Crying Through COVID-19

A Message From a K12prWell Friend

Sometimes we hear from friends we've met through #k12prWell about a message that needs to be shared. A great NCSPRA friend of ours, Molly McGowan Gorsuch, reached out last week about her own COVID-19 experience, and we are very thankful that she has volunteered to share her perspective to help others.

Be well,

Shawn and Kristin

Shawn McKillop, APR | @ShawnMcKillop on Twitter

Kristin Magette, APR | @kmagette on Twitter

Crying Through COVID-19

The Scene: Henderson County Public Schools, Public Information Office (AKA me), the week of March 13-20 in Hendersonville, North Carolina.

Friday (the 13th): We go into the weekend told by the state it’s safe to keep schools open.

Saturday: All public schools in N.C. are shut down by order of the Governor.

Sunday: District leaders convene in our “war room” to draft, edit, rework & message two weeks’ worth of planning in seven hours.

Monday: I draft internal staff directives, attend an emergency school board meeting, translate and record parent all-calls, send media press releases, review plans for feeding kids and teaching with a brand new remote learning model, stare at unanswerable parent questions on Facebook and, finally, send the last message out.

And then I wept.

I’m talking head-down-on-desk, suddenly totally drained, wracked with emotions I hadn’t realized I’d been holding onto until I stopped to breathe.

It made me think: “Maybe that’s why, in our roles as professional communicators for entire school districts, we so often don’t allow ourselves to pause for our own mental breaks.”

Because we’re terrified that if we do take a breath – just a moment – our efficient compartmentalization will crumble. And we’ll feel the full force of whatever deluge we’ve been powering through. 

In a way it’s true: Once I’d allowed myself to weep on Monday, the floodgates opened, and I’ve pretty consistently cried a little each day since then.

I teared up Tuesday when I saw the anxiety in a little girl picking up meals for her family, and her teacher, visibly anguished at not being able to embrace her in a hug. I was surprised when hot tears spilled mid-workout Wednesday, and I had to explain to my CrossFit family why I was crying during burpees (yes they suck, but they don’t make me cry). Thursday, I ugly cried in front of our director of safe schools when he entered my office moments after I learned a close, immunocompromised friend was being tested for COVID-19. On Friday, kind emails, Tweets, and texts of support and appreciation from my HCPS Family gave me what my Momma calls “the happy tears.”

I feel like I’m a blubbering mess. But honestly? I’m OK with it.

Why do we equate resiliency with a staunch ability to suppress or set aside raw, real emotion? We can bend and not break, but still allow ourselves to feel. I realize this is something we should always give ourselves space to do, and in these uncertain, anxious times of the coronavirus pandemic, we should grant ourselves extra grace to feel ­– and respond to – our emotions even more intensely.

Thankfully, the topic of wellness is being discussed openly by the media, as the world holds its collective breath. Jelena Kecmanovic, founding director of the Arlington/DC Behavior Therapy Institute, writes in The Washington Post, “Notice negative emotions, thoughts and physical sensations as they come up, look into them with curiosity, describe them without judgment and then let them go. This is an essence of mindfulness, which has been consistently linked to good psychological health.”

In The New York Times, psychologist Dr. Harriet Lerner recommends practicing self-compassion. “Anxiety and fear are physiological processes that cavort and careen through our bodies and make us miserable. They will subside, only to return again; they will arrive uninvited for as long as we live,” Lerner said. “So don’t be hard on yourself when you can’t shut yourself off from fear and pain — your own and the world’s. Fear isn’t fun, but it signals that we are fully human.”

By accepting uncomfortable emotions, we can see them as legitimate reactions – and then move on. This may mean allowing yourself to get misty-eyed in public spaces more frequently than usual. Or finding an empty, wooded space in nature to yell out frustrations.

As for me, I’ll be doing both. Feel free to do the same.

Molly McGowan Gorsuch is the public information officer for Henderson County Public Schools, a 23-school district in Western North Carolina. She is a proud board member of the North Carolina School Public Relations Association, is a charter member of the Public Relations Society of America's WNC Chapter, and serves on the Henderson County Education Foundation board. She stays plugged in with her #SchoolPR colleagues on Twitter (@MollyMGorsuch) through #k12PRchat and is an advocate for #k12PRwell.

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