3 Tips for Working from Home with Kids: How Career Moms Can Manage the Chaos

Working from home has unique challenges even under usual circumstances. Working from home when your kids are all the sudden home with you, no school or daycare, is more like a circus than a work setup. BUT, that’s what a lot of us have got right now, and we’ve got to figure out how to make it work…indefinitely.

Here are 3 tips for doing just that.

1. Adjust your routines…and THEIR routines

I know, I know, we work SO hard to get them into a routine, the last thing we want to do is mess with it! If ever there was a true NEED for adaptability and flexibly, though…this is it. This is the big one. It’s time to pull out all the stops to building an environment conducive to getting some work done in your home, and if that means the kids have to adjust, too, so be it.

I’m pushing the baby to stay awake just a little longer than normal in the morning, so his morning nap runs a little longer. It will run until just about the time I should be putting the oldest down to nap. When the oldest wakes up, it will be time for the baby’s second nap.

In “normal” life, and by that, I mean, a life where you leave the house…ever, this wouldn’t be a great routine. But in quarantine times, reducing the number of kiddos awake at one time may be the difference between getting work done and not.

Be willing to change up your routines, even the ones you’ve worked really hard to create, to get though this time. Yes, there will be some extra work on the backside, adjusting back to a regular work schedule and routine, but you can’t operate on the brink of disaster 24/7 until then.

2. Change your office setup and location

If you already have a home office and it’s away from the day-to-day chaos in your home (as would typically be ideal), it’s time to pack up and move into the disaster zone. Move your computer (hopefully a laptop) to your kitchen, living room, family room, etc. Set up shop in a central location in your home, and gate off the areas you can’t see. (This is obviously for the littlest of the bunch. If your kids are older, this is less imperative.)

The fewer times you have to get up and go investigate what made that plunking noise, who is screaming, and why no one is screaming, the more work you’re going to get done. Although it’s counterintuitive, right now you want to be set up in the midst of the mess, so a quick glance will give you the answer you’re looking for.

3. Adjust your scale

Ok, you guys, this just has to be heard. I’m talking to YOU, Perfectionist Paula! You know who you are.

I’m seeing SO many social media posts from moms who feel like they’re not doing enough, not transitioning easily, and especially not teaching well enough.

Let me ask you this…if you were suddenly called in to do a brain surgery tomorrow morning, would you expect to nail it? No? Huh. What if you were required to drive a garbage truck, run a MRI scanner, or fix a down powerline? None of those professions, either? Hum.

Then how come we all the sudden expect ourselves to be homemakers and teachers?! You do understand that your kid’s teachers literally went to college for 4-6 (or more!) years to learn how to teach your kids, right?! And that many of the homemakers that we are in awe of were giving their all to learning how to do that well for years before it was a masterpiece and not a mess?  

You guys, you’ve got to start being reasonable! If what you know how to do exceptionally well is accounting, right now you’ve got to accept that “exceptionally well” is probably about 50% of your usual exceptional accounting work. (Maybe less!) And right now, that’s GOOD ENOUGH.

And on that note, if you’re an accountant, the fact that you’re also a mother doesn’t mean you magically know how to do accounting, while you teach your kids reading, while you make sure everyone’s healthy, while you somehow get groceries from the bare shelves, while you hunt down TP, while you livestream the Sunday service. Stop the insanity! These ridiculous new expectations will kill us faster than coronavirus if we don’t start giving ourselves some grace, like, NOW!

Here is the only expectation you can have for this new work from home setup: I’ll do my best. Period. If today doesn't go well, I vow to get up and try my best again tomorrow. If today does go well, but tomorrow doesn't, then I'll get up the next day and do my best then. I'll keep going.

Just continue to show up as the women that you were before corona came to town and you’ve got this, friend! I know that means you’ll get less “work” done right now (as in, traditional work). But you’re working harder than ever, and you need to acknowledge that!

I know right now you’re having to try a bunch of things you don’t know how to do, and you probably suck at most of them. I know right now there are fewer nights with nutritionally solid meals as a family at the dinner table. I know right now your family has a lot more screen time. I know right now your kids are sassing you, and telling you that you don’t do it like Mrs. Jones does! You’re failing at things faster than ever before, and rarely does a minute go by that something isn’t screwed up or not going how you hoped!

And do you know what THAT all means? That you’re trying! You’re doing your best! And in this new normal, doing your best is KILLING IT! Every woman that agrees to rise to the occasion and do her best is KILLING IT right now!

Adjust your scale, lady. Change your expectations. And for the love of all that's good, THANK your kid’s teachers!