Parents Are Looking at Another Season of Quarantine With the Kids. Ten Moms and Dads Tell Us How They’ve Survived So Far.

It might not tell you anything you don’t already know. If nothing else, though, take solace in the fact, if you’re feeling stressed, scared and a little bit crazy, you are definitely not alone.

Non-parents just don't understand.

Sure, everyone's got it bad right now. But pour one out for the breeders, who've been in lockdown with the wee screechy ones for almost six months, and just received some discouraging news: Freedom doesn't appear to be coming any time soon.

In a normal year, this is when parents would start popping bottles of rosé as their tiny roommates get shipped off to become another adult's problem for a few hours. With the coronavirus pandemic still raging, though, Gov. Kate Brown said last week that at the current rate of infection, Oregon schools aren't likely to open until damn near April. It's like digging your way out of Shawshank and popping up in Rikers.

Don't worry, though. We got you.

Sorry, we're not offering to babysit. But we do have some advice.

In this issue, we've compiled a guide to surviving another season of parenting in quarantine. We've compiled a list of the must-own items for keeping the little ones distracted and thus yourself halfway sane (page 18) and produced schematics for constructing a blanket fort that'll tie them up for hours. We also asked a few kids how they feel about all this—after all, if you're stuck with them, they're stuck with you, too.

We know, however, that the only people who can really grasp what parents are going through right now are other parents. And so, over the past week, we surveyed dozens of Portland moms and dads about how they're holding up. Some took the opportunity to vent, others shared what they've learned from having their routines upended like so many boxes of Legos.

Here, we've published 10 of the most illuminating responses. It might not tell you anything you don't already know. If nothing else, though, take solace in the fact, if you're feeling stressed, scared and a little bit crazy, you are definitely not alone.

The McKelvey Family. IMAGE: Maddie Maschger.

Gregory McKelvey

Age: 27

Occupation: Political campaign director

How old are your kids? Stokely is 2 years old and my daughter is 1 year old. We also have a Pomeranian named Teddy Wap.

What is your typical daily schedule? At first, it was really difficult to get into a routine. The kids were staying up way too late, but eventually we fell into one. The kids both wake up between 7 and 8 am. We then try to keep the TV off until at least 3 pm for what we call "imagination time." The kids go to bed around 8 pm now—we read to them at night. We were lucky that we have kids who sleep through the night. As for me and my wife's routine, it is just diapers, Zoom meetings, and work.

When you need a break from your kids, how do you distract them? Currently looking for suggestions. The best thing for our 2-year-old is cartoons because it is the only thing he does independently. But we don't want him to have too much screen time.

What is your sanctuary? We bought a Peloton bike. Other than that, it is basically 24/7 work either running the campaign for mayor or running a house of little monsters.

What do your kids do that drives you the most insane? The worst thing my son does is he thinks if the TV is on, we have to be watching Puppy Dog Pals, but Dad needs his Dame Time. Also, they are really fascinated with gravity right now, so they like to hold their sippy cups upside down as they drip onto the floor.

What have been the bright spots? We have gotten to see every little advancement that might have occurred at day care otherwise. For example, my daughter is learning to crawl. My son is learning to kiss and hug and talk. Those things are amazing.

What new family activities have you adopted or resumed? Before the pandemic I would come home with food, and people would eat it wherever they want. Now we try to slow down for just a little bit every day at the table. Results may vary.

When you leave the house, where do you go most often? When the protests first erupted, we attended those until police violence made it clear they were not friendly for children.

What have you learned about your kids since being stuck at home with them? They are brilliant. They pick up on everything. But they don't understand what is going on. My son frequently hands me his shoes because he just wants to leave the house.

What has being stuck at home with them taught you about yourself as a parent? I think it has made us slightly more confident. Like, if we can get through this we can get through anything together.

Jenny C.

Age: 35

Occupation: Nurse

How old are your kids? 7 and 4

What is your typical daily schedule? Wake up, login remotely, make coffee, give kids chocolate milk, encourage teeth brushing, remote work for four hours, warm up noodles for kids or make sure they got a frozen PBJ from the freezer, give them a piece of fresh fruit and water bottles, eat leftovers myself, pet the cat, four more hours of work, shower, play outside with kids, dinner, read books, kid bedtime, attend a protest with a buddy.

What is your sanctuary? A phone call with my friend while sitting anywhere alone for 30 minutes.

What do your kids do that drives you the most insane? Fighting loudly when one of us is on a call.

What's been your worst freakout so far? My kid broke their arm early on in the pandemic, and I had to take them to the ER. We didn't have masks yet.

What have been the bright spots? Talking as a family about "the germs" and wearing our DIY "FAUCI" shirts.

What have you learned about your kids since being stuck at home with them? They're way better at video games than I ever was.

What has being stuck at home with them taught you about yourself as a parent? That I could never succeed in home school. Teachers deserve anything they ask for.

