Friend and children still in complete lockdown

[madbirdlady22]

I am getting quite worried about a friend of mine, and wondered if there is something I can or should be doing do to help her.

Since mid March she has been in lockdown with her dh and children, and along the same lines as everyone else stayed in. Back then she would not even take the children for a walk, they stayed at home 247 with shopping delivered. I asked her why not go for a walk, but she said there was no need as they have a garden.

Now we are in mid July, and the children have still not been out. They decided against going back to school in June, and they have not been out anywhere at all since March. I am feeling quite worried now, not just for her, but for the children as well (they are ages 7 and 4) she has not seen any friends or been out of the house at all since the lockdown began.

I suggested the park, she said it was too busy, I mentioned going to the gardens nearby for a picnic with her dc, and she said they couldn't get a ticket, but I know it is possible to get tickets easily. She lives an hour and a half away, so I can't just pop in and check on her, and I feel I should respect her wishes.

She is now saying she doesn't think the children will go back to school in September after all. I am getting very worried about her.

I think/thought her MH is fine, her dh has PTSD at the moment. I am feeling concerned, she has no family nearby and no other support from what I can gather.

They spend all day every day in the house or in the garden.
They are not shielding, are not vulnerable at all and they are all perfectly healthy.

Should I say something? Are other people also doing this? Should I just leave them to it? She has been a friend for 35 years plus and we grew up together.

I think having the priveledge of working from home on a stable wage and then almost judging others who do go out and about but being disgruntled when others say it doesn't sound healthy is quite funny though really.

Hearhoovesthinkzebras

Maybe I am projecting a bit. I'm really upset by the whole thing, if I'm honest.

I also think the SAHM vs WOHM thing is a bit of a red herring: there's a degree of choice there, which is not the case here. If you're a lone parent/sole breadwinner and you weren't furloughed you bloody well had to work through it.

But I do think there is an implied moral judgement here. I've read tons of threads which have carried the clear implication that people who fail to "slow down" and enjoy lockdown etc are failing to priorities their families. There's quite an old-fashioned and anti-feminist undertone about it to my mind.

@thepeopleversuswork

Hearhoovesthinkzebras

Maybe I am projecting a bit. I'm really upset by the whole thing, if I'm honest.

I also think the SAHM vs WOHM thing is a bit of a red herring: there's a degree of choice there, which is not the case here. If you're a lone parent/sole breadwinner and you weren't furloughed you bloody well had to work through it.

But I do think there is an implied moral judgement here. I've read tons of threads which have carried the clear implication that people who fail to "slow down" and enjoy lockdown etc are failing to priorities their families. There's quite an old-fashioned and anti-feminist undertone about it to my mind.

Well it hasn't been said on this thread. The only people judging on this thread are the people going out and about judging the people staying at home.

Both are valid choices.

And it is identical to the SAHM Vs WOHM debate. Both sides consider the opposing choice an attack on their own choice.

@Hearhoovesthinkzebras I think you're missing the point slightly. It's about choice again. If someone doesn't have the choice to stay at home with their family then they don't have the opportunity to do a lot of the things that are described by the people who are continuing to stay isolated.

But I have observed a strain of thought at the moment which is evident on here which combines a bit of fear with a dash of agoraphobia and an element of triumphant introvertism which says: "I'm alright jack at home with my family. I'm not leaving the home again until I have to. I don't care what society thinks about me and I feel good about having license to ignore being part of society." And it makes me quite uncomfortable.

That might be how you would feel if you are staying at home but I don't think you can ascribe that to other people as they probably have very different circumstances. They may be quite capable of weighing up the benefits and risks but if the risks are higher for them than you and the benefits are lower then they may be making the choices you would make if you were in their position. When people talk about the risks being "minuscule" I think they're the ones with the smug "all right Jack attitude". Not everyone is under 45 with no underlying conditions .The chance of catching it may be very low in some areas in the moment but it isn't particularly low in others. I also know of a few people who have had potential symptoms but haven't been tested so not particularly reassured by that anyway.

[quote SecondStarFromTheRight]@Hearhoovesthinkzebras I think you're missing the point slightly. It's about choice again. If someone doesn't have the choice to stay at home with their family then they don't have the opportunity to do a lot of the things that are described by the people who are continuing to stay isolated.[/quote]
Exactly this.

There's been this drumbeat of how wonderful lockdown has been, how much people have enjoyed the halcyon period of quality time with their children. How much they have realised they never liked going out anyway, don't feel the need to see anyone except their DP/DCs. How much they've enjoyed baking/crafting/long walks.

To be honest, if you're someone like me who has to work for 10 hours a day to keep food on the table, with a DC whose mental health has been impacted by it, its been absolutely excruciating.

And I find while I can make my peace with the fact that others have had better fortune than I have, I can't stomach the comments about "the ratrace" and the implicit suggestion that people who don't step off it are missing this golden opportunity to put their careers above their families. And the suggestion that this lovely life lived in the garden with smiling DP and DCs around you as you bake bread and plant vegetables is the one true way to raise a family.

I may be bitter about it and I probably need to get over it. But when I see stuff like this about people basically deciding they are going to live like this in perpetuity because their family is privileged enough to be able to choose this route, it makes me wonder how we as a society will be able to move past this them and us situation.

