Consider Mental Health Issues of Masks

July 9, 2020 0 Comments

I am a mother of four Three are in the Central Community School System — one in elementary school, one in the middle school, and one in the high school.

My oldest will be a senior this year. I also worked in my daughter’s elementary school in the cafeteria this past year.

I am deeply concerned about what rules and regulations might be imposed on our children when they return to class this fall. I especially oppose any requirement that our students be required to wear masks in order to go to school.

On June 25, I watched new state Supt. of Education Cade Brumley outline his guidelines for the new school year. These guidelines include “very strong recommendations” that children be required to wear masks at school. Supt. Brumley made it clear that his recommendations were strictly voluntary and not binding on local school systems like ours in Central. However, he said they would be enforced by the Louisiana Department of Health.

That evening, I attended a meeting of the Senate Education Committee at the State Capitol to express my opposition to our children being forced to wear masks. However, during the evening meeting, something was different. Supt. Brumley once again said his guidelines were not mandatory on local school systems. However, the Department of Health was there also. This time, they said their guidelines too were suggestions and not mandatory.

That relieved some of my concerns. However, I knew that the Louisiana Board of Elementary and Secondary Education and the Central Community School Board could still impose masking requirements, even if Supt. Brumley could not. Then Wednesday, the Central School System released their plan for going back to school that did not require masking. That leaves only BESE, and they are meeting on the subject next week.

Mental Health Effects

I think what concerns me most about all of these guidelines is nobody’s really addressing how this is going to affect our kids’ mental health. Our kids are not used to wearing masks. They are not used to seeing people in masks everywhere we go. Our kids are not used to having a gun pointed at them and having a temperature taken. The first time my seven-year-old had that done, she literally jumped back because we don’t point guns at each other! This is all new for them.

I have a good friend who taught in early childhood education. She has tried to raise awareness about how Katrina babies looked after Hurricane Katrina and how many adjustment issues and emotional issues they had. She has said over and over that Covid babies and these kids coming into school right now are going to be 10 times worse! I feel that because we’re talking about my kids.

Working in the cafeteria, I love them all! We saw hundreds of kids every day. They would come up to us and give us hugs and high-fives, and they would see our smiles. That was my favorite part of my job — to see in those kids’ smiles!

I can’t even fathom them not seeing smiles. For some kids, school is the only place they see smiles!

School is the only place they get those hugs. School is the only place they get those high-fives and “Good job!” For all the special ed moms and their babies, how are they going to do this?

It’s just not practical! So many teachers I’ve talked to, so many bus drivers I’ve talked to say this is not going to work. This is not going to work!

This is a virus and we have viruses all around us, all the time.

How long are we going to do this?

How long are we going to expect our kids to do this?

This is our future! Is this what we want our future to look like?

I don’t!

My kids won’t go back to school if they’re required to wear masks.

I’m not gonna do it.

It’s restricting oxygen — it’s not healthy. It’s mentally damaging and I’m not doing it!

I know many moms who won’t do it.

So I think there’s a lot to consider here.

I know everybody is worried about the physical aspects of this, but we really need to be thinking about the mental aspects.

This is not OK.