The current context of social isolation presents a new challenge: how to stay home and take care of ourselves, of those close to us and of our immediate space, for a collective purpose. Add to that the need to maintain paid work, whether working from home or still having to go out to secure an income. As we adjust to the containment of COVID-19, the daily challenges are many. We face different obstacles and have found strategies to overcome them.

Despite the burden of these new domestic arrangements falling primarily on women, many fathers and male caregivers are experiencing new situations. The increase in hours spent in the domestic space can lead to an increase in pre-existing commitments; it can also lead to new care experiences that require creativity to conciliate. Many questions concern us at the moment. A persistent one has been what it means to be a caregiver/father in the current moment we are living in, versus what it meant previously.

What has changed? What got better? What are the challenges? What are the coping strategies?

The PARENT Project, together with DeCode/M, Promundo-Portugal and the global MenCare campaign, proposes a challenge to fathers and/or male caregivers: send us short videos, photographs or reports that portray your experiences in these times of social isolation, for dissemination on our page and on the project’s website*.

With a focus on your experience of parenting and/or caring, we want to know your personal impressions, recommendations, strategies, challenges, and practices for this period of confinement. How is your day? Which situations are particularly challenging? How is it possible to deal with these challenges in a new, reduced space? How is the family dynamics?

Make a post on Facebook with the hashtag #PARENT_MenCare or send your videos with your name and maximum resolution to campanhaparent@ces.uc.pt . Challenge other friends to do the same!

Selected videos will be published on social media periodically and will be part of our National MenCare Campaign.

For more information about the PARENT project: www.parent.ces.uc.pt

*Sending your video authorises its dissemination on the websites and social media pages of the project and its partners.