As you all know, due to COVID-19 school has been shut down, and everyone has been told to stay inside. This is to stop the spread of COVID-19. However, this impacts everyone’s social lives and causes isolation for everyone except from their family, and it will impact everyone differently. 

This social distancing affects everyone differently because everyone has different living situations. For example, with my living situation I live with my parents and two siblings. I spend a lot of time with my family even without the quarantine. Therefore it isn’t very hard to stay inside the whole time.

However, even though it might not be as much as everyone else I still feel very separated from society. I want to be able to hang out with my friends. However, that is not possible right now. I try to Facetime them whenever I can however it is not the same as seeing them in person. 

I think that with school I was able to talk to my friends about whatever I wanted to. I was able to talk about things that you really only talk to your friends about because they understand what you are going through with school. 

Going to school also forced me to go out and talk to them. However, now I don’t have that anymore. I feel as though I have no one to vent to about specific classes or about other things. I feel as though when something funny happens that I can’t fully laugh with them because we can’t see each other in person. 

Someone described their time in quarantine to me by saying “I feel sad, emotional, and scared that something bad will happen to my family members because they live far away, so we won’t be able to visit them for such a long time”

This brings up another problem. The source revealed that they have family living in Europe. This means that they are unable to see their family. They said that it is scary that there is uncertainty about when they are able to see them again.

Another anonymous source told me that she visited her grandmother through a window to wish her a happy birthday.

However, I know that this situation is different for everyone. There are some people that live alone, and now they are locked up in their house by themselves. They might rely on their social outings to talk to people. 

Other students might have plans with their friends where they go out every Friday or Saturday night. Now that this isn’t possible anymore they crave that social connection. They feel locked up in their house and are upset because they can’t see their friend anymore. 

Even though there are things like Skype, Facetime, and text messages it is still not the same as seeing your friends and family in person, and it might make someone feel very socially isolated from everyone.