Would you let your kids play with this child?

[unlimiteddilutingjuice]

We're really good friends with one of our neighbours who has a child about the same age as ours. We'll call him Jamie.
Jamie and DC call round for each other every day. They are in and out of each others houses all day.
If I'm cooking and Jamie is there- i'll dish him up a plate. Its that kind of relationship.
For the past week and a bit our family has been self isolating and my kids have obviously not been allowed to play. Next week the 14 days are over and this brings the question of how much social contact to allow.
Me and DH are working from home and will be able to socially distance. Our kids are off school and have been largely confined to the house.
Right now both Jamies parents are working as normal.
Jamie's Mum is a key worker and is in contact with immune surpressed people both at work and relatives.
On the one hand I can see that mixing with Jamie puts my kids in contact with germs from all the people he's mixed with. Also that if Jamie catches the virus from our kids it could potentially be communicated to vulnerable people.
On the other hand: this situation could go on for months and months and it seems inconcievable that our kids not mix with anyone except each other for that whole time.
Jamies Mum is expecting normal mixing to resume once we're out of isolation, I think. DH is against.
WWYD?

Social isolation for your circumstances means not having friends or neighbours around.

The neighbours child will be mixing at school etc.

My children are older but once they get in from school today they will not be mixing with anyone from out side our house.

No

My neighbour popped round yesterday and I had to keep moving back from her to keep some distance between us. I won’t be letting her in from now on I don’t think. I don’t intend to see any friends or family for some time.

Social isolation means no socialising

My children are older but once they get in from school today they will not be mixing with anyone from out side our house.

This. The government advice is quite straightforward. We should avoid all unnecessary social contact. Unfortunately, that means that kids (other than siblings) won't be able to play together until this is all over. It's going to be tough, for sure, but we're just going to have to get through it.

No

Ugh.
I know your all right. But this is so tough.
It doesn't help that so many people are going about their lives as normal. It makes me feel slightly as if im over reacting all the time.
I have to think how to explain this to Jamies Mum now.

You don't have to explain it. Just say you are following the guidelines.

What is there to explain?

'this situation could go on for months and months and it seems inconcievable that our kids not mix with anyone except each other for that whole time.'

I think given another week or two it won't seem such a strange thought.

No I wouldn’t, I’m sure both children will be upset about it, but it’s for the good of everyone.
My dad called over last night as he needed something and we had to treat it as a dead drop, I hung out of the window a little to chat, but I don’t want any of us to possibly infect the other as DD1 was at nursery until early this week, and he’s a key worker.
It was sad as we miss him and he misses us, but we’ll see each other in due course.

The more you do it, the more it makes people realise it's necessary. Like it or not we are quite likely to follow social cues!

At the end of last week /beginning of this week I was all set to socialise as normal just reducing to one in one groups. But now I've realised most of my friends have stopped all playdates and all face to face socialising, it's made me stop and say OK, no, actually let's not even do that.

I think it was that I was thinking the risk with big meet ups is that infection is passed around to 10+ people at once. So I thought ok, 2 people wouldn't be as much of a problem. But actually the assumption is that any one person with the virus will pass it along to on average 2-4 people, and that in itself is bad enough to cause all of the exponential spread. So in fact it makes sense to aim to pass the virus on to one or less than one person. Which means limiting social contact completely. Unless you're actually living with someone, no contact. Even if they are your next door neighbour!

"What is there to explain?"

Shes a really good friend and is taking considerably more risks that me. She's out all day with vulnerable people. She's worried about her relatives.
Her DH hasn't been allowed to work from hom either.

I think she'd probably like to isolate more but can't. My kids are the least of her risk profile.

By contrast: Me and DH are sitting in safety, working from home on laptops. DH has some mild asthma but none of us are at risk.

I think it might come across as really snotty if I imply that my kids are at risk from her kid. When the risks she is taking as a key worker massively outweigh anything we're experiancing.

I think pp is correct: I just have to lean on the "guidelines" line. And maybe stress that we want to limit her exposure as much as possible.

twitter.com/drjanaway/status/1240730801945354246?s=19
Maybe this twitter thread helps

Not really NaomiShapiro although it certainly packs an emotional punch.
I was looking for advice about handling this specific situation rather than a general guilt trip.

I've been talking with DH and he suggested getting a Nintendo Switch so that the kids can socialise through gaming.

That's a good idea. My daughter plays a couple of games with school pals and I think it'll be great for keeping that safe connection.

We have almost the exact same scenario here. Like Bertie , at the beginning of the week I was thinking it would be okay for just the 2 of them to play outside together but have realised that they really can't even do that. Tbh, my son's taken the news really well, but it does just seem so bleak that children can't play out together on a beautiful sunny day. It's such an unprecedented time that I think feeling like you have to explain (and I do know what you mean) just has to go out the window - we are the ones following government advice and shouldn't feel in any way guilty/uneasy about that.

I was in similar situation. But had to pick something up from a friend. Told her to leave it by her door. She said you're not even going to come in and say hi from a distance. I told her I am very afraid. I dont want to catch it or give it to anyone.
She asked if I had spoken to a counsellor for my mental health. -which irritated me but she got it and understood I don't want to have any outside contact.
Good luck Op and for now apologise to Jamie's mum and say you are still isolating for the time being.