Working from home not all kids play for Karen Koster, but the retail therapy with the creche savings is a nice bonus
AM presenter enjoying the extra cash in her pocket and quality time spent with her three children.. except when it comes to the schooling part that is
Karen Koster revealed she is saving a fortune in creche fees since Covid 19 restrictions forced them to close.
And despite enjoying the extra cash to use on some retail therapy throughout the crisis, the Ireland AM host feels it’s unfair to expect parents to home-school their child after a full day of work.
The mum to Finn, five, JJ, four, and two-year-old Eve told the Irish Daily Mirror: “It [work] has been great for all of our headspaces.
“But it’s not easy.
“When I envisaged working over the summer, I thought I’d have two in creche and one in camp and holidays booked and all of that but it is now looking at the summer let’s make it count and let’s not wish it away.”
“For me I become so focused on the kids it’s probably good for me to be outside of that for a little while and get a bit of headspace outside of the home.
“Otherwise all I do is tidy up and see the mess they are making, and I start to go crazy at them so it is actually good for me to get out of the house and just have some time out.
“It’s really hard for working parents with young children at the moment.
“Like really hard, obviously we are not on the front lines or saving lives, but working from home is not the scenario you envisage with children there.
“People who say ‘oh I work from home’ you don’t have your kids under your feet, don’t also have a full time job.
CREATIVE
“I was trying to do the home school thing with Finn but now I’m like, look if he is just being creative and not on TV that is a win for me.”
Karen, 39, who previously hosted a series for Virgin Media dealing with the topic of ‘mammy guilt’ added:
“Because as someone else said, my kids are feeling like a failure, I’m ending up fighting with them, and that’s just adding another stresser.
“Nobody should do a full day’s work and then come home and try and school their child, you are lucky to get the homework done I think, so yeah I’ve really just lowered my expectations to be honest.
“And making sure that they are happy as number one not that they are doing joined up writing. That can wait until September.”
Despite the added mess and stress about the house, Karen said she has been enjoying watching her kids grow closer as they spend more time together in lockdown.
Meanwhile, she is also enjoying the extra cash she and her entrepreneur hubby John are saving on creche fees for their two youngest kids.
Speaking about how she unwinds from stress and anxiety, she said: “Too much retail therapy, I’ve bought so much stuff for my house.
“I’m looking at things saying ‘oh I need a new one of them’ and stupid things like bins in the bathroom to art for the bedroom, so much stuff online.
“Anything I’m saving in creche fees I just seem to be able to find something to spend on.
“We still had two in creche, so we really noticed it, so we are like okay we will buy this and that with the creche money, so it has been very nice to be honest.
“We got some garden furniture like everyone else, and some nice things for the house.”
The blonde beauty said she has been spending a lot of time recently reflecting on her own habits and coping mechanisms in lockdown, and told how she has often struggled with dealing with anxiety and pressure in the past.
Describing the past few weeks as a pressure cooker, juggling the new normal of working with her three kids at home, she said she is working on not trying to take out her stress and anxiety on those closer to her.
She said: “For me it has kind of felt
We still had two in creche, so we really noticed it, so we are like okay we will buy this and that with the creche money, so it has been very nice to be honest
like a pressure cooker to a point like working such an early shift and then coming home, trying to run a house and with three kids I’ve kind of learned that sometimes I’m just not great in a crisis and I really run out of patience and it has actually unveiled the parts of my personality that I wish weren’t there.
“I take my stress out on people who get caught in crossfire basically.. so I’m probably trying to look at my own self in that way and saying ‘don’t take my stress out on the kids, but don’t try to be perfect either.
“It’s kinda funny, I definitely think I am very insular in the sense that I prioritise my family, and probably to the detriment of friendships, but I think we have all kind of got away with it because we are all in the same bubble of having young children and working.
“But yeah I think it’s made me go. I’m actually not that great at coping with anxiety and I do end up taking it out on my husband.
“It’s good though, John has probably talked me off the ledge a few times but it’s made me realise how I cope with anxiety and how I retreat into my own bubble and that I should actually make more of an effort to reach out and be there for other people because actually I get way more out of it as well.”
■Karen was speaking to launch Virgin Media Ireland’s #Backingbusiness initiative aiming to boost Irish businesses nationwide, with free on-air advertising.