ADs and the hardon colanders

[CruCru]

Here’s the new thread.

@TooManyButtons 💐 So sorry. But pleased it was a peaceful death, bit of comfort

Oh, @LivinLaVidaLoki I love that story.

@LivinLaVidaLoki a friend and I also had a conversation about death being mysterious to most people. I have worked in elderly care and nursed dying people and had to ‘lay out’ one man for the undertaker to collect. I’ve also sat with my mum as she died with sepsis. But I am the exception amongst my friends. Most haven’t had that direct experience of death. It is a part of life, it’s not always pretty or dignified but it will come to us all.

@TooManyButtons for you. Glad you could be with your dad in his last moments.

@RobinHobb - if it helps, you are more likely to catch the new strain, but not more likely to be very sick. So the risk to your health if you catch it is the same, just that you are more likely to have it.

[quote MargosKaftan]@RobinHobb - if it helps, you are more likely to catch the new strain, but not more likely to be very sick. So the risk to your health if you catch it is the same, just that you are more likely to have it.

[/quote]
Actually that really helps.....
Fear does make one irrational; thanks for helping me see that.

There's even a possibility that the more contagious strain is milder. My understanding is that in general, milder strains of illnesses often are more contagious, because if you don't feel ill, or don't feel very ill, you're much more likely to be out and about meeting people than if you're at death's door. And therefore milder strains spread better.

@LivinLaVidaLoki That is indeed a great story and I think you are right with your comment about people’s experience with death affecting their views.

I’ve said before that I’ve lost quite a few friends to various things, some really very young, and had a couple of brushes with the grim reaper myself. I’m not particularly bothered about Covid. Others I know who have been relatively shielded from this are petrified it’s hanging in the air ready to drop in them the moment they step outside.

Sorry you had such awful experiences caring for your parents

I’ve just been wandering about on the active board and read a bit of the ‘no more school bubbles’ thread written by an anxious teacher.

I’m not an unfeeling monster and do appreciate that lots of people have anxious moments, not helped by the media and government fear factory, but am I alone in wondering why so many teachers seem to be terrified?

When it comes down to it, covid is a coronavirus which causes most people (especially one could argue, the demographic of a typical school) little to no problems. Since forever, surely teachers have gone to school through every winter season of coronaviruses, noroviruses, flu, nits, impetigo, hand foot and mouth, chickenpox, worms etc. All contagious illnesses and some more dangerous than others to pregnant, vulnerable or elderly people. Yet never before have teachers demanded masks, screens, excessive cleaning, bubbles, the quarantining of healthy kids who sat next to someone off with one of those illnesses. I just can’t get my head round it. However, I don’t dare to post this on a thread full of teachers

@LivinLaVidaLoki I agree, I think a lot of people haven’t experienced it.

My mother and I sat with my grandmother as she died. It was all kinds of things — upsetting, sad, boring, respectful/honouring, occasionally darkly funny and at times oddly life-affirming. After she died, the lovely care home assistant said we were the first family members she’d seen in several months who had sat with their relative as they slipped away. ‘They normally just leave it to us,’ she said.

As a society we tend to euphemise death, don’t talk about it frankly, and of course for many it’s something that happens ‘away’ — in a hospital, nursing home, or a hospice for example. It’s easy to hide away from, if someone is that way inclined. Except a person can’t hide from it. Besides tax it’s life’s only other certainty!

My friend is a funeral celebrant and she has said before that it’s surprising how many people fudge death with not just themselves but also their children. Teenagers being told they can’t go to a funeral because they won’t understand or it’ll be too upsetting for them, for example, or being told that Great Grandma has gone to live on a farm. (Sounds flippant, genuinely isn’t.) Of course it’s a parent’s choice when and how to explain this stuff, but it does contextualise some of this death fear that we see sometimes.

