I just can’t send my children back to school

[Ijustcantcope]

I have always been anxious about Covid. I’m vulnerable, DH is older and I help take care of elderly parents. I took my children out of school just before lockdown as I was bloody petrified.

I managed to send them back for their week in June and then in September although my anxiety levels were high. When they broke up for half term it was a blessed relief. I could finally sleep well and eat. I felt relaxed and happy.

But now as going back to school is looming I’ve got the sick feeling back again. I couldn’t get to sleep last night and had a good cry.

I’ve always had health anxiety around the children which was caused by 10 miscarriages before I had them, then 1 of them having a lot of medical issues. I had just got better with it and now this.

One child is desperate to go to school, the other one isn’t bothered. I am a supply teacher (not working at the moment) so am happy to home school them and they did well over lockdown. But I feel guilty about them missing all the things they love about school.

I just feel that if I knew what was coming e.g. if we were going to lockdown again or there was going to be a vaccine I could make a more informed decision. I’m just so worried about making a wrong one. Either way, it’s going to be shit.

What if the vaccine doesnt work and this goes on for years. I can’t protect us all then. Some days I feel like just going out there and catching it. If I end up dying or my parents do well then that’s it. If we don’t we can move on without all this worry.

I don’t think I can take much more.

And I can’t seek help for my anxiety. I’ve tried. Apparently someone will contact me for talking therapy within 24 weeks.

[Jakey056]

You need to send your children back to school. The long term social damage you visit-on them is unfair. You need to take responsibility for your anxiety. I get awful anxiety too, but I own it and work it out. You are really over estimating the risks. what are you going to do - live like this forever?

[herecomesthsun]

You need to send your children back to school.

No you don't. Though of course you can, if you all want to.

The long term social damage you visit-on them is unfair.

No. A few months off school is not huge, in the greater scheme of things.

You need to take responsibility for your anxiety.

Which you are doing.

You are really overestimating the risks.

It sounds as though you have researched and considered the risks.

are you going to ...ive like this forever?

This winter will be tough and come the spring there will be a lot more information and maybe even a vaccine, if we're lucky, who knows.

Please don't let people make you feel bad about the very difficult situation we are all in. Take care and stay safe x

[commandatori]

Exactly @OpheliasCrayon - regardless of what the OP chooses she deserves help for her anxiety as the priority.

[Friendsoftheearth]

As long as you are willing to accept that your dd may well suffer terribly with both loneliness and potentially MH issues then just keep them at home.

I don't think you are being fair to your children, at all. Especially given covid is here to stay, you would be better advised getting to grips with your anxiety and making a long term plan around your parents.

1-2% risk is tiny! I would be happy with that. So it is matter for you.

[Friendsoftheearth]

I also find it staggering that someone with diagnosed health anxiety is being advised to keep her children at home, knowing it may harm them - particularly as this is going to go on into the long term. Clearly op needs help with her MH - this is very important.

It is not fair to let your children suffer if you anxiety is spiralling op.

You know this op, which is why you have posted. You know this is not reasonable and you were looking for other views.

Your children need to come before your parents, they need to stay next door and your children need to have a life that is as close to normal as possible.

[herecomesthsun]

@Friendsoftheearth

I also find it staggering that someone with diagnosed health anxiety is being advised to keep her children at home, knowing it may harm them - particularly as this is going to go on into the long term. Clearly op needs help with her MH - this is very important.

It is not fair to let your children suffer if you anxiety is spiralling op.

You know this op, which is why you have posted. You know this is not reasonable and you were looking for other views.

Your children need to come before your parents, they need to stay next door and your children need to have a life that is as close to normal as possible.

knowing it may harm them Why would it harm them? The alternative also has serious potential consequences for this family.

into the long term into spring maybe, things might look different then

It is not fair to let your children suffer it's not fair to talk to the thoughtful and caring OP in such a negative way. Her children did very well with homeschooling.

why you have posted OP was looking for discussion of a dilemma ( and, perhaps, support)

your children need to have a life that is as close to normal as possible. that may not be possible in a pandemic, though

I also find it staggering that... there is so much sheer insensitivity to people's different situiations.

