Fed up with being called selfish for having kids in school

[Namechangeforcontroversy]

NC just in case

I’m so exhausted with people laying into other parents for being selfish for sending their children into school. Most of my friends ended up in tears daily, having to be furloughed and later losing their jobs and being fairly confident that having children contributed to that during the last lockdown. Parents cannot work from home effectively while homeschooling one or more children especially EYFS/KS1. These children are being failed. Parents who have important (but not key worker) jobs and who are reliant on both salaries are being thrown under a bus for months on end. I understand why the schools had to close but it’s almost unbearable on a daily basis for parents at the moment. Working every hour under the sun, attempting to keep up with home schooling, cook, clean, get some sunlight to help with MH. My standards have slipped but we still need to eat even if it’s just a sandwich for lunch and something for dinner.

Parents are seen as selfish for being anxious about living in mess, off ready meals, no time for exercise or health for weeks on end with no end point for the greater good. When did caring about your family become selfish. When did we have to think about every other person in the UK before ourselves.

I know it’s a pandemic and it’s shit for everyone. But I have to say day to day it’s got to be hardest for full time wfh parents with young children.

My three are in school as DH and I are paramedics. I see the impact of covid every day and it’s horrendous. But I also so friends who are shells of the people they once were and are weeks away from a complete breakdown. From losing jobs and their home. From their mental health deteriorating to the point that they can’t function. And that’s bloody terrifying too.

@TheKeatingFive I wasn’t necessarily saying those specific ideas... but responding to your ‘in the real world’ comment.
As I said earlier, you can’t ask people to stay at home and expect compliance without support. They need to be doing something to enable better compliance because the numbers are looking pretty scary right now.

@Lelly78

I think you are all missing the point of the OP. She is not justifying her own situation but defending others who might be categorised as "taking the piss" because they don't need the place, and trying to emphasise that we don't know what is actually happening in their lives.

Correct me if I'm wrong though!!

You are so right

Oh, it’s napqueen. I think I remember some of your posts too.

Okay, still taking this on face value though. You are a paramedic. When you are sent to treat a seriously ill patient, you do it willingly because the heart attack patient or car accident victim really needs you. Paramedics (quite rightly) complain when they are called upon to take a person with toothache or a sprained ankle to A&E because they are taking the piss. This situation is the equivalent for teaching staff. You have a genuine need for childcare because your job is essential. The stressed, tired parents who are feeling a bit low (like all of us) are taking the piss and are the equivalent of your toothache patients. Yes, they are struggling but so is everyone else. Their struggles don’t trump the needs of school staff to be safe and the NHS (your employers!!) to survive.

TheKeatingFive well what do you suggest then? Because if we carry on as things are now, covid cases aren’t going to go down and KW won’t have childcare, because the schools are half full.

You don’t think parents trying to juggle work and home schooling are already at risk of being made redundant, or even fired for not doing their job?

OP, you are the type of people the keyworker scheme was designed for.

We also qualify as keyworkers, both DH and I due to the nature of our business. Did last spring too. We made the decision that I would do my work for the business at weekends and some evenings, in order to not take up those places and keep us and our employees safer. Means that I am in charge of supervising the children with their online school during much of the day and do what I need to around them. It's not easy at times, our days are full on as we have a business to run and three DCs but it is doable so we decided that is was the right approach and would feel like we were taking the piss to use keyworker spaces in our situation. Friends in exactly the same situation have used theirs and yes, it is unnecessary I'm afraid. I'd like to get out of this situation asap so by keeping mine at home I hope I'm helping!

Thanks OP for recognising the struggles other people have with this. I wish I could make banana bread and teach my kids all day. Meanwhile in the real world my employer wants me available 12 hours a day and helping plug the £30 million hole Covid has caused us so far. Only going to get worse unfortunately.

There was someone on another thread demanding that her children should be able to go to school on the grounds that her DH was a key worker even though he was on furlough! Some people are just so entitled.

hobby

Re. Funding for better SSP (really urgently needed), more extensive furloughing, more help for business and even ... UBI is there - because borrowing rates are still low.

This is a global problem. It's not only the U.K. dealing with it, so the sums borrowed ... well, we won't be alone in that.

The thing that isn't going anywhere is the problem of the NHS.

The needs of business are very real. But the intractable problem of NHS capacity is just ... intractable.

And so some sort of solution is going to have to be found.

We're going to shoot past 100,000 deaths soon - and unless something gives, we're going to see plenty more additional deaths through the NHS not being able to provide adequate care.

🤷‍♀️ At some point, you have to accept people aren't 'breaking the rules' of 'being selfish'. They have to work, to eat, to pay the rent of mortgage. And the only way to get the figures down is to remove that need to work somehow.

£30 million is a lot, jskeyboy. Which sector are you in?

You're both paramedics? Wow, op. Thank you for all that you do!

How are you coping?

