Take your kids to work ... year?

Be careful what you wish for.

At the start of the year, I told my manager that I felt off-kilter. I wanted to work from home more and spend more time with my kids.

Fast forward to today. I’m working from home and spending more time with my kids—a LOT more. And it’s a LOT.

Let me be clear: I’m incredibly thankful to have the privilege of working from home. I deeply appreciate that my employer and my team recognize that being a working parent in this moment requires some grace. I’m so grateful for a supportive husband and an amazing sister and our health. And I love my children more than anything. But working from home while parenting and pretending to homeschool is a new kind of challenge.

I think of Dr. Emily W. King’s parental PSA daily, usually while I’m peeling a toddler off my face during a video call or attempting to wrangle my kindergartener into more than 5 minutes of homeschool.

Although I’m still learning to fully take Emily’s advice, my family has fallen into a semi-manageable routine in the almost 2 months (?!) since we’ve all been home. Here’s what I’ve learned about making it work with my new coworkers: a freshly 2YO and a “how many days until I’m 5 and ???” YO.

Routines are great. As long as they work for you & your family

When schools first closed, I saw post after post of perfectly crafted learning schedules and homeschool set ups. I even tried to make my own schedule, which, in hindsight, was laughably ambitious.

And when we failed to live up to any sort of grand schedule on day ONE, I felt like I was failing on multiple fronts.

(For the sake of historical accuracy, here’s what one of those early days looked like. We’ve … had better moments.)

We’ve since thrown strict routines out the window. Once we factor in my meeting schedule for the day, when my husband will be home from work, and if/when my amazing sister can spell me for a few hours and watch the kids, each day looks a little different for us, though we try to stick to some foundational basics: morning routine, my team’s daily goals & gratitudes call (in which my children make daily cameos, for better or for worse), morning worksheet, lunch bike ride & stroller nap, afternoon outdoors time, and clean up before dinner.

It gives us a rough structure to map to that’s familiar and consistent(ish), without adding a whole other layer of stress to my mom-work-teacher brain.

Lower your expectations. Great, now lower them a little more

In the pre-COVID era, we kept screen time to a minimum. These days, I practically beg my kids to watch a show. I don’t feel great about it, but it’s necessary for our shared sanity.

Lowering my expectations has been essential. My kids will bomb every video call. Some days are more productive than others. I might walk into the kitchen to find my toddler standing on the counter in front of an open cupboard. (Ok, that was actually a legit safety hazard, and I quickly put his stool accomplice permanently out of reach.) Not every day requires changing out of PJs. My 5yo won’t listen to me like he does his kindergarten teacher.

And that’s okay.

Know when to walk away

Some moments just aren’t going to be productive. Recognize that, and when you can, walk away.

My kids, being tiny humans, need a break between breakfast and lunch. At first, I tried to muscle through because MOMMY’S AT WORK. (You can guess how that went.) Now, meetings permitting, we take a quick mid-morning walk around the block or play trucks in the front yard for a few minutes.

I don’t want to be the kind of parent who says no every time my kids ask me to push them on a swing or read them a book. Sometimes, I finish my work before taking a play break. And sometimes, life trumps work.

Push the swing. Read the book. Play the game. Your work can wait for a few minutes.

Repeat after me: Impact over time on task

Working parents are incredibly efficient. Don’t beat yourself up if you can’t sit at your computer, uninterrupted, for 8 hours a day. That’s just not realistic right now. Focus on the impact you’re delivering to your team and ruthlessly prioritize your efforts to maximize that impact.

Ask for what you need

After 3+ weeks of my toddler LOSING HIS MIND in our weekly marketing meeting, I realized that it wasn’t the meeting (or the 2YO!) that had to go—it was the time slot. Rather than getting increasingly frustrated that he couldn’t hold it together for 2+ hours of back-to-back video calls, I asked if we could reschedule the meeting to the afternoon when my husband is more likely to be home. It hasn’t fully solved the crazy, but it’s helped.

Support—and lean on—other working parents

Don’t underestimate the value of checking in on and lifting up other working parents.

One of my coworkers (Michelle, I’m looking at you!) drops me a chat from time to time to see how I’m holding up. My former coworker (Rian, love ya) texts every week or so to commiserate, share a meme, and check in. My Twitter feed is filled with working-parenting in quarantine memes and supportive, humorous messages from working parents that I admire (Maggie, it you).

Especially on a rough day or after a sleepless night, those little actions and messages add up to something big. And please know it’s ok to cry, even on a Zoom call.

Take care of yourself

When this first started, I was staying up way too late each night for my second shift: trying to cram in every ounce of productivity I’d missed during the 9 to 5 workday. That was not sustainable.

This is a marathon, not a sprint.

Take care of yourself or you’ll burn out quickly. Get enough sleep. Tone down the quarantine alcohol consumption. Eat something other than just Double Stuff Oreos. Exercise. Phone a friend. Learn when to turn off the news. Drink water. Unplug when you can.  

We’ll get through this, parents. We might come out the other side with a few more gray hairs and an intensified coffee habit, but if that’s the worst of it, we’re incredibly fortunate.

Now go celebrate take your kids to work day. And then repeat—again and again and … ?