When Easton barged into the house after school on Monday, I was in the kitchen, shaking a bottle of barbecue sauce.
“Is that medicine for the coronavirus, Mom?”
Granted, it was an oddly shaped bottle — but it was clearly time to have a conversation.
Certainly everyone else is talking about coronavirus. My email is inundated with updates and reassurances from everyone from fitness studios and salons to retail giants and restaurants. They all say the same thing: Extra sanitizing precautions, we’re washing our hands, you should wash your hands. This isn’t rocket science, people. But COVID-19 hysteria is real.
I know you’re inundated too. And I’m just a mom, not a psychologist or a doctor or a “qualified professional” in any way. So I won’t tell you how to talk to your kids — I’ll tell you how I talked to mine. Maybe there’s something here in my words that will be helpful to you and your family too.
How I’m Talking to My 1st Grader About Coronavirus
I asked him if people were talking about it at school, and what they were saying.
This was the gateway question … my “mom” version of tell me everything you know. Easton had a bunch of (highly inaccurate) facts to spout off. He told me he heard it came from a bat in China and it had killed 200 people in Illinois already.
I corrected the misinformation.
As soon as he started rattling off statistics, I stopped him and told him that anyone talking about it, especially adults, needed to get their facts straight. I told him that on Monday in Illinois, only 11 people in Illinois had it and no one had died in our state yet period.
Then I told him what we do know.
I kept my explanation short and simple:
Coronavirus is a new sickness that’s like the flu that started in China and has spread to many people all over the world because it’s easy to spread by coughing and sneezing. Yes, it’s in Illinois. No, it isn’t in our school yet. But it might be soon, and that’s why we have to be so careful to wash our hands.
I let him ask questions.
“Is coronavirus fatal, Mom?” I didn’t even pause in my response. I told him yes, it is sometimes fatal. But then I was equally quick to reassure him:
- It’s not fatal to MOST people. Most people are sick for awhile, like when I had the flu, and then they get better.
- You’re not going to die from it. It’s very rare for kids to get coronavirus and kids are healthy enough to fight it off and get better.
- I’m not going to die from it and either is Dad or anyone you know. If our family gets sick, we’ll go to the doctor, we’ll stay home and rest lik e we’re supposed to, and then we’ll get better.
- The people who are dying from it are already sick or much older, like Great-Grandma Esther. Grandma Esther isn’t going to get it, most likely, but people like her, or people who have other illnesses, might.
“Isn’t there medicine you can take to make you better?”
What I said:
Some germs have medicine that kills them and others don’t and this is a germ that doesn’t. But, just like the flu, most people who get sick need to rest and drink lots of water and stay home until they get better. There are medicines that can make you feel better while you have it, but there’s no medicine to make it go away.
I was honest.
What I said:
We don’t know everything yet and it’s changing very quickly. There are a lot of people who are really scared right now, including a lot of grownups, because it’s scary when things are unknown. But there are lots of people learning more every day, and learning more helps us to be less scared. You don’t need to worry unless I tell you it’s time to worry.
I told him what we can do as a family.
What I said:
So we’re going to wash our hands even more than we already do, with soap, for the right amount of time. Sing “Happy Birthday” twice. We’re going to use a lot of hand sanitizer. We might not get to do as many fun things for a few weeks so we avoid germs. Some of our activities might get cancelled. And schools might end up closing, so you and your brother would be home with Dad and I. If anyone doesn’t feel well, we’ll go to the doctor. But we don’t know any of those things yet. We just have to wait and see what happens.
I made sure he knows he comes to me with questions.
These conversations have taken place over the course of the week, because I told him from the beginning if he was worried about anything or wanted to know more, he should ask me first. And some of these have come up in the morning on the way to school (my time with E) or before bed (#DoneWithFun Daddy’s time).
And then I changed the subject.
First, I made sure he knows I believe we are going to be OK. And then I dropped it. Because informing your children can empower them but dwelling on it endlessly causes more anxiety. I’ve tried to limit my adult conversation and news updates to outside his earshot so that he isn’t inundated the way we are as grownups. I know all the swirling headlines and rumors are only making me more anxious … I can only imagine how it would be magnified in the mind of a 7-year-old.
I’ve seen the phrase “unprecedented times” thrown around in a few COVID emails recently. I’m not sure I’m ready to take it that far, but there is a new reality right now that’s sobering. I didn’t think I’d be explaining what a pandemic is to my 7-year-old. But I believe in being open and upfront with my kids as much as possible, even about hard topics. And I want them to see that their parents approach these new uncertain times without the overwrought hysteria that has our country in its grip right now.
Want more resources? If you haven’t seen this yet, here’s another awesome tool for explaining coronavirus to kids. It’s an illustrated comic that shows them exactly what they want to know, and its available in a downloadable format that you can print out too.
So, what did I tell my 4-year-old?
Not much. All he needs to know is that there are lots of yucky germs right now, so we have to wash our hands a lot and use hand sanitizer to make sure we don’t get sick and miss fun things like birthday parties.
Making a connection to the direct impact on his fun has made him more amenable to copious hand sanitizer … as long as it comes from this zombie apocalypse bottle (make your own if you’re among the lucky with hand sanitizer available!)
I’ll level with you: It’s getting weird out there. Every day is a question … do we continue with life as usual, or give in to the panic and start a self-quarantine? Every hour, something new is developing, and it’s ever harder to resist the media-fueled mania.
For me, the COVID-19 hysteria is forcing me to live in the moment. Like, really really present, in a way that I’m guilty of not being often enough. Because we literally don’t know what’s coming tomorrow and we can’t control what happens in the big world out there.
But the moon is still above us every night and the sun keeps rising every morning. So I’m keepin’ on keepin’ with life as we know it, until I can’t anymore. Girl, wash your face. And your hands. And hug your kiddos every morning and every night. We’ll get through this, but it might be a wild ride for a little while.
Are you talking to your kids about coronavirus? What are you saying? Share with me on social media @neverdonewithfun, pleeeeease! We are all just feeling our way when it comes to parenting through the hard topics, and I would love any insight you can offer me. Be well, mamas.
