How many of you have broken lockdown rules?

[vulvic]

I'm just wondering. I thought the vast majority had stuck to it but seeing more threads and hearing more stories, it seems there is a lot of people still seeing close family.

Anyway, I'm in the Channel Isles. Still in lockdown but slightly easing.

I'm not interested in shopping, garden centres or more exercise. I'm not even interested in socialising or catching up with friends.
I just want to see my mum.

I think it's badly affecting her mental health now as she was depressive anyway, and my DS is struggling having not seen her for 2 months.

So, I'm just wondering, have any of you still been seeing close family? Or were you sticking to it and now given up and started visiting? Or are you encouraging to stick firmly to it for as long as possible?

I've been a firm sticker to the rules but now starting to feel the negatives are outweighing the positives but still completely paranoid.

[1forsorrow]

Depends how you read the rules I guess. My teenage GS has visited, we view it as him doing a welfare visit with my husband being in the vulnerable group, over 70 BAME and diabetes, not to mention moral support for granny and bringing some supplies if I need them i.e. I get a weekly delivery but if I am low on bread or milk he will get it.

We maintain distance, he sits in garden and we chat at french windows. Some might say we are breaking the rules, I don't think we are.

[VerticalHorizon]

It's hard to really say what the 'rules' are in some cases.
Essential shopping for one person could be quite different for another.

2m distancing at work 'where possible' - but what counts as possible? It might technically be possible, but in practical terms, a bit difficult to pass a spanner to a bloke on a ladder without getting close to him etc.

Do you NEED to go into the office to collect your mail? but if you don't there could be an important tax letter...

[WaxOnFeckOff]

Broke it on the first day (probably?) by going and collecting my DS from university. Other than that no, and I'd already been stuck in for two weeks as I (probably) had the virus in mid March. I've been out once a day (but not even every day) for exercise (under an hour) and have been for food shopping, one big shop and one top up per week. DH is NHS so out at work every day, i'm working from home and DSs have left the house less than once every day for a walk.

I've been proud of them. One DS desperately missing his GF but has managed to stick to video calls.

It makes me mad when I think that an 18 year old has coped and yet grown arse adults have been sneaking off to see partners.

[1forsorrow]

@Straycatstrut that sounds really tough. At the end of the day you have to do what you have to do to get through it. I hope things get easier soon.

[nanbread]

Yes. I've been to a few friend's houses locally to drop off birthday presents and have stayed for a chat outside, at a distance. I do feel uncomfortable about it in hindsight, it's played on my conscience a bit.

I've also borrowed a few things / loaned or given things to neighbours. Not sure if this is considered ok or not, they would have had to go to shop or ordered online otherwise.

We've also driven to exercise once or twice in the past few weeks since that police guidance came out. I was struggling to get our DC to exercise or even leave the house to go to our local park for the Nth time, whereas they will walk for hours with more space to explore - and that is important to their physical and mental wellbeing. One of my DC has a physical impairment and it's really important that he exercises regularly to build up strength and stamina.

On the other hand I've not been to a shop or takeaway or work or anywhere else (bar a handful of outdoor spaces) for two months.

[ChicCroissant]

We haven't seen family but we live miles from them so not difficult really. Seen neighbours in the street and at the VE day party yesterday, easy to keep a distance there though. Go out shopping on our own. I miss going out as a family tbh, we can only go out for a walk together!

[Menora]

As already stated - not talking about lonely vulnerable elderly people

The issue with mental health and lockdown is that people do need support and help but this does not mean it should be used as a free for all excuse to do as you please. Or where would it end? And as most people are not MH professionals we are often making decisions based on what we think is going to help. It will not help my MH to end up in hospital on a ventilator it will make it much much worse - so that one hug someone might give me, might make me feel better in that moment but long term it could do more damage

I agree that someone who is very vulnerable needs support. There are lots of ways to do this that don’t involve putting more people at risk.

You can video call. You can talk on the phone. You can contact support services. You can use common sense (as I think most people do when caring for vulnerable elderly) but for us able bodied adults we need to also make sensible decisions for the greater good, not what helps you feel better NOW but longer term

[Mcvitoes]

@Vicbarbarkley

That all depends on your interpretation of essential.
I think it is essential to visit, and, walk with my dad.

Officially, there's no room for individual interpretation, so in the politest possible sense, it doesn't matter what you personally think.

They said you must stay at home. They gave limited exceptions to this, which they defined as essential. And they said it didn't include seeing friends and family.

[ilovemyrednosedaymug]

We have delivered supplies to each other in the beginning depending on who could get what in their shopping, but we haven't had any social visits.

I am intending to visit them in a couple of weeks though if things are eased slightly. They live 3 miles away and in the middle of nowhere.

[cardibach]

cardibach. It’s not nonsense. They are many posts on Mumsnet where people are accusing others of murder for going outside. That’s A fact
Maybe so @BirdieFriendReturns but that’s not what the thread is about. It asks if you’ve broken rules, not if some random person thinks you have. You haven’t. So it’s nonsense.

[WiddlinDiddlin]

Since march 11th, OH has done the shopping once a week, either waitrose, tesco or morrisons (all local) and once to jmart (still local).

He has also walked our dogs in groups, two dogs per group, once each per day (so in and out three times but to a quiet location that means he sees no one and touches no gates etc).

He's been to my dads once to do some garden work that couldn't wait and my sister was too ill to do.

