Managing Parenting with COVID Fatigue

I had one of those defeated moments the other day. I’m sure you know that feeling. I was on a work meeting in my home office. I sat back in my chair and glanced into our play room that has been a classroom for a solid year. My two elementary kids were sitting with their headphones on at their desks with their laptops both on zoom classes. Nothing was particularly wrong with that moment. I mean, after a year of schools being closed I am certainly used to this being our current norm. But in that moment as I looked at my kids staring at a computer screen with the expectation to be staying engaged and learning and myself trying to figure out a solution for something work related; I just felt way too overwhelmed. If I knew that tomorrow my kids would go back to school and be out of this weird world full of zero in person instruction, maybe that would help. If I knew tomorrow we could stop having to mask up anytime we left the house, maybe that would help too. If I knew tomorrow I could hug my mom and spend time with her un-masked and not socially distanced, maybe that would also help.

But that is not where we are. Yet.

Honestly, this feeling or moments like this are not rare these days. It all of a sudden just washes over me. As we approach a year into the pandemic, I am having a harder time on some days managing parenting in the midst of my COVID fatigue.

In that particular moment the other day as I sat there in my house working while managing two kids schooling at home, I felt the weight of the world on me. I wanted to scream “enough!” in hopes that the universe would finally hear it and make it all better. Instead, I just sat there. Frustrated. Longing for the day I can leave the house to go to a restaurant or a store and have zero fear or rules to follow. When I can send my kids to school and hear all about their days of interacting with their peers and what they learned that day. A day of work without having to also balance helping with common core math or helping the kids find a certain supply for art class or frustrations when their zoom sessions keep freezing up.

The longer this all goes on, the stronger my fatigue gets and the more I struggle. Not only with the pandemic in and of itself but also parenting during these times. In those moments where I just want to lose it, I will tell you what I do. I let myself feel those emotions. When I am feeling sad for my kids and frustrated for myself, I let myself just breathe in that for a minute. Those emotions are valid. They are not dramatic or something I should try to talk myself out of.

On that particular day, this is exactly what I did. I closed my eyes and just let myself feel it all. Did it make me miraculously feel better? Nope. Well, maybe a little but I am not here to lie and say that’s all it takes to boost my mood back up. But I honestly think I might end up feeling worse or that the moments of defeat would turn into hours if I didn’t at least allow myself to admit how I was feeling.

Our kids are likely feeling many of our same emotions. We can’t make it all better, just like with many things in life. But we can help them to know it’s ok to feel those feelings. I am constantly amazed at how resilient my kids are. Even through moments of frustration they somehow keep on being so incredibly positive even in a year like no other. But they need to know it’s ok to have those down moments as well.

Even when we feel exhausted or mad and just plain over all of it. In those moments, give yourself permission to hate all of it. To scream into a pillow or whatever you feel like doing. Then look to the hope that remains because I promise you it is there. We are not quite out of this pandemic. But we will be.

How do you deal with the COVID fatigue? We’d love to hear from you!