Back To School(???)2020: Moms Speak Out

It didn’t have to be this way. 

Anger is like air now. I don’t smell it, I don’t feel it, I don’t even realize that I’m breathing it in. It’s simply a part of me - like oxygen. At first, it motivated me. I created and supported and wrote and cooked and loved so fiercely. As it settled more deeply into my body I got sick; panic attacks, migraines, stomach in knots, bowels turned to water. 

But now, now it simply IS. I don’t notice it until I’m growling at my children or about to throw my phone across the room. This is the person I’ve become, the mother my children have, the wife that Adam loves. 

In one week, this will be the person guiding my son’s education. 

Our school district is allowing parents to choose whether we send our kids to school or use the online learning platform. Our son will go to second grade from our home, our daughter will go to half-day pre-kindergarten at school...for however long the schools are open. Making those choices for them felt impossible, even though objectively my family is extremely privileged. 

We don’t have to send our kids to school. Neither of us is in danger of losing our jobs or our home if we don’t leave the house for work. We aren’t living on the edge that so many millions of families across the country are - and it still felt like a life and death decision that we simply didn’t have enough information to make. 

So many of the conversations I see online break things down to their simplest parts or stand at extremes. And I get that: it’s where the clicks, likes, and retweets are. It’s so simple to say that schools shouldn’t open or that parents should keep their children home or that teachers should strike. None of those stances are necessarily wrong. 

But the full truth is that our economy doesn’t work without public schools being open. Parents have been breaking these last months as schools and then summer options closed. There’s no support. There’s no leadership. There’s no guidance. And as always happens in a crisis, the people who were already at risk are crushed first. Then, the pain rolls uphill. 

In the absence of national leadership, it has fallen to states and districts to decide what happens with schools, what risks are acceptable, and who we’ll sacrifice. In my school district, elementary schools will open fully in-person while middle and high schools work on a hybrid system and all families have the option of using the online learning platform. 

There’s a decision matrix that will be used to determine if and when it is safe for specific schools and/or the district itself to open. That matrix is available on the district website so that parents can track it day by day and see if we’re trending toward closures. And while that is so much more information than many districts across the country are offering, there’s still no plan, no information, nothing available for the parents who will be left completely without childcare if the schools close. If your kid has a complicated IEP and needs 1-1 instruction to thrive, well, you’re shit out of luck. 

After months of isolation within our home, when it came time to decide how my family would approach the school year, Adam’s biggest concern was me. Specifically, my mental health. Even with medication and therapy, I have not been okay for months. And while his boss and his team have worked with him so that he can care for the kids and for me, this isn’t sustainable. So what happens if I’m struck with another week of debilitating migraines while our seven-year-old is trying to navigate school online and his four-year-old sister is, you know, being four, and Adam has to work? 

How do we make it through this school year in the midst of a pandemic while the world is tearing itself apart? How do we protect our kids and ourselves? What’s the best choice for our community? And what about all the families who don’t have the resources that we do?

I’ve worked with nearly 3,000 moms as a community creator, coach, and peer mental health supporter and one thing I know about moms is that we always assume that we’re the only ones who can’t handle something. We assume that those other moms, the good moms, have things figured out and that we’re the ones who are weak, who are failing, who can’t come through for our kids. It is, and has always been, bullshit. But it’s bullshit that seems somehow baked into the modern American experience of motherhood. 

So I decided to ask moms how they are feeling about the coming school year and what their plans are. It turns out that no one is comfortable with the choices they’ve made, even when they know it’s the best choice they had.

None of us are okay.

Not one. 

All The Horrible Choices

I asked four mothers who are also partners or spouses of teachers to speak with me and each one of them said they just couldn’t do it. They are all barely holding on and speaking their fears out loud was something that they couldn’t handle. At the time I asked (mid-July), none of them had any guidance from their school districts about whether school would be in-person or online. Two live in Georgia, one in California, and one in Colorado. 

I spoke with two moms in Wisconsin:

Jenny’s two daughters go to a Catholic school that she is deeply involved in. Class size is small enough for social distancing to happen, but they’re dependent on the school district for buses and no one knows what’s going to happen with that yet. What happens if a kid with a fever arrives by bus? What happens if one of the teachers has a child with a fever? Or if a teacher gets sick? There aren’t enough substitute teachers in the pool already and parents are being asked to volunteer as subs. Both Jenny and her husband are working outside the home and both have some flexibility to stay home if needed. They know they’re in a good position — and the worry is still there. 

Rae is a single parent in Milwaukee. Their son attends a Montessori K-8 public school, and when we talked, the biggest issue they were having was the isolation. While other parents at the school were able to get their kids together in small groups over the summer, Rae and their son live across the city from the school and haven’t been able to participate. They’re moving closer to the school and to Rae’s parents in August. So, one problem was solved but schools were also canceled last year just before the initial IEP meeting for Rae’s ten-year-old. 

“I’ve waited a year, and then they’re just like, yeah we’re gonna cancel it. So now we have to wait, I don’t even know — however long. And for real, I was in tears,” they said. 

