Kailey Firmin: Lockdown, kids, work – the struggle!

Hello everyone! I’m Kailey, a busy mum of three, full-time trainee engineer, part-time student and wife. I am profoundly Deaf and married to a fellow Deafie who is also an Engineer.

So, how are you all coping with lockdown 3.0? I am finding it all just simply overwhelming now! Although I imagine my situation is a little different to most people’s.

Up until Christmas we were a homeschool family having followed that way of life for seven years. Due to a change in work commitments for both me and hubby we had a family chat to discuss options.

My eldest boy – A – is 12 and middle son – H – is nine. They have never been stopped from going to school, it had always been a choice they were free to make. However, as of January our home life was due to change. I was already working a 45-hour week but Hubby was on three days, allowing him to support the boys learning the rest of the time, but not anymore.

Our local school was very welcoming when we attended a visit in December, it was a little unruly with all 5 of us plus my interpreter, but that is another story!

Anyhow, back to this lockdown. The boys were so excited to start at their new school on the 5th January… but it wasn’t to be!

The first email we had from the school was informing us about the phased return and that the secondary school students were returning on the 11th January. There was little information regarding what the kids would be doing until then?!

However, we were confident all would be clear soon. Then came the Government announcement which we only found out about from the email sent by the school saying – DO NOT SEND YOUR CHILDREN IN TOMORROW, WE WILL REMAIN CLOSED. Luckily, we picked up the email at 9.30pm – I wonder how many did not?

Anyway, the email also explained that the primary age kids were going to start lessons on the 5th as planned and they were to be delivered through MS Teams. Great! It is all under control… yet how do we log them into Teams?

I know it was not the school’s fault but all I wanted to know is how to get my boys into the swing of things as quickly as possible so they could settle in to the (albeit odd!) way of life. They both missed a day and a half of learning while their accounts were created. Yet, that was less stressful than the first day of virtual lessons.

My work hours are 7.30am – 4.30/5pm depending how long I take for lunch. After working for two hours already and now having to teach a nine-year-old how to use Teams and explain the rules the school have set about not socially communicating through the system – which all became suddenly more complicated when you have NO IDEA who the teachers are!

Never have I felt more incapable then when I was faced with three messages from two different people on my son’s account that gives me no indication of who is who other than spelling!

Now, my English is by no means great so I suddenly found myself googling names to figure out which of these may NOT be a teacher. My blood pressure was now hitting the roof and it was only 10am! Hubby emailed them for a list of teachers to give us a fighting chance… we are still waiting on that!

For me, I want my kids to do well and I don’t want them to get in trouble for missing lessons or not doing their homework. This is a much easier thing to do if I had communication from the school in my preferred language – BSL!

But I don’t even have time to think about most things as I have work too. My boss is very supportive, but, and it is a big but, I am offered the phrase “We are a goal-based company, not time based. Meaning you can be flexible when you work.” I do understand what is being said, yes.

However, I can’t help but cause myself overwhelming stress as what I take from that is “Yes you have children to look after, support, feed, stop from killing each other, BUT, as you can work evening and weekends too anytime you take out of work for family responsibilities, we expect you to work your full 45 hours around that.”

To me it feels like I am expected to either be superwoman OR kill myself trying. I know it is dramatic but is it truly how I feel. I have thought about leaving my ‘once in a lifetime apprenticeship position!’ I have looked into being furloughed for childcare reasons.

I mean, in all I have talked about, I haven’t even mentioned my youngest girl – C who is four. She should be starting her education journey at pre-school, but we haven’t been able to find a local place willing to take new children.

I did think that my eldest was pretty independent and capable, alas, no. Bless him, he thought he had done everything correctly for his assignments but had not fully submitted anything and all the dates say he is overdue for 15 items. 15! He only officially started taught lessons 4 days ago, how can he have so much already?

My son is telling me the teachers don’t know how to use the system and most of them should be due next week. Do I trust my son? What he says makes sense…. Yet surely the school would have contacted us parents to give us a heads up?

Having homeschooled my children for seven years I can openly and honestly say what we are all going through right now IS harder! I am in the dark as to what the school and teachers need from me as a parent supporting my children. I am unsure as to the expectations for my children – is simply logging into the lessons the goal? What upsets me most is I do not know how to handle the stress of juggling it all.

Am I alone in my Mummy guilt? Am I alone in feeling the school not making an effort to communicate with me in BSL? All I can say for certain is I am lost and confused and can’t help but feel increasing anxiety surrounding education and work!

Kailey Firmin is profoundly Deaf and a bilateral hearing aid user. She is a trainee Engineer and student. Learning BSL was life changing for her and now it is her preferred method of communication. She is Mum to 3 hearing children living in Shropshire.