SIL still isolating due to covid risk

[dragontears]

AIBU to think this is no way to live now? She works from home and will only leave the house for essential errands with mask on. She is terrified of getting long covid. Feels like her life is very very limited for a 38 year old!

Anyone else have people they know in this position? How to support them?

Yes she needs help. Long Covid is awful but so are a thousand other things - she is over inflating the risk of getting it and it’s consequences vs any of the other things that could happen to her - getting hit by a bus, getting Lyme disease or cancer, choking on a bit of bacon etc etc etc….

not to say that I don’t think LC is not serious and terrible - I do. But it doesn’t sound like she’s got any particular need to be concerned about it. Hence why it’s more of a mental health issue.

well she's not all that likely to get Lymes or hit by a bus at home.

This.

Most of the world is back to normal now. There's a small risk of long Covid I guess but then there's a small risk of getting knocked over by a bus. You choose your own path

She is being, quite frankly ridiculous and this is a mental health problem. She could have contracted severe flu pre covid and ended up with a post viral syndrome etc

No but she can choke on food, get electrocuted, fall down the stairs….the list goes on. Part of the problem is people’s perception of risk. People in general tend to be terribly at accurately assessing risk, and tend to all too often get it backwards. Eg people of terrified of long covid but think nothing of driving their car.

This really is odd then. It’s one thing to have had a bad experience with covid so nervous of any future repercussions, but this is plain paranoia.

I’ve had covid twice, the first pretty bad (but not needing hospital), the second I would never have even guessed I had it. Although I can definitely feel my chest has been affected by the first bout, it never occurred to me to live the way your sil is.

I have a family member like this but it's not about COVID, it's just terrible anxiety and I suspect agoraphobia. It crept up really gradually and sadly her nearest family didn't feel able to rock the boat or push her too much. She never leaves the house at all anymore, even for health issues. I haven't seen her in 20 years. Two of her children haven't seen her in 15 years and she's never seen some of teenage grandchildren at all. Some of them blame her husband for 'enabling' but he is a good, well-meaning man who has only wanted to help. It's incredibly sad, she's missed out on so much and it's been really hard on all her (adult) children.

Your brother will need your support to help and encourage your SIL to gradually start to take steps to challenge her fear. Even tiny steps like taking her mask off in a shop for a few seconds and building it up from there as she sees that nothing has happened. Did she have the COVID jab?

Agree so much with this. I feel so sorry for your brother. Imagine spending some of the best years of your thirties like this?
Even my grandparents did more in their 80s when we had restrictions.

I agree.

Ironic in a way that she thinks she's keeping healthy but she's perpetuating a severe mental illness.

I do also think the government need to take some responsibility for their fear mongering and propaganda which has contributed to people feeling like this.

Absolutely.

Unless SIL has some health issue OP isn't aware of, it looks like she's one of the casualties of the deliberate policy decision to try and make low risk people more worried for their own safety. We didn't have to do that, and it threw a lot of people under the bus. Now we see the effects.

I'm immunosuppressed, but I never caught Covid due to the heavy isolation. I stopped wearing masks at least three and half years ago, and when I'm in heavily populated areas, just keep my distance as best as possible. I catch the odd cold and had a throat virus after going on holiday this year, but that was due to a virus through the air conditioning, not Covid. I'm concerned that she's let it get to her like that, and she needs to get help.

That's horrific. I'm so sorry.

Maybe she just doesn't like people, enjoys her own company and COVID has given her the excuse she needs to live as she wants to live.

Yes that's very true that people all have their own perceptions of risk, which can get skewed.

But I think the issue for me is that in a similar way people get their own ideas of "normality" and they are just as prone to skewed perceptions.

This is an issue that comes up quite a bit in the wake of the lockdowns and some of the more vigorous attitudes are clearly fuelled by resentment over the curtailing of liberty during that time.

Which I totally get.

But equally, I do know people who - without suffering any particular social issues - have opted to revert to a quieter lifestyle going forward, and to me the same rationale - personal liberty to live one's own life to one's OWN taste - ought to apply.

Of course at the extreme end there are people who are suffering very much and DO need help. But there are also people being bullied (even shamed really) by the fact they don't want to live the same way as the man on the next seat of the Clapham omnibus.

I think its very important we don't become narrow-minded about what is a life "worth" living. Provided people have human interaction of some sort, why do they have to be out and about? I, for one, like physical shopping and restaurants. But I don't flatter myself that that makes my life somehow more "worthwhile" than another person's.

Adrenaline junkies are an extreme example of the "must be out and doing something" variety, and I personally can't think of a more "wasted" existence from my perspective. But each to his own. And why not?

The issue in this case is that the lady is clearly frustrating her spouse, which is something she does need to take into consideration.

To be honest even with vulnerability there's a point where you have to get on with life.
I am immune suppressed and was very ill with covid in 21. I do worry a bit because I never want to feel that I'll again, scarily ill.
I don't change my behaviour or where I go except but I do wear a mask when flying and I avoid crowded places a week or so before an important event.

The reason we aren’t all suffering very badly from covid is that as a population we have built up a certain amount of immunity from exposure AND BEING VACCINATED - back when we were in lockdown, there was no vaccine, and initially no clear picture of how it affected different populations.

It is facile to say that some consortium of powers-that-be tried to scare us into compliance. It isn’t appropriate to have the same level of caution now (for most of us) because ffs a huge percentage of us still have some residual immunity from repeated vaccination or exposure and that is doing its job just about well enough.

Can the SIL pay for a top up vaccination? Obviously it won’t cure her of agoraphobia but baby steps.

It’s very sad she is living her life like this. My best friend has long covid but she is still living her life and has gone on holiday recently. She clearly needs mental health help, but sadly not much you can do if she won’t get any. Maybe a chat with your DB might help, even if to say you’d support if he wanted to try and ask her to seek help.

That's the weirdest part about the situation. In her 20s, she was a social butterfly, always at the pub or the theatre etc. It's like she is a completely different person now. It's very difficult to watch.

You realise that athletes with no immune issues get long Covid right?

As others have said who have got LC, it’s no walk in the park.
She is right to be worried and take precautions.

And yes, I developed symotoms after Covid too.
i can’t work.
I can’t even stand or sit for long periods wo feeling unwell.
I can tell you that I always wear a mask. Have some air filters on when people come or have done ‘riskier’ activities - like dh travelling by plane wo a mask and giving me Covid again - twice. Each time worsening my baseline. So yes now we have air filters running.

No, she doesn't.

Does she make your DB also live like this? Or is he able to meet friends / go on holiday / to the pub etc?

I don't see the point in it all if your DB is out and about living his life and likely exposing himself to the virus, that's the most likely way she'll contract it.

Not that she has any right to force your DB to live the way she does for an extended period either.

What a shame, do you think she would accept help?