice (once before going through security, then before boarding) and then, to my surprise the staff at the Warsaw airport checked them again.

The biggest nuisance is having to wear a mask for several hours (airport, flight, transport to and from the airport), besides I see no major drawbacks of travelling during the pandemic. We have no choice, but to learn to live with the virus, trusting in science (get the jab!) and hoping it does not mutate to escape the vaccine-induced immunity.

A photo round-up is due next week.

Pandemic diary - September 2021 notes

Wednesday, 1 September 2021
The school year begins. Nearly everyone hopes things shape up well, but too few people take precautions so that things go well. I fear the delta wave has begun in earnest in Poland.

Tuesday, 7 September 2021
The delta wave reaches it peak in Israel, with more than 10,000 new infections per day confirmed. The country has begun to give out the third dose of Pfizer vaccine to fully vaccinated adults. This helps contain the pandemic (with hindsight – new infections have fallen by more than 50% within 3 weeks since then).

Thursday, 9 September 2021
Looking at pandemic figures in highly-vaccinated countries, one easily notices the pandemic retreats in Spain, Portugal, Denmark, Italy and in several other countries where more than 60% of the population have been vaccinated.

Saturday, 11 September 2021
50% of Poland’s population fully vaccinated (way too little).

Friday, 17 September 2021
Two-third of all residents of Warsaw (including children below 12) fully vaccinated. The capital of Poland ranks third in Poland in terms of full vaccine uptake.

Tuesday, 21 September 2021
The government approval application of the third dose of any mRNA vaccine for health-care staff and everyone aged 50+. Waning protection has become a matter of fact and quite probably smart folks will face a necessity to get jabs twice a year until this mess is brought under control.

Wednesday, 29 September 2021
More than 1,000 new infections on one day reported for the first time since 27 May 2021. In 2020 a four-digit figure was first reported on 19 September.

Thursday, 30 September 2021
And customary month-end report, of the sluggish pace of vaccinations in Poland.

1. Vaccine uptake in age groups

2. Vaccination status in the entire population of Poland

Electric cars – a future of motoring?

Experts in green transport convince us we have no choice, but to switch to electric vehicles, if we are to hold up the global warming and save the planet. The transition is to be long-lasting and carried out in stages, but ultimately, between 2030 and 2050 many European countries are bound to ban sales of brand-new cars with traditional combustion engines. Before the strict prohibitions come into effect, milder measures will be taken, particularly traditional vehicles will be forbidden entry to central areas in bigger cities. In the transitional period, hybrid cars are gaining popularity. They prove economical in town, but do not perform well in terms of fuel consumption in motorway driving, even at moderate speeds. Nevertheless, they help their drivers feel less guilty.

To make it clear, I do not dare to call into question the necessity to drastically reduce the emission of greenhouse gases. We should go to any length to protect the planet if our children and grandchildren are to inhabit it. I only wonder, whether electric motoring is definitely the best option.

Electric buses running around town and charged at terminuses or in depots – I am all in. But electric (only) passenger cars? Potential buyers see several drawbacks of such vehicles.

The first aspect which puts many people off is the price – such cars generally cost twice as much as their counterparts with traditional engines. Given savings per 1 kilometre and decreased cost of maintenance, the payoff distance is between 100,000 and 200,000 kilometres. The only way to get around this is to have governments subsidising purchases of electric vehicles and thus redistributing wealth.

The second discouraging factor is the inconvenience. Range of the best-performing electric vehicles reaches these days around 400 kilometres and such distance is only theoretical, i.e. achievable in ideal conditions – driving at steady speed, on a flat road, with windows closed, aircon off, etc. Charging infrastructure is still way too meagre to facilitate charging of several vehicles. On top, charging up batteries takes much more time than filling up the car. These factors make longer journeys inconvenient. In fact an electric car is good for driving around town, while in fact a car is the least desirable way of moving about in a city and should not be promoted.

