Top 5 Things To Do as a Working Mom and Rookie Blogger during COVID-19

You want the truth? I felt like a failure.

Not only did I feel like I failed myself, but I felt like I failed those who were excited for me and the launch of BoyMom.com. For months, I had dreamed & anticipated what this site would be and the purpose it would serve. I fantasized over the friendships that would be built here – the village of boymoms that would connect and encourage each other here. I wanted so badly to help create a place where moms felt heard, supported, and encouraged.

When COVID-19 sparked “safe at home” / “stay home” / “shelter-in-place” / “quarantine” orders across the nation in the beginning to mid-March, I had mixed feelings. My work (an hour away from my house) encouraged everyone to “work from home” for a little while.  A couple days later, it became mandatory.

I was anxious – My toddler’s daycare closed – My boys’ school closed. We were ALL going to be home? At the same time? Every day? Um.. I’m sorry, for how long?

Now – before you label me as ‘ungrateful’ and think ‘Oh, trapped with your kids is awful? You must be a bad mom’ – Please stop. Did you mean to stumble on this page, Karen?? We keep it real here. OF COURSE I love my children and OF COURSE I cherish my time with them… But also, I’m supposed to work my 45+ hour/week career, serving hundreds of small business clients nationwide, while home-schooling a handful of pre-teens AND attempting to keep my 2-year-old’s half-naked body out of my Zoom conference-call windows?!? Oh – Okay. Pfffft. I got this. It’s, like, for a month, right?

It was March 12th when I began working from home. The workload that I had before COVID-19 increased exponentially as the small business owners that I service began to panic – thinking that if their states were under strict orders for everyone to stay home, no one would be looking for their services (mostly home-service based – painting, handyman, etc.) during this time.

As I had been planning for months, BoyMom.com was scheduled to go live on April 1st, but I was spending more of what would’ve been my “personal time” (to work on personal projects – like BoyMom.com) on work things instead – Taking on more phone calls with clients, more emails, more marketing analysis research, etc. I was determined to NOT let my clients down because their businesses matter to me. I started to put my personal goals aside.

Two weeks into quarantine & 7 days before the website was supposed to go live, I was driving alone with my 2 year old son, in his carseat, and a freak mini rain storm hit. My mini-van’s bald tires were no match to the winding turns of a hilly road, and I spun out of control. As I fish-tailed, then desperately tried to correct, we scaled up the side of the hill and – before I could even realize what was happening, we began to roll… over … and over…. And over. Every time we landed on either the tires or the roof of the van, I just repeatedly shouted, “We’re ok! We’re ok! We’re ok! We’re ok!” while there was zero sound coming from the back seat.

We rolled 4 times down the hill - in a mini-van – in the rain. When we finally stopped rolling – the blood drained from my face & I felt like my heart stopped. We landed, right side up – only God knows how - and I recall being horrified to look back to my son’s carseat – terrified at the thought of what I might see. I looked back and there – sitting perfectly in his little seat – was a speechless wide-eyed toddler, completely unharmed.

“Mama…” he whispered, “what happen to us?”

I didn’t have time to process anything. It was raining – there was shattered glass everywhere. I stumbled out of my driver door and tried to slide his door open – it wouldn’t open all the way. I struggled to unbuckle him and pry him from his carseat – “You ok, baby?” “I’m ok, Mama. What happen?” he kept repeating.

A lady pulled over on the side of the road and invited me to come sit in her car while I called for help. I had blood running down my arm and I wasn’t even coherent enough to realize if it was mine or my son’s. Bewildered and shaken, I asked the lady “Does it look like he’s bleeding?!” Like a freaking super woman, she looked at me confidently and said “No, here – have him sit in my car, I think it’s your blood” as she gestured toward my hand. My knuckles were bloodied and covered in glass shards.

Y’all – This is hard for me to type and relive. By the time help came, I had a new perspective on life – a new appreciation for every minute with my little man - with my family. As I watched paramedics check my toddler for injuries and my mom-van get dragged onto that tow truck, I couldn’t even comprehend how we walked away from what had happened. I got home… curled up on the floor of the shower and bawled my eyes out while the hot water ran over me.

Reading other moms’ blog submissions or writing my own blogs were the last things I wanted to do during that week leading up to “launch date”. I wanted to spend every waking moment with my kids and family, quarantined in our home and snuggling. My loving man pushed me though – “Babe, the little guy is fine. You’re fine. We’re all fine. There are moms out there who want to see this project come alive… Do it.”

So, on April 1st, exactly a week after the accident, BoyMom.com went live – and I was damn proud of it. It wasn’t perfect – it didn’t have some of the features I was hoping it would – it still needs a lot of work – but it went live, just like I promised myself and others that it would.

But then?

