I think maybe I can speak to this in a way that will be hard to hit me for so I’m gonna say it for those that ain’t in a position:

Do y’all have any idea how hard it is to live with a mental illness in 2020 and how much harder it is with kids that you’re pretending normal for?

I know we’re all supposed to be only parents instead of whole people because America has a really odd relationship with family structure and society and whatnot but it’s lots of folks that were gutting out the spring and making it through summer

Like I got my fucking eye shot out and I live in a house with more people than spac because coronavirus and there is. Not. Room. For. Me. To. Grieve.

Much less in front of my children

And lemme tell you getting shot is fucking traumatic, I’m pretty fucked up about it

Ngl I was hoping that despite all evidence to the contrary, we would collectively pull our heads out or at least shut down interstate travel or something so my kids could have a taste of normal and I could just have room to breathe in

But instead I live in a hotspot state and I’m gonna keep my fucking game face on and we’re gonna home school a couple kids and pretend this is all normal cause the kids ain’t got space for the grief for grownups; them seeing us scared is the worst kid thing

It just seems like a lot of the analysis about reopening schools is “GOP bad” and that absolutely does not take into account all the factors for any given family

All I’m saying is I have cried precisely twice in the last month and a half and both times someone immediately rocked up because it was five adults and two kids in 1200 square feet and I have to think it’s not fucking healthy for me to be processing this with my game face on

And there’s parents out there with way heavier mental loads, with kids who need things the parents simply can’t provide without the structures we’re all mostly legally obligated to make use of

Like “school” isn’t just a question of grade-appropriate education or of recess with friends. These days plop an average elementary aged kid down with a phone they’ll have a guild in minutes.

It’s a lot of things, stop making it just plague or not plague.

It should go without saying but doesn’t because this is Twitter; the previous frank discussion about the realities of dealing with trauma is not an invitation for advice on how to deal with said trauma. Please assume I did not say everything relevant in ten tweets.