Looking back at 2020: The value of reaching in before someone reaches out

It has been a long 12 months for everyone and while pubs and cafes and any other space that could possibly host a human has opened its doors for some restrained and restricted revelry after Premier Dan unlocked lockdown, many of us breathed out - was the marathon finally over?

Mental health stress has been a real, and unfortunately, still silent challenge for many people this year as we have all individually responded to the adversity thrown at us.

Some people rise in times of challenge, and we need those people. Others need a helping hand extended, without judgement or shame - just a hand to say "we've got you".

Three Melbourne friends who have ridden the roller coaster at COVID ground zero have reinforced the importance of what we all found to be the moments that inspired us most this year - displays of our own humanity.

It's the idea of reaching in before someone, often at their most desperate, has to reach out.

If we reach in every day, collective humanity wins. A stranger smiles. Someone survives.

The dank alleyways brightened with children's artwork, handwritten signs of encouragement hanging in windows, the art, the front yard music, the little hidden treasures hidden by a stranger designed to put a smile on the face of someone they'll never know. There's a lot to be said for acts of selflessness.

One Melbourne friend, Nicole, is a disabilities registered mental health practitioner. She said during COVID, the needs of her private clients far outgrew the needs of the school kids she was tending to in St Kilda east.

"The kids had support from their school community, family and home, whereas my clients' support had been taken away. No community groups, no support workers and no schedule. Instead those with ailments ranging from BPD (borderline personality disorder), anxiety, depression, mental impairment, OCD (obsessive-compulsive disorder), autism, addiction and more were left to navigate much on their own," she said.

"More hospital returns began. I resigned from my school and opened my books further to help those in need. I was, and remain, flat out."

And then came the news that rocked her own family's foundations. Her 82-year-old mum had tested COVID-positive.

"I had to get them to repeat the word 'positive' three times. With knowledge of the frailty of her Parkinson's-infested body I broke down. Wailed. And the worse thing? I couldn't see, nor be with her. Not even to hold her hand.

"I cannot describe how hard it was to have the knowledge that she was only a few suburbs away from me and I couldn't do a damn thing to help her. I was told by outreach she had two days to live. My emotions were a roller coaster.

"Once I got over my (selfish) crying I began a new thought process based on the serenity prayer - "change the things you can and accept the things you can't".

"For weeks and weeks I worked so hard on landing on acceptance. I think I almost got there. Meanwhile, my creative mind worked. Surely I could do something?

"Sitting alone in my lounge room I thought of mum's favourite song, Dream a Little Dream. I played it and began dancing, sending silent vibes of love in thoughts of her and her isolation.

"I text my brother in NSW and suggested that we all dance to mum's favourite song, record it and send a link to her nursing home. My beautiful broken family, complete with exes, all took it on.

"One by one we danced and recorded our versions of mum's favourite song. Her amazing carers uploaded them and continuously played the dances and music on her television in her room. Even if she couldn't see us, or feel us, I hoped she could hear us.

"I stopped work. It was a hard decision but I knew I could not be of value to my clients if I was not fully present. My beautiful clients became the ones texting me to ask if I was OK."

There have probably been countless studies about the power of love and its affect on the human body but miraculously, and against all odds, Nicole's mum made it. Love won.

Nicole began walking. She would meet a girlfriend, and they would walk their suburb, taking in and discussing diversity in architecture, people's gardens and they learned to use their hands, instead of their masked faces, to say hello to fellow walkers.

"Much of bustling Melbourne had become akin to a ghost town. The silence was eerie," she said.

"Whenever we saw a tram we'd share the line "Another tram. No-one innit". This went on for months. To depict our city's silence I began doing yoga poses in the middle of the road. My friend photographed. It was our way to remain physically, emotionally and creatively fit."

Mark and Angela live in the pretty Melbourne suburb of Clifton Hill.

"While I appreciate not everyone's experiences are the same as mine, I have found restrictions to be an inconvenience at best," Mark said.

"It has meant a Melbourne winter at home and now restrictions are lifting, glorious spring weather arrives. There is a sense of relief and that we have done the hard yards and deserve to bask in the sun.

"Life is good. I get to work from home, not have to worry about commuting to work in the city, there is no rush in the morning. I have avoided a wet and cold winter from being at home. I see the people I love every day and the family dog loves it.

"From this, I've learnt I'm more of a homebody than I ever thought and the need for strong family connections. Social contact with others need not always be exclusively with friends and family, but the friendly hello or socially distant chat on a walk with the dog.

"It has brought people out of their shells, talking to strangers, building more of a community than I have experienced since being in Melbourne. I have never seen so many families out with their children. No technology, people are playing with their dogs with their children."

Angela has praised the public health crisis responses, early intervention and prevention strategies.

"In the UK they are experiencing 22,000 cases a day - here we are lucky because of strong leadership and a strong public health response we have contained this second wave," Angela said.

"I thank that man Dan who enters my home via Facebook every day to tell me what is happening and what I need to do to keep this pandemic at bay.

"It is a pandemic - I don't want to blame or attack our Premier's leadership. Unfolding pandemics are unpredictable and I choose to trust that man Dan and the science and to respect and care for my fellow Victorians.

"I keep my distance, I wear a mask and I wash my hands. I choose life, and my family's lives, and I choose to care about the lives of my fellow Victorians.

"Through the lockdown myself and our family have lived in a deeply privileged bubble - we have work, therefore have money, a roof over our heads, great food and we have grown into an even more loving family.

"I know this is, and was not, everyone's experience and many people are really struggling. Government sanctioned systemic racism continued to expose itself with the tower block lockdowns, the untruths about the Black Lives Matters march and the use of the pandemic to continue to ignore continuing deaths in custody.

"I have also experienced exemplar models of collective care from the Aboriginal organisers of the Black Lives Matters March and through my job at an Aboriginal controlled organisation.

"I have the great privilege of seeing Aboriginal people and communities model and enact what whole of community collective care looks like.

"The last gig we went to the day before before lockdown in March was New Order. As we left the gig they played It's the End of the World as We Know It by REM.

"We laughed. But as I look back, it was for some, and I am grateful for my family, my workplace, my friends and for the science and that keeps us safe, well and protected."

This article was originally published on November 3, 2020