All the Things…and a Pandemic
Motherhood is all the things, which has become my motto and certainly all the things have been amplified during the pandemic. I was enjoying a family beach-house getaway when the pandemic escalated. As we headed home and I sat in the car scrolling through what seemed like craziness with mom-friends posting locations that still had toilet paper and sharing videos of obnoxious lines to enter Trader Joe’s I thought the idea of a pandemic would be short-lived. I was four months pregnant and my other two children were nearly four and two. I had no idea that my children’s birthdays would be celebrated under quarantine or that my mom wouldn’t be allowed to be present for the birth, as she had been before. How could I know the trajectory of the next several months? How could I know that I would be contemplating what is safe for the holidays? How could I know that I would be faced with making complex choices daily? I couldn’t; it has been exhausting mothering under the strain of the pandemic, which was an additional stressor on an already taxing several months.
Before the pandemic, my alcoholic-addict dad attempted suicide. My mom, sister, and I spent months pouring ourselves into helping him; help that he adamantly refused. Eventually, we were done. Perhaps, the years of his behavior towards us finally came to collect, and we no longer had a reserve to endlessly pay his tab. My dad is no longer in my life; my dad is homeless. My dad doesn’t know that I grew and birthed a whole human. I was processing the loss of my dad as I was celebrating the new life I was gaining. I was attempting to help my four year-old process the loss of Papa G; I was attempting to process my conflicting truths-- grief and overwhelming relief. Therapy, adulting, and mothering felt like I was juggling swords, and then Covid-19 hit and all of sudden someone sneakily lathered the swords in lube.
The first quarantine birthday was for my eldest daughter, her fourth birthday, and I was so sad because I was keenly aware that she was experiencing the abrupt disappearance of my dad and now I had to explain that a virus was taking more people from her life, albeit temporarily. I cried. I cursed. I got onboard with the Zoom birthday party. My friends planned a surprise drive-by celebration. And at the end of her birthday she proclaimed it was the best day ever. I felt like I had flipped Covid-19 the finger.
As the pandemic progressed my confidence dipped because I was dependent on people, and as a general rule I don’t like people; the people did not disappoint, they were not following the recommendations, numbers were increasing, and ultimately hospitals were left with no choice but to limit the number of birthing support persons, and just like that my mom and doula were going to miss the birth of my third kid. Rules tightened even more, and if my husband or I were Covid-19 positive I would be birthing alone. How do you accept all the things when all the things are monumental and in flux?
Needless to say I was exhausted. (I am still exhausted.) Yet, I was trying to model good coping skills, leaning into meditations and breathing exercises with the kids. From 7:00AM to 7:00PM I had to hold it together. I had a small window--after bedtime-- to identify, process, and accept my feelings around all the things. Those precious post-bedtime moments were laden with tedious conversations about who to see, where to go, how to make life feel more normal, how angry, scared, and sad we were about the virus. Motherhood during the pandemic has been all the things and what keeps me awake, binging mind-numbing Netflix series is that there is no clear answers regarding the end of the pandemic, how to navigate the complexities the pandemic forces upon us or what will happen with my dad; so I know more things are coming but I can’t think about it in this moment because it isn’t after bedtime and I have to be just mom right now.