The Family Guide to Quarantine (Paperback or Softback)

They have closed the gates. You are inside. Quarantined.

Whether you are only in partial quarantine, or on full lock-down, the prospect of having to stay at home, with your entire family, instills fear in many a parental heart.

Sure, you love your spouse and your kids. But you are not used to spending all day long with them. You are not used to being home from work. You are not used to your spouse lurking about all day long. You are not used to your children not being at school. You are not used to being home inside all day either.

You are worried about the situation.
You are discomfited by the new rulings.
You are stressed about whether you bought enough groceries and toilet paper, and when and how you will be able to get more.
Your finances may be suffering because of your job situation, or sudden lack thereof.
You are not sure how secure you are financially long-term, because of the sudden dislocation of the stock market.

Things are a mess. (And your kids eat a lot more than you realized, and make a lot more noise!)

Welcome to the new reality.

It would probably be abnormal if you did not feel like you have been hit by a truck: No one was prepared for this situation, and it is not anything we have ever had to deal with, or thought to expect. It is ok to be stressed, shocked, distraught.

But the sooner you can get beyond that, and start putting your (new) life together, the better you are likely to feel. Even if you are certain that the situation will resolve very soon and we wil go back to normal life as we know it, there is no point in being stressed and snappish until life normalizes. Your family life will be better long-term if you get a grip on things faster.

This book will help you down that path.

The book covers everything from how to prepare (if there is still time before the lock-down is final) to how to not kill each other.

It includes ideas on how to entertain your children, and how to entertain yourself.

It covers suggestions on how to use your time to create a healthy lifestyle for yourself and your family, even though you are in quarantine.

It includes resources on everything from meal planning to homeschooling.

Most of all, this book discusses an approach to being at home together that you might find helpful.

Nobody would have signed up for a quarantine voluntarily. But you can choose to look at the silver lining.

Quarantine has the potential to recalibrate your family life, to bring your gang closer together, to reprioritize.

You can use the enforced together time to create a healthier lifestyle, inculcate a life-long practice of self-care, and teach your children how to be resilient.

This quarantine can be a miserable marathon that makes you feel like you re caught in a dystopian sci-fi novel from which you can not escape.

Or it can be an opportunity for fostering creativity, new skills, and togetherness that might otherwise have been impossible to imagine.

So stop shaking your head, put on a smile, and prepare for the new normal of quarantine. The ride might be more fun than you could have anticipated.

We hope this book will be helpful in the journey.

Fern Reiss is an honors graduate of Harvard University who writes frequently about parenting and psychology for major magazines including Sesame Street, Scholastic Parent and Child, Moment Magazine, and Parade. She is a member of the American Society of Journalists and Authors, and was a 2005 finalize for Inc Magazine's Entrepreneur of the Year award. Fern's other books include The Publishing Game: Find an Agent in 30 Days, The Publishing Game: Publish a Book in 30 Days, The Publishing Game: Bestseller in 30 Days (all Writer's Digest Book Club selections); The Infertility Diet: Get Pregnant and Prevent Miscarriage (an Independent Book Publishers Association Benjamin Franklin award winner); Terrorism and Kids (an American Booksellers Association BookSense 76 winner); The Breast Cancer Checklist; and Coronavirus and Kids: Comforting Your Child. Fern runs her Expertizing Strategize-Publicize-Monetize online course for small businesses at Courses.Expertizing.com. She and her husband have worked out of their home while homeschooling their three children for over 20 years.