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2020 was an opportunity for me to connect with my kids



Things have changed but maybe that's no so bad

2020 was an opportunity for me to connect with my kids


If someone had told you in 2019 what 2020 would be like, you’d probably have thought they were crazy.

Imagine your surprise as they detailed the adjustments you and your family would need to make, the amount of time you’d spend in lockdown with your kids, the “new normal” of school, grocery shopping, and connecting virtually with other people.

Yet here we are, ten months into Covid-19, and most of us have more or less adjusted. Some, like Sydni Ellis, writing for Popsugar, have actually found things to like about enforced family time. Ellis has taken comfort in the realization that her family is more resilient and, most importantly, more flexible than she previously thought.

Ellis, a mother of two preschoolers, plans to take this knowledge into post-pandemic times. She writes: “Next year, I plan on reminding myself that kids are adaptable – Logan loves to tell me that his favorite restaurant is closed on the inside, but we can still get some in our cars – it doesn't take much for them to be happy.”

She’s also discovered aspects of herself and her family that she likes. “I learned my husband secretly loves ice cream, I'm not-so-secretly terrible at mastering dances invented by teenagers, and my kids are both obsessed with dressing up like superheroes. Most importantly, I learned that it's okay to not be perfect.”

READ MORE: Board games are back

Granted, Ellis admits that, as a mom of two kids not yet in school, she did not need to worry about transitioning them to online learning. And, as a parent in the age of iPads, her workload has been reduced by tech.

It didn’t start out all hunky-dory. By her estimate, home life was hellish for the first few weeks of shutdown. But to her extreme good luck and circumstances, her entire family rolled with things remarkably well: “My kids were happy just by drawing with markers, playing with stickers and finger-painting on the back porch. Running through the sprinkler provided hours of entertainment, as did watching movies inside a pillow fort.”

Getting to this point of “happy, chill home” was not smooth. Like most of us, she was often not her best self, but she now realizes the long term value of being present, even under duress (or maybe especially under duress). “I worried less about being a ‘good’ mom,” she says, “and focused more on being a ‘present’ mom.”

Now that the light is at the end of the tunnel, she intends to take some 2020 into 2021. Not a lot, but just enough.



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