Life during lockdown

I have a 2 year old and a 4.5 year old (usually at school) and my husband and I am both attempting to WFH. My employer is being supportive and understanding if I can't do a full day but my husband's job is very long hours and to enable me to do any work at all he is working very late into the night and is exhausted, while I am constantly stressed that I can't do my job to any standard. The children cannot be left unattended for more than a few minutes and certainly couldn't get on with school work, the primary school have sent very little work and it requires a great deal of parental input, I can see if we had just one child it might be manageable but with a toddler as well my daughter will be at a great disadvantage compared to others who either have a full time SAHP or no/older siblings.

This situation can't go on. Please allow childminders to open ASAP, ours is small and local and it feels very low risk if she could reopen but would vastly improve my mental health plus the support I can give my older child. I know she is little but missing her Reception year is not a good start to schooling.

My partner and I are full time WFH with a 2 year old. I say full time but realistically we only get about 4.5 hours of work in a day because we are alternating looking after our toddler. We are very lucky that our employers have been understanding but it doesn't make the mental challenges easier.

As the mum I bear a lot of guilt around not providing more enriching childcare and falling behind on house work as well as my job. I'm also the main cook in the house. It is impossible to balance. There is zero time to myself and I feel anxiety in the mornings and lunch time at everything I'm having to manage.

I don't think there is enough discussion going on in the public sphere about it, I feel alone in the struggle even though my partner's being wonderful and I'm sure other mums are going through similar challenges. I think there's a worry for mums that if we complain we are going to sound like we don't love being a mum or something but I love my son 100%, it's just really hard to do it all without a support network. I would like to see childcare support be one of the priorities as we ease lockdown, for toddler age children also, not just school aged children. 

I am a teacher and single mother of a 5 year old and I am really struggling to prepare lessons for my students, be online for my colleagues, homeschool my 5 year old and do all the usual housework (cocking, minimum cleaning) at the same time. All my work colleagues have no children, are always ahead with their work and constantly come up with new ideas of what to do. I feel like they think I am not putting enough effort in. They haven't said it but the fact that I am so far behind with the work and I am being laid of by the end of April says it all. There is only so much work you can do next to a 5 year old one who needs constant supervision. Also her school keeps sending work that the parent is meant to do with them. There is hardly any task sent by the school that my daughter could do by herself. I am just thankful that Twinkle is currently free and lets me print of resources for my daughter that she can do by herself like coloring templates. 
One of my biggest concern is that when school reopens that my daughter, who is also SEN, will not want to go back. She enjoys herself at home, generally never liked school or nursery in the first place. She likes to stay at home and does not like to go out. I am already struggling to get her out of the house to do a bit of physical exercise. Will schools take that into consideration or do they think all their students will just be happy to go back to school? 
 

As a teacher I am opposed to any rushing in to reopening schools as the students do not observe social distancing even though there are only about 15 students in a school which normally houses 1400+.  It would be a hive of germ spreading!

Our eldest child is 6 years.  The expectation from our primary school that we can switch to completely supervising his learning online is unrealistic.    We are also juggling care of his siblings with working from home ourselves.  We do not have a spare computer or printing facilities.  If schools reopen  with children attending alternate days then serious thought needs to be applied as to how this affects parents with jobs. Employers will lose patience eventually I fear.

As a grandparent (under 70) who normally helps with childcare it is not easy to be living near our daughter and son-in-law and not be able to support them. They are fortunate to have jobs that mean they can both work from home and are both still in employment. 

All the family have been self isolating and social distancing and we hope that before too long we will be able to help again with their two toddlers and give them a break - and see our lovely grandchildren!

In the great scheme of things however we feel hugely lucky to have a garden, be well and to have family, albeit 'virtual' for now. 

I am solo parenting with a 4-year old as my partner has had to travel for corona-virus related work.
 

i am self-employed so saw the amount of work I was booked to deliver drop due to cancellations or postponement.  Now the level of work is increasing again, which is great financially and great for long term business viability. But trying to deliver this work professionally and also home school / entertain the 4yo is getting harder each week. 
 

he seems happy enough, but like all parents, I worry about his long term mental health with no friends or other role models in his life. 

I think we should be protected from being fired becsuse I am unable to work efficiently AND look after 2 kids - let alone adequately homeschool them. What am I supposed to do - my kids are screaming while I am on my phone to my boss who is asking for more and more work to be competed. Everyone's mental health is suffering. Can we be allowed to do less hours? 

We normally look after our grand daughter for 24 hours every week.  This is not possible during lockdown.  We miss her and vice versa, she will be 4 years old on April 27.  But my wife who is a retired Deputy Head has at least 45 minutes every day on Face Time with her.  We keep in touch with the family, 2 children over 30 years old, one Son-in-Law and one grand daughter using Zoom.

This is a note for the discussion admin - I was redirected to this discussion on completing the 5-min 'life under lockdown' survey - in which I confirmed that I do not have children! So I've been sent to probably the only discussion to which I can make no contribution at all. Your algorithm needs fixing.

Good luck and best wishes to all the parents, guardians and new home-schoolers out there, and to all of the children.

I'm the mother of a toddler, trying to work full time from my home as is my husband.

Its impossible and exhausting to manage both!

i worry this will negatively effect my employment as colleagues without children are able to focus on their work where as I barely do 4 hours a day.

We are a family of four with both parents working in full-time jobs. Our two children are aged 5 and 7. We are really, really, really struggling. The school puts links to documents onto the school website each week which we are to download and then work through with the kids. We are trying our best but our work is suffering, we are falling increasingly behind with school work and we are getting less and less sleep. This is not sustainable. We need help!

There is lots of concern about the 'digital divide' and the issue of poor families falling behind as no access to IT equipment. I think there is a divide with a much bigger impact that gets overlooked: that between state schools and private schools. The latter currently deliver full school days via live webcam sessions. The former don't deliver any lessons at all anymore. The only teaching left is by us parents.  

What help do we need?

- For the schools to reopen as quickly as possible, for all ages (!), at least for a few hours each week or alternating weeks, delivering the core subjects: Maths & English

- As quickly as possible offering full-time childcare again - obviously to be balanced with overall risk to society

- In the interim, live web cam based classes from all state schools, for all ages for core subjects at least 1 hour per day for each class (ideally with classes split into sub-groups for younger ages so more interactive vs longer hours in full classes for older children)

And what we do NOT need: More links to online education sources. There are countless already, marketeted everywhere, and they don't replace teaching

As a working mum I would like to see some support for parents working from home.

i am lucky enough to still have a job but I have no time and resources to help my child with home schooling. He is only 5 and needs help with activities and homework's .

we do need some sorts of childcare, maybe smaller groups or some funding to hire a nanny few hours a day.

or maybe reopen schools for few hours in the morning and have smaller classes. now they can spend more time outdoor and school should get regular daily deep cleaning sessions