Active discussions

Meet the Other Phone. A phone that grows with your child.

Meet the Other Phone.
A phone that grows with your child.

Buy now

Please or to access all these features

Talk
AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To feel nothings left for average families

365 replies

Aubrystrawberry · 02/04/2020 10:00

I fully support the vunerable and elderly getting special times to shop and think it's great that some supermarkets have kept slots for them. But.... Is anyone else feeling like it's a catch 22 for families? Especially ones with kids.

I have managed to get one slot in April through Asda. It was pure luck! I have children aged 2 and 4. My partner's still working all week and he's worried about catching this virus like the rest of us. We are trying to stay home because I'm anemic and don't know how dangerous it would be as I've been quite poorly. It's not recognised as a huge problem but I've read that we don't have enough red blood cells. (I've made another post on this)

Anyway I've just been on Asda to try add a couple of things on and see how much is now out of stock. It says I'm not allowed to amend until 2 days before it's delivered now. Fair enough. But for god's sake.

I've been on Iceland this morning and they put up a bright red warning that if I'm not elderly or vunerable there are no slots.

Morrisons said they have no slots at all anywhere.

Sainsbury's the same.

Tesco's the same.

I went on Amazon to try do a pantry shop. Nothing on there.

Luckily I get milk delivered. But it's becoming a nightmare trying to work out how i will get food in a couple of weeks time.

What do they expect from people? We are slagged off if we dare take a child or two in shops. We are judged for even being in town with kids. Not everyone but quite a few are vocal about it on our local page on Facebook. People are taking pictures of people trying to get them in trouble for being irresponsible. I'm trying to be responsible and keep the kids indoors and us out of germy shops with mucky trolley handles. But I'm being told on all supermarket websites we should go to the store If we can.

I am not sure how many more weeks this is going on for, but like many others we don't want to risk getting this virus so we want to stay home.

I guess there's nothing we can do. But I think the elderly and vunerable have had a fantastic amount of help and support as they have special times to shop, slots online, volunteers shopping for them. It just feels like families are being treated like vultures for wanting to feed their kids.

Also I didn't panic shop and now I wish I did!

OP posts:
Mia1415 · 02/04/2020 17:20

@peterlon1

Thanks - but we are not in the most vulnerable group. If this had happened any other year, then my son would have been but luckily his asthma has stabalised.

peterlon1 · 02/04/2020 17:23

Can't wait to things get back to normal my poor Poochi's could really do with getting out, but no dog walker at present, they are sitting here crossed legged and people are worrying about a delivery slot!!

ochreheart · 02/04/2020 17:23

Build some mental resilience OP. Keeping that slot in your circumstances is selfish. I know a number of families doing the same. As a single mum working full time and shopping for 2 shielded families plus my own, it makes me quite angry.

twinkle2306 · 02/04/2020 17:24

@ochreheart how rude. Why should she give up her slot. She found it and even if it was released who's to say it will be given to a more at risk person everyone is doing the best they can and trying to keep their families safe. Goodness sake

peterlon1 · 02/04/2020 17:28

@Mia1415 it is not for people in the most vulnerable group it is for people like you and your children who are high risk with Asthma, any condition that concerns the respiratory system is high risk and you should not be exposing any of you to the potential of harm. But I know where you are coming from so far not used anything myself managed a shop two days ago and that is me done for a few days I can eeek! out a small amount to go long way. and with my local flower/plant shop selling fruit and veg if I have to I can survive on veg stew for some time lol

notjustamother · 02/04/2020 17:29

Sorry YABU, one of you could go alone. I am a single mum of four kids and having to drive to petrol stations to get food so I can leave the kids in the car safely for a moment and relying on friends to drop things but as and when (but can't really get them to do a full weeks shop for me) leave slots for people that really need it.

bellabelly · 02/04/2020 17:30

@twinkle2306 Completely agree. People are so quick to wag the finger at other people at the moment. It doesn't help at all. People are understandably anxious and we would do well to be a bit more understanding and pleasant to one another on here.

peterlon1 · 02/04/2020 17:37

Sorry @twinkle2306 but many of us agree with @ochreheart it is not so much the fact she has the slot but that she is complaining, when to be honest there are more deserving cases, my niece and her 4 daughters live a short distance from me and they have a new baby in house and one just about to deliver, my niece has a severe nerve problem in her spine and her left side is mostly defunked and at times both of her legs just give way without warning. They cannot afford to get ill as one baby has not yet had shots and her dad isn't allowed in the house because he was in a house with people who were sick. I am disable and high risk group, but I pre-cooked some meals for them and took over a loaf of bread, went in porch put bag down hammered on door and left.

BlueCheeseNoWay · 02/04/2020 17:41

We're the same, can't get delivery slots anywhere.
And we don't have a car so we HAVE to go to the shops twice a week as we literally can only shop for as much as we can carry and poor dh is doing it on his own as I'm staying in with the kids! ☹️

peterlon1 · 02/04/2020 17:44

@BlueCheeseNoWay is there no one can help you with car? even it you just put it in boot and walk back to house and then take it out of boot?

peterlon1 · 02/04/2020 17:49

one thing I am happy about is that a few weeks ago I saw a very large bag of teabags on special offer and bought one for me and one for my sister, we are both teabags! so at least we will not run out of those for a while, I'd go mad without my tea.

