- I am Georgia's Mum,
Georgia is a New South Wales HSC student,
about to embark on her last term of school.
She had it all built up as to being this glorious final year
where she would have memories forever
or make memories forever.
And she had it idealized and looking pretty,
pretty fantastic for herself.
- My mindset at the start of COVID was
definitely very chaotic.
- When lockdown happened,
we started to get word from the school that
this was canceled,
and then that was cancelled,
and then the next thing was cancelled.
Every time she had this disappointment,
and she would be in tears.
"This was meant to be perfect Mum,
but this is,
you know, this can't happen.
This is my final year.
I'm never gonna get a chance to do this again."
- I feel like I'm missing out.
Like, I feel like,
it, I can't...
I feel like I'm not really present
and that this year's not gonna like,
be everything that I hoped it would be.
- Tried to be a reality checker,
and tried to ground her in that moment,
at the same time acknowledging that
that was a pretty big disappointment and
yeah, pretty much sucks.
- When I went to Mum,
she made me feel really heard
when I told her about how I was feeling,
which was really important to me
because it made me feel really safe here,
and it made me feel really like, appreciated.
- I said to Georgia,
this time of COVID was an opportunity,
and you could either choose to take it as a
negative that cost you and
stopped you from being able to do a lot of things.
Or you could take it as an opportunity
to find other ways to do it.
In terms of whether or not it was hard for me,
during COVID I,
yes, it was.
Those sorts of things I have never tried to hide too much
from the older kids.
I've shared that with them.
I recognize that I have to fill my own cup
to be able to keep giving to the kids.
Doing some reading or cooking.
Those sorts of activities really helped me along.
Sitting in the sun.
We were so blessed during lockdown time
that we had really nice sunshiny days.
Looking for those opportunities
is how I maintained my self-care.
- It was so nice to have that time together
and to connect with each other
a lot more than we previously had been doing.
- To have, you know,
however long it was where we were all in a house together
and no one was going anywhere
except to the shop to get some more milk or whatever,
was a very special time
and I'm really proud that I was able to
identify that in the moment and not look back and go,
"Gee, I wish I had appreciated that more."
'Cause I really appreciated it.