I knew it.....I just knew this was likely to happen. Our school shut down because of Covid on this past Thursday. We have 70 ish schools in our district from elementary through highschool and only 2 have shut down--and we are one of them! UUUGGGGHHH and Noooooooooo!
This last week has not been a great one.....my stress level totally shot up, my kids got sick, we've had Mickeys for lunch 4 days this week and chick f a for lunch on the other. It's ridiculous. I feel terrible that my coping skill of eating out has been thrown upon my children this week. Oh and let's not forget I, along with millions of people, sat on the edge of our seats all week watching the election. Day and night.
Rewind to last weekend I thought my decision to take the kids to an outside greenspace would have been fine. We went on Saturday and Sunday. Well, by Monday my son started to have congestion and by Tuesday he wasn't feeling well at all--no fever, but just a rotten headcold. So, I told him we could see how it went at school and if he started feeling worse to come home....OR he could stay home in the morning and see how he did, and go to school later if he was ok. He wanted to go to school so we had normal routine, I dropped them off, but then not more than 15 minutes after I got home the nurse was calling to go pick him up. And that put us in the covid protocol at our school. We had to have a dr. note, a clear covid test, OR stay home for 10 days. I knew he just had a headcold so I assumed we would go to the Dr. and she would write a note. Well, she surprised me and said because he had two symptoms (congestion and headache) that she wouldn't write a note and he could stay home for 10 days or have covid test. The headache was debatable because when you ask a 6 year old do you have this?do you have that? they usually say yes. I know she was erring on the side of caution, I get it. BUT, that meant test. I didn't think staying home for 10 days was a good option.
The test was terrible. I had to hold his head while they put a swab in each of his nostrils (to do the rapid and the send off one). She pushed the swab in his nose soooo far, then twisted it around for the slowest count to 10 ever. He was crying and squirming and I'm sure it felt like the swabs were in his brain. Awful. When she was finally done his nose started bleeding. Poor kid, it was not a good one at all. After we left and 30 minutes later they called and said the rapid test was negative. However, because they wait for the 2 day one to totally clear someone, he had to be home on Wednesday too, and we expected the call on Thursday morning.
Wednesday morning was not good because my daughter had started complaining of not feeling that great also, but she didn't have a ton of congestion, she had no fever, so I said listen, let's just head to school and it should all get better throughout the day. She melted down a bit because her brother got to stay home and she didn't. She said she was upset because he was going to get all the attention, which is a hot button w/ my kids, well I suppose all kids.... Anyway, we still made it to school okay, but sure enough a bit after noon the nurse calls. Nurse said my girl was saying she had stomach hurting and needed to come home. Of course, I know how she was in the morning upset and I wasn't sure how 'real' this was. The nurse also knows the history w/ my girl and her struggles, and told me my girl might just be upset because brother was home. We were only 2 1/2 hours until end of day and I told the nurse I just didn't want her to get put under the protocol too. Nurse said she would try and work with her and see what she could do, fully understanding the situation. Didn't work, nurse called me back saying to come get her.
So now, both kids home on Wednesday and I read my email that night and CRAP, they said they are closing the school until at least Tuesday of next week due to Covid. In the background, whenever a new Covid test was reported we'd get an email, and it seemed like I was getting daily emails....I just knew things weren't looking good at school. Our school has about 815 kids and we are currently at 25 cases between staff and students. Before the shutdown, and after getting all the emails, the principal sent a note saying that there was an outbreak in one of the 5th grade classrooms. So, I suspect someone got sick in the classroom, they notify you directly if you could have been exposed to that person, then everyone got tests from there and bam.....an outbreak.
I fully understand the shut down....I really do......but, I started feeling so mad. Why?? Why our school? My kids need school so badly. Not any more than anyone else's, of course, but I started wondering with only shutting down 5 days, will they keep pushing it out more like they did in the Spring. Will they push it out so far that they won't go back until after the holidays? Or at all? I just can't think about it.
On Thursday we got the call my son's 2 day covid test was also negative. I knew it would be.
So, on top of sick kids home all day again and fighting about doing school work, etc. I was completely glued to watching the election all day and into the wee hours. I just couldn't stop watching....the votes just trickling in. I can say I've never watched a political election so closely as I watched this one in my entire life.
My exercise is off the rails. My caffeine is off the rails. My eating out is off the rails. It hasn't been the best few weeks, to say the least. I think the biggest thing for me to work on going forward is to learn new coping schools....food and sleep are my coping skills of choice. I didn't really think of sleep as a coping skill, but after digging into why I'm coming home and taking a nap after dropping off the kids at school....I think it's because I've been feeling a bit lonely, and the days feels so big when I'm here by myself--and, I've napped even when I'm not actually tired. I'm motivated when the kids are around, but if I'm by myself, it's such a different story. I didn't realize that I actually DO get my energy from being around other people. Who knew? But, it's so true....when the kids get home I start doing laundry, dishes, cook dinner, etc.. I have all day to do it, but don't until they get home. I just jump into mom mode.
So, the silver lining in this time of me being at home is I really am learning a lot about myself. It's hard learning and not always pleasant. It's been a time of self-discovery, more self awareness....but then it becomes, what will I do w/ it? I've even had thoughts about going back to work because I learned that not having enough time is not the reason I'm not doing things. At least with work I felt productive, like I was accomplishing something. Apparently I do well with deadlines and a forced structure. I'm not planning to go back to work any time soon, however, so it's really just allowing myself the space to work through all of these things. Be kind to myself and having realistic expectations while doing it. That is turning out to be harder than I thought.
I so hope the kids get to go back to school on Tuesday.
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