18 The Times Magazinethat is less about what happens in our
individual lives (my husband is devoted to
our kids and would love to do more if time
permitted) and more about the fact women
are presumed to be the primary caregivers, the
flexors, the ones who have to mould careers,
if they have them, around family life.
These days I look back on the person I was
on March 10, 2020, and can only laugh at my
naivety and my utter unpreparedness for what
was to follow.
The first weeks and months of life in
lockdown were full-scale pandemonium – one
of the main reasons being neither my husband
or I had ever in our parenting lives spent so
much time with our children, especially in a
two-bedroom basement apartment with no
outdoor space.
Schools in New York went fully remote and
didn’t reopen until October, and our youngest
daughter’s nanny couldn’t continue to travel
in. My husband would work from the kitchen
counter, I’d hide in our bedroom, and I turned
our living room over to the two terrors.
It wasn’t that I didn’t want to parent my
kids, but I felt enraged that I would ever have
to contemplate sacrificing everything I’d
worked for over 15 years to achieve. I refused
to countenance that I might have to engage
myself more deeply in child-rearing. I still
shudder at the memories.
Because I was in the middle of huge work
projects, including a book and a short film, my
parenting – or complete lack of it – was truly
hideous. I made my six-year-old the babysitter.
Home school didn’t happen (I mean, obviously
not, given she was essentially substituting for
my paid help, although I did get upbraided
for this by her art teacher, whose homework
assignments I had never even bothered to
read, let alone encouraged Rose to do), and
on so many days I don’t think I even got them
dressed. I obviously paid for this when my
youngest would whip off her nappy and wee
or poo on the floor, all while laughing her
beautiful little head off.
There was the time I found them tattooing
their entire bodies with felt-tip pens, but left
them to it because they seemed so happy and
I was desperate for the 45 minutes’ peace it
was affording me – until I discovered that
washable ink does not wash off bodies. Then
there was the day my eldest figured out how
the Facebook Portal camera worked and sent
photos of her and sister to every random
acquaintance I’d ever friended on Facebook.
Which I only found out about when people
started messaging me back.
I once even let Rose comb my hair with
a kitchen fork throughout an entire Zoom
meeting I was hosting, because at least that
way she wasn’t talking and distracting me.
It was funny and feral, but wildly
irresponsible. Which I also knew, veering fromlaughter to tears (was I ruining my children?)
almost hourly, before I would pour myself a
glass of wine at 5 or sometimes 4pm. I never
even used to drink before the pandemic.
Looking back, I am certain this was my
rebellion against what I felt was the unfairness
of it all, furious with the societal constructs
that seemed so stacked against me and all
women. I remember in one moment of
madness going on an online shopping spree
during the sales – not to stock up on tracksuits,
the only thing any of us were wearing, but
instead a glamorous work dress and white
stiletto heels, which of course I’ve only worn
once, for an hour, in the comfort of my lounge.
But I needed something to convince myself
that I hadn’t lost all semblance of the old me.
Yet as the months went on and “normal
life” became the one we were living rather
than the one we had had pre-pandemic,
the unrelenting chaos was unsustainable.
Lockdown measures began to ease (although
they’ve remained consistently pretty strict in
New York); our youngest’s nanny returned,
albeit on reduced hours. Hybrid school startedup and the home school days became more
regimented and impossible to ignore. I had to
teach as well as work, alongside all the other
daily tasks, and honestly, sometimes, I have
contemplated whether I would have to quit
the job that is so beloved to me, even though
I have no desire to. A handful of weeks
ignoring my kids can be laughed off; a year
and counting doesn’t seem so funny.
I worry about the impact this year is
having on my children, especially my eldest,
Rose. Thea, the toddler, thinks it’s wonderful
that she has all her favourite people on
demand all the time. But Rose, who turns
seven in just a few weeks (her second
lockdown birthday), is struggling. I see it in
the temper tantrums that she randomly has,
in the tears she sheds at night over missing
her cousins and her grandparents (it’s now
been a year and counting since we’ve seen
them), in the nightmares that plague her
dreams most evenings and in the increasingly
frequent meltdowns about “hating her life”,
where she often articulates the same distress
I feel inside. My heart hurts for her and for
everything that I’m not able to fix.
Of course it’s not always this hard. We have
great days. The highs are intense – when we
laugh, it’s almost hysterical. And when the four
of us are together, piled up in front of a movie,
a perfect moment of happiness, I want to stop
time. To hold on to the small victories and my
children before they’re teenagers who hate
me. A strange irony.
I know how lucky I am. To have my
kids, my health, a job. My experiences, our
experiences, are merely (merely!) mentally
exhausting, not life-threatening. We don’t live
on the poverty line. I can put food in the
mouths of my children (even if it is only
processed crap they want to eat these days).
But oh my God, I miss my life. I miss
getting dressed up every day. I miss my
workspace. I miss my office on the 26th floor
of the World Trade Center in Manhattan. I
miss my commute. I miss the physical space
I had from my children. I miss how happy I
was to come home each evening and see them
again. The truth of the matter is that even
the greatest moments in lockdown cannot
cancel out the reality of the crisis, one that
so many other mothers and I are experiencing- that may take years to come back from,
psychologically, domestically and career-wise.
Sometimes I joke with my friends that
when this is all over I will need a month off.
Not to go on holiday (although that would be
welcome), but to lie in a darkened room alone,
somewhere the 2m apart rule is observed - rather than the “Let’s see how close we can
get to Mummy at all times” one to which my
children adhere – to process it all. And so I
can scream and let every last bit of repressed
rage out, just not so silently this time. n
ONE DAUGHTER COMBED
MY HAIR WITH A FORK
DURING A ZOOM MEETING.
AT LEAST SHE WAS QUIET
Pearlman at the
Scottish Fashion
Awards, 2015SHUTTERSTOCK