[quote SecondStarFromTheRight]@Hearhoovesthinkzebras I think you're missing the point slightly. It's about choice again. If someone doesn't have the choice to stay at home with their family then they don't have the opportunity to do a lot of the things that are described by the people who are continuing to stay isolated.[/quote]
But that isn't the fault of the people who do have the choice and nor is it a criticism of the people who are going out to work.

This really is a very bizarre argument. If people choose to suffer the financial penalty of leaving their job then that's up to them. Its not an attack on the people who carry on working.

Is you going out to work an attack on the people who don't work?

thepeopleversuswork I can understand why you find it upsetting. I found all the social media posts about how kids will remember how parents stayed home and played and played really nauseating to be honest. I can totally understand how the millions of people who couldn't do that would feel absolutely awful seeing them. It's also not true, and I bet there were equal numbers who due to anxiety or job losses etc were unable to concentrate on their kids due to other worries, the idealised picture of families staying home and enjoying themselves certainly won't have helped them.

FWIW this is one of the only threads where I have detailed how and why we've enjoyed lockdown. I have previously answered threads re kids mental health, just to give a counter argument that not all kids MH is suffering (mainly to parents worried only because people say the kids MH must be suffering when not all kids are the same). But we have certainly kept quiet about it on our SM and in conversation with friends,many of whom have not enjoyed it for various reasons. It would be cruel to discuss how wonderful we have been having it whilst for some people this has been the worst thing they have ever experienced.

maxdash But getting back to the theme of the thread, you and your kids have not left your house since March. You are an adult and are rightly free to make your own decisions but you are inflicting that fear (you say you aren’t scared, but why else would you suddenly stop leaving your home when you previously went out and about?)

You child’s anxiety will reappear when you go back out, and may be worse.

@Hearhoovesthinkzebras I think it's the (and I can't think of a better word) preaching from this group about how they are staying in to do their bit and it's helping to keep the R rate down and if everyone was doing the same we wouldn't be in this mess etc etc, which is tiresome as someone needs to be out working and, as has been said before, not everyone has the luxury.

I'm truly concerned at how much people think they've got the right to intrude on other people's lives.

Perhaps you all should open up your lives so that we can judge each decision that you make for your families?

[quote SecondStarFromTheRight]@Hearhoovesthinkzebras I think it's the (and I can't think of a better word) preaching from this group about how they are staying in to do their bit and it's helping to keep the R rate down and if everyone was doing the same we wouldn't be in this mess etc etc, which is tiresome as someone needs to be out working and, as has been said before, not everyone has the luxury.[/quote]
And if there has been any of that on this thread it has only been in direct response to those people being attacked for the choices they are making. If people are attacked it's understandable that they defend their decisions.

hear Ask me a question about my life, I will answer honestly and you are free to judge if you want!

@Nicknacky

hear Ask me a question about my life, I will answer honestly and you are free to judge if you want!

It's not my place to judge your life Nicky.

You aren't answerable to me and the people on here aren't answerable to you (even though you seem to think they need to justify themselves to you)

hear You literally just said to do it😂

Nicknacky we 'suddenly stopped' because there was lockdown. We've never previously walked around our local area, so all the things we previously did were unavailable to us.

Yes, I am fully aware that the anxiety will likely reappear, it was very unlikely to have gone away had life continued as normal, it appears to be personality related. It has however been nice to have a 4 month break from it.

maxdash

Thank you, I appreciate your comment.

I do think people need to make their own decisions vis a vis risk. This is all a bit of a derail from the original topic of the thread. I do think its not ideal for children not to leave the home for months on end and there are going to be consequences to this but I understand that people have given this significant thought and are doing that they think is best for their families.

But I do think we need to address this gulf which seems to be developing between those who have had to work and those who haven't as I think its doing us as a society some significant harm.

I may be part of the problem here but I think our political leaders haven't done much to help things with the assumption that the home-schooling will just automatically get done (by the women).

I'm truly concerned at how much people think they've got the right to intrude on other people's lives..

It's a message board where people write things and discuss given tiny snippets of someones life. The 'judgement' might feel personal, but it's not as it's only based on a tiny fraction. What would be the point though if everyone just agreed, that wouldn't be an interesting message forum.

@Hearhoovesthinkzebras I don't think there's been too much of it on this thread to be honest, but there has been an awful lot throughout lockdown and it can get wearing.

[quote SecondStarFromTheRight]@Hearhoovesthinkzebras I don't think there's been too much of it on this thread to be honest, but there has been an awful lot throughout lockdown and it can get wearing.[/quote]
The very thread is a judgement on someone staying at home.

If someone had been saying this time last year that they had decided to take their children out of school to home Ed them and 4 months later you were talking to them and asking how it was going, would people have been concerned if they had said the whole family had not been outside their front door for 4 months?

Yes there is a pandemic now and lives are very different, but in this country at least and if not shielding you have been able to go outside at least once every day. Admittedly there was confusion over about how much and how far, but we have always been allowed outside our homes. Because the Government knew how important this was for the benefit of people’s mental as well as physical well being.

I'm truly concerned at how much people think they've got the right to intrude on other people's lives.

If I believe someone is effectively abusing their children damn right I’ll intrude! We all should.

Exactly @ineedaholidaynow

@Hearhoovesthinkzebras I think you misunderstood what I was talking about but never mind.