You’re Out of Touch

The voice of a Mother amidst the pandemic 2020-2021

Thank you for holding my hand, listening to my voice and creating a warm safe space to confidently share Eddie.

 

This is the start of something 

I've craved and carved this out during the toughest year

Believe me

That takes some doing.

The more I worked on it the more I needed it. 

Something for me. Something to fulfil me. 

Something to escape to.

My husband starts his working day at his official start time.

My day starts after clearing the breakfast dishes away, dressing small humans and finally taking that belated, almost forgotten shower.

I get dressed inbetween his Google Teams meetings 

So as not to reveal too much.

My husband's desk has taken over my dressing table.

My desk battles with play dough, paints and stickers.

My husband continues systematically dealing with queries (oblivious to downstairs as he focuses on his screen and zones out inside his headset.)

My "to do" list lengthens and gets further away as our children ask for drinks and snacks and my help in diplomatic matters over Hungry Hippos.

When does my time come? 

His trips to the toilet are calm, required and convenient.

My trips to the toilet are overdue, rushed and hassled.

I wait.

In between homeschooling PowerPoints and online reading books my patience grows thinner and thinner by the day.

During the first lockdown we play in the sun and explore the dream that this is what primary education should look like for a 7 and 5 year old. 

Employers adapted and understood. 

Lockdown two: Employers want more and offer less understanding as our resilience is at its lowest. 

In the third lockdown the government realise they ought to prioritise education. 

They tell schools to supply 3 hours of schooling per day per child. Not x amount of hours per supervising grown up. 

I guess Sunak wasn't involved in that calculation.

I'm still waiting.

I have ideas. I have a voice.

I have a "colleague" who is waiting for me but no salary, 

So colleague has to wait 

For me.

My husband decides to take his break. I collect myself, change the use of my laptop from Time Tables Rockstars to Zoom and try to find some space. 

Space away. Space to listen. Space to be heard. Space for my work. Space to find myself.

But all I find is I'm lost.

I gave me up to make time for them. More than I expected when I was expecting them. 

This wasn't what I signed up to do. Why did my contract change? 

My body aches with responsibility. My skills and strengths are stretched but never spent. 

That isn’t an option when the end is too far away down too long a tunnel to even look into.

In a past life I lifted weights but right now I feel pinned down with the weight of responsibility, my children’s emotions, expectations of school,

The heavy fact that this time cannot be replayed for a second chance.

The gift of home-schooling gives me a different type of time with my children. 

I learn a lot about myself. I learn a lot about them. 

A gut feeling grows: something isn’t right. One child now needs extra help when extra help is in lockdown. 

My new role at home confuses my children. I’m not their teacher and their home is not their school. 

School days blend into weekend days which blend into school days and I wake up exhausted. 

I’m too tired to dream, to plan. I lose my thread during sentences. 

I’m pulling my household through fog.

I listen to announcements, I announce the restrictions.

I strategise the essential supermarket shop and I choreograph teatime with military precision. I want the day to end. 

I want my time, release. I need quiet. I need air. I need space. 

I want someone to make me a meal. Not a takeaway. Not *ping food. 

Something that has been given the time, energy and thought that I put into our meals. 

Something to fill my never-ending always-emptying cup. Who will pick me up? 

I need someone who isn’t in my bubble. I mask my feelings. My eyes only tell half the story.

How will I recover? Will I have the time to recover? 

I missed the chance to say goodbye to my old self and my business. Changes came in quick. I was distracted by the essential, expanding, emergency role of mum. 

(A role I should be grateful for, but the responsibility of which feels too heavy to bear.)

I’ve aged. I’m so much older now.

Experts say we have gone back 12 years in terms of my role in society. 

I could do with the energy of my 28 year old self now. 

But

We have:

• the experiences of the last 12 years

• the wisdom to know a lot better

We have the sisterhood and we will claw this passage of time back together. 

True colours have been shown. 

The truth of all matters has been magnified. 

Will we play hardship Top Trumps (we haven’t had it equally hard) or will we swallow and hide our psychological downturns and recessions and focus on our present and future liberties?

We should be grateful. I’ve had enough of shoulds

I wrote this touched out from little humans on the cold floor of my kitchen, propped up against the kitchen cupboards having spoken openly to an old friend who knows what I’m made of. 

Today I am surviving. 

One day, today or tomorrow I will thrive again

I will remember what support was offered.  

*Microwavable food in our house