Healthy Disruptions: Silver Linings/Sources of Strength

In this episode, we ask the question, what sources of strength did members of our community  rely on during the early days of the pandemic? We join in the conversation by sharing reflections on our own sources of strength while centering community voices in a discussion about perseverance, hope, and survival amid prolonged uncertainty. Through exploring diverse perspectives, we also challenge what is considered to be a source of strength while also reflecting on the pandemic’s silver linings. Hosts include Alejandro Echeverria and Joshua Liashenko.

Transcript

Hello, welcome to Healthy Disruptions, a podcast about health and community in southern CA.

This season’s theme is titled Narrating the pandemic: Collective reflections through the Disruption.

We will talk about the lived experiences of individuals surviving and thriving in Southern California through the Covid-19 pandemic.”

Thank you for joining us for your healthy dose of disruptions. Stay with us. 

You have heard countless stories across your life and continue to tell, listen and watch them. Stories of success, of failure, of loss and happiness. Whether you are experiencing personal issues, a life changing event or living through a global crisis, stories can give you a sense of comfort and support. They also lead you to unexpected places and conclusions. And at times you feel vulnerable. But you learn to build trust. You learn to draw strength from these relationships as well from the stories at any difficult moment.

Well that is what we want to focus on in this episode. What source of strength did you rely on during the pandemic? What does your source of strength say about who you are as a person? 

We are Joshua and Alejandro. Two anthropologists from the Inland Empire. Today, we’re going to talk about the Sources of Strength members of our community continue to rely upon, during the pandemic. 

So Alejandro, what have been your sources of strength? 

I know this might sound cheesy but being with my partner became a real source of strength for me.

At the beginning of the pandemic, like many people, I was forced to study and work from home.. and you know… being around my family all day. 

I wasn’t used to that.. 

I got distracted by my dad talking loudly on the phone and I felt trapped in my room 

And had a few very awkward zoom calls. Like one time, my brother walked into my room. Fresh out of the shower. Nothing but a towel… Asking if he could borrow a clean shirt. 

And then I had lots of issues with the slow Wi-Fi. Both my siblings were working and studying from home as well. And you know, we fought over the Wi-Fi a lot. 

So I started commuting and staying at my partner’s house to be more focused. I felt more at peace at his house. 

After months of doing this, We finally decided to get our own place…It just made sense. 

When I shared the news with my family, (and let me just say- I never talk with them about my relationships!) 

My mom cried and asked why I was leaving her. 

I think we even went a few weeks without talking. 

 It was difficult, but my partner was there for me. We would talk together at night. Assuring me she will eventually understand. 

We made our own little home in Riverside and we created our routine as a couple.

We enjoyed decorating the apartment, cooking meals together and just being silent watching Netflix at night.

I liked having someone to eat and laugh with, someone to vent to, or just sit close to..

Creating our own home during the pandemic gave me something positive to focus on rather than the endless news of rising Covid numbers and omg my zoom fatigue. 

While we built a home, we also built our relationship…My parents finally recognized him as my partner… My mom even calls him mijo  now.

But because of  rising rent prices, we moved to a studio in my brother’s house… a few houses down from my parents’ home where I grew up.. 

Everyone on the street knows who we are and where we live. 

And we’re there, you know, changing what it means to be a home or a family. 

I like showing my neighbors who I really am and it feels really good

I also feel like I’m inspiring the young folks on the street to know that its ok to be queer.

I know my neighbors talk about us with their children, and that’s a good thing.  

Being that source of inspiration and strength for other queer folks in my neighborhood has also become a source a strength for me. 

I’m still kinda processing all that’s happened but overall I’m happy we took this opportunity to make some positive changes for ourselves … and actually… for those around us, too.

But what about you? What was your source of strength?  

It’s funny because as a naturally anxious person, I was initially surprised by my lack of anxiety in the early days of the pandemic. As someone with Generalized Anxiety Disorder and has struggled with depression since childhood, my “normal” is to always expect the worst and to be on the lookout for bad things to happen. Whether it be anxiety awaiting blood work results, worry that a few moments of airplane turbulence will turn into plummeting out of sky, or fears that I am not living up to my full potential plague my conscious and subconscious thoughts on an almost daily basis. In just a matter of days, my entire life changed but I remember feeling some relief with being forced to stay close to home. Like you, I drew strength from my partner (or in my case, my husband) and enjoyed the extra time we spent together since we both started working from home. Being able to share household chores during our workdays and share daytime meals when we would have otherwise been apart, drew us closer together. And of course, we baked homemade bread, went on long drives just to get out of the house, and invested time in making our home cozy since we were spending so much more time inside. The novelty of doing everything at home and navigating a new type of work/homelife balance definitely distracted me from the uncertainty of the pandemic. I felt safe as long as I was at home and because I was able to be mostly at home, I consistently felt safe. When I did need to leave the house for essential supplies, all of the health and safety precautions imposed on me and those I imposed on myself, created a sense of control in the face of uncertainty and potential chaos. 