The electricity mains and installations in most houses lack capacity to facilitate charging many such cars overnight. My father, an electrician, has worked out that if two cars were charged simultaneously in the underground garage of my building, the energy consumption (around 7,500 Watts) will be around 100% allowed for the installation. The third car plugged in would blow fuses. Electric installations in buildings and the entire power grid (which is likely to conk out in the event of a heat wave in Poland) need to be adjusted if cars are to run on electricity.

If we are environment-conscious, we should realise where the electricity in our sockets comes from. As long as Poland burns coal in power plants, electric cars still contaminate air, but at power plant chimneys, not at exhaust pipes. In Norway they make more sense.

Besides, a motor vehicle does damage to the environment only in 60% between the moment it leaves a dealer’s showroom and its last trip to a scrapyard. Manufacturing and recycling account for approximately 20% of carbon footprint each. Therefore if a carmaker prompts you to buy a new hybrid or electric SUV to save the planet, do not do it. You should rather look after your current car (provided it is a small and relatively modern petrol-fuelled one), drive it as rarely as possible and keep it going in good condition as long as possible.

We have to face a bitter truth. A car will become again a luxury good on account of its detrimental impact on the environment. Electric cars are not a perfect solution. The solution is to drive less, avoid short journeys and traffic jams, drive economically, choose to go by bicycle or by public transport around town. And not to deceive ourselves.

Cold, cold year?

Summer of 2021 will go down as the warmest since records began, but in Poland it was just slightly warmer than long-term average. Although June (thanks to its hot second half) and July were markedly warmer even in comparison to 1991-2020 reference period, August tilted the balance of the entire summer towards just “a bit warm” category.

With temperature averaging out +17.2C it was the coldest August in Warsaw since 2005 (+17.7C then) and the third-coldest in my lifetime, after August 1998 (mean temperature: +16.4C) and August 1993 (+16.6C). My parents remember six Augusts between 1976 and 1981 when average temperatures in Warsaw were ranging from +15.8C to +16.8C. In recent August there was no spell of exceptional cold (month-time low of +7.3C, while on average the lowest temperature in August is +7.8C), but on 12 days temperature did not top above +20C. Rainfall was also in abundance – monthly precipitation reached 166 millimetres, vs. long-term average of 61 millimetres (and was short of post-WW2 record by 13 millimetres).

September has been partly making up for the cold August, offering plenty of sunshine and day-time highs of +25C recently. Forecasters say the coming week should bring clement weather with temperatures peaking just below +20C. Preliminary forecasts for next months suggest October should bring above-average temperatures and Indian summer, while November is to be warm, but wet.

I wonder whether 2021 will be the first “cold” year since 2010. Until now, the year-to-date negative temperature deviation in Warsaw stands at some - 0.3 Celsius degree. If the trend continues, 2021 stands a chance to be the coldest since than 2010 (mean: +7.9C). So far four months (February, April, May, August) brought below-average temperatures. More than four months with below-average mean temperature in Warsaw were reported during my lifetime in 2003, 1996, 1991 and 1991. Everything depends now on the weather in the fourth quarter. But do not date to confuse weather for the climate. Just like one swallow does not make a summer, one colder year in just one part of the globe does not deny the continuing global warming.

Next post in two weeks (off for a wedding next weekend, hoping not to catch the Delta).

Pandemic diary – August 2021 notes

Tuesday, 3 August 2021
4 million deaths officially reported worldwide. Had it been 40 million, few would have cared anyway.

Sunday, 8 August 2021
500,000 coronavirus tests per 1,000,000 citizens have been conducted in Poland, the lowest number in the EU, 15% lower than Bulgaria which is the runner-up in this nefarious ranking.

Thursday, 12 August 2021
In Greece the number of new inflection (7-day average) is the highest since the onset of the pandemic (or testing has become more widespread).

Saturday, 14 August 2021
In several European countries attacked by the delta variant, the wave seems to be over. Look at the new infection numbers in the Netherlands, Portgual, Malta, Spain. Hope the trend is sustainable.

