The Daily - The Agony of Pandemic Parenting

Episode Date: April 16, 2021

This episode contains strong language and emotional descriptions about the challenges of parenting during the pandemic, so if your young child is with you, you might want to listen later.Several months ago, The Times opened up a phone line to ask Americans what it’s really been like to raise children during the pandemic.Liz Halfhill, a single mother to 11-year-old Max, detailed her unvarnished highs and lows over the past year.Guest: Liz Halfhill, a single mother and full-time paralegal, in Spokane, Wash.Sign up here to get The Daily in your inbox each morning. And for an exclusive look at how the biggest stories on our show come together, subscribe to our newsletter. Background reading: The Times followed Liz and two other mothers in different parts of America who shared their experience of pandemic parenting over dozens of interviews. What emerged was a story of chaos and resilience, resentment and persistence, and of course, hope.Take a look at “The Primal Scream,” a series from The Times that examines the pandemic’s effect on working mothers in America.For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday.

This is my primal scream. From The New York Times, I'm Michael Barbaro. This is The Daily. I just wanted to say... Several months ago, The Times opened up a phone line to ask Americans what it's really been like to parent during the pandemic. I have to hide in my closet to make this phone call because there's no peace. There's no quiet. phone call because there's no peace. There's no quiet. All I hear all the time is mom like that. They're coming to get me. I can't escape these kids. They eat all day long. There is way more

laundry than when they were in school. And all their pets, I have their dog and I've got the three-legged hedgehog and I've got the talking parrot and no one wants to feed them. I think I need to run away. All I can do is hide in this closet. And even this doesn't last long enough. Mom. I have to go. I'm being called. Mom.

One more scream. Hello, New York Times. I'm calling you from the toilet because I literally just had to say to my kids, I'm going to pee. Leave me alone. My child just cleaned her faces with toilet water. I miss being able to crap in peace. I am sitting right now in the toilet and my 13-month-old daughter is running around.

Yep, now she's in the bathroom. And she's going to try and steal the toilet paper. Oh, I should add that I'm a single mother, so this is every day. There's no partners. I mean, my mom is here, but she don't know. She'll quote-unquote watch the baby, but then I find the baby eating, like, lint out of the garbage can. but then I find the baby eating like lint out of the garbage can. The upstairs pillows are downstairs. The downstairs pillows are upstairs. And I didn't think that upstairs pillows being downstairs and downstairs pillows being upstairs would bring me this level of anxiety.

But here we are. I love my kids, but for fuck's sake, like, we are together all of the time. Somebody else, we are my children. My kids are assholes. They are primates. They're barely human. They think I'm a slave. They're so messy.

The cleaning and the cooking. That's the hardest part. They just eat all the time and make messes. They don't even care. They'll just look at you and throw something on the floor. I can't believe there's so many people on earth when it's this hard. Sex is not that good. And I didn't even have sex. I did through IVF. God, I just am amazed that the population is as big as it is. I really, truly am.

But so much I'm sitting in the bathroom talking to no one. God help me. Oh, at least I don't have COVID. in the bathroom talking to no one. God help me. At least I don't have COVID. I don't think. It's Friday, April 16th. April 16th. It's the morning. We're up and ready to go almost. I'm making French toast for Max and I have to drink coffee, of course. My name's Elizabeth Halfhill. I live in Spokane, Washington. I'm a full-time family law paralegal and a single mother of an 11-year-old kid named Max. Say hi. Hello, New York Times News.

My name is Max Snokes. I'm 11 years old. My mom is Elizabeth Halfhill. She's 30 years old. Max is very kind. He is very creative, so I just had to tell him to stop sawing cardboard in the background because he's building something right now while I do this. I like drawing, building Legos, a lot of forms of art, mainly clay and drawing. Sometimes I do a little painting. So he's creative. He's kind. He's really funny.

He makes me laugh all of the time. I mean mean I just even if he wasn't my kid I love him as a person I have a drawing of a squirrel that I made you have other ones too I'll grab one no no mom yes yes yes those are just doodles stop the weekend of March 13th I remember March 13th was the date that everything, like the state of emergency came down. It almost felt, I don't want to say fun, but like exciting, like, oh, school's out for two weeks. And, you know, then we get two weeks off and it'll all go back to normal.

