It was one of the highlights in an otherwise bleak year: That BBC interview when Professor Robert Kelly was candidly interrupted by one and then both of his young children while on live TV. Kelly himself seemed unimpressed by his children’s arrival, acknowledging their exuberant presence with only apologies to his colleague. But the rest of the world exploded with a bemused sense of relief. “Don’t sweat it,” all the comments, Tweets, and reshares seemed to say. “We’ve been there, too.”
And really, what parent hasn’t? Balancing motherhood and work has always been a topic with evolving answers. But doing it from home adds a layer of complexity that seems to frequently result in bloopers you couldn’t make up.
For my family, it wasn’t live TV — but it was a live classroom setting.
“Fart, flop, doodle!”
I was downstairs when I heard it.
“‘Fart, flop, doodle,’ I said!”
My 7-year-old and I had spent the previous 10 minutes trying to log on to her class’s Google Meet session, and I was coming off the adrenaline rush of trying to get it to work. Finally we were on! And then, as if on cue, my preschool daughter’s voice started booming from upstairs.
She was playing with her dolls, oblivious to the fact she was also on camera. Half-dressed, she came bounding down the stairs. “Lulu! Fart, flop, doodle to you!” It wasn’t just once in the background. Oh no. She repeated it over and over. And over.
I don’t know where the phrase, “Fart, flop, doodle,” came from. A show? A friend? Either way, an entire second-grade class suddenly got a very specific impression about the goings-on at the Casares household. It was my own Robert Kelly moment, and I had a choice. I could pretend like it wasn’t happening. I could excuse myself and sternly remove my younger daughter from the room. Or I could find the humor in this unique parenting moment.
Sheepishly, I grinned into the camera, shrugged my shoulders, and joined in the chorus of giggles.
A PANDEMIC PLUS?
If there is a silver lining to this pandemic, it may just be the wake-up call the rest of the world is having right now about how hard it is to raise happy kids while holding down a career. What caregivers have been doing forever, in other words, is now something a lot of people are discovering for the first time. The put-on-a-movie-so-I-can-take-this-call strategy. The schedule-the-Zoom-meeting-during-the-nap approach. The stay-up-until-midnight-working solution so you can spend most of the day caring for people who literally depend on you for survival.
Have I mentioned it before?
#MomsAreSuperheroines
But the real positive to emerge from this recognition is not the pat on the back. It’s the movement toward restructuring work so that it’s more conducive to family life. Big corporations, schools, small businesses — employers everywhere suddenly have more than just a moral imperative to offer flexible working conditions. They have a practical one.
The benefits of flexibility are manifold. Flexibility means parents don’t need to choose between love and duty, between family and work. In being supported in both, they can give their best to both. They can also let go of mommy (and daddy) guilt. This is an issue I address frequently because it’s so toxic, so pointless and…so pervasive. If national work-from-home movements take us one step closer to letting that go, I’m all for it.
Embracing a Growth Mindset
Of course, some days the hilarious antics don’t feel all that hilarious. Maybe you’re operating on four hours of interrupted sleep, or your toddler spilled juice one time too many. The fact is, sometimes we cry or yell instead of laugh. It happens. Honestly, when my preschooler walked in that day, I could’ve just as easily reacted with grim resignation, like Kelly, or embarrassed fluster, or even frustration. No one handles things perfectly all the time. The trick is recognizing your mistakes and then making them right.
The best way to do this? Do-overs.
- Kids are people, too. Just as you would apologize to a friend if you lost your temper or handled something badly, apologize to your kids. It doesn’t need to be long or complicated. Phrases like, “I’m sorry,” or, “I wish I’d done it a different way,” or even, “Can I have a do-over?” teach kids how to correct a social mistake.
- The benefits of modeling sincere apologies go beyond social niceties. As outlined by Carol S. Dweck in “Mindset,” learning to view imperfection as an opportunity for growth leads to more resilience.
- Let your kids see it in action even when they’re not directly involved. If you have an argument with your partner (or friend or relative) in front of your kids, be sure they also see the two of you make it right. This process of coming back together and making up is a powerful model for how to behave.
And one final tip? Just make sure you switch off your computer or device when you’re done. Then you can go back to being as weird as you want.
I know first-hand that working mom life is hard, but I also know it doesn’t have to be impossible.
Trust me. The best way to get unstuck isn’t to work harder. It’s to use a framework that gets real results, no matter what area you need to tackle first.