Jason Anderson

Age: 42

Occupation: Product manager

How old are your kids? 13 and 11

What is your typical daily schedule? I get up around 6 am to start working from home. My spouse usually starts work by 8 am. The kids will get up between 9 am and noon. My spouse and I will work till about 5 pm, then transition into making dinner. The kids pretty much do whatever. I try to encourage them to help around the house with chores, but that's been a stress point I'm tired of managing.

When you need a break from your kids, how do you distract them? They are fairly independent at this point. One of my girls has a Barbie doll house remodel project she works on, but now we have pieces all over the house.

What is your sanctuary? I've been working on our basement. I stripped a 500-square-foot family room down to the exterior walls, reframed, had electrical work done, dry-walled, and am now working on installing a birch plywood ceiling.

What do your kids do that drives you the most insane? They don't really help out with stuff. I'll be making dinner and they'll be disengaged looking at their phones on the couch while I do all the work.

What's been your worst freakout so far? The girls got into a physical altercation while getting ready to do something. I apparently chose the wrong child as the first person to parent, and the conversation completely dissolved from there.

What have been the bright spots? We typically spend a lot of time together as a family between activities and family trips, so without actual things to do, this has been tough. Family game night and movie night don't mean as much when your kids have been doing whatever they want for the entire day.

What have you learned about your kids since being stuck at home with them? This is an awkward development time for both ages. My youngest will cook, but only if it's a sweet treat.

What has being stuck at home with them taught you about yourself as a parent? I don't think I'll ever get my needs met by them. My biggest need would be for them to contribute around the house so I could have more free time to pursue things I like to do. Instead, I feel like I'm stuck in a rut of working my job, cooking, cleaning, and doing other household chores.

Bianca

Age: 40

Occupation: Registered nurse

How old are your kids? 5 years old and 18 months

What is your typical daily schedule? The only thing typical about our day is that we are up by 7:30 am, sometimes earlier, and that I make meals and snacks all day long. We are outside in the backyard a lot. Thank God for summer. When it's over, we're screwed.

When you need a break from your kids, how do you distract them? My daughter naps, but there is no break from my 5-year-old son. I'm trying really hard not to allow too much screen time, because his behavior turns terrible when he's on the iPad for too long.

What is your sanctuary? I literally do not have one. By the end of the day, I am so stressed and burnt out. This is a really unsustainable way of life for families with small children.

What do your kids do that drives you the most insane? Ask for a snack 10 minutes after they just ate a cooked meal, then ask for a snack about 10 minutes after eating a snack.

What's been your worst freakout so far? I have a good freakout at least once a day, it seems. I lose my cool with my son and cuss, which I hate doing, but he really sends me over the edge.

What have been the bright spots? I feel so bad but, God, it's really hard to see any bright spots. We are all really struggling with the burden placed upon us right now. My son is supposed to start virtual kindergarten, which I know will be a true disaster for him. My daughter looks at other people like they are aliens.

What new family activities have you adopted or resumed? We're just trying to survive the day in my house.

What have you learned about your kids since being stuck at home with them? While I always knew my son was probably a neurodiverse child, I will need to get a pediatric specialist to evaluate him. He's had all of his favorite things stripped away from him, and it's brought out the worst in his behavior.

What has being stuck at home with them taught you about yourself as a parent? That I have a lot of unresolved childhood trauma and PTSD as an adult from two traumatic, tragic early deaths in my life. I thought I had done a decent job of working through them, but it turns out, not so much.

Brenna Bell and family.

Brenna Bell

Age: 45

Occupation: Environmental lawyer

How old are your kids? 15 and 11. My housemate has a 5-year-old son, and I have two other housemates, who are 26 and 31.

What is your typical daily schedule? When school was in session, we had more of a schedule. Summer is a little more flexible since we're not focused on distance learning to the same extent.

When you need a break from your kids, how do you distract them? My screen boundaries have become more lax. Minecraft is more of a fixture in my son's life than I might want, but it helps him connect through others. We also live on a farm, so there are endless tasks to do.

What is your sanctuary? Riding my bike to work used to be that time for me, but then I started working from home. I just started going into my office and working there alone one day a week, and it's been awesome to have the long bike commute again to be alone and to move my body.

What do your kids do that drives you the most insane? My son wants constant attention and wants to talk about the things that are really important to him—Minecraft, Legos, space—way more than I want to.

What's been your worst freakout so far? My worst freakout happened because my partner was traveling in Scotland when the pandemic blew up and came home early, but my housemates were really freaked out about him living in the house, so they wanted us to stay somewhere else for two weeks and quarantine. But all our goats were pregnant and I'm the main goat herder, so we couldn't and it was all sorts of drama. It ended up with my partner, son and me living in a tent in the meadow for two weeks in March when it rained every day. I kinda freaked out a few times then.

