Families may face an uncertain future as they shelter in place, but they’re enjoying time together in ways not normally allowed by their over-scheduled lives.
Heidi Warren, a call center employee, mostly stays confined to the two-bedroom San Jose apartment she shares with her husband, a grocery store worker, and their two children, 4-year-old Jeffrey and 7-year-old Jade. Up until a week ago, family time was limited to two hours in the evening because of her long commute — but those hours usually were taken up by dinner, homework and cleanup.
“The silver lining is definitely being with my children and spending time that our normal schedules would never allow for,” Warren said.
Dione Travis of Dublin is definitely trying to look for “the positives” right now, she says, which include “quality time” with her daughters, 14 and 17, while she and her husband, a Workday employee, are at home.
“My best friend always says, ‘Find your rainbow.’ Maybe it’s a little sugary sweet, but I also think sometimes it’s truly the only way I’m able to get through times like this,” Travis wrote in a Facebook post.
To that end, Travis is helping her daughters appreciate all the “random acts of kindness” they have witnessed in the past week: “Like my amazing neighbors who brought us a platter of spaghetti and garlic bread last night that just felt like pure love in food form.”
Mark Reinecke, a psychologist and clinical director at the Child Mind Institute in San Mateo, agrees that “optimism, hope and tenacity” are necessary for getting through any challenge, however dire. Certainly, families miss all the things they can’t do right now — socializing at school pickup, weekend soccer games, dinners with friends. But they also need to focus on what’s in front of them.
“It is possible to find happiness, hope, connection, meaning and value during challenging, uncertain times,” he said in an email. “By forcing us into our homes, this pandemic has made our worlds small. We’re pressed into reconnecting in a more intimate, thoughtful manner. We’re pressed to enjoy simple experiences and activities.”
Above all, he said, this experience can teach children a valuable life skill: resilience.
Children and teens become resilient by learning to solve problems, regulate their emotions and build social support, Reinecke said. “Resilience is earned through adversity,” building confidence that a person can overcome any challenge.
Carolina Katz of Walnut Creek believes that today’s youth, including her 18-year-old son Cameron, are more resilient than parents think. “I do feel that as babies of the post-9/11 world, they have resilience in their DNA. Whether they know it or not, they will get through this.”
A graduating senior from De La Salle High School in Concord, Cameron is disappointed he probably won’t have his senior ball and graduation ceremony — things he’s been looking forward to since freshman year. He’s also stressed about which colleges he’ll get into while preparing for still-scheduled Advanced Placement tests without in-person help from his teachers. Still, he emphasized his own silver lining: his gratitude to his teachers.
“They’ve been awesome,” Cameron said Wednesday. “I’m grateful by how dedicated they are, how willing they are to help us adjust to this change. They’ve done the best they can to make it as good an experience as possible.”
Milpitas Unified second-grade teacher Adrienne Barber hopes the parents of her students can be kind to themselves and “take a pause” from the common Bay Area worry that these changes in their children’s education mean “they won’t get into Stanford.” Barber, who lives in San Jose, urges parents to enjoy the time with their kids.
Her 11-year-old daughter says that being home may not be normal, but it’s still fun — she actually has more time to talk to friends and do “fun things” like gardening and drawing.
As the week dwindled down, Lee-Leidy’s ex-husband took the kids for a couple days. “I’m fortunate we have two households,” she said. “It gives them a change of scene.” And she’s trying not to focus too much on Gov. Gavin Newsom’s announcement that schools were “likely” to remain closed the rest of the year.
“I’m focused on one day at a time and on what I can control and what I can’t,” she said. “We will get through it, of course, no matter what.”
