Diary of a family in quarantine #2

Last week the Advertiser started its quarantine diary with the McLure family of Smiths Beach. Mum Lisa – a hairdresser at Elements Hair Room in Cowes, and a personal trainer at her home studio – shared what the first few weeks of isolation had been like with husband Tim and their two kids, Angus, 10, in grade four at Cowes Primary and Evie, six, in grade one.

This week Lisa talks about how she’s keeping physically and mentally healthy, and even offers advice on dealing with hair problems at a time no hairdresser is available.

“Financially, JobKeeper has made a massive difference for us.

I’m still running my personal training studio with my 14 clients, but rather than charging people I’m offering free 45-minute sessions via Zoom, about 14 a week, in the morning and evening. I love to get up at 5am, have my coffee and do a session.

They’ve all been so loyal and we’re all struggling, and I enjoy it. Some clients have insisted they pay because they’ve got the means to do so.

Tim goes running three days a week and that’s when we all join him on the bikes. We go from Surf Beach to Forrest Caves and then back along the main road.

When Cowes Primary was still open, we’d ride into Cowes and back and I was doing 150km a week. I’d definitely suggest people get a routine during quarantine and find their thing, whether it’s yoga online or going for a walk or bike ride.

There’s so much on Instagram and Youtube these days and members of the YMCA can still do Les Mills classes online. It doesn’t have to be an hour or two. Even just 20 minutes a day all adds up.

I’ve found with a lot of women in particular that since coronavirus drinking was increasing. For me, I’d get to the end of the day exhausted and have a drink or three and the next day feel like rubbish.

Usually I’m home all day on weekends, but now it’s all the time. It became a bit like ‘I can’t wait to the end of the day to have a drink’. But then I realised, hang on, this isn’t healthy.

So the other week I said to Tim we can’t drink during the week. It’s not something we’d usually do so why are we doing it now. I love red wine too much so we cut right back and there’s now none in the house.

Friends were the same: realising if they keep doing this they’re not going to be healthy at the end of it all.

I still make chocolate muffins. I’ll buy a heap of cookies from G’Day Tiger (in Thompson Ave), eat one in the car, then bring the rest home and share them, like I’m really generous.

I had an operation last year and my body since has done what it wants to and gone haywire. No matter how much I exercise or how well I eat, bang, the weight goes on just as quickly. That’s hard as a personal trainer, because I’m expected to look a certain way.

Aside from cutting alcohol, I think it’s been important during coronavirus to have a routine. Just getting dressed and making your bed is a really important thing I reckon. The days I have a routine I feel better than the days I don’t. Although I’m not sure the kids have brushed their teeth for the last four weeks and Evie might just have dreadlocks before I figure she hasn’t showered or brushed her hair.

If we’re in the same clothes for four days, it’s just less washing for Tim to do.

I haven’t shaved my legs for four weeks but we’re all going to look the same at the end of this. I’m thinking about starting the women’s moustache movement.

I’ve been on Facebook for about a decade but I cancelled my account, just for coronavirus, because it’s full of people sharing their opinions and scaremongering and people then commenting and having fights. I wouldn’t invite that into my bedroom, so why am I reading that stuff in bed?

I’ve kept Instagram though. Because I’m a visual person and it’s all photos, it’s not got any of the nastiness.

I have GAD (Generalised Anxiety Disorder). I take medication and see a psychologist once a month. For mental health, I definitely recommend a psychologist. They just unscramble thoughts and don’t have an agenda. Unlike friends who can think certain ways.

It's ok to not be ok, not every day is sunshine and rainbows. Just talking to someone – on those days I feel better for it. It’s the grey days on Phillip Island I find hard, the gloomy sky. I just ignore the phone, curl up in a ball and I can’t get out of my own way.

Leanne, the owner of Elements Hair Room, made the decision to close the salon at the start of the quarantine and we’re remaining closed until restrictions are lifted.

So I’m getting lots of friends and clients calling me to ask which packet of hair colour from the supermarket they should buy. If they’re blonde, they risk being yellow or orange because colouring is quite technical. When they come back to the salon we’ll have to counteract their natural, the band of supermarket colouring and the tips of the old colouring. It will be tricky.

Our favourite people will be the ones who don’t mess with their hair at all.

It’s a bit easier for brunettes to colour their hair themselves."