LOL, Remember When You Thought You Wanted More Time With Your Kids?

‘Be careful what you wish for,’ goes the old adage – and I’m going to go out on a limb here and say that’s never been more true than for most parents who always honestly and truly believed they wanted ‘more of a work-life balance’.

Until last week.

As we start week two of coronavirus isolation – or as most parents know it, Day Six Of No Childcare – I’m starting to see a lot more friends and people I follow being honest about the fact that they’re struggling with their kids being around ALL. THE. TIME.

Because while many of us have sat in hour-long meetings day-dreaming about how much we’d rather be with our kids right there and then, most of us have now experienced exactly what it’s like to have your kids in those meetings there and then. And, even with the mute button deployed, it’s not exactly as we’d pictured.

It seems like, yet again, it’s the working mums who are coming off worse. And yes, I’m saying mums, because anecdotally a lot of the mothers I’ve spoken to are finding they’re definitely lifting the extra load at home (even when they have comparable careers in the couple). When I put out a call on Twitter for people to speak to me, it was only women who replied.

‘As someone very career-focused I always felt very torn between time with my children and the demands of my job. I desperately wanted to go part time but there didn’t seem to be the opportunity,’ says Ruth. ‘However since Covid 19 has landed and the opportunity to be with the kids all day every day has come with it, I miss that time I had where I could be an adult. I’m struggling with not being very creative and feel like I’m failing them when I can’t come up with games to play all day. Let’s just say I’ve realised I certainly prefer quality time over quantity!’

Of course, working time is one thing – the stresses of combining childcare and homeschooling with full-time work are surely fine to admit? But for many, the weekends and evenings are proving tough too – free of distractions and activities (who ever thought they’d say, ‘I miss softplay’?) but full of kids starting to become bored of their surroundings and, honestly, you.

As Lucy – a mother of two - told me, ‘It’s about looking at the clock feeling exhausted because you’ve done breakfast, got them dressed, done two carefully planned activities… and now it’s 10am and you’re out of ideas.'

It's not easy for new mums either, who had been sold a maternity leave full of coffee meet-ups and baby sensory classes (seriously, why aren't they as entertained by crunching tinfoil and bashing wooden spoon at home?). 'You're just so tired being a new mum anyway, and there's nothing to distract you from that,' says Judy. 'Then there's the fact that your partner is home all the time. I know it's what you thought you wanted, but the reality is it's just more time to bicker over things like who has done the most nappies, or had the most sleep.'

But this isn’t the case for everyone – and that’s where the new guilt really kicks in. Other people I know have told me how the huge silver-lining of this cornavirus crisis is that they’re getting to see their kids more, to deprioritise work legitimately (with many companies attempting to be flexible, aware they can’t just ditch half their workforce) and really understand ‘what’s important’.

Social media hasn’t helped either if you’re getting a bit weary of your offspring. Many mumfluencer types have been posting about not putting pressure on yourself with too many activities and just, like, y'know, letting your kids understand the beauty of fun, learning and cooking, or some such… but is it only me, or does that – coming from a mumfluencer with angelic children who appear to not want to colour in their light pink sofas – feel like just another aspiration? One for those with gardens or Agas? Those messages never really mention whether a whole series of Peppa Pig is also a legitimate learning tool and whether you can 'give yourself a break!' if you shouted at your child to 'PLAY WITH THE BLOODY iPAD FOR FIVE MINUTES' so you could finish a Zoom call.

Zoe tells me: ‘I already spend two days a week with my son (he goes to pre-school the rest of the time), so I thought it wouldn’t be so bad to go to full-time. But my God! I had visions of cooking together, playing together, learning together. You know, structured days of wholesome activities. Winning at mumming. The reality is very different. The other day I spent 45 minutes setting up a phonics ‘match the sounds’ game, collecting toys for him to sort into sound categories that I had beautifully displayed. It took him about six minutes to complete the task. And then asked if he could have the iPad back.’

