I’ve always been a planner; I have to-do lists for nearly every aspect of my life. On a bigger scale, I have a vision for how I want my life to pan out. At least I did three years ago: dream job at 25; homeowner at 28; married at 30. But then Covid-19 hit in 2020, and all those plans were pushed to the back of my mind.

I can’t be the only one who feels like I’m now battling a two-year lag on my career, love life and health. I’m not as far forward in my career as I thought I’d be by now, and I’m no closer to home ownership or marriage than I was three years ago; if anything, I’m even further away. The cost of living crisis has reduced any hopes of saving for a house deposit and a recent breakup means I’ve re-joined the single life. On top of everything else, at 29, I’m now more aware than I’ve ever been of my own health and fertility.

Writer Katy Schneider called it the ‘pandemic skip’ in a September 2023 article for The Cut, and as soon as I came across the term, my lingering feeling of being left behind made a lot more sense. In the piece, Schneider describes it as “the strange sensation that our bodies might be a step out of sync with our minds”. That sounds about right to me, considering our lives were put on hold for two years while our bodies continued to get older.

“I feel like I’ve been catapulted into a different life”: this is what the ‘pandemic skip’ has done to your brain