We have had norovirus over the past two weeks (confirmed by stool sample)
It started with my dd and seven out of ten family members went down with it, including our cleaner who comes once a week. I didn’t get it and my elderly GM who lives with us didn’t get it - but I was obsessive with hygiene and protected her as she is almost 100 and something like that could kill her. I cleaned up and looked after everyone as they all went down like flies. I was up through the night too with all DC. I was and am knackered. My GM’s carer was on sick leave for 1.5 weeks while we had it because she had an operation.
The carer came back for the last two days people were still symptomatic . I told her that she needed to be scrupulous with hand washing to prevent herself from catching it. I gave her really detailed instructions to prevent it including noro-specific hand sanitizer and reminding her about washing her hands.
She did not seem to take me seriously and she did not wash her hands at all, and used loos, was in close contact with DC and shared food with them.m even though I warned her not to for her own sake.
The last couple of days have passed with no more family sick. I deep cleaned the house and breathed a sigh of relief.
It was the carer’s day off yesterday and she came this morning and said she had vomited for 12 hours straight yesterday because of something dodgy she ate. I said I think you have had what we have all had. She said absolutely not, it was food poisoning and she had made an official complaint to the cafe she had eaten at. She had also brought a meal she had cooked for us last night!
I said I’m sorry we can’t eat that, and I sent her home because I just cannot deal with the house being reinfected or the DC getting it again, and especially not my GM. I said I would still pay her but I just did not want the risk of reinfecting the house.
She left in a mild strop/disbelief and I am sitting here feeling like she thinks I am an obsessive lunatic. I can see where she is coming from if she genuinely thinks she had food poisoning, but do you think I was U for sending her home even though I am STILL paying her for today? I could go into lots of detail with her about how we were tested and it’s been confirmed and how contagious it is - cruise ships etc - making noro the most likely culprit in her case, but every time I tried to justify my decision to her, she just glazed over, and I gave up.