Covid taking away special times with kids that will never get back

[beammeupsc0tty]

It may be trivial, and i know people are going through so much worse but the longer this goes on the more I feel robbed of such a special age with my kids. Obviously we are still making the most of it and trying to be inventive with activities but i can't lie it really isnt the same and it makes me sad.

This is just a rant really there's nothing we can do as the situation is what it is. I just think my 5 year old is at such a lovely age where if life were normal, we'd be doing lots of lovely things together - bday parties, playdates, family holidays abroad, even just a fun day at the soft play without worrying about social distancing / hand santiser, being paranoid!

Obviously people going through so much worse but it just sucks sucks sucks all the same. Anyone else feel like a rant?!

It’s taken away education, and my DS will never now get the GCSE results he would have got if he’d had a proper education. He and his fellow year 11’s will be damaged by this for years to come.
He worked hard through lockdown but he wasn’t ‘taught’ , he worked through it on his own mostly.

A five year old will forget those things within a short time. Like Fipperty, I'm more worried about older teens and young adults.

I think the biggest impact is on 15-25 year olds. This is an age where typically young people have a whole host of experiences, that really are non-repeatable and they are missing things that affect their future lives.

Your 5 year old will be able to do all the things he is missing this year next year or the year after and they won't be markedly different. Plus he probably won't remember. Teens and young adults have missed out on doing things that they will never do (GCSE/A Level/Uni exams/Uni experience/End of school celebrations/gap years etc.)

fipperrygibbert ditto, my daughter too.

It will pass but it is painful walking on this journey with her

I wish England would cancel GCSE’s too.
Get them doing course work and give them a grade on mock’s and teacher assessment.

Yes, my daughter missed out on most of Y6 and all those final milestones/special events. She's now finding it harder to make friends at secondary as mixing outside of school is difficult. It does indeed suck.

Sorry i didnt mean to minimise anything else anyone else is going through. I know its not that bad for the 5 year old, god i struggled teaching him during lockdown and its only basic stuff, the damage to education for the older ones I can only begin to imagine and its so sad as no matter how hard they try there is only so much you can do without the access to teaching they should have had.

Life experiences for older teenagers and early twenty somethings too, i know what you mean, what a time I had when I was that age, time of my life in some ways!

Covid just sucks...i just wish it would all just magically go away. I keep vowing never to take these things for granted again. But I am also feeling like life will really never go back to the way it was and even if more normal we'll be in an altered state after this.

It really is so sad. Memories we can’t get back, they are children for such a short while, I agree with the PPs that teenagers do hve it worse but it’s not a competition it’s shit all round! I’m gutted about no Christmas assemblies, Father Christmas visits, birthday parties, Halloween events etc myself, it’s quite disheartening especially when you have yearly traditions that will have a permanent gap in!

I’m just grateful to have my kids in good health. There’s lots of time for parties and celebrations in the future.

I agree. My poor kids don't know whether they're coming or going with the school shirting every 5 mins for a covid case. I know it's deemed necessary but other things are really going on the back burner for this

*shutting

Yep I know it’s tiny on the grand scale of things so please don’t shout me down but all the normal nursery stuff that parents get invited to are now just children. I totally get why and I know there is so so so much worse but it still stings a little.

@justanotherneighinparadise always one!

I actually think younger children will fare the best of all of us, to be honest. In fact, many thrived particularly in the first lockdown, spending so much quality time at home with parents that they wouldn't otherwise have had. They won't remember much, but they certainly won't look at it sadly - they'll remember going for walks, baking, watching films. It's all good!

It's teens I feel sorry for the most.

My 17yo DSS is in Y13 now, and due to covid his sixth form experience has just been completely shit. I remember when I was at college, I was able to do work experience and volunteering in Y13, spent time with my mates in the library working together etc, and going into town after college, going to gigs .. loads of things, he cannot do that. His sixth form experience has been condensed to JUST doing his A Levels, and even a lot of that is stuck in his bedroom instead of being in the classroom. It sucks, and it was a really good two years for me - that he now won't be getting back.

He didn't take to working from home either, so if exams are cancelled there's every possibility he will be given grades too poor for his chosen university, so even after covid he will be impacted for years to come.

Children are disproportionately affected by lickdown. Some of it is so minor things. I'm upset at them moment of the lack of swimming lessons. Minor I the grand scale. GCSEs, a levels etc... These will always stay with them.

Sorry i didnt mean to minimise anything else anyone else is going through

You absolutely didn't - you even used the word 'trivial'. You are allowed your feelings; like another pp said, it's not a competition. I find parents with GCSE age kids (yes, a generalisation; no, not necessarily the ones on this thread) are usually the first to tell you to embrace the years of parties and days out and early childhood because it goes so quickly 🤷‍♀️

My boy is coming up for 4 and I'm going to delay him starting school to get a redo on this year, so I get where you're coming from. I feel robbed too.

