To not understand why people go on about the impact of Covid lockdown on children

[PrunellaModularis]

It comes up all the time on MN and I don't get it.

They had several months off school, couldn"t see their friends or grandparents or do clubs. Then lockdown ended, back to school, friends, grandparents and clubs.

How come people say "because Covid" to explain young people's behaviour.

Disclaimer: I'm not talking abouy kids in abusive families.

Ignore poll - don't know how to disable it!

I think part of the problem is because of covid parents gave kids phones and apps eg tiktok much earlier and regularly than they would have otherwise. They did this with goog intentions- to keep kids occupied and to keep in touch with friends.

But the lowered age and extended use were then hard to remove when lockdown lifted.

And we now have it being "acceptable" to spend hours on tiktok.

Controversial thread, especially involving child rearing ✅
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Nicely done OP, nicely done 😂.

It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to understand that if you tell children the world’s so dangerous they must stay inside for months and not see anyone, they get v anxious (many adults were terrified and the news was full of overrun hospitals and high deaths) and lose their social skills.

Plus, those who had them spent hours on screens doing schoolwork, socialising with friends and speaking to family members.

This makes it difficult socially and educationally when they go back into the world. Lockdowns persisted over two school years: a huge chunk of time in a child’s short life, and places like Greater Manchester were still on Level 4 when the first lockdown lifted for everyone else, so remained in lockdown for almost a year.

Not all kids could home-school, because there were no devices or Wi-Fi in the home (most temporary accommodation has no Wi-Fi) and most parents were working and couldn’t supervise them.

Not to mention all the scenarios already mentioned of kids:

• sharing beds in temporary accommodation with parents who had to go out cleaning hospitals or working in supermarkets,
• crammed into tiny flats in blocks with no outside space,
• who had to care for parents who were v v sick and
• who lost parents, grandparents and siblings to COVID or other serious illnesses, without being able to say goodbye.

Those who weren’t affected should acknowledge their privilege.

We were very lucky as I was on shared maternity leave with my husband, I had a 3-month old baby and a 2-year old toddler at the time of the first lockdown in 2020. We got on fine as we had a small garden and a small-ish house but at least not stuck in a flat. I think the only real negative impact for us was that my eldest son was introduced to more screen time - we let him play educational games on the iPad which I wouldn’t have introduced if not for the lockdowns. Before Covid he was going to classes and we were out and about, he only watched a bit of TV. Later in the same year the two went to nursery and we were able to get back to work, although there were disruptions and it was not easy getting work done with the kids around when nursery was closed.

I think it was very hard for older children or those going to university for the first time - I feel very sorry for uni students as Covid really ruined that experience.

My 3-month old baby is now 6, he is the most difficult of my 4 children but I have never linked this to the covid lockdowns as I don’t think it had an impact on my very young children. I realise we were very fortunate.

Yes, our Year 7 are shockingly behaved atm and I scrolled back in my head and they would have been in Year 1 when Covid hit - just when they were learning 'how to learn'!

It’s impacted the current Y5 and 6 even more at my daughter’s school where their reception year was disrupted.

It will have been different for everyone but I think it was particularly tough if you were very stretched for time if working alongside trying to care for & educate your kids if not a key worker or struggling for money if made redundant, not offered hours, furloughed or self employed etc

Eh?

I never vote. Thought it was daft when it was introduced. I come here to chat, not tick a box.

It was fine for DS. He didn't fall behind. But it impacted heavily on his peers in the current yr6 and that's had massive implications and secondary consequences for DS throughout the last 6 years.

But ironically CHAT famously doesn't have a voting option and has far less contentious topics on there , so that was always an option 😉.

I'm sorry for being so suspicious, I'll grab my coat.

I could have written this same thing for my DD. She also was in year 6 and missed all the leavers stuff at Primary and then started secondary at a new school basically learning online.
She became more dependant on computers and less with real life and struggled to make friends,
Not saying it’s linked but her year group also had a lot of behavioural issues throughout secondary school and she really struggled and still is, hasn’t made many friends and has a really hard time.

I'm sorry for being so suspicious

Apology accepted. This was a genuine AIBU. You should report threads threads you think are deliberately goady rather than over thinking.

During the pandemic my FIL ( DS’s grandfather) had a catastrophic stroke. I was diagnosed with breast cancer and DH ( his father ) had a stroke. All were dealt with under Covid rules so no visiting, treatment in isolation and all a bit of a shock to all of us. DS had his GCSEs cancelled and school was not normal. No work experience, years were isolated for a long time and sports suspended.
we though DS had coped well with it all but then we lost my DSis while he was in his first year at uni and everything seemed to catch up with him.
Without Covid we would have had better access to counselling and the last few years may not have been so intense for him. He hated being off school and struggled without sport as an outlet.
A lot of his friends have had anxiety problems. They quietly support each other and DS has a close network of friends who have been great over the last 12 mnths while he was spiralling down. I suspect they relate to his situation more than any adults do.
He’s made it through with the help of his current flatmates, two of whom are schoolfriends from home. They know what he’s been through. He’s also supported them through problems recently with his experience of parental illnesses.
Maybe covid has encouraged them to communicate because they were isolated for a relatively long time. They prefer to FaceTime rather than text or phone each other. And check up on each other regularly. Despite DS becoming irritable, miserable and at times antisocial they r stuck with him and we are seeing a return of the funny, fun loving laid back individual of old. It has been worrying but hopefully it has been a learning experience and he has gained coping skills for life.
We can’t teach them how to cope with loss and stress but they do appear to be resilient if a little melancholy at times. I think it has taken them a little longer than other generations to grow up because their lives were put on hold. They were stuck at 15/16 for too long, at 21 they are still acting like teenagers at times.

