COVID-19 Conversations: Surviving on One Paycheck

Mayra is 27 years old and lives with her two sons, ages eight and 11-months, and fiancé in Florida. Before the pandemic, Mayra was a stay-at-home mom and a full-time online student in social work. In May 2020, she was trying to balance homeschooling her eight-year-old son with her own school work while managing their household on her fiance’s reduced income from a barber shop. 

How has the pandemic impacted your family?

Mayra: Before the whole coronavirus, I would say our financial situation was good… we were able to have savings to help us out whenever we needed it.

In my opinion, we were financially stable. Our financial situation now… if all of this continues the way it will, we will be one of those families that’ll be paycheck to paycheck.
- Mayra

If anything were to happen, especially right now with a health issue, my husband doesn’t have insurance… So if he were to land in the hospital, we would have to pay out of pocket. And that we don’t have right now.

I am one of the people to say it has taken a toll on my life. It has taken a toll on me physically, mentally, and emotionally…. [My fiancé is] feeling more pressure and more stress, and he tries not to show it, but… he says, “I’m stressed. I feel like I’m disappointing my family.”

What are the challenges in remote learning for your son and for you?

Mayra: For my eight-year-old not… able to go to school, the only thing he’s not happy about is not having his friends around. He still does see them… over the video meeting they do for school, but he’s like, “It’s not the same. I wish I could play with them and talk to them in person.”

I do help my son when he needs the help but there are some times where I myself am stuck. I have to reach out to my husband’s cousin who is a teacher or his aunt who is a teacher and they both understand… So, they have helped me with explaining to me how I can help my son do better… If I didn’t have them to be honest, I would have been lost completely.

It was so much put on my plate with his schooling. I was also trying to get my school work done… So, I was piling up work, mixing up our work… That’s why I chose to not go into my summer semester of school because I needed that break, especially if all of this was still going on, I did not want to put myself in another stressful situation.