When my husband and I watched the number of COVID-19 cases in Maine blow up right before the holidays, we pulled our kids out of school in a panic. We weighed the importance of them being part of their pre-school's end-of-year celebrations against potentially spending the break sick at home, and decided it wasn't the risk. It was a short week anyway and the kids seemed to enjoy the time at home with us.
Looking back, I wish we hadn't done any of that, because now my kids are quarantining, along with almost all of the school, because they're close contacts with two positive COVID-19 cases. They will be out of school for an entire month.
This is the first time there are positive cases in our school
We have been spoiled by how well our school was able to prevent COVID-19 from spreading in the past, especially considering that most students are not eligible for the vaccine yet.
We had a couple of scares that turned out to be false positives. I still lost sleep over those and had to juggle work, remote learning, meals for everyone, and keeping the kids entertained when they were done with staring at a Zoom screen.
While we were able to remain COVID-free for the last two years, we still felt like the combination of Omicron and the holiday season was a ticking bomb.
My husband caught COVID-19 days after Christmas
Then my husband tested positive after a masked close contact with a neighbor, just days after Christmas. His first two at-home tests came negative. The third was a clear positive. We immediately quarantined him away from everyone.
The kids and I avoided infection, but the quarantine period was without a doubt the hardest 10 days I've ever experienced as a parent.
I had to single-handedly take care of three kids under the age of four, keeping them entertained, taking them to several appointments for PCR tests to make sure they were still COVID-free, and trying to enjoy my time off with them. I cried a lot. I yelled more than I want to admit. And they all watched much more television than we've ever allowed before.
It was the only way I had to cope.
It took only two days for school to shut down
The day before school started in January, I sat on my couch sobbing while my husband went through all the possible scenarios. We debated whether we were going to keep our kids home the first week, fearing an even bigger COVID-19 surge.
We decided to send them back because we felt that they needed a learning environment.
Only two days after school started we were told that our son was a close contact and needed to quarantine, and because of that, so did our twin daughters. Between the quarantine, a national holiday, and school holiday, they won't be back in school until the end of January — meaning they will be out for an entire month.
The closure sent me into despair. Now that I'm back at work, it's even harder for us to handle remote learning, entertainment, and care.
My feeling was heightened even more when, after announcing to our son that he had a "home day," he started crying, asking to see his friends.
My kids have been robbed of so much because of the pandemic, and right now it feels like it will be robbing them of even more. I am mentally exhausted of constantly doing risk-assessment and second-guessing every decision, wondering what will happen to our children if they catch COVID or if they miss more school.
Every parent I've talked to in the last couple of days is at a breaking point, more so than in the early pandemic days. We can't keep doing this. Our kids can't keep doing this. And that breaks my heart.
