What Staying at Home is Teaching Us

At first, this mama’s dream came true. Stay-at-Home orders meant having my people together, all of us on generally the same schedule and without the distractions of other places to go and other people to see. I felt like I won the lottery. For a few days. But if I am honest, all this togetherness gets hard. Being in such close quarters for days on end is truly testing our patience with one another, and we’re running our reserves of grace dangerously low. Before we’re at each other’s throats, it’s time for us to hone in on what’s really happening here and learn from this. It’s time to acknowledge and honor what staying at home is really teaching us.

Reality Strikes

I mean, my teenaged son opened his bedroom door and the funk took me out with one breath before I could duck for cover. Gross. I’ve had the “I’m neither your maid nor your waitress” talk with the kids at least a few times since starting to stay at home. Tom’s passive aggression when he emerges from the office has truly been at an all time high lately. He tries to call it his “dry sense of humor”, but we all know better. Even the dog is super high maintenance and has decided dry kibble no longer satisfies his newly refined palate. Seriously? How perfect.

We all get testy, and it’s no fun.

UGH.

After a few weeks of staying at home together, though, it’s a lot easier to see how we’ll need to strategically equip ourselves for the upcoming weeks. It has become clear that the hearts we nurture in one another during this confinement require not just family time with board games and jigsaw puzzles. They also thrive on the evergreen support of emotional presence, a healthy dose of patience, and a positive mindset – from each one of us, for each one of us.

Yes, indeedy, friends, we are truly all in this together.

So here’s what staying home is teaching us – a few golden nuggets we’ve learned in our time together the past month or so. I think of these as our family’s version of essential learning, equally as important as the required math and writing skills the kiddos are picking up online as they finish up the school year from afar. Maybe a few of you can relate:

1. Show Up for Yourself

You can’t give others your best unless you’ve taken good care of yourself. I know you’ve heard it a thousand times, but that’s because it’s true. Eat well. Hydrate. Exercise. Meditate. Take a walk. Take a bath. Read. Listen to your favorite playlist. Do whatever it is you do to fill your own cup, so you can pour from it without feeling empty. Even better, encourage everyone in your household to do the same.

2. Honor Your Own Desires and Aspirations

Take steps toward your personal goals each day. There’s so much uncertainty about how, when, and if the world will return to “normal”. The one thing you can control in the midst of all the worry and confusion is your own action.

First, commit to staying at home for the duration. Because COVID. And because our front-liners are putting their health and safety on the line daily for your health and safety. Respect that.

At the same time, find your focus and get to work. No need to bite off more than you can chew. A bit of progress each day for multiple days adds up to great strides and then leaps and bounds. This time is going to pass anyway. Spend it moving closer to what you ultimately want.

3. Check Your Kid Approach

These days are long and largely unstructured. Establish guidelines and clear expectations for your children while they’re at home, then allow a lot of grace. This ambivalence is new and different for all of you, but likely more shocking for the younger crowd who is accustomed to the order of the day at school.

Appreciate how drastically their young lives have changed in the past month, and then talk with them about how the same has happened for you. Create an open and trusting platform for questions, discussion, even for disagreement. Meet them emotionally before practically. They will likely be more open to tackling what you need them to do if they feel supported, respected, and understood.

4. Be Aware of Your Affect with Your Spouse/Significant Other

It’s easy right now to have a mile-long and growing honey-do list with countless hours at home. But the truth is that you both likely feel at a disadvantage and not in your best mind space in recent weeks. You may find yourselves stuck and uninspired with the new and challenging reality of working from home (or the stress of not working at all) amidst distraction and disruption all day long.

First, do no harm. Curb your frustration with a deep breath and a moment to think before you speak. Start with appreciation. A sincere thank you for something simple goes a long way in trying times. Make every effort to show love and admiration in place of criticism and disapproval.

What Staying at Home is Teaching Us Most: Love One Another

These days are long, friends, but the time is fleeting. Try to find the gifts in the togetherness. They’re there, if you’re open to them. Staying at home together is teaching us the lessons that we may never learn at school and work. Kindness matters. Empathy is so important. Alone time is as necessary for our personal growth as time with one another is. We try to be patient. We prioritize taking care of each other. We rely on each other. Not because we have to, but because we can.

Because we are family.