Homesick DD locked down in uni room

[RollercoasterRita]

We took our DD to university in the middle of September. She was excited and full of hope. Now due to someone in her halls of residence being tested positive for COVID, her whole floor has been locked down in their tiny rooms with food parcels being delivered to outside their doors. Totally understand the precautions which need to be taken, but my baby girl is lonely and scared and homesick and I just want to drive up there and get her. I feel so helpless....

Bring her home to self isolate. People need to get a grip. This virus is going nowhere so the sooner we start getting back to normal, the better. Yes, there will be deaths and illness - just as there is with every other virus out there - but the vast majority of us will be absolutely fine. The masses cannot continue to make so many (largely ineffective) sacrifices for the few.

With the parcel and post thing, that's actually really shocking of the uni. If they won't let students collect them, they need to get someone to deliver them. I'd be calling up to complain about that.

I really feel for your dd op and all the students in this awful situation. I hated the shared living aspect of university, I may friends the first night with a guy in the pizza takeaway, and all of my mates I met through him.. leading to me marrying one! The flatmates bar 1 were meh.

I'm a Manchester native and the whole situation is awful. I don't know why they've moved them in! Well I do it's purely financial. It's awful for the students, stressful for the staff and rubbish for the locals as it's driving our infection rate up even higher which will no doubt lead to more restrictions on our liberty. Also the areas where the students live have statistically more vulnerable populations ie BAME. It's shit for everyone and surely the security guard thing is illegal!

If it was me I'd bring her home. Misery for the sake of building resilience and "toughening up" is pointless and cruel, esp in late adolescence which is tough enough anyway.

If its Northumbria uni theres 770 students tested positive.

They must stay where they are

@Serin

HottoCold

"Millions have been in isolation for months"

Presumably they arent limited to tiny bedrooms.
Lockdown in your own home is entirely different to lockdown in a hall of residence

...............

Some people have been in a ‘tiny’ room yes!

If i could have 2 weeks in a tiny room over 7 MONTHS in a huge mansion,
I know what i would choose !

I’m a resilient, get on with it type person and always have been but I remember feeling quite homesick in the first few weeks of university despite making great friends and there not being a pandemic.
I really really feel for these students.

I remember my first term at uni in 1990 I think the posters saying treat her like an adult are very unkind no adult would find that anything other than incredibly difficult even if in their own familiar surroundings with a freezer full of food. Hugs to you both xx

JKRowlingIsMyQueen

My choice!?!?!

Yes, iv chosen not to put myself at major risk of dying !

The OP’s daughter has to be locked down for 2 weeks, she has no mental health issues.

Get a grip!!!!! Ffs

@intheenddoesitreallymatter

Im well aware of how these things start.

But the OP has said she has no mental health issues , is just feeling lonely and sad.

So is a quarter of the country.

Im on month 7 of lockdown .
Not because i want to but because my consultant has advised that.

We are talking about 2 weeks !
Not the end of the world !

I volunteer in a secure facility. Even the detainees there aren't confined to their rooms.

I'm fed up of reading posts in this thread comparing posters' experience of lockdown, or even shielding, to what students in catered halls are experiencing. If you have a house it's entirely different.

Think of the smallest bedroom in your house. Then imagine not being able to leave it for 14 days other than to go to the bathroom. And you're 18, 'having left home for the first time, with strangers delivering your meals and leaving them outside your door.

Students in shared flats will probably be okay..But those in halls confined to their rooms should get some sympathy at least, rather than being told to grow up.

But the OP has said she has no mental health issues , is just feeling lonely and sad.

So is a quarter of the country.

It's not really comparable. This is an 18 year old away from home for the first time in a hall of residence with people she doesn't know, and now she can't even mix with them Most people who are self isolating are in their own familiar homes with their home comforts around and they know about things like local shops that will deliver. Their relatives and friends can come and talk to them through the windows etc. It's a very, very different situation.

I'd be asking myself what would Dominic Cummings do? He's in charge of this whole s*show so follow his lead and you won't go far wrong.

