To be totally demoralised by the endless illness?

[Sheepdog49]

I'll start this by saying no-one has any severe illnesses and i know we're really lucky for that and i am grateful.

I have 3 kids aged 14 - 4 and we have literally rolled from one bug to another since September; one kid made it just 3 days back at school this term before coming down with yet another bug. And yesterday i heard there is the dreaded norovirus sweeping one of the schools; we had it a couple of years ago and one kid landed in hospital for a week so think i have some trauma over that! I know we have no immunity to this strain so waiting for it... (to be clear we've had lots of throwing up since then, just not norovirus where everyone is taken out in one go). We've had flus (with vomiting), colds, endless coughs which went on for WEEKS, strep, tonsilitis, ear infections, sinus infections and a fun case of HFMD.

I suppose it would be amazing to hear from anyone whose kids AREN'T always ill, or people who manage to avoid some of these bugs so it feels there might be hope! I appreciate i sound melodramatic but i'm so exhausted off the back of 3 nights of no sleep, and feel like i live in fear of the next one getting sick with sometimes literally days between illnesses.

Thanks in advance to anyone with moral support!

Just solidarity from me. I've been ill for over 4 weeks now with what I think must be the flu. Every day I think I'll feel better tomorrow and I don't...either the same or worse!
My youngest was at OOO on Xmas Day for tonsillitis and hasn't been right since, he was off all of last week, he also had D&V which I don't know if was related or a bug on top of a bug. He had a high temp again this morning but seemed OK in himself so I gave him calpol and sent him in. Rightly or wrongly.
My middle one is unwell with general cough/cold/sore tummy.
It's relentless. Every morning is a battle and I'm just on standby knowing that at any moment I could get a call to collect middle one!

Yes, there are 4 viruses circulating widely and freely.

One of them, covid, can be caught and re-caught within a few weeks and is pretty damned good at lowering your immune system for months afterwards, so you keep catching everything that's going round.

Get as much rest as you can. See what you can do to avoid mixing indoors with others, especially when you or they are symptomatic (hard to impossible in schools, but still hold the thought for other places). See if there's anything that can be done to improve the ventilation in your school (potentially expensive, so may be very low priority, but if no-one is asking about it then it'll not be a priority at all)

and I hope you're on the mend soon. When warmer weather comes, people start opening windows and some things move back outdoors, then there may be some respite (except for covid which isn't seasonal)

Thanks both! So sorry to hear @inmyera that you're so poorly. It is SO demoralising, and just feels like you're going to be stuck in this forever. You must feel totally exhausted. My two youngest had a horrible bug at the start of december which lasted two weeks, was a temp which came and went, cough, sore throat and a random 24 hours of vomiting shoved in the middle of it all. I have been a nervous wreck every since because i got so run down and exhausted.

I do try to keep windows open and get everyone outside a lot, keep everything clean and hand wash etc but it all seems to be for nothing because they keep catching stuff! One of my friends kids had 100% attendance at school last term and i just felt i must be doing something wrong - my eldest got a letter about low attendance and he'd genuinely just been ill time after time! Sigh.

I know you're right, it'll pass eventually and the weather will be warmer, i'm just so over it.

Really hope you are well again soon and thank you for the replies x