A few months inconvenience?? My husband and I both have serious health conditions. He could wfh while shielding, I had to stay at home as wfh wasn't an option for me while shielding. Our child worked in retail at that time and they were terrified of bringing Covid back to either of us. They have suffered with terrible anxiety ever since even though their dad has had Covid 4 times and I’ve had it twice (maybe three times) and they’ve never had it. My husband also had a breakdown a few years ago which affected them both badly. The long term effects on us, our child and our wider family have been awful, it’s no wonder so many kids are now struggling to get back to some kind of normal

Children are impressionable and change over a period of months. Whatever their age, lockdown meant they missed out on 'normal' experiences. They didn't interact with anyone outside their immediate household. Some ages and some children have been less affected long term. But I doubt many benefited from the isolation.

@Crwysmam - that's good news about your son. What I've noticed about my DD (21) and her friends (large group, mixed sex) is how much they care about one another. They've really got each other's backs.

You sound unbearably smug about how lovely your life is

Because the effects are still there. It depends on the age of the child who bad the effects are. I know the children leaving primary who are now 17 were very badly effected. Also those starting primary so the year 5 and 6 now. I only know those years effect due to personal experience.

Lock children and teenagers inside. Give them screens. Everyone wearing masks and washing hands. Rolling doom news. Missed education. Missed transitions. Whole developmental periods stunted. Weird ‘bubbles’ and social distancing when they eventually do go back to school. Kids losing loved ones. Anxiety the norm. Doing everything online now completely normalised.

What could possibly go wrong? 🤔

My family weren’t particularly affected, but it was and still is, clear to me that a lot of people were. I remember noting how often I was seeing women who looked anorexic in the aftermath as well as being aware that a lot of children had completely missed out on key moments at school like developing formative skills in the early years. My dd who was 16 at the time missed out on graduating high school.

We are a ND family so we like our own company but one of my friends really struggled not being able to see people and I still remember her phoning me in tears - I really felt for her.

My eldest is autistic and was built for lockdown, he was quite happy about the whole situation and isolating comes naturally to him.

My youngest didn’t cope as well. She developed anorexia and collapsed then was taken to hospital as a result because we didn’t know she was starving herself at the time. Mentally she’s never really recovered and I believe lockdown enabled her ED to get to the point it did.

Lots of children in my area couldn’t do online classes due to not having enough devices at home to enable them all to access it and subsequently they fell behind. A lot of people in my area rely on free school meals and it was tough for the parents when they were suddenly home and struggling to feed them because furlough hadn’t kicked in.

My friend is a teacher and she’s noticed the difference in kids since lockdown, she has always said that a lot of kids were different coming back. You never know what was going on behind closed doors and for lots of children school is their safe place and it was taken away from them. I think it’s incredibly ignorant to think that just because your children bounced back everyone else’s did.

I had twins in lockdown - personally developmentally I see no difference but it would really depend on how militant and anxious the parents were during that time - some went completely overboard and it’s no wonder that has had an effect on their children

When you look at the attainment data you can clearly see which are the years with “Covid kids”. The kids who missed out on reception and all the social learning. The kids who couldn’t go to nursery. It’s a horrible social experiment. My DD was lucky - she caught up academically and socially quite quickly, but others in her class (y3/4) didn’t.

Why is there a core of people who play down the effects of prolonged restrictions and always brush it off as "a few months?"
Why do they forget different parts of the country had different rules?
Why do they forget the autumn tiers?
Why do they forget the November "firebreak" lockdown?
Why do they forget everything shutting down again Jan to April 2021 and the long phasing back to July 2021.

Then the persisting organisational restrictions into 2022 affecting routines and experiences in schools, or access to grandparents in carehomes.

Why is 15 months to 2 years brushed off as "a few months" then the surprise at the generational impact which is widely and officially reported?

There was a poster upthread who made the point that it could be psychologically comforting, which was interesting. I can see that this would be especially true for those who were most vocally supportive of restrictions and perhaps calling for more at the time, especially if they hadn't realised that the decisions about lockdown were basically a choice about who to treat as collateral.

I noticed how many school parents split up immediately after lockdown ended. It is quite shocking.
I’m guessing a lot of kids witnessed/experienced some awful friction at home too.