Jews in the D cover story
ALEXANDER CLEGG/JEWISH NEWS
Abby Segal and her 4-year-old daughter Aliyah weather the challenges of single parenting during a pendemic.
Single Parenting
During a Pandemic COURTESY OF CADY VISHNIAC
L Local l JJewish i h single i l parents t on h homeschooling, homeschooling h li need for support and the uncertain future. MAYA GOLDMAN CONTRIBUTING WRITER
C
ady Vishniac’s 8-yearold daughter Luta was about to start her Zoom math class. “She has these Zoom classes that are the bane of my existence,” said Vishniac, a divorced single mom living in West Bloomfield, on the phone to the Jewish News. “Paper! Paper! Paper!” Luta chanted. “Look at me!” “I see you, Luta. You’re climbing on the stairs in a way that makes me nervous,” Vishniac said as she ran around trying to find the computer. Vishniac located the computer and explained to Luta that class would be with the whole group today. Luta, who has behavioral challenges, has mostly been getting individual instruction. “I can’t!” Luta shouted. “You’re getting the idea,”
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JULY 9 • 2020
Vishniac said to JN. This is what it’s like to be a single parent in quarantine. AMPLIFIED CHALLENGES When Gov. Gretchen Whitmer issued her stay-at-home order in March in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, parents found themselves in a seemingly impossible situation. Vishniac put it bluntly: “You can’t make a kid focus on school and work 40 hours a week at the same time.” These challenges were amplified for other single parents as well. At one point during quarantine, Abby Segal, a single mom in Bloomfield Hills, went five days without taking a shower. When she finally got a second to sit her 4-year-old daughter Aliyah down in front of the computer and went to take a shower, she heard Aliyah
open the back door and walk outside into the yard. “You don’t have another set of eyes,” she said. “You don’t have coverage.” For divorced single parents, the pandemic brought up the added question of how to co-parent during a stay-athome order. As Vishniac said, “There’s a degree of social distancing that I can’t do. I can’t do it anyway because she’s going back and forth between my house and my ex’s house.” Erica Gray of Farmington Hills has been divorced for almost two years. When the pandemic began, she didn’t feel comfortable having her 12- and 13-year-old daughters, Chloe and Leah, split time between her house and their dad’s place. Legally, though, she had to continue the custody arrangement she had with her ex-husband.
Cady Vishniac and Luta
“You can’t make a kid focus on school and work 40 hours a week at the same time.” — CADY VISHNIAC