OP we have a whole list of tribal things we are gutted about. And we know it's trivial, in the grand scheme of things, but it's ok to wallow a bit in your own trivial from time-to-time.

Hopefully moving forward, this time next year soft play, fireworks, nativity plays, school assemblies and all other such trivial moments will be reinstalled.

I feel you OP

I gave up work after having my son and we've spent the last 2 years going to playgroups/sensory/music/messy play classes/ swimming etc it's been a way of life and I've met friends for life along the way. It's been such a special part of my life.
Enter lockdown 1 which I was pregnant all the way through and feeling crappy I then went from all these great activities to not being able to do much at all and feel like a really crap mum these days. I'm much snappier, more stressed and anxious etc and DS (now 3) has more tantrums and seems moodier (could be age, could be the arrival of his baby sister) but I blame myself and think it's because of lockdown 🤦🏼‍♀️
I find myself getting anxious that time is running out before he has to go to school and before he gets too old to do all the things we used to do. Every night at bed time he asks what we can do tomorrow and it breaks my heart that I'm running out of fun or interesting things to say in response 😞
They are only little for such a short time and I feel like I've lost a year.
Let's hope next year is a better one 🙏🏼❤️

For everyone saying it's worse for this group of people or that. Of course it's been terrible for everyone in different ways but it doesn't take away from anybody else who has struggled.

A five year old will forget those things within a short time. Like Fipperty, I'm more worried about older teens and young adults

Agree with this to some extent - teens and young people really have been shafted - but I’m also very concerned about babies and preschoolers missing out on early socialisation and language development. There’s a finite window for that too, which will be very difficult to make up - predicting lots of extra referrals for SLT, behavioural issues etc among this group. Small children may not remember this time (thank goodness!) but there will undoubtedly be a knock on effect.

I read a Guardian article the other day about educational regression during lockdown, and apparently the worst affected group in this respect was age 7.

Yep, it's crap.

We've had to pick DD's secondary school without even an open evening to see them - a choice that will impact her future hugely. God knows how we're supposed to work up to her travelling there alone, when all the intermediate 'steps' are banned currently.

On the softer side, there'll be no last Primary Christmas concert, no final year with the class she's been with since Nursery (they've split their classes up and she's no longer with her two best friends) when they're probably going to different high schools. No Brownie/Guide sleepovers have happened at all this year, no birthday parties, no playing out with her friends for the last time they're likely to want to 'play'. She briefly got her dance classes back - long enough to sit a virtual exam. Then she missed loads of them due to two rounds of self isolating, and now they're gone again. She's 10, and her life consists of madly stressful school, as they try to compensate for the missing year, and the weeks they've been out, and the house. Her friends exist on screens. She's had no in-person company from anyone she likes of her own age since March, because we're Greater Manchester so we've never had a let up from the restrictions.

She's coping, but it's so sad watching them at school. They just don't mix anymore

I’m not sad for my 4 year old about Christmas stuff, they don’t miss what they don’t know. I’m sad for me. There aren’t many years where they are young enough for the magic and there’s a lot of days of drudgery with little kids and not many magic red letter days in return. They might not know what events they’ve missed out on but I know and I’m sad they I won’t see them enjoy their Christmas lights trip or the pantomime or to see Santa this year.

It’s not a tragedy and I’m hardly comparing my experience to the actually bereaved but I also think it’s ok to feel how we do. Most people have lost things and missed out on things and so long as you aren’t complaining about it on someone’s bereavement or homelessness thread then why shouldn’t you talk about it. The flippant “oh I’m much more worried about x and y”, (usually things that are more personally relevant to that person) is obnoxious.

I hear you, it's hard for parents, it's hard for children. I'm "lucky" in many ways, as my little one was a lockdown born baby, so she doesn't know any different! But I'm still sad for her not being able to play next to other babies, but mostly I'm sad for me, missing out on a lot of the fun and social aspects of my first (/only) maternity leave.

Oh yes OP rubbish in so many way for all of them (and us) from the littlies born during this time who couldn't be welcomed by their wider family, the small babies and toddlers who can't go to play groups/ soft play, the reception children who had to start school without their normal settling, the parties and Christmas activities and after school clubs... the older ones who had to transition to secondary or where you've had to choose a school without being able to visit.... right up to the ones who missed major exams and then went to uni to be locked up in rooms they have to pay for the pleasure of!

Don't let anyone minimise your sadness. I've said throughout that I'm so pleased that my children are old enough to understand but young enough not to be in exam years.... but even so, they have missed lots and it's OK to feel sad!

Agree, trivial in the grand scheme of things, but these feelings are all valid

@Hayeahnobut

A five year old will forget those things within a short time. Like Fipperty, I'm more worried about older teens and young adults.

I agree I have two little kids and they will be just fine. They're not likely to remember or know that they missed things. Year 6 and secondary age kids , and those with SEND will be much more profoundly affected.