For students who already have an IEP, this transition back and forth from in-school to online is hard enough. But at least their parents are supposed to have some recourse with schools and districts and are supposed to be getting support. For the millions of kids across the country, like Rae’s son, who were in the midst of the process, there’s nothing but more waiting and more questions. 

Rae’s plan? To hope that their mother will consider retiring a few years early in order to help on the days that their son is learning from home. It’s the only way they’ll be able to keep their job.

Susan lives in Berkeley, California, and has a seven-year-old and a thirteen-year-old, both in public school. Susan and her husband are both college professors so they’re juggling public school and college closures, openings, and online options. 

“This is all I think about. I can’t sleep now,” she said. Every mom I spoke with echoed that sentiment. 

“Our district has had this really thoughtful process,” Susan explained. “They’ve done town halls, they’ve done specialty town halls — like Spanish-speaking town halls and Black family town halls — my experience of participating and witnessing is it’s been a very thoughtful process. And now this!” she said. 

The “this” that Susan is referring to is an extremely vague email that went out to parents the day before we spoke asking them to choose in-person, hybrid, or online for their students for the year. It wasn’t at all clear if this was an information gathering survey or if this was the parents actually choosing an option for the year. So Susan went looking to see what her local teacher’s union had to say. They were against in-person instruction for the first semester of the school year. That’s what decided Susan and her family. They’re keeping her kids home for the school year, but she, like every parent I talked to, was worried about what happens to the kids and parents for whom that isn't truly an option. 

Amanda lives in Kansas and very few people around her are taking this seriously. Her daughter should be going into 1st grade in public school this year. Her husband has been working outside the home throughout the pandemic so it’s been up to Amanda to put her real estate work on hold and care for their daughter at home. “Stressed. As. Hell. We are stressed as hell,” she said. 

After months of isolation, Amanda made the decision to send her daughter to a summer day camp for both of their mental health. Like many moms she was finding herself yelling, snapping, and just being mean. Her daughter needed people and Amanda needed a break before she broke. But now she’s scared every day that her daughter will get sick or that she and her husband will. “Do I send my kid to school and risk her getting a debilitating illness that could kill her or leave her with long term problems, or do I destroy what’s left of my career and my mental health and keep her home? That’s the choice coming. Assuming they give us a choice.” 

Tara is a mom of two who lives in Ohio. She runs her business from home and her husband has been working from home for the past few months, but they don’t know how long that will last. The family has been very serious about safety because both her daughter and husband have asthma. But her main concern is for her son. While her daughter is an introvert who’d happily do online school and stay in the house forever, her son has been struggling with the isolation. “He is struggling, he’s really struggling right now and he has been struggling since April. If we have to do a whole school year at home...I...I don’t know. So do I send him back and keep her home? But health is paramount for me. So we do online school. But if we do that, how do I get him that interaction he so desperately needs?” she asked. 

If that quote seems circular to you, you probably aren’t a mom. This is how the thinking goes, the “what if” spiral. When we spoke, Tara had no plan from her district but her thinking was about balancing the needs of her family with the needs of her community. 

“As hard as it’s been these last four months I still feel like, as somebody who has that privilege of being able to work from home, my husband is home at least through September and I’m home no matter what. I feel like if I don’t send my two children to the schools that’s fewer children in the classroom. So that people who do have to send their kids, it’s not a full 35 kids per class. Maybe it’s 20. And maybe that’s a little bit more manageable for the teachers and the kids. But I don’t know, Graeme, I just don’t know,” she said. 

Keisha has a toddler, a first-grader, and a background in education. She and her husband live in Maryland and their district has already announced that they’ll be distance learning until at least January. A sample schedule has been released to parents and it leaves Keisha wondering how her six-year-old is going to handle hour-long blocks of online instruction. And how she’s going to manage that and caring for her almost-two-year-old. 

At the end of last year, one of the online lessons for her then-kindergartener was an audio essay. Just audio. As he listened to it, she paused multiple times to ensure he was engaged and to ask him questions and help him process the lesson. She was eventually so frustrated by the structure that her husband had to step in. So what happens if the instruction level in first grade is just as inappropriate? As an educator and as a Black mother, Keisha was already supplementing her son’s education. Things are now more complicated. “It’s a weird in-between. If he was in the classroom and he was full time in there, then I just do what I do at home. But with this, I’m having to supervise and to think about how will I supplement.” 

Keisha’s worried about all the parents without her education background and the ones who don’t have the flexibility of her schedule. She’s joining another first-grade parent to create a “pod” where they can share the supervision of the kids and is thinking about how they can reach out to a parent who might need that support for their kid too. Of course, every person you add brings layers of risk, so how many kids can you help? 

Jennifer is in Virginia with her two kids and her husband. She recently started working for Chase Bank and that has changed everything for her. They are fully supportive of her working from home, they’ve given extra PTO, and when one of her kids hid her work phone and then forgot where it was, her boss understood that kids are, well...kids. She knows exactly how lucky she is compared to so many other parents and at the same time, she’s struggling. Jenn has anxiety and is in therapy, but managing a mental illness during a pandemic, while stuck in the house with your family for five months — it’s a lot. 

