Who Am I Now?

Before getting sick, I had a tidy collection of identities. Hell, I didn’t just have those identities, I was them, or so I thought: runner, rock climber, yoga teacher, giver, doer of things. There were other labels, too: competent, smart, fit, active, social, energetic, stable, healthy. None of these labels or identities fit like they used to. They hang loose around me—hand-me-downs that neither fit nor flatter. From the folds of fabric and vacant space, a question arises: Who am I now?

Who am I now that I can’t run or climb? Who am I now that I ask for help as often as I offer it? Who am I now that I can’t take my kids adventuring? Who am I now that I forget things, struggle with basic arithmetic, and am made ill by cognitive exertion? If I shed the hand-me-down identities from my pre-Covid life, what will I wear?

I don’t know what my long-term answer to this question will be. For now, I’m pretty much just sitting here in my skivvies (some identities still fit, thank God!). Maybe that’s enough. Maybe I don’t need to rush to fill in the blank—“I am _______.” Maybe I can hem the sentence. Why don a dozen extra layers when I can just rock the classic miniskirt of “I am”?  

Okay, maybe it’s not quite that easy. We’re socialized to spend our lives defining ourselves, both to ourselves and to others. Many of us unconsciously derive our sense of worth from our labels, identities, and stories. But if there’s ever been a time to buck socialization and try something new, surely this is it. I haven’t gone out with my gal pals, hugged a friend, or attended a party in nearly a year now. So much has changed. Why not change how I relate to myself, too—or at least try it on for size?

Here’s what I’m trying on:

• I’m trying to be present for my life as it is right now.

• I’m trying to experience myself as the observer of my own experience.

• I’m trying to be curious about my own emotions. Rather than labeling them as good or bad, I’m trying to explore them and see what I might learn.

• I’m trying to let go of the need to please others. I’m trying to release the need for constant approval.

• I’m trying to practice self-acceptance and self-love. This means accepting myself, even with a pile of old identities gathering dust on my floor. It means being gentle with myself in this moment of uncertainty, loss, and possibility.

All of this trying is hard work. I fumble often and have to begin again. I don’t necessarily expect the trying to pay off in a new wardrobe of identities. But it is paying off in a more nuanced way. It’s helping me to be okay with the strangeness of this in-between. It’s helping me to find spaciousness where at first, I only saw emptiness. It’s helping me to glimpse possibility within uncertainty and growth within loss. And so more moments than not, it’s okay with me that I don’t know how to define myself. When it comes down to it, it’s more important to me to simply be myself (whoever the hell that is.)

How is long Covid impacting your sense of self? If, like me, you’re finding that old identities don’t fit, then how are you coping with that? How are you navigating this strange in-between? 

P.S. If you have a friend, community, or support group that might benefit from this email, please share! Thank you for being here and engaged in whatever ways feel good to you.