UNWELCOME INTERLUDE
Well that was a strange couple of weeks and definitely not the half term I’d envisioned… perhaps there’s a lesson in there somewhere around having lower expectations. I’d arranged to take time off from client work for the school holiday and imagined H and I would spend some quality time together, culminating in the planned carpet fit on the Friday that would finally get her into her new room. After living in three upside down bedrooms for the month of October, to be able to tick one off as complete was a milestone we were all more than ready for.
First came a last minute change of plans and then came Covid.
On the first Sunday evening of the school holiday H was offered a last minute opportunity to go away for the week with a friend’s family. We settled on her going for three days as we’d already made plans for the latter half of the week. This meant a six hour round trip to Devon for us and dog at 7:00am on Thursday morning - something that, pre becoming a parent, I would have scoffed at. Now? I understand how that might be a thing.
We said our goodbyes on Monday morning and I ruminated on the fact I suddenly found myself with unplanned, free time on my hands - an unexpected pleasure and a small window of insight to the future pehaps. Everything I read at the moment seems to be on the subject of empty nest syndrome. I’m not sure if it’s excellent timing or a kind of subconscious cramming for motherhood tests yet to come.
After reaching our pre-arranged pick up point on Thursday morning and enveloping her in a hug I noted sniffs, a husky voice and the look of extreme tiredness. Nothing unusual there when two teen girlfriends have shared a room away from the confines and rules of home. However, one three hour car-ride home and two instantly positive lateral flow tests later, we realised we were all of sudden in the thick of it.
Despite the close proximity of the long, enclosed car journey (insert scream face emoji), and the feeling we were slamming the stable door shut after the horse bolted hours ago, we went straight into infection prevention mode. Postal PCR kits were ordered, surfaces wiped down on repeat, masks worn as needed, upstairs windows thrown open despite the now low outside temperatures and H’s bedroom isolation began. By Saturday night, the PCR results came back - ours negative and as expected, her’s positive.
It’s an odd feeling when the thing that you’ve lived in fear of for the past eighteen months materialises and demands that you now deal with it. A strange kind of calm descended and I focused on the practical stuff that I could control. Because for me, I’ve come to realise it’s pretty much always about what I can control.
She isolated in her room from Thursday to Thursday and Patrick and I lived out the long and protracted routine of checking in on her symptoms, testing ourselves daily and wondering if the vaccines would work. They did and I am beyond grateful. As we both work at home and already had a food shop delivery booked, we made the decision to not go anywhere apart from leaving the house to walk the dog, taking care to keep away from people.
As for those symptoms, she had a constant headache over the eyes, a couple of days of aching limbs, she felt bunged up with a stuffy nose and was extremely tired throughout. I would wager that the one jab in August, coupled with her youth was instrumental in her coping well with it physically - she told me she’s had worse colds. Towards the end, the hardest thing both for her to get though and for me to witness, was the effect of her isolating away from the rest of the house with too much thinking time and the stress of missing A Level coursework at the start of a new half term. But she remained steadfast about trying to protect us as much as possible and I’m proud of her for her resolve and how she got through it.
Meal deliveries to the bedroom door were eagerly received and in the way that a parent would be, I felt reassured and comforted by the stable appetite and frequent requests for snacks. A welcome diversion came in the unexpected form of Ed Sheeran’s latest album release, who after testing positive was also isolating - Covid twinning with your musical hero is apparently a thing. As she played her favourite tracks and I sat listening at a distance out on the landing, I felt grateful for not only his insane musical talent but also the power of distraction in a time of need.
With the carpet fit rebooked for when we hoped wed all be in the clear, we got to spend another week in the delightful chaos of the upside down (and now freezing cold), upstairs. My wardrobes had already been moved into H’s old room where she was isolating and the doors had been left off. To me this signified germ exposed clothing so I restricted myself to a sartorial diet of what I could find in the laundry and ironing basket. Wear, wash, repeat.
Here we are on the other side. After an onset of symptoms calculation and confirmation from NHS Test and Trace, H finished her quarantine on Friday and this week went back to college. Through this unwanted but upon reflection, inevitable experience, my faith in the efficacy of the vaccines has been reaffirmed. By inevitable, I mean that since the onset of autumn, the rise in daily cases and the ineptitude of a government unwilling to grow a pair and put it’s “Plan B” into place as a preventative rather than reactive measure, I fully expected H to catch Covid. She’s still in education where it seems a vast majority of cases are rising. Not only that but after eighteen months living a restricted half-life that in teen terms came at a crucial development point, she needed to be out there, doing all the things she should have been doing and re-learning what it is to have a social life. So yes, Covid felt inevitable.
I suppose, in part I share our experience here, not only in the cathartic process of documenting the weird, time-suspended interlude of the last two weeks but also to provide balance among the myriad of stories that circulate. I’m the last person to play down the significance or make light of catching Covid - this is not what this post is meant to do. I’m mindful that everyone’s experience can be vastly and in some cases, catastrophically different. But after all this time spent waiting in the grip of anxiety, I feel a measure of relief that the thing I’d been dreading has passed, at least for now, perhaps for good for this household. Optimism is key.
This weekend, with the three of us in the clear, the carpet was fitted, we moved H into her new room and put the other two bedrooms back into some semblance of order… for three glorious weeks until the plasterer arrives to start the next phase. On Monday morning I got up at 6:30am, booked my Covid booster jab for four week’s time, pulled on fresh clothes and returned to the routine of an early morning beach walk.
Most, if not all of the equilibrium missing from the household these last two weeks felt like it was slowly being restored as I stood on the shore and watched the sun rise, just like it always does.
And breathe.
