This is Ask Lisa, a podcast to help people understand the psychology of parenting, now in the midst of a pandemic.

Psychologist Dr. Lisa DeMore, author of two New York Times bestselling parenting books, takes your questions.

And I'm co-host, Rina Ninan, a journalist and mom of two.

Some of what we talk about comes from raising children ourselves. Most of the time, I'll be getting

answers to your parenting questions. So send your questions to Ask Lisa at Dr.Lisademore.com.

Today, we talk about how to manage feelings of helplessness and hopelessness.

So I feel like today I just need some reassurance from you.

And I don't know how you get out of a spot when you feel like you just can't get up again.

And I'm realizing so many parents feel this way about not being able to get up.

And it's such a critical time back to school.

And then I found this email that Mother sent us from the South.

And by the way, the emails have just been incredible coming in.

We'd love to hear from you. And in this email that I'm going to read you, I've changed some of

the details, the personal details, but not the gist of the email, just so this person is not able to

be identified. The mom writes this. I'm a mother of an only child. He's a nine-year-old boy. I'm also a teacher waiting

through the challenges of online teaching. I've never worked so hard in my life. I've been consumed

by work for over a month. My son comes to school with me every day and has his own workstation.

He does his online classes with his teacher as I teach my kiddos online.

I've been an awful mother lately.

I feel I've neglected him, didn't shield my stress from him, and haven't given him the outlet

of play lately at all.

How do we parent and work through this pandemic when we're all in each other's presence

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