Monday, 16 August 2021
Delta wave hits its high in France, with over 23,000 (7-day average) new confirmed infections.

Monday, 23 August 2021
The Federal Drug Agency issues an unconditional approval for the Pfizer vaccine. Looking forward to the same step being taken by the EMA.

Wednesday, 25 August 2021
50% of Poland’s population have received at least one dose of a vaccine (in my calculation I assume the population of my country is 38,160,000, therefore I declare it 4 days later than other observers do).

Friday, 27 August 2021
New inflections reach their peak in Italy. Hope they do not increase considerably, since we have booked flight to Rome in early October.

Saturday, 28 August 2021
Podkowa Leśna is the first gmina in Poland, where more than two-third of residents (including children less than 12) have been fully vaccinated. Thumbs up, hats down!

Tuesday, 31 August 2021
And a customary month-end report, of the sluggish pace of vaccinations in Poland.

1. Vaccine uptake in age groups

2. Vaccination status in the entire population of Poland

Inflation creeping in

The inflation reading in Poland for July 2021 hit 5.0% year-on-year; the highest since May 2011 and the second-highest in the last two decades. Probably I would not gripe much about it, had the monetary policy been conducted in a proper manner. Sadly, it is not. Despite the rising price level and rapid recovery in the economy, benchmark interest rate in Poland stays at 0.10% (which in fact means the real interest rate is almost -5%, perhaps the lowest in the civilised world).

Interest rates in Poland were slashed to a record-low (by historical standards) level of 1.50% in March 2015, when Poland struggled a deflation. Then such move, with real interest rate of nearly 3%, was justified. Despite economic expansion, the central bank kept its rate level until March 2020, when it responded to the pandemic-related economic standstill by a rate cut of 50 basis points. In the next weeks the current level of 0.10% was reached. I will refrain from commenting on the legitimacy of such move in a situation of an unprecedented supply shock. I believe tools different than the cost of money should have been used to help businesses and customers out.

Customarily, I am referring you to my essay on harms inflicted by too loose monetary policy. Times have changed, economic principles have not, albeit some are intent on setting new paradigms.

Astonishingly many people realise why the Polish central bank does not react to the price growth which exceeds the statutory goal of monetary policy (i.e. inflation target of 2.50% +/- 1 p.p.). They do it to help the government finance its debt cheaply and pay negative interest on a large portion thereof. Not only the debt service spending is lower thanks to lack of monetary tightening. Higher prices mean higher tax inflows, predominantly from VAT. Inflation which spirals out of control always at least temporarily translates into negative real interest rates which facilitate transfer of wealth from creditors to debtors, including the biggest debtors in the world, i.e. governments.

Those particularly worse off are savers who now either accept a depletion of their savings kept in bank accounts by 5% yearly in real terms, or search for havens which might shield their money from inflation. Unlike me and my parents, not everyone noticed the opportunity of inflation-indexed 4Y government bonds in 2019 (which has turned out to be an excellent nearly risk-free investment making me give up on my resolution made a decade earlier). Folks with substantial savings have rushed to buy properties, as they believe tangible assets should store value. I am putting it down to Poles’ inability to invest in any other asset class than properties. Had flats purchased for investment reasons been put on the market for rent, this would have been quite okay, since thosee dwellings would meet someone’s housing needs. Horrifyingly, a growing number of flats stay vacant, as the purpose of their purchase was purely speculative, i.e. to benefit from value appreciation, despite bearing upkeep costs.

Moving back to the core topic of the post, i.e. to inflation, we should understand what drives prices up and why there is little chance the price growth decelerates.

1. Far too much hollow money has been printed during lockdowns. If goods or services are not produced, but economic actors receive a pecuniary compensation for being idle from a government, the link between a payment and goods or services offered in return is broken. A first-year student in economics would recognise it!