[IloveJKRowling]

Around here there are some forest schools offering outdoor activities, and I'm sure the local home ed community do things outside as part of meet ups. If you do go down that route, most home ed parents do link up with other families a lot to make sure their kids gets some socialisation. Even if you met up indoors with other home ed families, it would still be lower risk than schools given it would be low numbers and you could ensure social distancing.

I bet other home ed parents would love to include a qualified teacher in their circle too!

[Jakey056]

*but it’s the catastrophic harm that would be cause me to our children if one of us died or was seriously ill**

This is REALLY important. I think you quickly need to read a lot on anxiety and the cycle of anxiety. You are clearly not thinking from a logical point of view. Your risks of death or sickness are so low but in your anxious state you are elevating everything. PLEASE do not give this thought process to your kids. My mum was highly anxious and I learned it from her and had huge problems with anxiety until I learned to manage it. You do not have to wait for therapy in 24 months. Go online, read about anxiety and health anxiety and in particular look at the lectures online on you tube about health anxiety.

MOST IMPORTANTLY - You have to learn to tolerate anxiety, accept risk and manage your emotions and not spill this into your innocent kids lives. They need to go back to school.


Do not read the papers, do not listen to the radio or watch TV - you will hear fear and distort it further.

[IloveJKRowling]

As far as a normal life is concerned.

Has no-one read all the teachers posting about the bubble closures etc? School isn't normal, it was never going to be in a pandemic and it isn't.

Only 1 of 200 schools in Liverpool unaffected (and that was a few weeks back now too).

It's not normal.

Also - plenty of children are successfully home education even outside of a pandemic. Probably their lives are far closer to their normal than schools are right now.

[Jakey056]

@herecomesthsun


The long term social damage you visit-on them is unfair.

No. A few months off school is not huge, in the greater scheme of things. This is not a few months off school, this is living with a parent who will not seek help for her MH and insists on her kids staying home so she can feel OK

You need to take responsibility for your anxiety.

Which you are doing.She is not, if she were she would be sending her kids to school and working on feeling Ok about doing so

You are really overestimating the risks.

It sounds as though you have researched and considered the risks.
The risk is TINY, the risk to her kids development and future MH is significant

are you going to ...ive like this forever?

This winter will be tough and come the spring there will be a lot more information and maybe even a vaccine, if we're lucky, who knows. So her kids ensure not seeing their friends etc until spring because she cannot accept or investigate risk/ No. Thats is unfair on her kids.

[Friendsoftheearth]

If you actually read the posts here you will see that her eldest child is 'desperate' to go back to school and wants to see her friends.
Of course it is harmful to keep her away from her friends, teachers and school life. Locked away at home and missing everything can have a huge impact on some children. Horse riding and a bit of forest school for very sociable outgoing children is simply not going to cut it!

This is only a problem because op has anxiety, if she did not she would almost certainly feel much better - so she needs help.

You know as well as I do that this is go on far and beyond spring next year, we may never stop it - those that are developing the vaccine have already flagged it is not a silver bullet, and will not stop covid altogether. Op could be waiting for years given her age etc to even have access to a vaccine. In the meantime her children could go into serious decline mentally, physically and academically.

Just because a short burst of homeschool went well, that is a very different prospect to long term schooling from home.

Call the GP op and tell him/her what you have told us, they can help you.

[herecomesthsun]

@Jakey056

**but it’s the catastrophic harm that would be cause me to our children if one of us died or was seriously ill***

This is REALLY important. I think you quickly need to read a lot on anxiety and the cycle of anxiety. You are clearly not thinking from a logical point of view. Your risks of death or sickness are so low but in your anxious state you are elevating everything. PLEASE do not give this thought process to your kids. My mum was highly anxious and I learned it from her and had huge problems with anxiety until I learned to manage it. You do not have to wait for therapy in 24 months. Go online, read about anxiety and health anxiety and in particular look at the lectures online on you tube about health anxiety.

MOST IMPORTANTLY - You have to learn to tolerate anxiety, accept risk and manage your emotions and not spill this into your innocent kids lives. They need to go back to school.

Do not read the papers, do not listen to the radio or watch TV - you will hear fear and distort it further.

I'm sorry @Jakey056 that your mum was anxious.

However, this virus does actually kill people and the OP, who is an intelligent professional person, thinks she has an increased risk from it, on a reasonable reading of the evidence.

That bit sounds extremely logical to me.

