A Shift of Emotions -

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In my household there is usually one person, my mom, who typically carries the highest load of emotional labor. Physical and emotional labor are very different things, but can also be connected, where emotional labor is caused by invisible work that is placed upon someone when they know that they are expected to get so many different things done, and if they don’t do them, they have failed.

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Before the quarantine from the Coronavirus began, my mom would carry so much emotional labor on a daily basis. From making phone calls, getting groceries, doing laundry, cleaning the house, and cooking, she does it all. However, most of the time these actions would go unnoticed by my family and I. It was never intentional for us to ignore the things that she would do for us, rather it was never talked about and we never understood the great things that she would do for us to stay happy and healthy. Carrying out all of these different jobs for the family has really affected my mom, and she would get so worn down mentally and physically due to her mind constantly running to ensure that she never forgot any small detail that needed to be done. At certain times, she would have a breaking point and express to us that she needed help and did not understand why we couldn’t see that and do some of the jobs for her. No one ever pointed to my mom and said that she was the one who had to carry out all of these jobs, but she assumed the position, and none of us ever questioned it. Her assuming the position in it of itself was

emotional labor for her because she knew that none of us would do it. This made us all slowly begin to expect her to always do these things for us instead of helping her or doing them ourselves, kind of taking her for granted.

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Throughout this quarantine, it has just been my parents and myself in the household, so we have spent a lot of time together. By spending so much time together, my dad and I have realized many of the different things that my mom does for us that we don’t normally notice in our regular lives. Since there is not that much to do during quarantine and we have so much extra time, my dad and I have started to help out my mom a lot more with things around the house. For example, my mom is the person that does all of the grocery shopping, so we expect certain foods to always be in the house when we want them. However, due to the pandemic that is going on, the grocery store has turned into a sort of dangerous place due to the virus being so contagious. With this being said, my mom has become fearful of going to the store to get us food. My dad and I noticed the anxiety that my mom was feeling at the thought of going to the store, so we came up with the idea that she uses the click list at Kroger so that she did not have to go into the store. When we brought this idea up to her, it was easy to tell how much gratitude she felt for us even noticing that she did not want to go to the grocery. However, it did not stop there, because even though we solved the problem of actually going into the store, we could still tell that she was frustrated with what food to buy for all of us. My mom would constantly ask us what we wanted from the store, but especially what we wanted for dinner each night that week. As the quarantine has gone on, we, as a family, have finally come up with a solution to get rid of the annoyance of buying groceries. We all sit down and write a list of what we want from the store and then discuss what meals we want to have for dinner that week so my mom can order everything at once. This has definitely taken a load off of my mom, and now she doesn’t buy things we wouldn’t have ended up eating.

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I talked with my mom to see what her definition of emotional labor would be, and in response she told me that she thinks it is someone who has to work and is emotional about it because they don’t like what they have to do. Her definition isn’t that far off, but it is ironic because she carries the most emotional labor I have ever seen someone carry, yet doesn’t know what it really is. After explaining to her what my definition is, she finally understood and realized that there is a name to what she goes through on a daily basis. She said that she has had less emotional labor at the end of this quarantine because others in the household have helped her out with different jobs around the house.

I have been able to tell that my mom feels much less stressed during this time because we have helped her carry the weight of everything that she does on a daily basis. When quarantine ends and things go back to normal with each of our crazy busy lives, I hope to continue to help out my mom and never forget all that she does and all of the stress that is placed upon her that we don’t normally see.

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