And so that was the first moment. But the next moment was when I had made it through the summer with, you know, almost no child care and still having to work and all these things. And then the school announces two weeks before they were supposed to be back in session that no one would come back in person. And I don't know if it was a news article or a friend texted me, but I was sitting at home and I just started bawling. So closing thoughts at the end of the day before school, Max and I cleaned up the whole house and made it nice for tomorrow. We got his laptop all logged in and updated so that hopefully it's smooth sailing in the morning with no like tech difficulties or anything.

Max told me that he isn't excited for this year at all. And he's just sad that he can't see his friends. He's really bummed out, which makes me worry because I feel like tomorrow is going to set the tone for the rest of the school year, and I just hope that he likes it somewhat. I will check in in the morning when we wake up and kind of let you know how it's going throughout the day. Wish us luck. This is our first day of school style. This is our first day of school style. Because there is only digital school now, so I don't really care. It's black t-shirt and gym shorts. Don't have to be too formal.

Okay, I left Max in his class. He did okay for a minute, but his microphone on his freaking headset I just bought isn't working. It's 11.28 a.m. Max was out in the dining room muttering that he doesn't like school or his teacher because he was being silly on webcam and they made him turn his camera off. I'm already really discouraged because I know this is just going to turn into a power struggle where I tell Max to not be silly on camera and pay attention and he is going to get in trouble all year long because there's no peer pressure to be good. It's literally just an adult and a kid and us one-on-one. It's 11.57. I'm making grilled cheese. Max has informed me that his teacher has decided to call it quits for the entire day,

three hours early, because everyone's just getting used to everything. Max has distance learning sex and he doesn't want to do it. And I agree. So we're just going to take it day at a time and do the best we can. I got pregnant at 18 and Max was born when I was—I turned 19 right after he was born, actually. So I gave birth to him when I was 18. I was homeschooled by my parents religiously until fourth grade, like actual religious curriculum. And then I went to public school from that point on, and I ended up dropping out of high school in my sophomore year and getting my GED. out of high school in my sophomore year and getting my GED. Max's father and I were not married until he was three years old, but we did get married when he was three. And then we divorced when he was, I think, six. He was actually in jail from the time Max was six months old.

So he missed, you know, a lot of the first holidays. We were together after that, but I embodied a lot of the, you know, old-fashioned ideals of the mother doing most of the parenting. You know, and I worked, too. I worked full-time. So, yeah. Okay, so update. We're basically just by Thursday, Friday, we're at the end of our rope. We've been on computers doing our work in our school for like four days and we're tired. So we both woke up not in the mood today.

Max wasn't paying close enough attention in class and he sort of got snipped out by his teacher. Max was playing a game on his phone during class time. I got a little upset with him. And he immediately got a stress headache after that because he's just so stressed out by virtual school. He feels like it's hard to pay attention. It's hard to get assignments done. It's hard to understand what the teacher is saying when he's speaking to everyone in a Zoom meeting. So he got a stress headache.

He said he felt like he was going to throw up. He was like crying. The stress is just a lot for him. I kind of go back and forth between knowing I need to be upset that he, you know, is not paying attention or this or that, and then having total empathy. Like if I had to be on a Zoom meeting for five hours, I would definitely mess around on my phone too, right? So it's trying to find the line between enforcing the right boundary and also letting him know that I understand it's a struggle. So I calmed him down and I made him like a bowl of cereal and a cup of tea. And I was like, I love you. I was like,

this year, like, you're not going to fail. They they won't hold you back like you don't have to do perfect this year you just have to make it through and just be present in class as much as you can right so he felt better there are days where he didn't want to pay any attention to his laptop class and it's hard to enforce that sometimes. I had just gotten divorced and I had a pretty good job working for Apple, but I knew I needed something long-term career-wise. And I didn't even know what I wanted to do, but I was like, you have to get back into college. You have to get a degree. You have to do something. So I just enrolled at the local Spokane Community College. And right around that time, I started working as a legal assistant part-time as well for the attorney that sort of got me started on the path.

