We Can’t Do it All

No matter how hard we try, we can’t do it all. This is something mothers have been aware of for many years, but it was amplified during the COVID-19 pandemic. Almost everyone was affected by the halting of in-person schooling. The family life dynamic drastically shifted, and many people found little margin to adapt in a healthy way. Now there was even more to manage! One mother said, “You kind of decide what’s important in the moment and you can focus on that and do a good job with that, but something else has got to give, and something else will” (Anna North, “The Parental Burnout Crisis Has Reached a Tipping Point,” Vox, December 8, 2020, https://www.vox.com/22060380/covid-parents-burnout-schools-closed-kids-pandemic). The adage “You can do anything, but you can’t do everything” rang true in the new reality of pandemic life.