I recognize I experienced (and continue to experience) an extraordinary amount of privilege throughout the pandemic. I was able to work from home, Zoom became an everyday part of connecting with colleagues, and I was able to avoid most situations which would have led to exposure. I also knew that if I did contract the virus, my overall positive health, relatively young age, and access to medical care would mitigate COVID-19 illness, my class privilege and whiteness would shield me from systemic inequalities which made the conditions of the pandemic so much worse for millions of people.

Working in education provided security as California’s strict protocols for indoor gatherings meant most on-campus activities were severely limited or made impossible. Also, when the time came, those of us in education were among the first groups eligible for COVID-19 vaccines. When I was able to start my series of two injections, I immediately jumped on the opportunity without pause or delay. I felt the same way for the booster and will line up for the jab if and when a second booster is recommended.

So, I guess for me, home, family, and moments of control were my sources of strength during the most precarious moments of the past few years. Being able to rely on the comfort and safety offered by my domestic spaces, the support of my husband and our newfound frequency of spending time together, as well as the knowledge that I was being as safe as possible through following health guidelines and accepting the vaccine.

It's very interesting that we came together on this episode. I am happy to have worked with a fellow queer person on this topic. I’m sure we experienced unexpected turns during the pandemic and we both found strength in our relationships with our partners. 

Yeah, our queer positionalities really showed through. And I think that this is what led us to want to present stories that go beyond a sad and depressing narrative. Instead, embrace moments of strength, happiness, and hope. We want to showcase the stories that reflected some of our own experiences in a way that queerly narrates the pandemic.

What we really mean is that. Well, when we think about upheaval, we tend to focus solely on negative circumstances. However, the stories presented here offer a possible counter narrative to that assumption. As anthropologists, we recognize the power behind stories that reveal the pandemic’s worst aspects and the undeniable toll COVID has had on the lives of so many in our communities. Our intention is not to erase those stories. But to challenge pandemic narratives by providing a wider perspective. While upheaval presents instability and unexpected changes, the effects of those changes can also be viewed in a positive light. 

Before we get into more details, we want to acknowledge the information presented here is partial and situated in a particular time and place. We recognize that our experiences are not separate from the community voices highlighted here but instead, they are in relation with them. We also understand that  our queer subjectivities are alike to one another but also, at times divergent. Our approach to queering the pandemic reflects these moments of similarity and difference.

Lastly, we challenge what constitutes a “source of strength.” We actively resist a general definition of strength. We see the narratives presented here as being in relation to intersecting sources of oppression and experiences of privilege. We want to show how prosperity emerges from precarity. And also, how the two are entangled. Just like in our lives…. the good coexists with the bad. Well, it's complicated. 

As we all know, the pandemic disrupted many necessities of everyday life: Work, education, and financial resources. Various communities, mainly women of color who shared their stories with us, talked about being left to care for their families while also continuing to work in precarious and often unhealthy conditions. Most of us have either felt or witnessed changes in housing, education, work and health throughout our communities. And there are countless stories and personal experiences that show how people adapted and found some source of strength to continue on and see the silver linings amid the upheaval.

Looking through some of the stories and experiences that folks shared with us, we found some common sources of strength. Some found strength in their faith, religion and spirituality. We noticed a lot of folks in South Los Angeles and the Coachella Valley relied upon both solitary and communal forms of spiritual practice.

We had the opportunity to speak with unhoused Black South LA residents who mentioned they derived strength from faith and spirituality. Many expressions of faith and spirituality mentioned seemed to center around solidarity actions and practices. One individual shared with us:

Um, I say, mentally and physically everything is about the same. But, uh, my main concern. my main thing is that you have to protect yourself as best as possible. And you have to have faith in and hope and pray.

Due to their marginalization in society and vulnerability experienced in their communities, these folks found faith and spirituality as something to propel them through the pandemic. They mostly noted that they read the Bible on their own, or gazed up at the moon and witnessed its great beauty at night. 

Solitary acts of faith and spirituality found in urban South LA contrasted against other forms in a more rural region like the Coachella Valley. Specifically, it was common practice among Hispanic women in the region to be involved in communal faith practices. One individual shared in Spanish her reliance on faith and prayer as a source of strength: 

Prayer, prayer is just praying, praying, and simply asking God to, asking God to calm this thing that is happening. Prayer

Since these women prayed the rosary together in groups, this created a sense of closeness and mutual support. They came together spiritually and physically during a time of great uncertainty. This must have helped them not only mentally but socially. Praying in a neighbor's living room and hearing each other’s voices was a comforting and profound experience. 