I abandoned it. Work became harder. Life as a home-school teacher became harder. Running daycare for my toddler became harder. Devoting time to my man & kids became harder. Walking away from my computer and walking away from work emails & projects became harder. There were days in early April that, I swear, if Tim didn’t walk in the office with a sandwich, I probably wouldn’t have eaten. There were days where I yelled at my kids because they weren’t devoting enough time and attention to their online learning as I was and it made me furious. I was working 10+ hour days and I had their teachers emailing me that my children weren’t participating “at the expected level”. My sweet 2 year old didn’t understand –  If Mommy is home all day, why can’t Mommy play all day?

I KNOW some of you feel all of that in your soul right now. I know, because I saw. I read. I heard your videos, I read your posts, I saw your comments. This has been a helluva ride, y’all.

Somewhere towards the end of April, I snapped out of it. Enough was enough. No – I still didn’t have the mental capacity or drive to touch the blog again, but I knew I needed to fix everything else going on in my life. I began waking up early again – Making my coffee, planning my day, writing out my children’s schoolwork schedules for the day/week, taking breaks from my computer, focusing on eating foods I enjoyed (not necessarily healthy – but I was eating), and taking walks with the kids in the afternoon/evening. I was happier, more productive, and present. I committed to keeping 5 important things part of every week – and it seriously changed my attitude.

Here are the 5 commitments I made to myself each week to be a better & happier mama during the COVID-19 lockdown:

1.       Drink Water – Lots & lots of water. Yes, I drank booze, too – But I kept my water intake high. How much should you drink? Well, take your weight & divide it in half. That’s how many ounces you should be drinking. Weigh 120 lbs? Cool, aim for 60 ounces of water per day. It’s a lot. Yes, you’ll pee a lot. Yes, you’ll feel so much better.

2.       Self-Care – I printed out an online calendar and penciled in the days that I would be doing certain self-care things (i.e. Monday afternoon – coconut oil treatment for my hair, Thursday – hydrating face mask, Sunday night – bubble bath, etc.) Was it every day? No. But I definitely made it more intentional by putting it as a To-Do item on my calendar! It made for a happier mama, knowing that I was taking care of my body & skin while also taking care of everyone else! I planned for some primadonna Mama Time!

3.       Move Your Body – I’m not a fitness guru, by any means. I’m not super skinny and/or muscular either. I’m currently a recently turned 30-year-old woman with an average body – but “I like to move it, move it” (sung to the song from the Madagascar movie...you know the one). I began taking those kiddos on quick 20-30 minute walks in the neighborhood. It wasn’t hard and it’s not like it was weight-loss material, but it keeps me feeling alive. I also now rotate out a yoga ball for my desk chair and bounce on that while answering emails for part of the day to keep my legs moving! It’s super helpful! Mamas, if you can’t do a total of 30 minutes of movement to get your heartbeat up per day, you’re not really living your own life!

4.       Set Daily Goals – I began to treat my morning as if I was leaving for the office again (even though we all know that instead of 1 hour commute, it was about 2.5 minutes to my office downstairs now). I would wake up early, have some coffee, shower, get dressed (Disclaimer: I do not always do my makeup, though) and plan out what I was going to accomplish that day in three columns. I created my “Must” Goals that absolutely had to be done that day, followed by my “Preferred” Goals for items that would be nice to complete, and then my “Whatever” goals for things that I knew needed to get done by weren’t urgent or important. I felt “whatever” about them. Ha. Listen – you can call them whatever you want – This is just my method. My three columns included work items AND household items. The top half of each column was work-related and the bottom half was household-related.

5.       Make Time for Love – A little louder for the mamas in the back! Make time to love on your family, love on your babies, and love on your partner. Tim used to tell me, “I see you LESS now that you work from home” and I used to shrug him off. How could that be? But – he was right. I came to my senses and we had a heart to heart about when and how we would spend our time together. Put it on your calendars if you have to, ladies! Do not neglect those beautiful souls you live with. Go on a walk, watch a movie, play a board game, have a Nerf gun war – Just make the time. Creating at-home-date-nights with my man after the kids went to sleep has made such a difference. We put that *ish on the calendar, ladies. That might sound pathetic to some of you - but with a man who also runs his own business, we live out of calendars!

 So, am I “killing it” in the WFH COVID life? Nah. Nope. Not even close.

But I’m learning – and I’m working my way back to bringing this blog back to life. So many mamas have been reaching out to me asking about the blog and what was going on with it. I appreciate that so much. I felt like I had finally found a groove with all of the other important parts of my life – and I simply had left the blog out of it because I wasn’t ready.

Well, mamas – I’m working my way back into it because I have big dreams for this and I want so badly to build up that network of empowered mamas who can collaborate and be encouraged.

Please be patient with me as I begin to dive back into this journey & I’m looking forward to watching this project grow!

Cheers!