Kids, especially of vulnerable families, especially ones that can do temporary home school, may well be in a good place at home right now. It may be that, for once the best place for them isn't at school.

I have to say, Jakey, your post sounds a lot more emotional than the OP.

If a sabre-toothed tiger appears in the distance, you don't need to tolerate your anxiety, you need to get away from the tiger, even if there is only a 1 in 50 chance it is going to eat you. (Sabre-toothed tigers commonly are used as an explanation for how fight or flight response arose, which is associated with anxiety. My point is that we can have a sense of threat in anxiety, but occasionally the threat is real).

[wehowitch]

Does the op feel comfortable with taking her dc to activities, the shops etc?

How much interaction with other kids would the dc have if they were out of school.

Would they just be expected to stay in the home environment?

[Jakey056]

@herecomesthsun

I understand the anxiety response. I had 8 years of EMDR and CBT to undo the harm that anxiety inflicted. The example of a tiger is familiar to me - its the classic model for explaining anxiety and on that basis you are aware as am I that a short risk of immediate danger is of course met by fight or flight response which is appropriate. What is not appropriate is an ongoing stress over a tiny risk and catastrophic playouts which affect her kids. The response in t he UK to this has been over the top on all counts. I understand that people d ie but if you look at the figures the chances of the poster or her kids being affected are minimal. It is my belief that this virus will be around for a long time - even with a vaccine.

Her kids should be taught to assess risk logically instead of emotionally running from it - I am not blaming the poster but she does need to accept responsibility.

Finally,I have no idea why you felt the need to mention the 'emotionality' of my post. Is expressing emotion an issue or a negative in your book?

[Misssugarplum12764]

I’m a teacher. I’m really pleased with the measures we have in place and have absolutely no qualms being in school every day. I’d happily encourage my (non-vulnerable) friends to send their (non-vulnerable) children into school. But if a friend was vulnerable, or their child was, I couldn’t, with hand on heart, say the same thing. Measures in schools stop outbreaks at most, they don’t stop anyone from catching it.

[herecomesthsun]

@Friendsoftheearth

If you actually read the posts here you will see that her eldest child is 'desperate' to go back to school and wants to see her friends.
Of course it is harmful to keep her away from her friends, teachers and school life. Locked away at home and missing everything can have a huge impact on some children. Horse riding and a bit of forest school for very sociable outgoing children is simply not going to cut it!

This is only a problem because op has anxiety, if she did not she would almost certainly feel much better - so she needs help.

You know as well as I do that this is go on far and beyond spring next year, we may never stop it - those that are developing the vaccine have already flagged it is not a silver bullet, and will not stop covid altogether. Op could be waiting for years given her age etc to even have access to a vaccine. In the meantime her children could go into serious decline mentally, physically and academically.

Just because a short burst of homeschool went well, that is a very different prospect to long term schooling from home.

Call the GP op and tell him/her what you have told us, they can help you.

Calling the GP is generally good advice (although I think the OP has already sought such help).

The 2 children have a different perspective on school. "One child is desperate to go to school, the other one isn’t bothered." but mum is "a supply teacher happy to home school them and they did well over lockdown." so, from that, they'd be ok for a few months. They would miss little, having another "short burst".

In the next few months, we will see what happens with the NHS over winter with covid and the flu. SAGE are predicting a higher death toll over winter than we had in the spring.

Come February/ March there will be a lot more information to go on, there may even be different measures in schools.

I hope there will soon be a review of the current management of schools to incorporate WHO advice. It would make life a lot easier, either to know that schools were safer, and proper quarantine and cluster management was in place, or to be able to homeschool without penalty.

[museumum]

I think honestly that it's not fair on the one child who wants to go to school. I am an extrovert in a family of introverts and I would have gone insane without regular contact with a wide group of peers at school. Do not underestimate the needs of this child who wants to go back. They managed to cope with lockdown because it was the law and nobody was at school but I really don't think it's fair to keep them off while their class and school is open and your family doesn't actually have a clinical reason to shield.

[herecomesthsun]

@Jakey056 you were criticising the OP for not being logical.

On the contrary, I think she sounds very sensible.

1 or 2 % risk of dying, which has been calculated, is not "so low" and she sounds very insightful to me,r rather than "elevating everything" because of anxiety. It is a very reasonable point of view to prioritise health right now.