Like us, many individuals found strength in being with their families. Because of the shelter in place orders, college dorms closing and rising costs in rent, people moved back with their families, began working from home and began spending more time with their loved ones than ever before. The same individual who talked about the power of prayer also shared that she found strength in family:

The most interesting thing about this. Well, I'm going to speak for myself. For me the most interesting thing about this is a stronger family union. Since everyone was in their business, but now we had to be all locked up so we all had to be together. It joined the family more. More communication, more support.

By becoming closer with their loved ones, people experienced some changes in their behavior as well as in their mental and physical health. One individual mentioned that they began creating family nights almost every night. 

And another person explained that because of the shelter in place orders they began taking walks with their partner and dog each day in order to get some fresh air and change in scenery. Such a change affected their health and made them more active together. 

So we can all say that the pandemic taught us to be more supportive of one another and to be there for those around us. We created stronger bonds that manifested in communal support networks especially at the height of lockdowns. Social support, especially among those residing in the same home, made the upheaval a bit more bearable and even manageable. Many of us learned that truly, we are not alone. 

Throughout 2020, it was clear that the COVID-19 pandemic was not the only source of upheaval which brought disruption to people’s lives. In the wake of the brutal murders of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, and many other Black people throughout the country, communities began to rise up in awareness and action in response to the all too common injustices happening before our eyes. This energy of change and collective concern for the resurgent Black Lives Matter movement represented a source of hope and strength for many within our community. In speaking with Black women from Riverside, they noted the importance of the BLM movement in providing a source of strength during the early days of the pandemic. One Black woman we interviewed said:

Black Lives Matter. Black Lives Matter and it's the biggest, most awesome thing that has ever happened is the embracing of that statement across the world. That's what happened during this pandemic, not just in America where these little vigilante groups decide they can you know do what they've been doing forever view understanding history of America, you understand that. The supremacist groups have done what they're doing right now forever. So it's not a new game. But the protest the fire the outrage, the darn right outreach that eight point what was a 49 eight and 49 seconds that that police man stood on Lloyd's neck. You know, those are the things that stick out to me when we Decided as a country that we weren't human before anything else. And we cry out for humanity. 

So in a sense the BLM and massive social activism became a symbol of hope for change for a lot of folks. BLM and activism promoted a space to be out and be in community especially after experiencing shelter in place initiatives. People emerged with new perspectives. And began thinking about the future and how we wanted to live in that future world. 

So after talking about various sources of strength, we actually found that people would bring up perceived silver linings into their discussion:

Yeah, at least for me, like, I didn't want to be the one to say but I tried to just take deposits from it. You know, like You know I empathize with, you know, the decline of others. I definitely see the situation is going on. But I also like close myself in the world. I also like really discovered myself. One thing that's good about the pandemic was, you know, there's a lot of quiet. You know, there's a lot of time to really figure out who you are, what you're about, you know, and that's what I've used it for so. Those my places from it.

This individual’s insight really shows us how the pandemic offered members of our community the time to reflect on their lives and exist in newfound moments of quiet. Amid the extraordinary upheaval of a global pandemic, the changes in our everyday lives made way for moments of solitude and peace.

Even in the midst of precarity, fear, and chaos, people still found moments of joy, contentment, gratitude. They came together to pray, find solace in themselves and family members. They sought out and created safety and comfort in unexpected ways. People saw and knew they would get through the toughest times and this hope really gave them the strength to continue. 

So as we continue and live on through this pandemic, not all things last forever. This will end and we should reflect on our lives and who we are. What we want to accomplish. How we want to spend our time and energy. And how we want our world to look like and feel like. 

We at Health Disruptions believe we should take time to mourn and  remember all those that have passed away and are no longer here with us. To cherish those moments and memories we had with our lost loved ones.  

We also seek to promote equality, trust, and health in our communities. We want to help our families, friends and neighbors navigate the pandemic and it is our hope that by sharing these diverse stories, all who listen to this episode are inspired to focus on their own sources of strength and feel a little less alone. 

“Thank you for listening to Healthy Disruptions. Thanks to Vince Parra from BelzarMusic for the intro and outro music. []

This podcast was produced by the Center for Health Disparities Research at the University of California, Riverside in collaboration with Heath Assesment and Research for Communities and the researcher’s from the anthropology departments at Cal Poly Pomona and UC Riverside.  

Content was developed by our research team in collaboration with loved ones, friends and neighbors. The podcast is funded by a grant from the University of California Humanities Research Institute and The College of Humannities, Arts and Social Sciences at UC Riverside. 

For more information, you can also visit our websites at healthydisruption.buzzsprout.com 

We’ll see you next time for some more Healthy Disruptions.”