My latest piece, for The Sick Times, is one that was borne out of my own experiences, and especially my frustrations. The five years of the COVID pandemic have been difficult, but it was really 2022 and 2023 that were the most difficult for me. This was the period when so many people I know and love, the same people who were helping me process and keep going throughout the very dark periods of 2020, gave in to the push to “move on.” I have been watching in shock and horror as people close to me have returned to most or even all of their 2019 behaviors, discarding anything we might have learned about protecting each other from infectious disease and making the world a safer place for chronically ill and disabled folks (not to mention preventing more chronic illness and death). These years were also hard because as fewer and fewer people took basic precautions like spacing out risky events or waiting at home when they felt sick to determine if they had a cold or something much more deadly, the world outside got that much riskier. This increased riskiness coincided with my own health getting worse, making me feel that one serious infection could tip me right into disability. In 2020 or 2021 we were working with a shared understanding, but by 2022 all of the burden even in small social settings was shifted on to me if I wanted to be careful, limiting my social world. Suddenly someone not wearing a mask might say “oh yeah, I’m feeling sick, I’m not sure what’s up with me,” as if that didn’t have any bearing on the people around them. I had to start assuming that someone with an active case of COVID was in almost every social setting, drastically reducing my own range of action.

I think regularly about what I did not know, or more precisely, what I did not accept and commit to, prior to the pandemic. I had certainly heard that the flu kills some people every year, but it honestly never occurred to me that the corollary was that I should do everything in my power not spread the flu. This was wrong, and honestly, I’m pretty sure it was rooted in some eugenic thinking that is the status quo. People that might die from the flu, I thought, are people that are vulnerable to all kinds of stuff and something will get them anyway. I’m not proud of this, and I’m not advocating this line of thinking, but I also do not think this is uncommon. I didn’t specifically have this thought consciously, but I felt entitled to a certain range of motion in the world and it didn’t make sense to me to limit that for a small minority. My view on this is changed, dramatically. It is possible to do so much more for each other and to create a world where the flu and COVID and other infections kill so many fewer people each year. Huge institutional change is needed to make this a reality – like paid sick leave and supports for child care beyond the nuclear family – but that’s no different from a range of other social justice issues where I believe fervently that it’s important to fight for institutional change AND to act and live within my values as much as possible. (I want to add, too, that this growth is part of living an examined life. In the future I will probably look back on something I do now and regret the harm I caused, maybe even something comrades are already doing around me.)

Feeling this dissonance with friends and comrades over COVID practices has generated a lot of grief, as it has for thousands of others. This article, which draws on a survey that was responded to by more than 2,500 people, helped me work through that grief. It is helpful (and hopeful) to know that I am not alone, that none of us are alone. That it matters to keep pushing in the direction my values compel me. And it helps to try to make sense of why these deep gulfs have arisen between me and so many people I know rather than remain stuck in the frustration, anger, and grief.

I know the article has been useful to a lot of people who are in a similar situation as me: the COVID-avoidant who are feeling discarded. But I also hope folks who have had their differences with me over COVID practices will find some understanding of how our relationships have changed and why.

---

The “pandemic of abandonment”: Navigating friendships five years into COVID-19

Over the last five years of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, many people have experienced significant changes and ruptures to their personal relationships. People with Long COVID and people taking COVID-19 precautions have lost many friends as they are not able or willing to return to “pre-pandemic” behaviors.

This significant grief has received very little public attention, but the extraordinary response to a The Sick Times survey indicates a strong urge for people to talk about this experience. 

Of 2,586 people who responded to the survey, 81% reported having lost friends.

One woman told The Sick Times, “I don’t see friends often because I hate feeling like the bad guy or like a burden, telling them they have to mask to hang out with me.” Another respondent called this “the pandemic of abandonment.” 

Read the rest here: https://thesicktimes.org/2025/01/30/the-pandemic-of-abandonment-navigating-friendships-five-years-into-covid-19/