2. Recovery programmes run by governments to stimulate economies – they raise prices of specific goods and services, i.e. construction materials and services if a programme is aimed at such sector.

3. Broken supply chains, which have not been fully restored since early 2020. This problem affects several industries and strikes several markets off balances. These days the shortage of brand-new cars or bicycles is driven by shortage of components, without which vehicles cannot be manufactured.

4. Deferred demand – after several sectors were shut for months and as the general uncertainty seems over, customers rush to catch up on spending and business want to make up for losses incurred during lockdowns.

5. Lack of incentive to save. As people see their money evaporating on real terms from bank deposits, they are more eager to spend it, i.e. consume rather than invest.

6. Climate change and environment protection. This is the foremost reason. The time is coming to bring the price of several planet-destructive goods real and make them reflect the harm caused to the planet. For such reasons cars will have to be less affordable, prices of electricity generated from burning coal are bound to go up. Same needs to happen about rubbish collection charges, plane tickets, packaging, clothes and other goods humans thoughtlessly use in excess.

Having written that, I am happy I bought and furnished my dwelling in 2018, do not need to purchase a car, nor a bike and price growth of several goods does not affect me.

Depression – another episode

4 years ago I wrote about depression. At that time I felt something wrong was going on with me, yet not fully realising I was in for the third episode thereof in my lifetime. The first one struck me in late 2005, a few months before high-school leaving exams, the two other ones came in summer of 2011 and around autumn of 2017. I fully recovered from the last one in early 2018, with decreasing doses of pharmaceutical support. With such track record I am at the group of risk for suffering from recurring relapses of depression.

The pandemic did it bit in increasing the odds of a recurrence. During early months I did not fully isolate (numbers of infections were 100 lower than in late March 2021) and fleeting relationships originated on Tinder were lifting my spirits (or bringing me down). I actually considered myself quite self-aware and claimed I would easily recognise the first symptoms of the illness. In November 2020 I began to wake up two hours too early and had problems to fall asleep again. I put it down to stress and shrugged it off. Then came the continuous tension and inability to relax, resulting in constant fatigue. It kept me company since early 2021, but was bearable and did not influence my daily functioning.

Things took a noticeable turn for the worse in late June 2021. I blame a combination of four factors which sparked off the fourth episode of depression:
- prolonged social isolation (staying in home for too long, too little direct contact with people),
- general grudge borne against the society, actually the noisy fraction of them who do everything to keep the pandemic going (anti-vaxxers),
- my parents’ problems with health (amplified by lack of proper access to health care since March 2020),
- ups and downs in my relationship, including three break-ups (all revoked, we are still together).

How it encroached on me? I was void of any energy, felt constant anxiety, lost appetite and drive, had troubles focusing on even simple tasks, everything appeared to make no sense, future seemed full of negative events, I had attacks of sobbing without any specific reason. Life was overwhelming, getting through each day seemed a tremendous effort. Being quite aware how this black hole works I resisted other typical symptoms such as lack of self-esteem or suicidal thoughts. I also did not withdraw from social life (although in the darkest days interactions with people were horrifically tiresome).

In mid-July I consulted a psychiatrist and was prescribed medications. Side effects thereof were the most noticeable in my lifetime, despite moderate dosage. I felt dizzy, felt dry in my mouth, broke sweat even if not moving, my heart was beating faster than normally. For nearly 2 weeks I had to give up on driving and watch out when cycling or swimming. Then my body and brain got used to the chemistry.

Currently I can function normally or even intensely at work and socialise. I have no problems with concentration nor drive, my mood is neutral, gone is the anxiety. Sadly, I feel totally indifferent to any emotions and impulses, both negative and positive, I do not consider it natural. The tension has not waned yet and I still wake up around 4 a.m. I feel on the mend, yet a long way is ahead of me. It will involve several months of taking medicines and a therapy, to learn how to take some burdens off my mind. I also worry relapses might hamper the life of my family in the next years, even despite I have learnt how to deal with it and do my best to overcome it.