Parenting through Pandemic

Many of us began the e-learning process this week. This platform for class meetings, that website for assignments, the other program to access a textbook...it’s mind-boggling. As a parent, I feel for my kids and all they’re missing out on by not being in school. Social interactions with friends, live instruction from teachers, special school events they’ve looked forward to and worked toward. I also feel for the teachers and all they’re missing out on by not being in school. Thousands of remarkable people who selected an undervalued career with notoriously low pay because they love interacting with children, and are now pouring massive amounts of time and effort into learning new technology and trying to find creative ways to provide meaningful instruction via computer. I also feel for parents, as we struggle to help our children navigate life when we suddenly don’t know how to navigate it ourselves. 

I was reminded this week by Priscilla Shirer’s study of Gideon, that crisis is not new. Even more important, she reminded me that no crisis is big enough to place us out of God’s reach. So as we walk through this new weird (I’m definitely not calling it the new normal!), perhaps we can find glimpses of beauty from amongst the ashes. 

We can be grateful that God’s giving us so much dedicated family time even when feeling emotionally drained by it. We can enjoy the time to slow down and rest, despite being burdened by what we’re not getting done. We can be excited about schooling and working from home, even amidst moments of feeling overwhelmed by it. We can behold the good that comes from breaking up the busyness, while also grieving all that we’ve lost. 

We are not going to get this work-from-home, school-from-home, so-many-people-in-this-house-and-they’re-always-hungry, I’m-bored-and-there’s-nothing-to-do, quarantine thing right all the time. Let’s own up to it, borrow a line from Frozen 2, and do the next right thing. Maybe the next right thing is cooking an elaborate, scratch dinner and having a family meeting - or maybe it’s ordering pizza and watching that silly movie the kids have been wanting to see. Maybe the next right thing is pushing the kids a little harder to take their online school work seriously - or maybe it’s giving them a day off so you can take walks and ride bikes and throw frisbees. Maybe it’s extending extra grace to your moody teen, or maybe it’s giving some undivided attention to your lonely extrovert. 

We’re getting to know each other again, and better. We’re laughing a lot more. We’re engaging in each other's interests. We’re working together on projects. We’re having meaningful conversations that aren’t forced and awkward. Yes, we miss our own activities and we get on each other’s nerves. We get grumpy or sad or hangry sometimes. We vacillate between bored and overwhelmed. And we’re grateful for the time and mental bandwidth to lean in. So as we await the news of what’s next, I’m reflecting on this quote from Dave Hollis: “In the rush to return to normal, let’s use this time to consider which parts of normal are worth rushing back to.”