So OP sounded pretty rational in her decision-making, that was my point.

There's nothing necessarily wrong per se with being emotional.

[herecomesthsun]

@museumum Shielding paused, no one is allowed to shield and GPs (and secondary specialists) are being discouraged from supporting families who want to stay away from schools because they are clinically vulnerable. Even with several letters from doctors, schools are not accepting them as a reason for children not to be in.

So "valid reason" is a moot point, even for families who were formally shielding.

[Jakey056]

@herecomesthsun
Low risk? So is she not using a car for fear of crashing, not eating anything that would contribute to heart disease, terrified of the flu? All risks too and higher than Covid. When you are fixated on one risk and it triggers yo I fully understand the vortex it creates. But the risk is still tiny.
I'm glad there is nothing wrong with being emotional, but I knew that already, its just that you mentioned it in a odd manner.

[gnushoes]

I was brought up by a parent with an extreme cancer phobia which impacted every aspect of our lives. I'm still unpicking the effects half a century later and so is my sibling. If your child wants school, listen to them. Ideally send both. You aren't hugely likely to get Covid from them and your risk of damaging their mental health is equal that if not much higher.

[herecomesthsun]

So, depending on how you count the figures, 45-60,000 people died of covid in the UK from March to October.

In 2018, apparently, 1770 people died in a car crash (more recent figures I could find on a quick google). So odds wise, covid is a bit more of a threat, isn't it?

Of course, people say that these 45-60k deaths somehow don't count in the same way, because anyone who died under 45 had a medical condition.

But if you have a medical condition, well, it remains a concern, doesn't it? a rational concern?

Especially if you are also concerned about older family members.

[Honin]

Covid is a fact, not religion. It's not up to us to believe whether its existence is real or not, and there are several facts about the virus we have to understand.

1. Covid affects everyone, the only difference is your chance of dying or with serious compromised body afterward.
2. Social distancing in theory helps, but in reality, how many of us can maintain?
3. Hygiene is most important, but unfortunately most (including myself) don't always comply with the basic standard. I think we need a dedicated educational method to teach everyone (including adults) how to maintain personal hygiene.
4. Face mask works, especially surgical and N95 or above masks. It filtered most of our fluids from projecting and prevent droplets from entering from our nose and mouth. (and no, you won't suffocate or breath in concentrated carbon dioxide). Children should wear them as well. The only reason why they refuse because parents are not doing their job. Glasses or other form of barrier can also prevent droplets from enter via your eyes (FYI).
5. Curfew doesn't work, closing public places with the potential of mass gathering is a must, Covid has no schedule of when and where to infect. In theory, closing it for 3-4 weeks should be enough (which I will explain why)

If we look at cities and countries in Asia- Taiwan, Japan, Hong Kong, even China, where face covering is compulsory in public area. as well as wearing them indoors, their infection cases are extremely low, and death rates are even lower. It takes less than a month to isolate the infected since the incubation period is around 2 weeks.

Under this principle, we can identify and isolate the virus within a month and return back to our usual life, but of course, face covering and personal hygiene must continue.

[Jenasaurus]

@herecomesthsun

You need to send your children back to school.

No you don't. Though of course you can, if you all want to.

The long term social damage you visit-on them is unfair.

No. A few months off school is not huge, in the greater scheme of things.

You need to take responsibility for your anxiety.

Which you are doing.

You are really overestimating the risks.

It sounds as though you have researched and considered the risks.

are you going to ...ive like this forever?

This winter will be tough and come the spring there will be a lot more information and maybe even a vaccine, if we're lucky, who knows.

Please don't let people make you feel bad about the very difficult situation we are all in. Take care and stay safe x

This

[Jenasaurus]

@herecomesthsun

So, depending on how you count the figures, 45-60,000 people died of covid in the UK from March to October.

In 2018, apparently, 1770 people died in a car crash (more recent figures I could find on a quick google). So odds wise, covid is a bit more of a threat, isn't it?

Of course, people say that these 45-60k deaths somehow don't count in the same way, because anyone who died under 45 had a medical condition.

But if you have a medical condition, well, it remains a concern, doesn't it? a rational concern?

Especially if you are also concerned about older family members.

I agree with this post. We dont discount the deaths of people who died in a car crash if they were over 60 or had co existing conditions and say well they would have died anyway so dont count.