And she was telling me about the paralegal program, which was at the same college I was attending. And so I just enrolled in the program and sort of took it from there, I guess. Just finished my class, and I was working the whole time, like typing emails for my job, but I'm going to go make a cup of coffee and then get to work for the day. Woo, it's 9.17 a.m. I'm still going to school, so I am always tired, like 100% of the time. I did my class at work. The receptionist held my calls.

Everyone's really nice about me being in school. So I returned all of those, and then I just had a really busy whirlwind day at work. Then we came home, rushed through a dinner, kept cleaning. I literally cleaned until like 8.30 p.m. and then took a bath. I am sitting now, but it is 9.58 p.m. and I'm doing my math homework. So yeah, some days feel like they're so busy. They feel like they don't even exist. It's like I just went through 24 hours and I don't even like remember any of it because I was just go, go, go, move, move, move.

We'll be right back. I would like to let it be known for the record that I am not a homeschooler. I never wanted to homeschool. I always put my kid in school. This isn't me. It ain't me. I'm doing my best, but this is not my freaking talent. This is not my talent space. Okay. Not me. I'm a great mom and I'm good at momming, but I'm not good at educating. When they say tomorrow is a new day in COVID land, it's not a new day. And if it is a new day, it's probably just getting worse.

I'm actually just really pissed and upset because I know this isn't going to work all year. I know he's not going to learn anything and he's just going to be sitting at a freaking computer screen. Like, I wish they'd just cancel school for the year. There's no point. It's like you're implementing the system that just isn't going to work for most kids. And they're all going to be really behind anyways.

So why don't they just let us parents figure out what we're going to do during the day on our own and take them to child care or whatever and just can it. Like we're expected to keep working and implement an entire education system at home and have this power struggle of making them log into meetings at certain times five days a week. It's not realistic and it's not doable. And I might be really upset because this is drawing on like a bigger thing that I already deal with where I'm not a married parent. I'm not stay at home. I don't have a stay at home spouse. It's harder for me to do things already for Max working full time, like sports or extracurricular activities or things that I can't afford anyways. And then on top of it now, like the pandemic hit and it

just exasperates on like, I'm going to cry, but like things I already deal with and stress, like not being able to do things and provide as much for him as a lot of other families do. And the pressures now triple on me. Not that it's not on other parents too, but like, it's kind of impossible for me to make this work because I'm not like your classic design of a family that is prepared for something like this. I depend heavily on social things like school to get me by. And then without it, I don't know what I'm supposed to do. So I'm a single mom in the pandemic and I'm a teacher. So I feel like single mothers and teachers and mothers in general all take on more than they can.

And so I have like three strikes against me and it's just impossible. I feel like I'm not doing anything well. I feel like everything I do, I do badly because I'm managing so many people and so many things. I'm wondering if I missed the delivery of the toolbox that was delivered when this shit all went down last year. I'm trying to be a good professional woman and a good mom all at the same time, and no one is telling me how to do this. I'm not expecting handouts. I don't expect things to be easy, but I just want it to be doable. My daughter is three years old and eight days ago I gave birth to a stillborn baby birth to a stillborn baby at 21 weeks of gestation.

Today is my three-year-old's last day of preschool for the year, and I don't know how I'm going to make it to the end of the year. I can barely take care of myself. No happiness in my life. I can't stand my kids anymore. I'm just miserable. I am rarely alone. Even when I go in my room at night to go to sleep and turn out the light,

somebody comes in to talk to me and tell me another thing. It's endless. I'm lucky I haven't lost my job yet. I'm on the phone with clients all day. And I have a five-year-old in the background that if he's hurt on there, I could lose my job. I'm not the only source of income and we could be homeless. How are we going to do this?