I feel very judged for using a key worker place, despite have valid reason to use it. It is just what it is and for all those people saying children should not be in school if there is a parent wfh then come and try to do my job for 1 single day and you would change your mind, not only would you realise how insanely hard some people are working (12+ hours a day barely a break, a rare cup of tea is lucky, yet supposedly within the cushty bliss of being at home). I can’t stop doing my job it makes zero difference to my work if I am at home or my workplace and if I didn’t use a key worker place I could quite reasonably be reported to social services for child neglect and quite likely my small children in A&E as they can’t fend for themselves from dawn to dusk.

If and until there is any change and a shift to the government supporting or pressurising employers to essentially “let off” more staff from doing their jobs so their children can be home there is going to be a big take up of key worker places.

But I would add that if my children were older then I would definitely keep them home, they are in school out of necessity due to their age (infants)

Personally I think one of the most important thing we all do is to stop judging other people's decisions! None of us knows what is truly going on for them personally behind closed doors.
Everyone's mental health is being tested and for everyone's sakes stop judging!!!

Closing the schools has just shunted problems from teachers to different areas of society.
Many schools are still 50% full, some 70-80%

@whittystitties

Unpopular, but you also need to come to terms with the fact that in a country where the av. life expectancy is 81, and the average COVID death age is 80+ - we do need to seriously consider whether we have to change our approach to preservation of life. It's not a nice thing to consider, but we are literally ruining the economy, and our children's education, and vaccinating as priority for a group of society who are already past their sell by date!!

Agree. But it's an extremely unpopular opinion. To some of us it's pragmatic. To others it's heartless Granny-killing.

Right I've realised that I've been contributing in good faith to a thread where OP may be a paramedic or a nurse or a teacher and her partner may be a paramedic or in construction or something else. 🙄

Some interesting points shared but maybe I'll leave it there.

@thecatfromjapan we would come under real estate but it goes a lot wider than people would traditionally think. Primarily driven by the down turn in office and retail markets.

@MH1111

Closing the schools has just shunted problems from teachers to different areas of society. Many schools are still 50% full, some 70-80%

Ours is scraping 20% if that and claiming they are too full for 2 KW parents and SENs.

At least this time the work that they are sending home has some resources and is legible, so that's a nice improvement. And I've had a phonecall this week so that's matched contact from the previous four months when they quietly got on without checking on a child with multiple SENs who submitted not a jot of work.

And they wonder why I say I'm struggling when it takes 2 hours of rumbling meltdown to do 20 minutes of work that I differentiated to make it accessible to him while also doing battle with a supposedly NT younger sibling who is also a reluctant learner.

I'm just trying to limit the damage being done to my family.

I'm not sure that 'the problem' has been shunted anywhere, certainly not away from teachers.

Teachers are are doing some combination of remote and live teaching, with all the prep and marking that involves and if they're teaching an exam year have the additional perk of not being to answer any questions that their pupils might have about how they will be assessed.

If they're on site, numbers of children are still quite high in some schools making social distancing impossible (although the DfE do say that it's only to do done if 'possible'...) thus continuing the pre-Xmas trend of schools being the main route of community transmission.

And 'the problem' hasn't shifted, it's grown. The NHS is really, really struggling and the UK recorded 1,300+ deaths today.

@compulsiveliar2019
But if other people’s decisions impact on my health or my friends’ health, surely I can judge? I don’t feel the need to die or suffer serious illness because someone else is bored having noisy children in the house and wants some peace and quiet (a reason I have seen given). It’s easier to be kind if you are sacrificing someone else.

@BustopherPonsonbyJones

Your paramedics being called out for a toothache analogy upthread was spot on.

DS (15) was a proper fucking arsehole for the first two months of Lockdown 1. When school rang about his lack of engagement in online learning, I told them and they said that he could come in to school. So I sent him.

This time I emailed straight away and said I didnt want to get into hat again and could he come in, they said yes immediately.

Then DD's school called and said that as she is a FSM kid they were offering her a place as a vulnerable child. So we discussed it and said yes (she is primary age) as her MH during the last big lockdown did a real dive. I dont care if that makes me selfish, her MH is a bigger risk to her long term than the very small risk she has from Covid.

I didnt ask, they offered.

Everybody is struggling in different ways.

Everyone is struggling trying to juggle wfh and homeschooling but not everyone can send their child in else they’d be no point in the schools being closed. Btw I am a single parent key worker and can’t get a place.

Read the threads on here from people who don’t have children and they are still struggling with all the different changes.

No one needs to worry that their child is missing out on school education when there are so many more things that can be taught at home - cooking, sewing, changing a tire, gardening, reading together etc

No one needs to worry that their child is missing out on school education when there are so many more things that can be taught at home - cooking, sewing, changing a tire, gardening, reading together etc

How are the parents working from home able to do that? If they can’t keep up with the national curriculum?

More pressure to be the perfect parent?