“I’M. NOT. GOING. TO. WRITE. ANYTHING!” screams my first grader. We are an hour into virtual schooling, month 5. My half-time job waits for me to get to it at some point later today. When that will be kind of depends on how long this yelling marathon lasts. My part-time temporary teaching gig starts in a week and I’m trying to ponder the essence of my research method and how to teach it, but the yelling is making my mind numb and the words run away from me faster than my younger daughter can take a breath to continue yelling. And behind me is a torn-out shell of a room that will at some point become our kitchen. That was meant to be completed 3 months ago, according to our contractor, a year ago.

But “it’s all good…. We’ve got this.” Or so we like to say.

But the thing is, in some ways, we do by now.

After a few more rounds of yelling, the loud and angry first grader recognizes that I’m not going to rise to her level of passionate disruption and rebellion. She proceeds with a few more attempts to yell, each one slightly lamer than the previous.

I repeat internally my new mantra, “It’s okay to be angry, just don’t act it. It’s okay to be angry, just don’t act it.” And sometime alternate it with, “Just write the frigging sentence!” and other unprintable thoughts.

And then… the lesson that the past five months has taught both my daughter and me begins to emerge. She stalks off upstairs. And I… do not follow.

I do not shout after her.

I do not demand she get back down here.

I do not bribe her.

I do not threaten her ability to play on her iPad later.

I do not do anything of the things that I have tried over the past five months, engaged in multiple desperate power struggles to get school work completed. Instead, I sit and I look at the space she has created.

The space for us both to breathe.

The space for us to feel our feelings, separate from each other.

The space for us both to wish she were at school not home still.

The space to recognize that this works for our family best overall, even if not in the moment.

And the space to know that space is what we need.

I carry on with my work – now the words of my lecture flow and I write more in 7 minutes than I have all morning.

Soon enough, she comes down, eyes downcast, a sheepish and apologetic look on her face and an apology bursting from her.

We snuggle and consider the ending of the sentence she half wrote. She writes a few words and gets up to go upstairs again.

But instead of calling her back, I remember the space. I leave her be.

A few minutes later, she comes back down again. I remain calm on the outside but frustrated at our lack of progress. Doesn’t she know I have several hours of meetings to attend and work to get done? She does. Does she care? Nope – not on her radar. I just keep breathing.

“Don’t look. I have to do something.”

“Okay, I’m trying to work, so I won’t look.”

[she ferrets around for something]

“Mom, I have this for you. I wanted to give you a gift.”

The wooden tractor and bulldozer she put together in the early hours of the morning the day after Christmas are in an old box in front of me on the table. This was her favorite present – toys where she could be the carpenter, with real screws and real pieces to make a proper wooden toy. She put them together by herself, following instructions and concentrating so hard. They are her pride and joy. And now she wants to give them to me. They become the ultimate peace offering.

2 minutes later, the sentences are written, the work uploaded, and we have moved on to the next piece of work. It took 90 minutes to do what should have taken 40. But we have learned, and we got here.

It has taken us five months to get to this point. To recognize our need for space. To recognize that when the other is hurting, we cannot thrust ourselves upon each other and make it all better. We need to be alone to process, to calm, to collect ourselves, and to relaunch the interaction when she is ready.

This is what pandemic learning and life together has taught us so far.

[Submitted anonymously from a Mama in America.]