A whole generation of working parents had their life turned upside down due to the pandemic. The pandemic shutdown made it so many parents had to return home to either be remote workers or be a full-time parent for the first time in their life. This may have resulted in the scarring of a generation of working parents all over the world, and today we’re going to discuss this subject in more detail.
Financial Destruction
Many working parents had to take on their jobs to keep their family financially afloat. When the pandemic hit, many working parents were furloughed or lost their jobs. This caused financial destruction as many families struggled to dip into savings or attempt to find new remote methods to make the money needed to support their families.
Added Extra Responsibilities
Not only did the pandemic shut down many working parents’ jobs, but it shut down the school. This created a spiral of double duties and time parents needed to spend with their children. No longer could they afford or send their child to daycare or school, the children were stuck at home. Working parents now had to learn how to juggle remote work while keeping their children focused on remote learning.
Making Difficult Decisions
While some working parents were able to keep their job with the opportunity to work remotely, this didn’t make life easier. Now a whole generation of working parents had to figure out how to handle their children, whom they barely spent time with before, and ensure that they were able to get a solid education during a pandemic. This led to difficult decisions, such as one working parent having to quit their job to ensure their children were taken care of.
Increased Mental Health Issues
Many studies have shown that women suffer from worrying more than men do about everyday things, such as whether they’re doing enough. This thought process of working moms is even deeper as they’ve been shown to be more concerned about their annual reviews and whether they’re going to get that raise they’re hoping for. The concerns that working parents, mainly moms, had before the pandemic, increased substantially during this time and caused an increase in mental health issues.
In conclusion, the pandemic has hit working parents pretty hard as they tried to navigate the murky waters of juggling a remote work environment with remote learning and raising children all at the same time. It may hold true that the pandemic has scared the concept of working parents for this entire generation, and we’ll have to wait it out to see just how different the family unit looks as time moves on.