Boulder County mothers share their stories from pandemic: One of reunification, one of struggle

May 9—In an effort to pay tribute to moms this Mother's Day, the Daily Camera asked for mothers and their children to share their stories. In Boulder, four daughters who couldn't see their mom face-to-face celebrate being together again, while in Longmont a mother who faced numerous challenges from the coronavirus pandemic asks that moms be celebrated not just for everything they do, but the love they give every day.

A mom and daughters reunited

When the coronavirus pandemic kept Peg Beeler's four daughters from visiting her in retirement care, the 95-year-old woman's smile and laugh wasn't the same.

About three weeks ago, the daughters got to start visiting their mom once again. In a sunny room in Boulder's Frasier retirement community in Boulder, Patricia Ross leaned over on a Friday morning to hold her mom's hands.

"Three weeks ago, the world opened up, and we can touch and kiss and hug," Ross said. "I think your smiles have been bigger, and your laughs have been louder."

Ross is the third-oldest of four daughters: Linda Ketcham, Layna Beeler and Polly Golins — now mothers themselves. This Mother's Day weekend, the daughters said they're glad for the opportunity to be reunited with their mom once again.

Peg Beeler feels the same.

"I love it," Peg Beeler said, looking at her daughters gathered around her.

In-person visitation was paused in Frasier's assisted-living and skilled nursing communities on March 12, 2020. Visitation resumed March 8 — just shy of a year later.

In the interim, the care community worked to create options for people to see each other. In early June, the retirement community opened up "Lov Pods," where residents could see their loved ones in a tent outside. But a wall of plexiglass separated them, keeping them from hugging or touching.

Layna Beeler recalled the flare of jealousy she felt when one person skirted the rules: stepping around the plexiglass to give their mom doughnuts and a hug.

In June, the sisters' father, Brad Beeler, who was living at Frasier with his wife, Peg, died.

"She had to go through all that time of confusion without us being able to be with her," Ketcham said. "It's hard for her to connect on a phone or on an iPad. This has been a huge change for our family."

Peg and Brad Beeler raised their daughters in Boulder. They grew up gathering around the piano after dinner, where Peg Beeler would play and her daughters would sing. Peg Beeler was an accomplished musician who sang on the radio and was a soloist at Mountain View Methodist Church in Boulder. Her daughters said her pure soprano voice took the spotlight when she belted out "O Holy Night" on Christmas Eve.

"One Christmas we had our whole family in the front pew," Golins said. "She sang 'O Holy Night' and the pews started to crack."

When the daughters all had children of their own, they said Peg Beeler was the type of grandmother who would do cartwheels and handstands with her grandchildren out in the yard.

"You didn't just have them come visit," Layna Beeler said to her mom. "You were in the grass doing somersaults. You were doing handstands. She was quite athletic."

"I was crazy," Peg Beeler said.

The family has long had a connection with Frasier. Before she became a resident, Peg Beeler volunteered regularly at the retirement community. She visited residents who didn't have family around, ran errands for them and took them to doctor's appointments. Peg has now been a resident at Frasier for 26 years. Her daughters have also all worked for Frasier. The sisters praised the retirement facility for doing everything in their power to keep families united, as the pandemic dragged on, especially staff who helped their mom set up Zoom calls.

The daughters said they looked forward to celebrating their mom in person with a big meal on Mother's Day at Frasier. Peg Beeler, now a grandma of 11 and great-grandmother to 18, said she is wishing for a box of See's Candies or "most any kind" of Hershey's chocolate.

"We're ecstatic now," Ross said. "We're fortunate to have her here. What's stronger than a mother's love? She's given us so much strength, so much faith, so much beauty in her life."

A Longmont mom's wish for Mother's Day

As a mother of four children, Anny Remstad was already stretched pretty thin. But then, the coronavirus pandemic hit, tipping the weight of her job duties further.

Remstad, a Longmont stay-at-home mother, is the president and treasurer of the Moms Offering Moms Support (MOMS) Club of Longmont.

In a normal year, Remstad said the club is an in-person support group. The roughly 15 moms who are part of the club gather regularly and organize play dates for their children. If a mom is having a new baby or going through a tough time, the club rallies to help them by providing meals or offering them support.

But the pandemic crippled the club's ability to gather. Remstad said they tried virtual meetings temporarily, but it didn't take long to get burned out talking through a computer screen.

Losing face-to-face interaction with the moms who had been her support was tough.

"My support groups are very much in person," she said. "Like other moms, I just need to interact in person and just know that there are other people out there ... walking the same line as I am. That's kind of my support system. That sort of crumbled under me when the lockdowns hit."

Remstad's four children are 7, 4, 3 and 1. When the schools closed, her oldest son was among those learning remotely.

"Trying to switch on a dime to filling the teacher's role, as well as the mother role, especially having the other kiddos to take care of (was one of the major challenges)," Remstad said. "I really struggled with finding a balance and how to walk with him at the end of the first grade year and beginning of second grade year — how to challenge him enough, but also be encouraging enough."

Before the pandemic, Remstad said she could look forward to taking her kids to karate classes, parks and play dates.

"Then, all of a sudden, they couldn't (do any of those activities), and it was on me to fill in those roles as well," Remstad said. "We didn't have those other outlets for socialization and exercise."

Her husband, who has been working from home, would step in to help, too, she said. The grandparents, who have since been vaccinated, are also there to lend a hand.

Remstad said things have gotten better since the St. Vrain Valley School District resumed in-person classes earlier this year. That, and the world has cautiously been opening up again. Remstad even hopes to have the MOMS Club gather outdoors this month.

Remstad said she knows other moms connected to the club were going through an experience similar to hers.

As people celebrate their moms Sunday, she asked that they remember not just everything moms do, but the care and love that they put into every day.

"What I would like to be celebrated more for is being rather than for the stuff I do," she said. "Like, the slow things I do for my kids like holding them on my lap and reading a book or playing with them outside in the garden — the things that are more about the connections with the family ... than what I do for them."