Re-weaving the support systems that were lost to 2020
This week's Mutual Aid conversation: reminding ourselves that we're freer, now, to choose community
Greetings! I’m moving my family from Cape Cod to Central MA this month, so the brilliant Meredith Rodriguez will be supporting us with some Community Tuesday prompts. Recently we were talking about the uncanny similarities between the summer of 2020 and this summer — the rage, the grief, the hunger for community, the quiet moments of profound loneliness. Now feels like the right time to welcome those lonely, angry, sad parts of ourselves back up to the surface, to debrief them on what has changed and invite them to set down the heavy burdens they may still believe they must carry. And to think about what new community resources may be available to us now that weren’t then, to allow us to respond to the new challenges that this present moment brings.
— Ryan
The term “support system” is one of those things I (Meredith) didn’t think much about before the world shut down in 2020. Then, honestly, I didn’t think much about it because I was too busy being it: creating all of the systems and providing the support.
It was a bummer not being able to take my youngest baby (who had his first birthday in March 2020) to library story time or play groups. But as a whole, I felt an odd relief at not needing to code-switch between our home lives and the outside world, at not having to interact with the outside world much at all. To the extent that anyone was in charge, I was now in charge, so I set up our days around Zoom school and playing in the yard, so that my husband could work on Microsoft Teams. I felt self sufficient. My identity as a mother of four developed around that sense of self sufficiency, that “I am the support system” point of view.
Here we are, five and a half years later, and this is not that. The school year that just ended saw me driving all four of my kids to school each day, then picking them up in the afternoons, often at two or three different times. I drove back and forth to tae kwon do classes so many times that I still sometimes end up there by accident when I’m driving and my mind wanders. During the school year, the orchestrated chaos of snack, homework, extracurriculars, and bedtime flies off the rails when something like traffic shifts the schedule by three minutes.
But now it’s summer. I can breathe.
Now, I can go days without getting in my car and obsessively checking the ETA on my maps app. Three of my four kids are now at camp instead of hanging around at home. In this moment, I have a short window where I am able to reflect on how things are going for our family. I can sit on the deck with my coffee, and begin to untangle the complex web of kid stuff, marriage stuff, parent stuff. I can meditate.
One big thought keeps running through my mind is this: I don’t want to enter into another school year with me, myself, and I as the support system. Instead, I can knit together a system that works for me. I have done a lot of work in this regard during the past few years, particularly within my neighborhood. My husband and I got our neighborhood association up and running again. I made our home the “neighborhood hub” for our kids. I am currently in the process of creating a non-partisan community group to encourage civic participation in my city.
Getting to know the people who are physically close to me has made it obvious that we are all so busy now; another way that this is not that. Ironically, this presents a new obstacle to getting outside support. What has changed is that I now understand that I can’t continue to be “the helper” without asking for help as well.
Now that the term “support system” is on that I use regularly, I am able to play with the thought of interconnected systems. My family system, my community system, and my personal systems can all be spools from which I weave together a support system. As the systems in which I participate intertwine, my hope is that they all become stronger.
So now, I’m wondering: What does your current support system look like? How does it differ from the one you had in 2020? How has the way you think about terms like “support system” or “mutual aid” changed shape during that time? Please tell us more in the chat:
— Meredith
Weaving our threads together: join us for an upcoming In Tending gathering on Zoom!
If you are a caregiver who is moving through a season of clearing out more space in your life to touch in with clarity, community and creativity, and you’d like to find other likeminded people who are doing the same, please join us for a synchronous version of these chats on Zoom, which we host every month. We’ve chosen themes for each monthly gathering that appear again and again in our community, so that we can explore them in-depth within smaller groups. Each session includes some grounding meditation, a facilitated circle-format discussion, and additional meditation or writing prompts as desired by the group. It’s become one of our favorite forms of mutual aid, and we’d love for you to be a part of it.
Caring for K-12 kids: Tues July 8, 10:30am EST
Affirming neurodivergence (ours and/or our kids'): Tues August 5th, 10:30am EST
Caring for other adults: Tues Sept 2, 10:30am EST
Navigating cross-generational conversations about care: Tues Sept 30, 10:30am EST
Making space for grief: Tues Oct 28, 10:30am EST
Burnout prevention: Dec 2, 10:30am EST (note: this is the week after Thanksgiving)
If you’re not signed up to get the Zoom invites for our community gatherings, please click the button below to get on the invite list, which keeps the Zoom container secure and workable for all. We can’t wait to see you!
I come from a tradition where everybody focused exclusively on family as support systems and community as support systems. Reading this reminded me that a personal support system is actually a thing. Our need for a unique system that supports our unique needs doesn't evaporate when we become part of a family. It's really made me think about what I should include and exclude from my personal support system. I think having this attitude has meant that my personal support system is full of leftovers or whatever is easy and handy. Imagine what my personal nutrition would be like if all I got to eat was leftovers and fast food and microwave popcorn. I'm pretty sure my personal support system needs to be a little more robust and a better fit before it can actually be nourishing for me. Thank you for the insightful ideas!