It doesn’t take Gen Z or Millennials or whatever the collective “we” is to turn any major life event into a meme. And Covid-19 has been no different. We're especially enjoying one about working from home with your spouse. It suggests avoiding disagreements by just blaming all your newfound problems on an imaginary annoying coworker who can’t seem to do anything right. It calls her Cheryl.
It’s so much easier to stay happy with your partner when they aren’t responsible for leaving dirty dishes around, cranking up the heat when you’re already sweating, or chewing too loudly while you’re on the phone. But given the more or less national quarantine period being a minimum of fifteen days at this point, many of us are looking at being home with partners and other family members more than normal, without being able to engage in our go-to stress relievers of a night out, shopping, or even just going to the library by ourselves.
And while blaming it all on Cheryl might be cathartic in the short term, I think after a while we are going to need a longer-lasting solution. So what do you do when the tension is high, the square footage is small(er than you’d like it to be), and the escape hatch is bolted shut? Glad you asked! We have worked from home together for many years, and we’ve got some tried-and-true tricks to help you navigate the next however-long-this-lasts.
