So Bob, normally I prepare a bunch of emails and questions but today I was busy doing other things and you actually showed up early and you thought you were on time but you actually showed up early I actually thought I was early for being on time and you're actually early for being early and so I didn't prepare any of these questions and so it's we're going to be kind of winging it welcome to my world but let's do it what do you say all right so patron Robin from the UK

wrote in and said would you please consider exploring how it can be really frightening to rejoin the world after the pandemic kept many of us isolated for reasons of safety I need to get myself back out there yeah but I'm really unnerved Bob what do you think I think we all have a certain amount of agoraphobia as a result I mean I won't go to a movie now I mean I went to a movie with you the first movie I've been to the only movie I've been to and because you're afraid you

yeah I just like yeah but I mean that's just that's probably a small bit because some people are having a hard time even the house like Colleen's having a hard time leaving the house and being out there and being social even though you know so the first time we're currently in another huge wave in Seattle by the way yeah so right so so if you were if you were holding up like back in what was it before the vaccine came out right then you should be actually doing that right now

right out of anyway right anyway we had a we had people over for outdoor socially distanced movie night at my house I think it was July of 2021 so about a year and change into the isolation I think I was there yeah I think you were there yeah and we I just felt freaked out by all these people yeah around you know it was just like yeah just

intense and these are people that are you know like you they're like my family yeah that was one of the for if not the first large gathering of friends I'd seen my family right a large gathering but I think your party that summer was the first large gathering of friends I'd been around and and like you said it was almost entirely outside yeah almost everyone spent the entire time outside yeah so yeah but patron robin wants to know right

how can we get ourselves back out there I patron robin wrote a longer email about just how hard it is yeah and how she's worried that it this could last forever for her you know so what would you say to that well you know we don't know what's going to happen next year next month it might it might I suppose it's possible that some part of that could linger on inside Robin but you know

you get don't I mean I think whether it does or not the only thing we can do today is chip away at the agoraphobia that's come as a result of our you know forced isolation so mindfully putting myself out there in situations that are still safe of course safety first but but that is mindfully putting myself out there and stretching my comfort zone you know little by little and probably it'll be good

yeah for me regarding pandemic anxiety I totally get it and I think that it all comes that town to this emotional regulation coping model that I find useful to myself is that there's a fear we we have we're afraid okay that's good it tells us something there's a threat what is the threat well it's the

threat of and I think this is important and I'm going to walk myself through this because I feel like I need to do this right on for myself I'm afraid of getting

infected not only by COVID-19 SARS-Co2 but also just any cold because I had a very mild cold back in November and took all the tests and I didn't have

COVID and normally before the pandemic I would have just thought I think I might be fighting a little virus I don't

know you know and I wouldn't care it would just be nothing to my day but every night in particular when I

would be falling asleep I would feel that kind of pressure in my chest and think maybe I have COVID even

though I you know there are false negatives and and so it was it was scary because you just wonder well I'm I'm vaccinated I'm

boosted but you know there are plenty of people who die even though that's true yeah or they have long COVID or their symptoms like I just talked

with someone I know who had COVID a couple weeks ago and he's a young strong guy had had all the vaccines none of the predispositions

to hospitalization and he said it was like the worst five days of his life I mean the pressure in his head and he

couldn't breathe and it's I think it's three or four weeks later and he still can't a taste or smell and one of his ears

is completely blocked up wow and and because we don't have a lot of data on this it's it's scary because we just so

know like this is after vaccination and all that yeah he'd still got that sick yeah wow and and it's it's rare I

mean I hear much more people getting on the crime and having not a good time well actually I had other friends young healthy

friends of mine like 29 year old guy who said it was yeah the worst sickness he's ever been through wow and okay I guess you

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