Liz

Age: 45

Occupation: Former pastor, now unemployed

How old are your kids? 8 and 3

What is your typical daily schedule? Breakfast at 7:30. Play, feed bunnies, arts and crafts, lunch, walk around the neighborhood, play, chores, dinner, TV or games, bed. We go somewhere new every Thursday. On Friday nights, they get to stay up late with glow sticks and watch Dinosaur King.

What is your sanctuary? My wife works in a shed in the backyard. I hide in the stairway and drink.

What do your kids do that drives you the most insane? Constant mess-making. Also, asking Alexa to fart or tell fart jokes.

What's been your worst freakout so far? The preschooler put the smoke detector in the toaster oven and turned it on. It didn't make any noise, it just caught fire.

What have you learned about your kids since being stuck at home with them? They are smarter and fiercer than I am.

What has being stuck at home with them taught you about yourself as a parent? I'm a weakling.

Brianna Wheeler

Age: 41

Occupation: Writer

How old are your kids? 5

What is your typical daily schedule? Daily in-home applied behavior analysis therapy for my son, and then either a walk in a park or a scenic drive.

What is your sanctuary? My basement weed station.

What do your kids do that drives you the most insane? Oof. My kid is autistic, so that's maybe a loaded question—probably makes me rethink reality and question how I thought brains worked.

What have been the bright spots? My 5-year-old son learning how to apply eyeshadow after months of sneakily absorbing my constant stream of Drag Race content.

What new family activities have you adopted or resumed? We kinda already lived in our own isolation bubble because of our son's social development, so not much has changed really.

When you leave the house, where do you go most often? Either nature or Burger King.

What have you learned about your kids since being stuck at home with them? I've learned that my kid has probably absorbed more knowledge than I can comprehend, and that development is not a straight line.

What has being stuck at home with them taught you about yourself as a parent? I don't know what the fuck I'm doing, but neither does anyone else.

Margaret Seiler

Age: 44

Occupation: Managing editor at Portland Monthly

How old are your kids? 11 and 8

When you need a break from your kids, how do you distract them? Tell them to go outside, take a walk around the block, go pick up the apples that have fallen from our neighbor's tree.

What is your sanctuary? Delivering beer for my husband's brewery on weekends.

What's been your worst freakout so far? I haven't really freaked out yet. I've been mad and sad a lot but not freaked out. My daughter's worst freakout might have been when I told her all the Halloween plans she'd been making since last Nov. 1 are not going to happen.

What new family activities have you adopted or resumed? We've tried to do a family reading time, sort of like the Drop Everything and Read sessions I did in elementary school in the '80s.

What have you learned about your kids since being stuck at home with them? I've realized what a generational and cultural bubble they're in. My son and I watched Girls Just Wanna Have Fun, and I had to explain Catholic school, country clubs, and teen dance television shows.

What has being stuck at home with them taught you about yourself as a parent? It hasn't taught me anything new but has confirmed that I really need to be alone sometimes.

Nat West

Age: 42

Occupation: Cidermaker

How old are your kids? 16

What is your typical daily schedule? Our daughter is unschooled, so very little has changed for her daily schedule except online classes where she used to have in-person.

When you need a break from your kids, how do you distract them? Our daughter has been very independent from an early age, being an only child and being unschooled, so she hasn't had very much adjustment with quarantining. She picked one friend from a relatively early date to co-quarantine with, extending our "bubble."

What is your sanctuary? We watched every season of Criminal Minds—299 episodes—since the quarantine started.

What do your kids do that drives you the most insane? I've been able to watch her eating habits more than pre-quarantine, and I'm pretty ashamed of what she eats.

What's been your worst freakout so far? We had a couple COVID-positive tests at work, so that hasn't been fun.

What have been the bright spots? Cooking a lot more. Protests have actually been really encouraging to me.

What new family activities have you adopted or resumed? Criminal Minds during dinner—but now that's over, so we are floundering a bit.

What have you learned about your kids since being stuck at home with them? We have gotten a lot closer. Last year, I traveled 45% of the year, and this year zero, so that has helped a lot. We've actually become even closer because of the time spent at the protests.

What has being stuck at home with them taught you about yourself as a parent? I really like being her dad and would choose this over other options if given the chance.

Sasha Ackler

Age: 54

Occupation: Data application manager

How old are your kids? 23

What is your typical daily schedule? I work and my child works.

When you need a break from your kids, how do you distract them? Text them and yell.

What is your sanctuary? I needlepoint and read.

What do your kids do that drives you the most insane? He leaves glasses in his room and won't do a thing I ask.

What's been your worst freakout so far? When he showed up hungover on my birthday.

What have been the bright spots? Watching him succeed in his first real job.

What new family activities have you adopted or resumed? Baking.

When you leave the house, where do you go most often? Grocery store and pet food store.

What have you learned about your kids since being stuck at home with them? He is driven to succeed.

What has being stuck at home with them taught you about yourself as a parent? I got lucky and I'm proud of the tools I gave him to deal with his ADHD.

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