“You didn’t just survive a pandemic to put up with this”

I get the free newsletter from writer and former journalist Lyz Lenz (I’ve talked about her here bef0re). I deeply, deeply love how angry she is, and how she can skewer what’s wrong with the world on the point of her anger

Today her newsletter talked about dating (which, thank all the gods that I don’t have to do that and I have a partner who believes in mutual respect and a fair division of labor). It’s funny, it’s angry, but this part stopped me:

I recently found myself…in a situation where I didn’t want to be…And I found myself in the situation of once again doing a mental and emotional calculus: What do I put up with? What do I just handle? How long can I suck this up and deal with it before I break?

And my dear friend Katie texted me to tell me, “You didn’t just survive a pandemic to put up with this. You didn’t go through a year of hell to put yourself back into it.”

I think so many people are going through this right now–with jobs, with politics, even with the little things around the house that have always bothered you but you just didn’t change. I know I am. And so every time I think, “Well, it’s not terrible” or “It could be worse,” I’m going to instead switch to: “You didn’t just survive a pandemic to put up with this.”