Law Mom And The Modern Family Do Preschool

As law firms work their way to a post-pandemic work world, we can only hope that they extend some grace to pandemic parents.

Ed. note: This is the latest installment in a series of posts on motherhood in the legal profession, in partnership with our friends at MothersEsquire. Welcome Jamie Szal back to our pages. Click here if you’d like to donate to MothersEsquire.

Red alert! Red alert!

Calling all employees! All hands on deck, folks.

We have a Stage 10 Octopus clinger, and we need to help this clueless parent out.  Where’s the detangling spray? Someone find the special bright and shinys. Which veteran kid is the best decoy this year? Do we have all the emergency distractions?!

Let’s go!

Only in my desperate dreams is this how that morning of preschool drop off actually occurred. Like any other Type A parent, I read all the blogs, followed all the Instagram experts, soaked up all the other social media chatter from friends and family about the first day of preschool. I was ready. Or so I thought.

Instead, I found myself sitting criss-cross applesauce in the preschool play yard for close to an hour, each time I thought my daughter calmed enough to distract while I made a break for it resulting in whiplash sleep tentacle reattachment.  Seriously, it felt like a hydra — peel one arm off, 35 appear in its place. After finally sprinting, shoes in hand, for the fence and dashing down to my car at the bottom of the driveway, I made my escape to her inconsolable shrieks.

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Mind you, the preschool is located in a nursing home. Visiting their “grand friends” was one of the draws for us. To get to the preschool area, parents must drive all the way, down the hill, to the back-back-back of the parking lot. So that day, as I drove off in my little Mini Cooper (yes, it is possible to drive one as a parent), I thought I was in the clear only to crest the little driveway hill leading to the preschool to find myself foiled once again.

By the nursing home band.

Which set up for its weekly concert across the only exit to the parking lot.

So there I sat in my fun little Mini, stuck in my car, forced to sit and listen to the concert. The music forced me to press pause and reflect.

Not for nothing, we have spent the better part of the past two years (nearly half her life) with our daughter confined at home. We practiced ultra caution. Wear your mask. Wash your hands. Have some more hand sanitizer. No, we cannot go to the farmers market. No, we cannot go to swimming class. No, you cannot come inside the store with me. Forget stranger-danger, during this pandemic we actively instructed her not to go near people, period. Is it any wonder that she had a difficult first week at preschool?

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What was a wonder to me was how difficult that transition has been for me as well.

I completely underestimated how much comfort my pandemic pod gave me through the early months of the pandemic. I had a nanny-share. Both families agreed to very strict safety protocols so that we could interact with one another in relatively maskless comfort. We were at home. My daughter was not exposed every day to risk of catching this virus. I could focus on being a good lawyer with greater ease — and she could see me do it because I was home. What a gift being able to actually show my daughter what I do, how I do it, and how much satisfaction my work brings me!

Sending her to preschool has felt like I am sending the most vulnerable person in my world to fight on the front lines of a losing battle. I feel like I am putting a defenseless person out in front of me, instead of sheltering her in my wake. With three COVID-19 scares within the first six days, the anxiety of overanalyzing every aspect of preschool was overwhelming. (Thankfully all negative results.)

As law firms work their way to a postpandemic work world, I sincerely hope that they extend some grace to those of us pandemic parents experiencing pandemic school through our children’s eyes. The pandemic is not over. We are all relearning how to interact with one another in real life.

In some ways, my octopus-clinger of a daughter made me think of the legal industry clinging to the comfort of something it knows — old practices, old firm culture, old expectations of face time (the lowercase version, you know, for being in person in an office), and availability and hustle culture because that is all the industry has ever known. Terrified to experience something new and better.

Life Lesson: Make change happen quickly, like ripping off a Band-Aid. We saw that with the pandemic. COVID-19 forced rapid and immediate change by necessity, and we adapted. Is it sustainable? I don’t know yet. Perhaps the sting will ebb in time.

Pro-Mom Hack: If you rub the Band-Aid with oil, it dissolves the adhesive, allowing you to gently peel it off. Which makes me wonder: what is the legal industry version of detangling spray?


Jamie Szal is an attorney at Brann & Isaacson, where her practice focuses on assisting businesses in all aspects of state and local tax controversy, from audits and administrative proceedings through civil litigation. Jamie actively volunteers with the alumni network and Women’s Leadership Council of her alma mater, Trinity College, as well as actively participates in MothersEsquire, the Women’s Law Section of the Maine State Bar Association, and serves on the board of a dental-services non-profit in Maine. Outside of work, Jamie enjoys raising her fiercely independent, impish daughter; singing; and hiking around Maine with her husband, daughter, and dogs.