Trapped Inside With a Baby During the Pandemic
Words by Christine Carpenter
The guilt gnaws at me while my nearly eight-month-old son, performing barrel rolls on his foam vintage rug-inspired play mat, gnaws at the tattered tassels of my kilim rug that spill out from underneath. Born in June during the pandemic, my son knows very little of the outside world and therefore I feel a constant pressure to be entertaining him. The heat of shame rises to my cheeks for not playing with him in this moment. I feel the weight of his olive eyes that match mine, anchored on me and soon as I meet his gaze, the corners of his lips upturn into a Cheshire grin; he does not hold anything against me. Of course he doesn’t, he is not even a year old. Instead, he babbles, asserting himself, letting the world, our world (right now just his father, my parents, brother and his family, and myself), know who he will be. All the while I am doing the same thing; attempting to carve out who I am, or what I will be in my next endeavor. Our parallel lives share the commonality of defining ourselves and the paradox of attempting to reach out in a pandemic world staying home.
Ten months have passed since I last stepped foot in my New York City office. Nearly a year since I kissed my boss and friend of over ten years on the cheek on a Thursday evening, embracing an impromptu long weekend. Never did I imagine that I would not return to that office again, nor did I know the magnitude of how the pandemic would reshape the state of the world and completely upturn mine.
I am a new mother at the height of a global pandemic. Motherhood in conjunction with quarantine is proving to be all about my state of mind. I sift through the tangles in my consciousness in an attempt to de-clutter, unpacking the complex channels of my mental state. This virus has caused so many of us to reflect and much positive change to ensue. But navigating with a newborn? This is a ride I did not expect nor sign up for—and yet, here I am. After a major shift in gears from commuting to Manhattan for nearly a decade in the city’s fashion industry, to feeding, diapering and entertaining an 18-pound little human, I find myself forced to slow down. This job is far more exhausting than my former product development position, however, the pace is much different. No longer am I racing to make the 5:27 train. Instead, I balance my baby on one hip and an exhaustive list of potential projects and creative pursuits race through my mind. In the absence of my commute, I have recouped four hours back into my day, and with the addition of a newborn, I have subtracted what feels like 27. I have a freedom I’ve never known before, and yet, with COVID numbers climbing, I am trapped inside. Or safe inside. It’s difficult to determine which is my truth from moment to moment.
New York has just been doused with snow; a major two-day blizzard. I can’t remember the last time we’ve been blanketed under this much white, though it does not feel much different than the last year of being hunkered down. It used to be a novelty to be “stuck” at home; we would load up on groceries, cozy under blankets and drink wine. The first few months of quarantine did feel like that (minus the wine, of course, as I was six months pregnant). Now every day has a familiarity and the irony is that it is equally suffocating and liberating.
My son, Cole, and I awake each day in mine and my husband’s king-sized bed, his long, narrow feet that resemble his father’s in tiny form, kick me in the ribs. We’ve worked the first half of his night in the crib and he co-sleeps with us after his five o’clock morning bottle. I groan with exhaustion, planting kisses all over his little heart-shaped face and scoop him into my arms. I pad into the bathroom where he attempts to wrestle the toothbrush out of my hands and we both laugh. We make faces at one another in the mirror before heading downstairs where I promptly brew my first cup of coffee and prepare his breakfast; pureed fruits mixed with baby oatmeal. “Alexa,” I command; “turn on the baby lullaby station” and The Chicks’ “Lullaby” serenades us both. I sing along, pausing only for sips of lukewarm coffee and to wipe his apricot-smeared cheeks. Our day exists within the four walls of our home; beyond the door is a masked-faced world during the peak of a global health crisis. When I take pause to allow that fact permeate my psyche, I feel paralyzed.
I love the safety of home. I am forever a homebody, beginning with the security my parents established from when I was a little girl. Being home always feels like such a comfort and when I was working and commuting long hours, I relished my weekends cozied in bed, rarely wanting to socialize much outside of our house. The first few months of the pandemic, I did not pine for my long commute or miss my day-to-day routine, instead I reveled in the extra hours bequeathed to my husband Doug and I, time he begged me to take before our baby arrived—time I refused to take willingly because I worked for a two-man operation and I was too needed there. This has been the gift of quarantine. Over the last decade, I shelved my high value on family time and it had been given back to me in a glimpse between the stay-at-home order followed by my maternity leave.
My son’s arrival in the summer was a major relief; I spent pregnancy frightened of what was to come, consumed with the fear of childbirth, working diligently in therapy attempting to come to terms with the fact that eventually the little human I was growing would have to make his way out. I was in mental hell; my brain ablaze with every potential complication and worry I could dream up (or Google). Even though I am not typically the type to reach out, I signed up for an expectant mother’s group out of desperation. This was promptly cancelled when the world shut down. It felt like I had been disconnected from every resource I sought out for comfort.
When I first felt the weight of my seven-pound, one-ounce baby on my chest, I was heaving sobs of joy—and relief. It is incredulous that now, eight months later, I am able to count his public outings on one hand. Or that when he accompanied me to Trader Joe's over the summer when COVID numbers were down, I hyperventilated, my forehead pressed on the hot steering wheel once all of my groceries were loaded into the car. I had a taste of the freedom of a trip outside our home and the thought of either of us getting sick was debilitating. At some point I imagine every new mother must have a sense of feeling trapped; leaving the house with a newborn is akin to training for an Olympic sport, however, not having a choice to leave, or the only choice being to potentially expose your vulnerable baby to a serious virus leaves little room for the freedom of choice.
And yet there is a freedom of mapping out my day, constructing it however I wish. For the first time in my life, every decision, large and small, is left up to me, all mine. I thought I would be overwhelmed by this and struggle to care for a baby, but it has proven to feel very intuitive and freeing. While most days we don’t leave the comfort of our home, it feels incredibly autonomous to be responsible for all of his needs while simultaneously remodeling my own new lifestyle. I am a blank page, awaiting the narrative of my story to unfurl before my eyes and underneath my pen.
Today, almost a year since that fateful day in March, we are gathered around our inherited solid maple kitchen table; my baby’s feet in constant motion in his high-chair, Doug spooning mango, banana and kale puree into the little guy’s longing O-shaped mouth, me onlooking with adoration of their budding relationship from the adjacent chair. These walls, though on occasion confining, house all our happy memories, each a supporting beam of the framework of our story. The hallway where Doug dropped to one knee with an engagement ring, the floors that held a mattress before we had a bed to sleep on, the doorway we walked through for the first time as a family of three. I am liberated with the knowledge that I will be home to raise my son, a decision I never would have made on my own, one that was chosen for me by way of a pandemic. These feelings of entrapment are present and they are real, and yet, I am eternally grateful for silver linings; my family became complete when the world took pause.
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About the Author:
Christine is a new mother who lives with her husband and baby boy in New York. She is passionate about composing and sharing her creative journey through her words, creative projects like knitting and home DIY and loves to read in her free time.
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