Coping with children

[Beansprout30]

I’ve not had covid and luckily haven’t had to isolate at all but I feel the time is going to come and my big worry is how on earth do you look after young children if you get so ill?! I have a 4 and 2 year old who are so full on, I just don’t know how we would cope if we were wiped out in bed with Covid
Any experiences out there of these situations?

Honestly, no differently to how you would if you were ill with any other condition. The only real difference is if you needed to be hospitalised.

If you have an oh, even if you both caught it, there's likely to be a delay in getting the symptoms for one of you, so that person would care for re children and then hopefully you could tag tail when the other feels better.

Get easy access snacks in, food they safely eat that needs little prep... Stuff to keep them alive rather than aiming for total nutrition experience. Make sure you have the right medicines in, apparently hot s squash is good, I have manuka honey and flu sachets... Paracetamol... Make sure you have some stocks in your bedroom and do they have access to tablets or your phone.. Mark films or TV that would keep them entertainment.
Buy some creative stuff and hold it back... Toys... To bring out...

Basically... Prepare now.

I don’t know why you’ve had a biscuit. We both had covid at the same time as our 4yo and had a 1yo at home. It was really shit quite frankly. The anxiety of not knowing if you’d get worse or not was pretty awful. We had it mildly so we’re quite fortunate. The main thing for us was exhaustion. We were both working plus trying to homeschool for one of the weeks. Trying to look after that age of children while poorly does bring different challenges. You just can’t rest up. There aren’t many other circs where your whole household might go down with no respite or chance to recover. Eg some of us have had noro in parallel but that was 24-48 hours not 2 weeks. Both kids were bouncing off the walls and we were struggling physically for a good chunk of the isolation period. I can’t think of many other circs where I might be I’ll but no-one else can have the children/they can’t go to nursery/school as usual.

DH and I recently had Covid. I was in bed for 2 days with flu-like symptoms, he had lost his taste and smell, both of us extremely fatigued for over a week.

We have a 3yr old and 2yr old. We just muddled through just like any other time we would be ill. It's crappy, but not impossible. We took turns to nap in the day when the fatigue hit.

Not sure why this needed a biscuit, its a genuine concern. We have zero family help other than DH parents who are in their 70s and not great health so it's something I worry about a lot. Just have to muddle on as you do with other illnesses I guess

Get numbers of neighbourhood help scheme. Some meals in freezer. Snacks. CBeebies.

I have been really sick with the flu while caring for a small child alone and just forced myself to do the basics.

At the start of the pandemic I was a bit stressed about about this scenario (although my child is older now) so as others have suggested, I stocked up on easy meals (baked beans, soup, etc), snacks and things like paracetamol. It made me feel prepared!

We are on day 5 of covid at the moment. Both my DH and I are ill and have a 14 month old and an older child with severe autism. My DH is not doing so well and is staying in his bedroom to reduce viral load so I am battling fatigue with care for the children. Not fun as they have both kept me awake since 3am. There is no one who can help in this situation.

Honestly it's shite, husband and I currently ill with covid quite badly with a full on 2 year old who is thankfully negative.

It's draining as her routine has gone out the window, she's not getting tired or hungry because we can't go out and it's been non stop tv for the last four days.

Sorry couldn't be more positive but it's not great

We did it with 2 young DC. It wasn’t fun and I’m not proud of my parenting that week but they had unlimited screen time, and very easy meals like scrambled egg, lots of toast, fish fingers. We took it in turns to nap. Covid is a really funny virus as one minute you feel ok and the next completely wiped out. So in the ok moments we took them out in the garden so they could at least get some fresh air. We also tried to stick loosely to a routine of mealtimes and bath time so we all had points of reference to get through the day. We made sure we got them dressed too so they knew the difference between day and night. Just be kind to your partner, now is not the time for competitive illness. We also let the house go completely, it was an absolute bomb site then in the moments we felt ok would have a mad tidy up.
Not a week I wish to repeat but hopefully no harm done to the kids.
Definitely get a stock of honey, lemon for hot drinks which really help the cough, and good idea about a stock of crayons/activity books and easy to cook bits plus easy snacks for all of you.
You will get through it because you have to!

Honestly it's tough but as others say, you do stuff as you have to, there is no choice.
Husband, me and 3yr old all tested positive on Boxing Day, I'm very fortunate that son is fine and no symptoms, but husband and I are feeling awful.
Things for us-

• easy prep lunches and dinners
• keeping bedtime routine (so mega quick bath but still a quick dip) and bed at same time
• doing quick fruit/snack box in morning and then snacks are handy during the day so not constantly having to get up and sort
• trying not to feel shit about how much tv and screen time he's having
• some 'play' involves me just sitting with him or lay on floor repeating what I'm told to say 😳🤣
• working with husband together, either alternate time or doing stuff together so you're both in it
• defo make sure got meds and honey in

Don’t waste your time worrying about ‘what ifs’. Life with two toddlers is busy enough!

Unlimited screen time. Toast/fish fingers etc for meals - anything easy and instant. Snacks they can access available all the time and don’t worry about the nutritional content for a week or so. Let them out in the garden if you can eg opening patio doors if the garden is safe and you can watch from the sofa wrapped in blankets. It’s really hard especially not being able to sleep when you want and having disturbed nights when fatigued and ill but it doesn’t last forever. Let everyone stay in pjs if getting dressed is too hard on the worst days. I had hyperemesis when I had a toddler and that lasted months and was very challenging - but at least we could all leave the house and it was only me ill - but when I had to look after him on my own, I just lowered all my standards and expectations.

Thanks for the replies and tips, I will get some honey and lemons in! I remember being pregnant with dd2 and feeling so wiped out by sickness I really struggled to look after dd1 without the help of my mum

We are lucky we have a good size garden and amazing neighbours. Wishing all of you still poorly a speedy recovery

Dh and I had Covid at the same time and had our 2 year old to look after. It was tough. It took us both a while to recover, as neither of us could rest properly!