Content warning: family conflict, emotional stress, pandemic trauma
In March 2020, when the world shut down because of COVID-19, our house went from quiet to crowded almost overnight. For the first time in years, all of our children were back under the same roof. What should have felt comforting instead felt suffocating. One daughter was already home, our son returned abruptly after offices closed, and our youngest came home from New York City, carrying the trauma of three and a half years of life in a city under siege. She quarantined herself, withdrawn and fragile, and even simple acts of closeness, like a hug, were impossible. The very real fear and stress of the pandemic created an invisible wall between us. With five adults in one house, we divided the rooms like territories, each person carving out their own space to work, sleep, and cope. Physically together, but emotionally distant, our interactions became fragmented. Doors that used to be open stayed shut, and conversations drifted through walls instead of across tables.
In an attempt to create connection, I suggested a small ritual: we would take turns cooking meals together during the week. My younger daughter and my son joined me. For a while, the kitchen became a rare place of laughter and human contact amid the stress. But my older daughter mostly stayed away, struggling with her own battles. And my husband at the time refused to participate at all, dismissing the idea entirely. I tried in other ways, sending “Lunch is ready” group texts, inviting everyone to sit outside with me. Sometimes the children would join me in the backyard, and we would talk about the lizards running across the fence, boss's disruptive phone calls, hoping laughter could cover the sound of our growing silence.
I suggested shared evenings in the master bedroom, but every effort to bridge the distance between my husband and I was ignored or rejected. Even walks, which could have been moments of reconnection, felt like pauses rather than healing. He clung to traditional structures like family dinners, while the children and I were navigating new routines and coping mechanisms.
The reality became clear: being forced under the same roof by a global pandemic did not mean we could be together. Emotional walls remained, frustrations deepened, and the distance between us grew. The pandemic amplified the cracks that had been there all along, and the inability to connect in our shared home ultimately contributed to the breakdown of our marriage and the fracturing of our family. ( to be continued...)
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