@TooManyButtons sorry for your loss

I agree with this - I spent a large part of my childhood in a developing country because of my fathers job. Malaria, dengue fever, typhoid etc were all endemic yet everyone seemed to get on with life, and there was none of this fear. It's normal to fear death though, but it's not normal to stop living because you fear it so much (as a pp said)

I am feeling sad today because now that Xmas is almost here I do feel bad for the kids for the following week after Xmas. We had organised play dates and soft play and Xmas lights at Kew and lots of fun things which are all cancelled. All first world problems but what really saddens me is the week after that when schools will be closed. My little one is loving it so much, and keeps asking to go back to play with her friends, and she won't be able to.
I've written to our MP not that it will do any good.

Meh. Might as well enjoy what we have today. We are under house arrest but at least happy and healthy and not alone.... merry Xmas everyone :-)

Can I ask a silly question that I know I won’t get ridiculed for on here. If you have allergies does that mean your immune system is stronger than those who don’t based on the fact that allergies are caused by hypersensitivity of the immune system? I can’t work it out. A very unscientific study shows that I seem to suffer far less coughs, colds etc than many others I know and I’ve got multiple allergies so wondered if there was a correlation.

@Iheartmysmart

Can I ask a silly question that I know I won’t get ridiculed for on here. If you have allergies does that mean your immune system is stronger than those who don’t based on the fact that allergies are caused by hypersensitivity of the immune system? I can’t work it out. A very unscientific study shows that I seem to suffer far less coughs, colds etc than many others I know and I’ve got multiple allergies so wondered if there was a correlation.

I think they are medical people on this thread who know this well but here is my stab at it:

Allergies are auto-immune issues, ie your immune system doesn't distinguish self from non self and will mistakenly attack or hyper activate inappropriately. For example asthma attacks will be triggered by an allergen that will cause a massive over reaction of your mast cells (part of the immune response) which as a side effect tighten your airways (causing the asthma attack).

This doesn't mean your immune system is weakened or stronger but only that it has trouble distinguishing and reacting appropriately.

I think. Medics correct me as needed!

Merry Christmas all. And thank you for these threads!

I think we now have less contact with death and have binned a lot of the rituals surrounding it. My parents were adults during WW2 so experienced death of friends plus the prospect of their own death. When I was growing up their friends were older so death was part of my life. The drawing of curtains, wearing black and stopping and bowing ones head when a hearse passed were all things I was taught. I don’t think they are morbid but rather a comfort and also some of the rituals are a sign to others that you might be grieving and not up to light chitchat. I don’t believe that the death of my parents was a tragedy, I was sad, of course, but it was their time. My dc’s all came to the funerals even though the youngest was only 5 and they were not traumatised by it. We discuss what we want at our funerals and it has become a family joke that they’re going to play Britney Spears Kiss me baby one more time at mine and I will be haunting them.😀

As a former teacher, I've thought about what LostinaCloud said. It tends to be the sick bugs that teachers fear. When I did long-term supply around the county, I'd be pretty much guarenteed a new cold with each school I started at until I got used to the local brew of colds. It's a mostly rural county and the small towns are quite insular. In my last post which was plesantly local, I had pupils aghast that I travelled 6 miles to work

to all facing a first Christmas without a loved one.

I've not been with someone as they died, but I saw my uncle in ITU a few days before and it was a peaceful, nostalgic day. Because of the visiting window and distance travelled, we made the most of the day and I showed DH some of my childhood haunts. I saw him in the morge after. His illness had unfortunately fallen in the window where DGM was on holiday so she didn't get to see him. It was odd, but not frightening, and good for me as having lost dad suddenly in childhood, I always had questions about that kind of thing. It was like seeing a waxwork of him. Very close to his usual look, but that little bit different.

@TooManyButtons I'm sorry for your loss but glad you were able to be with him and found comfort in it.

2021 is looking a bit bleak here...vaccine is great but I can't see it being rolled out to healthy people under 50 which is what my dp is. He used to say he was worried about his parents, then it was my parents, and then when it comes down to it he's actually just worried about himself when he has no good reason to be. It's fine to mitigate risks, we put seatbelts on but we still get in the car...

