Parents of young children. I see you. You’re between a rock and a hard place here. Children crave routine. They thrive when they know what’s coming next. A reliable routine should mean less acting out. I find myself spending the last hour before I go to bed every night making sure I have the elements of our plan squared away, worksheets printed, art supplies prepared, everything in it’s place so that I can give my little one a routine that is fun but predictable. The next day, my beautifully imagined, thoughtful, perfect magical day feels like it’s playing out on a roller coaster that I am riding while wearing a blindfold. Everything will be moving along smoothly. Then, with zero notice, the bottom drops off and we are both careening towards and emotional abyss. My son and I are both willful and stubborn. There will be voices raised. There will be frustration and tantrums. There will be time outs. We might get back on track. We might not and I’ll give up schooling for the day. Most days are good and reasonable. We fall apart about every 3 or so days.
Does that sound overly dramatic to you? If so, I’d hazard you are not sheltering in place with a 5 year old only child.
In my fantasy, he’s be a perfect little side kick while I take online courses and teach my clients. He would sit with educational programs on his tablet when I needed him to. He would make charming well placed appearances in my Zoom calls. He would color while I read. Sadly, he’s 5. Some days, he complies, but he’s still so young that his endurance and concentration for behaving has a shelf life of about 1/2 a day.
AND HE HAS NO ONE ELSE BUT US.
I have many friends in similar boats. The common worries expressed are that we are doing emotional and psychological damage to our children by isolating our children from others their age. I understand the concern. They need each other. We do our best. We set up Facetime calls where they can make silly faces at each other on the screen, but it’s not intimate enough to allow them to practice the social dynamics of getting along with others.
I, personally, envy my single and childless friends to a certain degree. I have lists of continuing education courses I would love to take, workouts I would love to do, and books I would love to finish and other books I would love to start. I have very little time for any of these.
Here is an outline of my “unemployment” due to COVID-19:
I wake, make us breakfast, catch up on the news, have one or two hours of zoom meetings or emailing. Even though I’m furloughed, I still take pride and ownership of the club, so there are things that I can’t abandon. I sit down with our son to do some sort of Pre K home school for about an hour. I make lunch. We eat lunch. I take my son out of the house for some fresh air and exercise, hoping to get some, too. I’ve managed to get him hooked on Pokemon GO as I motivation to get outside. I try to steal 30 minutes to do something for my own strength. We work on a craft. We have our daily dance party. I make dinner. We eat dinner. I wrestle our son into the shower and through his evening ritual. This week, that ritual has expanded to exploring a Disney movie each night. Disney buys me about an hour and forty five minutes with my laptop to answer emails, blog, research with a snuggly kid on my hip. This means that he’s not going to sleep until 9. It also means that he’s not getting up at 6:30am, either, which is nice. I spend the time from 9pm until midnight on my own, but I’m not getting everything in that I would like. I usually spend an hour prepping for the next day: dishes, cleaning, laundry folding, school lessons, an hour in a hot bath mindlessly thumbing through social media, and about an hour watching something grown up to escape into a story. Some nights, I’ll write. Some nights, I’ll read. Some nights, I’ll think about practicing yoga, but go straight to meditation for a spell because I’m just so tired. Oh yeah, I have this guy in the house called a husband. He needs attention, too.
These days the constant attention my son needs is exhausting.
In spite of the exhaustion, I am 100% grateful for the gifts that have come to me out of this global tragedy. For his entire life up to this point, I was the working parent while my husband stayed home. Deep down, I have never liked being the novelty to my son. I frequently came home late for dinner. I often had to do things that were work related on weekends. I knew he wasn’t getting enough time with me because I wasn’t getting enough time with him. I didn’t realize until I was home all the time, that my son hardly knows me. Until we started doing our daily dance party, he had no idea what kind of music I liked. He didn’t know stories about my childhood. Now, he knows a lot more about the characters that were in my life before he existed. I’m cooking wholesome meals for us every meal. I’m serving up family recipes. He’s learning about how to make pasta and sauce. He’s beginning to understand baking. He’s even picking up the subtle nuances of certain ingredients.These are daily occurrences, and not special things that happen on Thanksgiving and Christmas. The mother he knew before the pandemic was always tired and trying to whip up a loving happy spirit out of any scrap of energy I could muster.
BUT HE HARDLY EVER LEAVES ME ALONE.
This means that the videos I want to make for the club and my clients fall by the wayside. Any reading is short lived (lasts about as long as it takes him to bore of a TV show or his tablet. And many days, I am more spent than after a hard work day. I’m choosing not to struggle to accomplish ALL THE THINGS, and that is going to have to be okay. The only other option is to raise the stress level and try and get everything in. Inevitably, that will inspire more trantrums and more rough parenting moments. The cost of doing that outweighs the reward. NO ONE IS HURTING FOR ONLINE WORKOUTS RIGHT NOW. So, why fight to get into that sphere? Also, THERE IS NO TEST OR GAIN FROM CONQUERING A RECREATIONAL READING LIST. So, I’ll focus my energy on what has will have the most value in the long run: embracing this time with my son.
I’m not going to deny that I am lucky. While I envy people who are on their own, I am fully aware that this comes with sadness and depression from being alone. They might be able to do A LOT more writing, studying, thinking, but I have the human medicine that I need right now in my home. So, my heart will stay strong.
But I might not get very much done.
Lisa Moves 