Covid on a plate

[CovidOnAPlate]

Needing to see whether I'm overreacting, as I have a tendency to (!), and it's been a rough 18 months in my anxious little life.

I'm naturally risk averse, had a baby during lockdown 1, and the flipflopping between "do nothing, see noone, go nowhere", and "get back out there, it's fine, life must go on", has been a struggle for me. I feel like it took everything to adapt to life with a baby and no support allowed near me, so i threw myself into that and it's been a struggle coming back out.

But I've been trying! My husband is the opposite. Total risk taker, happy to mix and do things in crowds, not particularly hygiene conscious... (rolls his eyes at my hand sanitizer).

Anyway, I didn't make a fuss about him going to a work conference this week (in my view it could have been online, but they wanted it in person, so off he went), I didn't make a fuss about him travelling by train instead of taking the car (I'd have gone by car to reduce possible exposure)...

BUT when he was there, the guy next to him at dinner didn't finish his meal, so my husband ATE THE MAN'S LEFTOVERS.

That's weird right?! I mean, even in normal times, but now?! My husband thinks I'm being ridiculous and over-anxious about covid, but he's not been terribly understanding of my caution throughout anyway.

Am I in the wrong to be finding that excessively unnecessary, during the covid pandemic?

Perspective please?!

Was it a friend of his? To be honest I would eat a friends leftovers without second thought A strangers I wouldn't. I think you need to calm down quite a bit to be honest.

I wouldn’t particularly want to eat someone’s leftovers, but a) this bloke could only pass Covid to your DH if he actually had Covid, and there’s currently no suggestion that he has, and b) if he did have it, your DH was sat in close proximity to him all evening anyway 🤷🏻‍♀️.

You are not in the wrong.

I don’t think you can get it off food anyway

All those people sanitizing their groceries were just nuts.

But it is gross and and not polite to scarf someone’s leftovers when dining.

I would have asked for a container to take it home for my garden Fox though.

It’s not going to increase his risk of getting covid really. Either the man next to him had covid, in which case he might pass it to your husband but through breathing rather than food because that’s how it transmits, or he didn’t have covid in which case he won’t.

It is a bit weird though. I presume he knew the man sitting next to him?

True. Sitting by him was already the "risk", and that didn't freak me out. So maybe I have a general germ phobia, which I'm now tacking covid onto.

I'd eat leftovers off a family member's plate at home, but not a stranger at a conference! He had only met the guy that day.

Anyone else singing "covid on a plate" to the tune of "jelly on a plate" in their head now or just me?

Pandemic or not, I would not do this, ever. Same as sharing cups / mugs which are just gross 🤮

I hear you! I'm cv, sahm due to my health. I don't go out. My only risk is my family bringing it home

Out of curiosity, what's with sanitizing at all? As in hands. I do it incase I touch something, then accidentally put something in my mouth before washing my hands. But presumably it's not actually a risk, as eating isn't a way for it to spread? Surely people don't touch door handles, them inhale their fingers so deeply that they could inhale covid particles?

I've not actually thought about it before. I just sanitize because I was told to start doing it last March..! #goodytwoshoes

I thought this was going to be about banana bread, sour dough and vast piles of deliveroo. And enough random booze to kill an alcoholic.
I'd say it's only moderately weird what your husband did.

Covid doesn’t transmit well on surfaces it’s mainly airborne. I think YABU.

Ok, I'll take it :) willing to accept I'm too cautious still.

Really ? Yes op you are overreacting.

I really don't think you can catch Covid that way. I think it's a bit grim though from a general hygiene point of view!

It's a bit weird but the Covid aspect wouldn't really cross my mind.

Why are you so afraid of catching it? Are you unvaccinated? Clinically vulnerable? For the vast majority of healthy vaccinated people it’s a mild virus, it’s not worth living in fear over, sanitising hands is sensible but so is attending work events! Eating a strangers left overs is just grim tho, I’m with you on that one 🤢

Meh, wouldn't bother me. You're not going to catch covid (or anything else) eating someone's leftovers.

Bit of an etiquette faux-pas though.

If the chap had Covid then your DH would have got it just by sitting next to him for so long anyway. Eating his leftovers would not have made any difference.

It's a weird thing to do but I wouldn't worry about it from a Covid perspective. You can't get it from food and the stomach acid would kill it off anyway.

Just out of interest has this laissez-faire husband of yours contracted covid at all during the last 18 months?

I wish everyone would stop going on about sanitiser. It's terrible for your skin and your general health. Just wash your hands with soap and water as you would normally.

Wouldn't bother me

You can't get it from food, stomach bacteria kills it

@WorriedGiraffe I'm vaccinated, not vulnerable. So no logical reason to worry. I just find it hard to readjust, as I've never in my life been told to fear something so much that I've had to stay indoors, cross over roads to avoid people, socially distance, wear masks, everything shut down... so I think it's just taking me a while to get used to the idea that the "killer virus" that ruined the end of my pregnancy and the first months of my baby's life (in terms of normality anyway), is actually not such a killer virus. It really scared me in the early days (when they put pregnant women on the vulnerable list), and it seems weird to now just forget all that. I'm not weird about any other illnesses. Flu doesn't scare me. I think it's just having been told it was SO TERRIBLE, my head is taking a while to process that it's actually not that bad after all.

@hestershaw1 who knows? He's not been symptomatic. We all had vague symptoms in the days before anyone could get a test, but maybe that was it, or maybe he's had it asymptomatically? Maybe he's brought it home as a result of being more relaxed about it, and we've been the lucky ones who haven't even known we've had it? The thing is though, he thinks "statistically it won't affect me badly", and I think "statistically there's a very small chance it might affect me badly, so why would it NOT be me? It's as likely to affect me as any other healthy late-20s person - I'm not the special one in that group that it wouldn't touch".

The invincible vs the worrier :)

I think you're being over cautious

But, unless your DH knew the guy who's food he ate that's a bit strange to eat his leftovers!