Just seen a newspaper post asking if people are going to get tested today...

So many responses saying "yes why wouldn't you?!" and some treating it like a family day out and they're happy it's busy....so, why wouldn't I? Maybe because it's Christmas eve and I don't feel ill so don't feel the need you weirdo.

Also I'm sure that mass population testing for anything is generally seen as a bad idea

@LivinLaVidaLoki

Just seen a newspaper post asking if people are going to get tested today...

So many responses saying "yes why wouldn't you?!" and some treating it like a family day out and they're happy it's busy....so, why wouldn't I? Maybe because it's Christmas eve and I don't feel ill so don't feel the need you weirdo.

Also I'm sure that mass population testing for anything is generally seen as a bad idea

The BMJ did a feature on what a bad idea it is to mass test.

Hello, everyone and welcome to those who have just joined.

@TooManyButtons I'm so sorry for your loss but I'm glad that he passed peacefully. It's so generous spirited that you wish for people to know that not every Covid death is a terrible, lonely, scary one.

@Lostinacloud the teacher threads on here are weird. DH is a primary teacher and he is nothing like this and nor are any of his colleagues and friends! Like you say, the one thing he gets riled up by is parents sending in kids who have vomiting bugs - just like, don't want to get it, don't want to deal with it, don't want the whole class dropping like flies for the rest of the week! But Covid - meh. They have had two kids and one teacher with positive tests and for all three it was very mild.

I'm so tired today! You know the saying "tired to your bones"? That's how I feel! I'm watching DD2 and DS while DH takes DD1 to the doctor and for a walk along the river after. "Looking after" is probably a generous way of putting it, but hey - they can't go to a friend or whatever because it is Against the Rules.

DD2 said that she wouldn't have a way of knowing if she had a loss or change to her sense of taste, so (in the interest of science and public health) she and DS are blind test testing fruit gums and a box of chocolate creams with different flavour fillings. The idea is that they are going to score themselves and then, if they think they have a loss of taste, they can do the test again and they'll be able to do a comparison.

That's testing for you!

@TooManyButtons

@TooManyButtons, so sorry for your loss

@Anotherthink, welcome to a little corner of sanity, I’m out of sync with my dh too, it’s get very wearing, but I come on here for a bit a sanity and feel better.

Anyway I’m currently locked away in the bedroom wrapping presents and watching naff Christmas programs with a supply a tea and Christmas biscuits so I’m happy for now as it all feels a little bit like a normal Christmas Eve. And the sun is out which always helps the mood a bit.

@Jourdain11
Your daughter's testing is similar to mine.

Can I taste the red wine? Does it taste as good as it usually does?

I test frequently every evening

Thank you @RobinHobb that makes sense. I guess it must be a combination of a mud eating childhood combined with current slovenly housekeeping which gives a bit of immunity to bugs.

@Jourdain11 Now that is dedication for you. I hope they publish their results! I hope your DD gets on okay at the GP.

I’ve just got back from a nice 5k walk with DDog. Almost got flattened by an enormous mastiff wearing a Santa hat which made me laugh which then led to a coughing fit - cos you know it’s cold outside - obviously resulting in several tuts and comments that I shouldn’t be out. Didn’t bother arguing.

I think so many people are unnecessarily scared of covid, and perhaps the healthier you are the more scared one is - vast generalisation, but for example DH is 40, runs a lot, no health conditions and slightly overweight- and is terrified.
This is what terrifies me about 2021 @RobinHobb because in theory it’s once the vulnerable only get vaccinated that we get back to some semblance of normality. The problem seems to be the (very) low risk population that are terrified.
You see in on MN every day when people talk about dropping off a present or whatever and people say “why would you put yourself and your children at risk like that?”
At WHAT risk?
Now I understand we don’t want to get CV because we could pass it on to someone vulnerable but that should be it really.

There is going to have to be a massive U-turn in thinking on this or we’ll be locked down at next Christmas still (when they’ve finally finished vaccinating everyone and are perhaps beginning again??)