BlueCheeseNoWay · 02/04/2020 17:58

I wish we did but both mine and dh's parents are very vulnerable, one of them has cancer and one has heart problems so we just don't want to take the risk with them.
No other friends or family close by with a car either.
We normally use Asda delivery but we've not been able to get a slot for weeks now. ☹️

RaspberryBubblegum · 02/04/2020 17:59

So why exactly can't your DH go to the shops? Is it because you think he's more likely to catch coronavirus? Because surely you're more likely to catch it from strangers handling your food and delivering it to your house?

peterlon1 · 02/04/2020 18:00

sorry about that @BlueCheeseNoWay if i was close I'd do it for you

FourTeaFallOut · 02/04/2020 18:01

People who are shielding can't get a delivery slot either. I understand the idea is that all these supermarkets are stepping forward and saving the vulnerable but it's just not happening. Meanwhile there's even more resentment from people who seem to think we have some kind of dial up access and leap frogging them over the queue. It's not happening.

peterlon1 · 02/04/2020 18:09

the chances of anyone catching the virus by touch is so minuscule it probably wouldn't even have a mathematical figure that would fit on an A4 sheet of paper, the chain of events for it to happen has to be in
an absolutely perfect timeline for it to happen. The first part of the chain is usually where it falls down. that person has to have a raging case of the coronvirus and to have coughed or sneezed on it seconds before you took hold of it. If someone was that sick they would be either in hospital or self isolating at home in bed. So chain broken before it begins. rule 1 - 100 Bold:WASH YOUR HANDS

PippaPegg · 02/04/2020 18:10

@Thingsthatgo not goady. Genuine question. How did you find out about all these local businesses? I can't get anywhere on google and my friends all shop at Tesco/ Asda..

OP send your OH in with a list. He washes his hands when he gets home. It's not hard. That's the best you can do in your situation and it's not bad

peterlon1 · 02/04/2020 18:12

Try these two website.

novablooms.com/
www.newcoventgardenmarket.com/

peterlon1 · 02/04/2020 18:12

why can I never get things to go bold???

peterlon1 · 02/04/2020 18:29

Bold: Test

peterlon1 · 02/04/2020 18:30

got it

Hannah021 · 02/04/2020 18:35

People are taking the piss now,
looks like everyone is feeling himself and his circle is more important than other people, and sooner or later, young single people will find themselves discriminated against by a bunch of entitled ppl who feel somehow having children gives them a priority...

stop this shit

peterlon1 · 02/04/2020 18:38

Completely lost me there @Hannah021 no idea who you is talking about?

MitziK · 02/04/2020 18:46

Not really so miniscule, @peterlon1. It just takes somebody feeling ill to have to go to the supermarket because they can't get a home delivery slot or coming back by bus from work, going in to the shop to get dinner when they're just feeling tired/not 100%, then getting ill over the course of the evening.

I thought it had just been a tough day at work and I hadn't eaten enough, as I went a bit woozy around 2.30pm. The next morning, I felt achey and sore, but that's common with autoimmune diseases like RA and PsA. It was only over the next few hours that I realised I was feeling a bit out of puff. But I'm not hugely active due to the arthritis, so it could have been just that. I knew DP would get shopping on the way home and it was his day off the next day, so I didn't bother going into the supermarket the bus stops right outside and went straight home for a change.

The following morning, I found myself out of breath from getting up and getting ready for work. Still no temperature and still no cough.

I called my boss, who told me to stay at home. I only started feeling properly wheezy at about 4.30pm - any other time, I'd have still gone into work, but I knew I could afford it and anything that could be termed as self isolation wasn't going to be treated as sickness for absence triggers, as my boss had made a point of telling me so.

In previous jobs, including for the NHS, I would have been told that I had to go in and if they decided I was ill enough, they'd send me home (and still start disciplinary for reaching trigger point) or I'd have been docked pay/threatened with the sack.

I only started feeling properly ill, as in 'there is no way anybody could make me leave the house' seven days after I first didn't feel quite right. In all the time leading up to that, if I hadn't got food, the cat needed food or work had been more like every other job I've ever had, I could and would have gone out, worked, shopped and spread whatever I had. Because you don't stop for a cold/minor flu/cough, you dose yourself up and drag yourself in and get on with what you have to do.

Were it not for all those extra little things - paid sick leave, a nice boss, the instructions to isolate being listened to by the boss, having a partner to do the shopping instead - I could easily have infected far more people that the ones I probably did over the first couple of days before I realised I was coming down with something.

peterlon1 · 02/04/2020 18:53

ok I read an article by a scientist wold gave a lot of information which I am not going to try and relay, so you tested positive for Coronovirus then?