Head vs heart

[mooselet123]

My lovely 99yr old grandma is in a care home which has had one confirmed case of Covid 19. For the last couple of days, she has been exhibiting some of the symptoms (breathless, cough loss of appetite, extremely weak although she currently has no temperature).

One of the nurses told us during a phone call this morning that there is no way of knowing for sure if it is Covid as she is generally quite frail and prone to a bad chest at the best of times and they can’t test her but there are lots of residents exhibiting similar symptoms and they are treating them all as if they have virus. Here is my dilemma...the nurse said that as she is so weak this could be the beginning of the end... and as such a family member (only one) could visit for a short while as long they gear up in full PPE. My family and I can’t decide what to do for the best. My mum and dad are in their late 60s and while not extremely vulnerable would probably be quite unwell if they caught it whilst I have moderately-severe but relatively well controlled asthma. My head tells me that we should stay away but my heart tells me that I’ll never forgive myself if I such a wonderful lady who has played such a massive part in my life dies having not had a single visit from her family for weeks...

If they’re providing full PPE I would absolutely go. Whoever goes could FaceTime the rest of the family whilst there. I do understand why some would rather not though.

It's an awful dilemma that sadly many families are having to face.

In all honesty I don't think there is a right or wrong answer.

Obviously everyone's circumstances are different and there are many factors to weigh up from the vulnerability of the household, the logistics of simply being able to visit, the ability to strictly self isolate after a visit and an assessment of the long term mental implications of one decision over another.

So in a sense what I (or anyone else) would choose to do is irrelevant because we are projecting our own circumstances into that scenario.

That said I'm generally mindful that the reason for the lockdown is not to stop the virus but to slow it to enable the NHS to cope.

In the context that is highly likely that most of us will get it at some point, unless I was very high risk or had family that were so (shielded category) and able to self isolate myself/family after the visit then yes I would go.

But I'm not you and you will have to make the choice for yourself, however you shouldn't feel that whatever you decide is wrong nor let people judge you. It's an imperfect choice in awful circumstances

Sorry one thing to add that would impact my choice would be the personality of your grandma and what she knows.

It's one thing for her to see care workers in PPE dealing with a lot of residents - it's impersonal.

However seeing a family member visiting in PPE might make it clear that she likely has it - because they are wearing it only to see her.

So a factor against visiting might be that it's actually better for her mental health to see family "normally" via face time rather than a much loved relative in real life in full PPE as that prospect could potentially be very frightening especially if she doesn't really know she's likely to have the virus.