The Worst And The Best of the Pandemic


Fig. 1. Parents are adjusting to working from home while 
also developing a homeschool program for their children,
Getty, 19 Mar. 2020, Insider.com 

        Today’s blog is going to be about an interesting program called Latino USA, which runs on 90.9 FM Sundays nights from 6:00 - 7:00 p.m. The segment entitled “The Parents Are Not Alright” was live on October 6, 2020, however, I listened to it on October 21, 2020. The hosts of the program were Maria Hinojosa along with Jeanne Montalvo. Jeanne was the one in charge of an interview with three guest speakers. The purpose and topic of the program were to virtually gather with parents from different locations in the U.S. and talk about their experiences during this hard time of the Covid-19.

        I learned that each of us is experiencing different hardships depending on our occupations, if we have children, and even vary according to the school year in which they are. I liked how despite those changes in lifestyle they found positive things about it, such as spending more time with their family or just having dinner together. On the other hand, I didn’t like the fact that children are growing without the basic socialization and the learning coupled with that. However, I’m aware that this is a forced change, and probably a new normal that we must get used to.

Fig. 2.  Graph showing the time spent doing housecleaning between    
parents and non-parents, Daniel Cox, JSTOR Article,  1 July 2020.     

        An article found in the JSTOR database is related to this topic of parenting during the pandemic, and curiously it is entitled almost the same as the radio program, “The Parents Are Not All Right: THE EXPERIENCES OF PARENTING DURING A PANDEMIC”. This article has many data and percentages comparing different types of households, and how each of them is facing the pandemic. Adults with children under 18 years old had to find a way to take care of them in addition to their full-time jobs. As we can see in the image above, non-parents, and parents without children at home had to spend fewer hours cleaning their houses. Thus, they also have more time for their own, leisure, or even reading for pleasure. However, there’s no difference in the time dedicated to exercise between these two groups. Mental health is another topic from the article, and it is mentioned that parents experience feelings such as loneliness, isolation, exhaustion, being overwhelmed, and depressed to a greater degree. I chose this article written by Daniel A. Cox and Samuel J. Abrams because it is highly related to the segment in Latino USA, and could even be considered a supplement in order to have more information.

        I found this topic very interesting and I wasn’t aware of all those differences among groups and households surviving to the changes of Covid-19. I agree that there are some positive things about this situation, and I think that we must focus on that in order to avoid those feelings of loneliness and depression. I can relate this to my theme for the semester because each of us has a unique environment inside our houses. Some members of a family may love it because they can spend more time together, and others may feel overwhelmed and stress because they cannot do their job without distractions. I personally tried to find the way to view this as a positive thing, I can spend more time with my family, and even my dog feels better because there’s someone home basically all the time. Like any other change in life, this is about adaptation and getting used to it. Finally, here is a great video by UFHealth that talks about some tips for parents during this pandemic:

Video: Tips for parents during COVID-19 crisis, UFHealth, Youtube, 7 April 2020.



Works Cited:

Cox, Daniel A., and Samuel J. Abrams. The Parents Are Not All Right: THE 
    EXPERIENCES OF PARENTING DURING A PANDEMIC. American Enterprise 
    Institute, 2020, www.jstor.org/stable/resrep25361. Accessed 21 Oct. 2020.

"The Parents Are Not Alright." npr capradio, 06 Oct. 2020, 
    https://beta.prx.org/stories/341179. Accessed 21 Oct. 2020.

UFHealth. "Tips for parents during COVID-19 crisis" Youtube, 7 April 2020. 
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2XzSkEvDQy4&ab_channel=UFHealth. 
    Accessed 22 Oct. 2020.

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