And if the guilt that maybe everyone else loves their kids more than you doesn’t get to you, your internal monologue will do it. I sobbed once a day for a month when I thought about returning to work after maternity leave and not seeing my child every day. I felt down every time I missed bedtime because I didn't leg it bang on six and missed my train. I looked around packed pubs at friends' parties and wondered whether this was really where I wanted to be, instead of cuddling my lovely baby. Just a few weeks ago, stressed at work, I had a classic working-mum-guilt-meltdown and cried at a colleague, saying, ‘Is THIS what I’m missing bath-time every night for??’ So why now, am I missing standing up in someone’s armpit on the overground? Or fantasising about the work toilets with their individual cubicles and lockable doors?

If other people don’t make you feel bad, then your kid will - mine, for instance, has beautifully sat (we don't do a lot of sitting usually, suspicious) alongside me as I typed some of this piece, enjoying his yoghurt and clapping his hands to nursery rhymes as if to say, ‘Me? How could you not want 28 hours in a day with ME?’

But if I’m trying to make myself feel better, maybe it’s that we do want 28 hours a day with them… just if we can also have two hours where we're not sending 45,000 emails. And it could be interspersed with sometimes seeing your friends and venting over wine. Or if softplay was open, of course. Or a zoo. Or I could go to my friend’s house and we could enjoy watching our children interacting, while also catching up. Basically, if it could be during 'normal life'.

Mum of two boys, eight and 10, Sian agrees: ‘I don’t think it’s a matter of wanting to spend time with them and then regretting it, I think it’s that we all had a routine that was working. They go school and clubs, I’m doing a masters degree three times a week, evenings were for meals and homework and playing and arguing and then they go to their dad’s every other weekend, so the time we did spend together was planned, it would be fun and was “quality” time because the routine of life meant free time with each other is appreciated.

‘Without the routine it’s all gone to shit! Every day is monotonous, to stay safe we have to stay in and so we’re all crabby. I’m juggling their schooling, my schooling, bills and trying to make do with food we have to reduce going out. So when they ask, “What fun thing can we do?” I’m like “Lads, I’m going to lie down on my bed and I’m coming out when it’s meal time”.'

‘I think it turns out all the things that I should do and make the excuse of “I haven’t got the time”, is in fact a lie. Because I’ve got the time and I just don’t want to do them. Keep the DIY volcano in the box and the box of cake mixture in the pantry, because the mental and physical stress of being inside 24/7 with my own kids is why I’m napping twice a day.’

Zoe adds: ‘On a normal day together, we go out a lot. To gymnastics, to LabTots science, to swimming, to the playground, to the zoo... Losing all of that has been huge, I find it hard to fill the time and I’m definitely relying on screens way too much, which I end up feeling very guilty about.’

But to be a parent, is to feel guilty. And while everything all these women have told me rings true, it’s still hard not to beat yourself up when you get frustrated, when there are women out there who are key workers and would love more time with their children. Or when you think that there are even more couples out there who are currently seeing their long-awaited IVF treatment suspended indefinitely. And when you know there are people who are alone and missing human interaction, and you’re basically sat there moaning that you’re at home, with your family and a person who loves you so unconditionally that you have to say, ‘No, mummy’s just writing an email, wait one second,’ 37 times a day.

'I was so happy to go back to work after maternity leave, not because I wanted to get away from them, but it was hard work (I have twins) and work was an opportunity to sit down, have a hot cup of tea and use my brain for something other than calculating milk/sleeps/poops,' says Claire. 'Six months on and I feel like I'm back on maternity leave again, only now they can toddle about and shout "no", and somehow I have to fit work around taking care of them. It's not physically or mentally hard, it's just monotonous, and I feel SO GUILTY for not enjoying it. I also feel guilty for how bored they are - they thrive on variety and they're not getting it! Then I feel guilty for moaning because we're all healthy... It all feels a bit #FirstWorldProblems.'

Hopefully, though, if you are feeling this way, there’s some comfort in knowing other people are feeling it, too. As with all things parenting, it sometimes helps if we all drop the BS and admit, we’re in the same boat. And even if you’re sat somewhere, calm and beautiful infant perched upon your knee, loving every moment and reading this article with horror, surely there is something we can all agree on: teachers and childcare workers deserve a payrise.

*All names have been changed.

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