I'm so angry at our entire government and societal system. There's just no backup or no help or nothing. I just want to wake up and go through my day and not worry and not wonder and not know what the future holds because this right here sucks and I'm sick of it. I'm so sick of this. This pandemic has made me realize that maybe I'm not cut out to be a mother. I love my kids, but I don't like being a mom. And I don't like being a mom and I don't like being a mom in America because it's just so

much more clear that America hates women and hates families. We don't have support. Moms are not heroes. And this is just so hard, so hard. So hard. Just eating breakfast, getting ready for the day. It's about 7.45 in the morning. Max had cream of wheat and toast, and I had toast and coffee. And we'll be leaving here in like a half hour to drop him at Susan's. How are you doing, Max? He says thumbs up. Susan is a very dear friend and I would venture to say sort of chosen family style friend. Max and I, before we moved into the house we are in now, lived in a neighborhood

where there were a lot of kids and a lot of parents living in a block radius. And Susan was one of them. They all homeschooled prior to the pandemic, so they were already set for all of this. But all of our kids are best friends. They run all over the neighborhood together. And Susan was home, and she said, Max can come and be on his laptop here while I teach my kids, and then he can play with them in the afternoon. So she's a part of my essential community. Like I could not have gotten through the pandemic without these other

women in my neighborhood. So also just to update you on where we've been last week was mostly fine. Max is doing good being at Susan's because he has friends there, but he is already completely burnt out on laptop work. It's been two weeks and he says that he just hates sitting in front of that webcam all day. And it isn't fun because it's not like, you know, they'll have you do some things, but it's not interactive. There's no arts and crafts. There's no gym. There's no music. Like there's nothing to do with your hands basically. So I texted his teacher on Monday and I said listen he just can't do this for the amount of time that you guys are expecting he's going to be done at noon every day so this week he's only doing school from 8 30 to noon at lunchtime his homeschool

friends are out of homeschool afternoon and he's been playing magic cards and walking to the park and doing things that I find to be better than sitting on a screen for the afternoons. And his teacher was totally understanding. He wrote back and said, you know, I'm sorry, this totally sucks is what he said. He said there was no other way to say it. Max! Yeah? Can you come in here?

Also, you were supposed to take the dog out and you never did. Sorry. Max! Yeah? Can you come in here? Yeah. Also, you were supposed to take the dog out and you never did. Sorry. Well, look at him. He's sad. Look at his face. So I had Susan, and then I ended up working from home from November through January. And then I used Boys and Girls Club until he went back to school February 17th. And now he is back at school two days one week, three days the following week,

and I have to find care the other few days. I think we've gotten closer over this little while. We get into arguments sometimes, but other than that, we're pretty close. You're going to make me cry. All of the stresses that caused us to be annoyed with each other or anything like that were all outside stresses of the situation, and we handled them okay. I don't think it's changed at all, really. It feels the same. We get along decently and we enjoy spending time with each other. It's like we had a relationship beforehand and the situation around it shifted,

but we're just mother and son, best buds, and it's still that way. I think I was always this way, but I think I now realize I'm absolutely unstoppable. Just nothing, I'm always going to figure out a way to make it work. I, like, nothing will stop me. Nothing can stop me from just keeping on keeping on, I guess. So today is April 14th, and I made homemade pizza for dinner.

Max, how would you rate today 1 to 10? 8. And how come? Because it was a good day. I had fun with my friends. I got scraped up a little bit, but other than that, it was awesome. Cool. Well, I rated it 8 for you, too.

Yeah. All right, and that's our report of a school day. Later. Bye. all right and that's our report of a school day later we'll be right back Here's what else you need to know today. Have you made a decision today whether you intend to testify or whether you intend to invoke your Fifth Amendment privilege? I will invoke my Fifth Amendment privilege today. On Thursday, Derek Chauvin declined to testify on his own behalf, and his defense lawyers rested their case, ending the testimony phase of his murder trial in the death of George Floyd. Closing arguments will begin on Monday, after which the jury will begin deliberations. If I were you, I would plan for long and hope for short. On Thursday afternoon,

the judge in the case, Peter Cahill, began preparing jurors for that process. Basically, it's up to the jury how long you deliberate, how long you need to come to a unanimous decision on any count. And so because that's entirely up to you, whether it's an hour or a week, it's entirely within your province. Today's episode was produced by Michael Simon Johnson, Diana Nguyen, and Luke Vanderplug. It was edited by Lisa Chow and Paige Cowett, engineered by Chris Wood, and contains original music by Marion Lozano. Wood and contains original music by Marion Lozano. Special thanks to the editors behind the Primal Scream project, Jessica Gross and Jessica Bennett. That's it for The Daily. I'm Michael Bavaro. See you on Monday.