Jenn’s school district has announced that they are going completely virtual for at least the first nine weeks. They’re considering plans to offer some form of childcare for essential workers and teachers, but there’s nothing concrete yet. It’s the parents who are stepping up for each other. “There’s a big push in our area; people are “podding up” and sharing tutors and nannies and things. And I was surprised, really surprised, that there’s a lot of talk about making sure all kids are included and minding the gap,” she told me.  The Parallel Learning and Nanny Cooperative is a Facebook group where local parents can connect with families that may need support and can share resources. 

I spoke to moms across the country over a two-week period in July and the later it got, the more moms told me that their districts were going totally virtual. Not one of the moms had heard anything from districts about possible childcare options. No one knew specifics on how IEPs would be handled for their kids. Only one had details about what the online learning platform would look like or how it would operate. 

Parents are being asked to make choices without the information we need to make them. And honestly, that’s nothing new. But these choices are coming after months of isolation, fear, and the rage that accompanies watching those in power do very little to avert this disaster. Exhausted does not begin to encompass the depth of what we’re feeling. 

Pandemic, Mental Health, & Parenting

For most of us, the science is clear. The safest thing we can do is to keep our children home. After that, there are levels of risk that are up to each family to assess. But what about the emotional and mental risk of keeping them home and isolated? Of sending them back to schools that look radically different than they’re used to? Of...all of this really?

I spoke with Sharon Kaplow, LCSW, a family therapist in Connecticut, about what parents need to keep in mind during the coming school year when it comes to our mental health - and that of our children. She noted that the lack of a plan feeds into our collective anxiety. Things keep changing and there’s nothing for us to hold onto, no anchor in the storm. Her first piece of advice: “Focus on your circle of control. Right now you really need to focus on your little microcosm on the planet, your family.” Determine the acceptable levels of risk for YOU and for YOUR FAMILY. Then you can move outside your little circle. 

Stepping out of that bubble can be scary. But Sharon said it’s important to be honest with your kids that the rules for your family and the rules for other families may be different. Maybe someone is okay with playing in the yard, but not playing in their room. That can be hard for children to understand, but they need to know that it isn’t personal —- they aren’t being rejected. 

We should also all be ready for behavioral regression. Sharon reminds herself and her kids of that. As they begin to engage more with the children around them, she’s reminded them, “Look, kids are going to forget how to play together. And they might not play fair. They might get upset really easily. You might get upset really easily. Just be ready for that.” And it’s okay, she said, it’s natural. This isn’t yet another thing for us all to freak out about, simply something to be aware of. “We’re out of practice. That’s all it is. Just try to be patient and be kind,” she added.

Last, but definitely not least, Sharon suggests that all families have a disaster recovery plan. “If we go in and something happens, then, of course, we take them out. But also, what is the hospital protocol? What would we do if someone in the family got sick?” she said. 

Having a plan can relieve so much anxiety and also help with decision making. It’s unsustainable for many of us to simply stay in our homes for the next year. We’re going to have to stretch. The important thing is to stretch responsibly and to keep reassessing the risk at the local level. Plan. Stretch. Reassess. 

Sharon worked with Sentio Solutions to create an app, The Relief App, where anyone can access mental health support from home. The program includes access to mental health resources and exercises, an app to journal your emotions as well as weekly online 15-minute sessions with qualified coaches who will teach you useful techniques to manage your stress levels during the global crisis. You can check it out right here:https://www.myfeel.co/relief-program

So, what the %*#& do we do???

The vast majority of us are simply doing the best we can. And it doesn’t seem like enough. It isn’t enough. We’re all suffering in our own ways, in our own families and we also know that our neighbors are, too. We’ve been left alone to figure out individual paths through a collective trauma. And that means that those with the least resources and capacity will suffer the most. 

Across the country, there are so many moms who are struggling to care for the physical, mental, and emotional health of their families while also trying to reach out to others in need. I see them. I see you. I SEE US. 

And I can’t stop thinking about how it didn’t have to be this way. 

The disgusting truth is that children are going to die. Teachers are going to die. Cafeteria workers, office staff, nurses, janitors, bus drivers, counselors, the list goes on and on. As one mom said, “It’s a menu of death, that’s what we have to choose from now.”  As we hear more from those who have recovered from COVID we’re realizing that the word recovery itself has been redefined. Months later some who have recovered are still dealing with massively reduced lung function, heart issues, and more. 

So do you send your child to school to spin the wheel of death, disability, or health? Do you keep your child home and try to juggle work and school? Do you leave your job? Do you lose your job? 

If you’re a parent making a choice that seems impossible, second-guessing, and spiraling and feeling unsettled even after you’ve set plans in place, please know that you aren’t alone. Everyone who is paying attention is feeling like this. It feels wrong because even the best options are horrible and all the plans leave someone behind. 

As we move forward I ask only one thing of you: don’t stay silent. Speak up about your concerns, tell your kids the truth about what is happening, reach out to those you can help, and ask for the help you need. Because the truth is that we won’t all make it through this and we owe it to our children, to each other, and to ourselves, to not go quietly.