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 As a working parent, I have to admit that I'm a little stressed out right now. Anxiety about COVID-19 and the effects of social distance and isolation on our daily lives were already making things hard, but the news that schools would be closed, which wasn't a surprise, has made the perfect storm.

I'm asking myself the following:

How am I going to work and take care of my kids?

How can I keep my daughter busy, educated, safe, and having fun?

How can I take care of myself so I can be the best mom I can be?

And to make things worse, we could all use a little more emotional support right now, but we can't even hug our own friends and family.

As someone who has had stress and small bouts of depression in the past, I worry that these feelings will come back. But I've learned a few things along the way that have helped:

Don't try to think of everything at the same time.

Take one day and one problem at a time.

Tell people what's bothering you.

Even if they can't solve all your problems, just listening to you talk about them and making suggestions could help you feel better. Find out what your friends who also work are doing. Talk to your boss about how you feel. Of course, they will know about the problems parents are having, and your organisation may be looking into what can be done. But for the short term, could you take a few days of vacation to figure it out? And if you're worried about money, you can get advice at Mental Health and Money Advice.

The way forward is to have virtual play dates.

As rules about social distance get stricter, it's no longer possible to play with friends and family. Could you meet up with other kids online through FaceTime, Skype, or Zoom? You can also play games with your grandparents online so that they can get to know other people.

What are we going to do with your kids all day if you stay home with them? As soon as I heard that schools would be closed, I got lots of tips on how to teach at home on social media and in my email. This scared me because it made me feel like I had to become a qualified teacher overnight. We've also heard a lot of reassurance that we don't have to become teachers, which is good.

What about the health and well-being of your child?

With all of these things in place, you're in a good place. My daughter's school just had a wellness week by chance. Every day, she came home excited about something new she had learned, like kids yoga (all the poses look like cool animals! ), giving each other massages, sewing a hand puppet, or colouring in a mindful way.

The Bloom programme for young people has given us a lot of great information on how to keep an eye on our kids' mental health. With all the change going on around them, it's only natural that they'll be worried. They'll also pay attention to the news. I've seen that the best way to deal with this is to acknowledge what's going on but try to keep things as normal as possible and reassure the person that it will pass.

Take care of yourself. holiday club eton

With everything going on, it's easy to forget about ourselves. But your children will feel your stress and worry, so it's important to take care of yourself. Look at the Bucket of Stress. It's a tool that Mental Health UK uses to help you figure out what stresses you out and how to get rid of some of that stress. At the moment, it may seem like all the clouds are bursting at once and you have to deal with them all at once, but now is the time to make time for the things you love and turn on your release "taps." For me, that usually means yoga, swimming, going to the movies or the theatre, going out to eat, singing karaoke, or having spa days with my girlfriends. Now, the plan is to figure out how I can replace any of those at home.