Help Me, I’m Trapped! Boundaries While Social Distancing
Rev. Shelton D. Davis, M.Div., M.A., LCMHC, NCC
Clinical Director, Sanctuary Counseling Group
If you have been social distancing for more than a week, the “snow day” mentality has likely worn off for you—that feeling that we all get when we get a day off for the weather, as if it’s a day out of time, lost to work and given over into fun and adventure. For the last few weeks, we have been hit with the sobering reality that these days are long and we are not quite sure when they will end. Many among us are used to going to work every day, surrounded by co-workers, doing our jobs, and coming home to our families. Others have become accustomed to working in our quiet homes, alone, just connecting to the rest of the world through conference calls. But these last weeks have moved many of us back into our houses and apartments, forcing us to create office spaces out of dining and living rooms, turning many parents into online support teachers, and shifting our shopping routines from catch-as-catch-can into an as-needed-hold-your-breath-and-rush-through-the-store sprint. No matter what our pre-COVID routines were, many of our worlds look drastically different from the way they were a few short weeks ago.
For almost everyone, this has strained our coping mechanisms. While most folks are feeling grateful for their loved ones, those same folks seem to be ready to pull their hair out on occasion, at the seemingly boundaryless environment that social distancing has created. In the spirit of coming out of these trying days with our familial relationships intact and perhaps even stronger, let’s look at some ways we can observe healthy boundaries while keeping ourselves physically safe:
Schedule daily time for outdoor exercise on your own. While a family walk is another great idea, it may not afford you the peace and quiet you are seeking. Enjoy both—after all commuting time is nonexistent if you are working from home!
Remember, just because you and your spouse or children are all in the same place, that does not make them your constant sounding boards for work-related stress. Bombarding one another with work problems with no other outlet only traps the strain in the house. Call a friend from work or video chat with them to relieve these pressures and let your family off the hook for coping with what someone did or did not do at work.
The cleanest person in the house may be working overtime right now. He or she may feel the need to tidy, clean, or launder all the time to keep the family safe, but this may lead to some resentment if everyone else is less concerned. Make these tasks team efforts instead. This is a great time to teach kids, often too preoccupied with sports, school, and other extracurricular activities, some life skills like cleaning a bathroom, doing the laundry, or cooking a simple dish.
Scheduling of time is one of the best boundaries we can set, especially as we struggle to remember what day it is in a COVID-cancellation world. Set your alarm (later than usual is okay, remember, no commute!), get up at the same time each weekday, set the kids to working on their schoolwork at the same time, take a snack break, send them out to play, and maybe even teach them the responsibility of coming in at an appointed time for dinner, showers, bed. Kids and adults thrive in well-established routines—ask any 4th grader what she is normally doing at school at a given time and she will often rattle off her precise location and activity. Setting a family schedule sets expectations and helps to create calm in the midst of a chaotic time.
Try to make the best of this situation by creating special times each week for different parts of your family unit. Parents need a date night, so, if your kids are old enough, let them have a kids’ movie night while you and your spouse enjoy a quiet dinner alone. If your kids are little, put them to bed early and enjoy a dedicated evening of star-watching together. In the same vein, enjoying dad/daughter and mother/son times is precious and rare. Girls’ nights between moms and daughters and boys’ nights for fathers and sons can make the mundane of our new normal feel special and exciting. Choose activities that help you to enjoy the person you are with the most—games, puzzles, arts/crafts, makeovers, playing ball, camping in the backyard.
While online worship has been a great way to connect to others’ in our congregations and as families, each individual in a family is likely connecting to God in different ways and feeling different things in these novel times. Find times daily to carve out to do devotions one-on-one with God. Let kids do the same by helping them find online or paper resources for devotions. Writing out feelings as a part of prayer may be one way for each family member to feel connected to God in the midst of our social distancing.
Lastly, challenge your family to help others by writing letters to those most impacted by the isolation orders. The vulnerable include those in assisted living and skilled nursing facilities who cannot leave their rooms, the elderly who are trying not to go out at all, and those with other health conditions that make them more susceptible to the novel coronavirus. Letters from children or adults allows for individual time in your home and creates a bond with someone else who craves human connection.
Above all of this, we must look within ourselves to find the grace of forgiveness as we use all of our resources and perhaps create new coping mechanisms for dealing with adversity. May we all be blessed by God with hearts of love, spirits of patience, and souls filled with hope to create the space we need to stay together.
