The day the world went dark
We’re having dinner at my father-in-law’s when I see a notification dance along on my phone.
“Babe,” I whisper to my husband. “The NBA just shut down…”
We exchange worried looks. We had been keeping an eye on this COVID thing for a while now, but it wasn’t until everything started closing that we realized how serious it might actually get.
We don’t have time to discuss it. If the pandemic really is coming, it’s going to have to wait. I fish out a soggy piece of pizza crust from the baby’s mouth while my husband cuts up strawberries for our toddler. The world may be shutting down, but it’s business as usual for our little family. A dirty diaper waits for no man.
On the car ride home, my husband squeezes my hand. “We’ll figure it out,” he says. “It’s not the end of the world.”
**
Two weeks later
It’s basically the end of the world.
I am glued to my phone, constantly checking for updates. The anxiety is real, palpable. Everything is shut down now. I leave only to go to the grocery store and then spend a half-hour wiping them down with Clorox.
“Where are the zombies?” I yell down to my husband. He’s downstairs working in the basement. He doesn’t leave the house anymore, either.
“If it’s the apocalypse, there should be zombies!”
As it turns out, when the world ends, there are not necessarily zombies. But there is laundry. And cooking. And cleaning. And tending to the needs of your baby and toddler who seem to have no appreciation for the fact that we are now living in end-times.
We are lucky. This becomes the mantra I cling to. And it’s true. We are healthy. We are financially secure. We have a strong support system. And as a stay-at-home mom, my routine is not nearly as disrupted as other people.
But still, the lack of playdates and mommy and me classes and family support is staggering. The mental load of processing this new information is draining. The need to be everything for my children at all times is exhausting. Loneliness feels like a monkey on my already tired back. I can’t seem to find the energy to shake it off.
When my father calls me and asks how I’m doing, I burst into tears. “Not well,” I reply. “And the zombies haven’t even come yet.”
“Don’t forget that what you’re doing is incredibly hard,” he reminds me. “You’re doing a great job.”
I hang up the phone and go check on my crying baby in her crib. As I rock her back to sleep, I remind myself to hold on. After all, this couldn’t possibly last much longer.
**
One year later
It feels like the anniversary of a death. Except instead of mourning a loved one, I am mourning the world as I had previously known it.
Am I being dramatic? Probably. But after a year of living in a global pandemic, I believe I have earned that right.
I watch my children push race cars across the floor and feel my eyes well with tears.
This twisted, masked, fearful version of life is all they have ever really known.
In the beginning, I thought this would be a blip on the radar for my children - a difficult thing they’d endure but not really remember. Now I understand that this is actually going to be their childhood in and of itself. They are the children of the pandemic.
Face masks are common. Testing is routine. Schools are closed.
This isn’t a freak event or a hard couple of months. This is their life. This is their childhood. This is how they will spend their formative years.
This is not what they deserve.
This is not what I imagined.
**
18 months later
My son starts preschool.
It is supposed to be a happy day, one I’ve thought about for a long time.
I imagined walking him into his classroom, introducing him to his smiling teacher, kissing him goodbye, and sneaking out the door to privately shed a few tears in the parking lot.
Instead, I drop my 3-year-old off outside through a side door. We are both wearing masks, and we can’t tell if his teacher is smiling or not because she’s wearing one, too. I have 10 seconds to kiss the top of his head - no lingering allowed - before he is ushered inside to wash his hands for the mandatory 30 seconds.
Since I never even left the parking lot, I don’t need to sneak out, but I do shed a few tears.
It’s not just because my baby is going to school for the first time.
These are tears of grief that my son is starting school in such strange circumstances. These are tears of sadness that I didn’t get to step foot inside his classroom.
And instead of my biggest fear being that he has a bad day, my biggest fear is that he contracts a potentially fatal virus we’ve spent 18 months trying to avoid.
**
Twenty months later
Still no zombies.
Today’s battle: getting my now two-year-old daughter to keep her mask on during library storytime.
She was nine months old when the pandemic started. I never imagined we’d still be in this situation when she’d be old enough to wear a mask.
But that day has come, and it has come with a vengeance.
“I WON’T WEAR IT!” she screams.
Masks are required for everyone over 2, and the librarian has already given me a stern look.
I remind myself to breathe.
“Kendall, if you want to stay at the library class, you’re going to have to wear your mask. If you can’t keep it on, we will leave.”
I state the boundary clearly and calmly, like the confident mama leader all those books tell me to be.
She looks me square in the eye and rips off her mask, her chin just slightly beginning to quiver.
“Okay, since you can’t keep your mask on, we’re going to leave.”
Chaos ensues. I grab the diaper bag in one arm and my sobbing toddler in the other.
We kick and scream our way to the car. Everyone stares on the way out.
I buckle her into her seatbelt, climb into the driver’s seat, and take some deep breaths. This is the fifth ruined outing in the last two weeks. Trying to keep a mask on my 2-year-old reminds me of trying to keep a hat on a baby at the beach. An exercise in futility.
I blink back tears.
We are never going to go anywhere. If she can’t wear a mask, our already limited options are cut back even further. How are we going to survive the winter? I can’t take another 3 months stuck at home.
**
Two years later
I spent the one-year anniversary of the pandemic crying and the two-year anniversary of the pandemic laughing, probably because I am now dead inside. (Still cashing in on my right to be dramatic…)
But also because, despite the pain and sadness and despair and upheaval that has been the last two years, I am still standing. I have poured every ounce of my energy into being a safe place for my kids during this unpredictable time. I have created magic when there felt like there was none to be had. I have chosen faith over fear time and time again. I never, ever gave up, even when I really wanted to.
So instead of spending this anniversary grieving about everything I’ve lost, I’m viewing it as an opportunity to celebrate all I have survived. This isn’t a cry of despair - this is a victory song.
There’s a saying in football: bend don’t break.
It essentially means, your defense can take a hit, but don’t let your opponent run away with the lead. Maintain some semblance of control. Don’t be broken beyond repair.
That’s what I’ve done these last two years. That’s what every mother has done day in and day out. We’ve fallen short. We’ve cried and then cried some more. We’ve binge-watched bad reality TV shows and eaten too much chocolate. We’ve taken some really bad hits. We’ve bent farther than we ever thought possible. But we’re still here. Even after 24 months of a global pandemic - we didn’t break.
I think that’s all I can continue to ask of myself: to bend with all my might. To refuse to be broken.
I might take some hits, but I’m not out of the game.
There is still some fight in me yet.
(Which is good, because I’ll need it for the zombies…)
This post is part of a blog hop to share our pandemic stories. It's hosted by www.laurapbass.com and you can read the next post in the blog hop by clicking here.