My parents are very religious and right wing. I am quite left wing. I usually just try to talk about other topics with them, and they do the same. However, with covid, I find myself occasionally frustrated and angry just knowing that they will vote for Trump again despite how horrible things have been with him.

I am a doctor fighting on the front lines of the pandemic, and it makes me mad to think they are voting for someone who does not care about the health of the American people, or about the safety of front line workers. I have occasionally sent my mom posts or newspaper clippings from my friends/coworkers with their experience on the frontlines, and her only response is that I should not be afraid because God is in control. Which I find frustrating because 1) I feel she’s making light/being insensitive to me/my coworkers’ prolonged work on this and has not expressed appreciation for our efforts, 2) I’ve told her many times that I’m not religious and she still insists on using this as an opportunity to pseudo-preaching/prosthetize to me, and 3) it feels demeaning and patronizing, and I feel like she just can’t understand because she just sits at home retired and knitting and it’s not affecting her or anyone she knows besides me.

My parents are thankfully following public health guidelines and believe that covid is real, but it doesn’t seem that my parents actually legitimately understand or care about the hundreds of thousands of people who are dying and the hospital surges that we’re experiencing. And I know they’re still voting for Trump despite all of it, which makes me furious. My solution for it so far is to try and avoid talking to them much during the surges because I’m busy anyway and that way I won’t get angry with their lack of caring, and to remind myself that their Trump vote really doesn’t matter because our state is going to go blue anyway so why care how they vote. But whenever I think of it I get so angry, and I’d like to be able to not be angry and find some peace about it and be able to feel like I can call them to catch up on other things without getting annoyed or angry.