To those who keep saying "it's just for two weeks":

At the end of that, it could be another two weeks of forced isolation. And another. And another. Remember "it's just to flatten the curve" turned into "we can turn this virus around in twelve weeks", which turned into much longer, and "normalish by Christmas" turned into "six more months of restrictions", and I doubt if that will be the end of it.

This is why many people are despairing, and why "it's just for two weeks" means nothing.

Think of the smallest bedroom in your house. Then imagine not being able to leave it for 14 days other than to go to the bathroom. And you're 18, 'having left home for the first time This. You have to ask yourself why anyone ever thought it would be a good idea to pack students into halls of residence when so much teaching is taking place online. Student accommodation is the care homes and cruise ships of this wave except with less dire consequences because students, for the most part, are young and fit. OP you know your daughter, if you are worried about her mental health I wouldn't hesitate to go and get her. She can isolate in her room at home, continue to study on-line - realistically she will miss nothing and can go back when the situation calms down.

[quote ineedaholidaynow]@mosscarpet in schools it isn't only close contacts in schools that have to self isolate, sometimes the bubble is treated as having burst, so a whole year group have to self isolate which be 200+ students. So some of those students won't have had contact with the person with the positive test result.

At DS's school there are some boarders, and the whole boarding house is treated as a household, so if one boarder shows symptoms the whole boarding house has to self isolate unless the person with the symptom has a negative test result.[/quote]
yes, I realise sometimes the whole year is sent home. (although thankfully not at dc school!)But the point is those children sent home isolate in the family home - the rest of the family are not expected to isolate. They carry on as normal. So the same could happen with uni students sent home to isolate if you were following the same rules.

Ok if they don’t live far away but if you have to travel on public transport or stop at services it wouldn’t be good

They should never have been encouraged to go to uni in the first place, they were told it would all be fine, this is so wrong, I would cancel the accommodation and do an online course, I will be encouraging my daughter to do an ou degree in a couple of years time.

What are they eating? I guess there are no cooking facilities in these small rooms...

@cyclingmad

Its for 14 days, chridt all of us single people who had to put up with months of not having any human interaction or leaving the house during lockdown had to manage. And it was far longer too.

Did you have to stay in your bedroom?

How people will respond to this is very individual...if I think back to my own family and friends at that age, some would have handled these circs without much trouble, others would have really struggled. It isnt a matter of who is more 'grown up', just personal differences. So there is no point saying that anyone 'should' be able to tolerate it well or that the the experience will be universally problematic.

To me the question is where they go from here....it's pointless to spend a term or a year doing this if people keep testing positive.

@Abraid2 I know it's very different being at home in your own room, and perhaps having family on the other side of the door...but those self isolating within a household are meant to pretty much remain in a separate room for the 14 days aren't they?

It’s not about it evening only for two weeks. Some unis have security to stop people leaving.

When did that ever become ok? When did going home to your parents house become impossible and against the rules because security are garding the entrance?

There was a daft post on facebook saying that that schools could isolate your child with out your permission and tbh now I’m not so sure that could be as daft as I thought. At what point do you say - ‘hang on that’s not right?’

I nicked this of another thread

I always like this quote. It's by CS Lewis but I think encapsulates a big part of the issue here:

Lewis Carroll quote -

‘Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience. They may be more likely to go to Heaven yet at the same time likelier to make a Hell of earth. This very kindness stings with intolerable insult. To be "cured" against one's will and cured of states which we may not regard as disease is to be put on a level of those who have not yet reached the age of reason or those who never will; to be classed with infants, imbeciles, and domestic animals’

Perhaps this isn’t considered acceptable but could students taking a private Covid test with a negative result be rehoused in another block?

Or is that unfair to those students who couldn’t afford a test? Or are private tests unfair anyway?

@saraclara

Thank you for that excellent post.

I'm so mad at the unis encouraging students back and I feel so badly for kids of your daughters age who've also had their A'Level years turned upside down.

DS is in his final year and after being assured his course will be 50/50 online and in class he's now had his time table and it's mainly online. with few employment opportunities he could have realistically stayed home and travelled to uni for his in person study.

It feels like a racket.