I have left the building to go to A&E once, and three times to the vets (drop dog off, pick dog up, stitches out).

My sister has been round twice, once to drive OH to the emergency vets with dog whilst I stayed here with other dogs, and once to help fell a small tree that was going to damage neighbours fences.

Social distancing has been maintained on all occasions except tree felling, car trip with my sister and OH in same car and me going to a&e as obviously you can't have a wound dressed and social distance at the same time.

[Coughsyrupsucks]

Other than the once a week to click and collect at Tesco’s, the most exciting my life has been is to drop some flour off to my Mum’s door step 3 weeks ago.

I pulled my daughter out of school on March 11th, we have taken this really seriously.

[yellowbrickwhorl]

I can't really think of anything, no. Possibly very slightly too many visits to the supermarket, but then all four of us in this house have had a birthday in the last month, so we've needed to hunt round a bit for things that would normally just be in stock all the time.

[YesILikeItToo]

I have visited a charming tradesperson because they asked me to - I had a plan about posting the item to them for repair, but by the time we’d had a phone call and they’d said it would be better to see it and discuss it together, I felt committed and walked round there and took the long way home. The I realised I had basically gone shopping for non essentials.

[oldiewelshie]

@Straycatstrut you are doing nothing wrong. You are vulnerable and your parents are providing you with support. That is specifically allowed. I hope you get through the rest of this lockdown OK.

[Menora]

Does it not seem counter productive to bend the lockdown rules to support your own or others mental health (or other self identified essential reasons people seem to be talking about) which is due in part worse to being in lockdown. Which is going to keep being extended the longer it takes to reduce transmission. Whilst we all continue to add to the transmission by not abiding by the rules

[wasthataburp]

We have been seeing my parents and I have been going out on both a family walk and then a walk on my own with the dog at night time

[VerticalHorizon]

Sadly we ARE left with having to individually interpret.
If you're not a care worker, and a parent has dementia and needs you to oversee their medication, is that essential, or is it not?

There is no categorical governmental guidance that covers every possible situation. You are left with HAVING to make a personal decision and hope that any sensible person would agree with you.

We have precisely the same issues at work... do you enter an old person's property to fix a faulty smoke detector, or personal alarm?
Do you travel 50 miles to check on a report that there might be a fault with a safety system in a care home? it MIGHT be a battery that needs replacing in the next 6 months, or it might be something significant which if it fails, could result in deaths IF there is a fire....

There are people up and down the country having to decide for themselves, and the Government knew this. It is impossible to dictate every circumstance, so I disagree that there is no room for personal interpretation.

[GlamGiraffe]

I havent been out since before lockdown, nor have my parents with my 99 year old grandmother who udually lives alone and lives fully independently, walks a couple of miles a day goes to the shops etc. We've all been home,them in one house us in ours. On my son's birthday they came to our house let themselves in the back gate (with their own drinks and glasses which was funny) and sat about 20 feet away from us. We are the only people who have actually had any contact with each other all since pre lockdown and were very distanced and outside.
On a realistic scale there is such minimal chance of any potential contamination between us it is probably far safer than going to a super market with recommended social distancing.
Most noticeably over lockdown my grandmother has deteriorated so drastically from being so active at such a great age then having to go into isolated lockdown, it's being active and involved that keeps you young when you are going on 100. She usually sees her seven great grandchildren every day. Seeing her great grandchildren from the other end of the garden made such an enormous change to her. She is losing her sight and cant see the screen on video calls So they do not allow a sense of contact. This once visit has made a massive changeyo her mind and and in turn this has impacted on my parents.

There are plenty of people who are continually talking about breaking rules etc but going to the post office, news agent, bakery, greengrocer, butcher etc is all perfectly within the rules. We can all do this every day, pop to the farm shop and the fishmonger too, that's a lot of social interaction. With any kind of rules, guidelines or law there is always the letter and the spirit ; the regulation and why. This current situation is no different.
People like my stupid neighbours who have had w separate parties in our front garden 2 weeks in a row where they think no one can see them and think the fresh air is a magical safety protector when you stand 4 inches from someone's face .will never get the spirit nor the letter of any rules.

[changeofname890]

I've sat in my parents garden and had a chat, they've been to ours and done the same. I've been to the supermarket and met a friend and we've shopped at the same time. I've been out with my neighbour today and the children have been doing cartwheels in the field together outside our house.
So yes, I've 'broken the rules', we've always stayed the appropriate distance apart. I just want to get back to as normal a life as we can.

[ElizaCrouch]

You can video call. You can talk on the phone. You can contact support services

Sometimes those approaches not enough. We treat people's needs individually. Some people struggling with mental health may manage with that. Others will not.

[OldLace]

Stuck to it religiously.
Single parent, both kids have ASD.
It's been really hard.

[EC22]

My mum visited me in my garden. That is the only time, I feel guilty about it and I won’t do it again.

[EatsShootsAndRuns]

We've stuck to the rules. It does help that we have a mahoosive garden though. Not been out in the street or had anyone over.

[Vicbarbarkley]

@Mcvitoes again, i say an 84 year old man, whose wife dies a couple of months ago, lives remotely no near neighbours. Has no visitors, only company is the tv.

Youn would honestly leave him to, basically, rot?

He sees no point anything since my mam died. If I did not visit and take him food he would die. One way or another, he would be another victim.

So, in the politest possible sense, I care more abput saving my dads life, than what you think.