Chemo and school run

[Babamamananarama]

Hi all

Just looking for some perspective here really.

I'm newly diagnosed with lymphoma and have just started a 5 month stint of chemo. For Covid purposes this puts me in the CEV/shielding category.

I am of course going to minimise my interactions. My life generally is quite low risk - I live rurally where Covid rates are suppressed, don't go to any shops (have avoided them anyway for the last year as don't really like shopping). I work from home. Basically my main infection risk in terms of both general bugs and Covid is the kids who are in primary school (though again, v small village school, low Covid rates). I've had my first Covid jab already.

DH is of the opinion that I basically should not do the school run. I'm quite sad about forfeiting that very limited social interaction and brief contact with kid's teachers for the next however many months. We have only recently moved here so I've only just started making relationships at the school gates. Our drop off/pick up is super well coordinated - outdoors, parents funnel through two metres apart and kids are despatched by teacher one by one with a brief verbal catch up which is really nice.

I guess I wonder how other people are squaring the circle?

I suppose I wonder how people

I too have lymphoma. Mine is non hodgkins. Having blood cancer puts you right at the very top of the highest risk category for COVID19. It really isn't worth the risk

Thanks for the response Sugarplumfairy65 and sorry to hear you're also on the lymphoma journey. I didn't know that we were ultra vulnerable.

how old are dc?
can they walk the last 50m on their own?
or is there a 'walking bus' your dc can join?

They are 7 and 4. It's a tiny village school (4 classes) so no crowds.
System is that you stand in a 2m spaced outdoor queue with the other parents in reception, and drop them to the teachers in the playground.
Other parents are usually pretty good about giving space and I could obviously make them all aware that I need to be super careful.
Or indeed I could stand on opposite side of the road and ask another parent to grab and dispatch them to me.

Logistically I could completely avoid it as DH is WFH too. I'm just really sad about the idea of missing those limited social interactions, and chances to check in with their teacher - I see so few people in the flesh and have had so little opportunity to make new friends since we moved here in September, due to lockdown. My chemo will stretch til June so it's a long time to be only seeing the immediate members of my family.

The next 5 months will go very quickly for you I hope. Do you know which chemo you'll be having yet?
Yes, blood cancer of any type and any stage of treatment, even watch and wait puts you in the highest category of vulnerability. That's over 100,000 of us in the UK. Unfortunately, I've just been diagnosed with breast cancer too, so had surgery and just waiting for my treatment plan.

Hey Sugarplumfairy65 blimey I'm sorry to hear about your BC - on top of lymphoma, that's quite a load. Has surgery gone Ok? Have you found the Cancer Support thread yet? There's a great bunch on there who are very welcoming to anyone joining the club no one wants to be in.

I'm on a chemo plan called DA EPOCH R which requires 5/6 day inpatient stays every 3 weeks. I'm back in for my third round this Wednesday.

I have leukaemia

My DC are old enough to travel independently, so no school run contact for me

At least daily exercise is permitted (unlike first lockdown) so rather than mixing generally in school, how about going for a (distanced) walk with a friend, which now that shielding has formally paused again, can include sitting down for coffee and chat?

Find your way in to it slowly - you’re still finding out what life will be like on your particular chemo (mine was really easy, and the long term inhibitor I’m on now is side effect free - other regimes can be more hostile, especially in an induction phase)

- it takes some getting used to! Is there a local cancer support centre near you? You may or may not want to use any of their services (which will include social activities as well as therapies and practical help, and which will be moving slowly back in RL as well as online) but it might be useful to know what’s there should you ever want/need it

Thanks iVampire. I've arranged to meet one of the school mums for a dog walk once I get over my next in-patient bout. Because my chemo is 5/6 days of in-patient treatment followed by the same amount of time recovering, every 3 weeks, I'm only really well enough to be out and about for 50% of the time. We only moved to the village in September so only got a couple of months opportunity to get to know people 'normally' before lockdown - so I don't have many local friends at all! Hence the school run was quite important just in terms of an opportunity to get to know people. That's what I'm missing to be honest.

Hi all, nothing to do with school runs, but I am 2 years into remission after treatment for lymphoma. I had inpatient (r-codex-m/ r-Ivac)
I feel great but my consultant did advise me to stick to shielding closely, as we are a vulnerable bunch. To be honest she told me to avoid large groups even pre-COVID. It’s been a quiet couple of years ☹️
Hope you keep well.

Honestly. At the moment there is no social interaction at the school run. No chatting to teachers or other parents. You won't be missing a lot at all. Take care of yourself and stay at home if possible

Happytoes great to hear a story of being out the other side. Although dismaying to hear about continuing shielding as a fair bit of my livelihood revolves around crowds.

My husband is doing the school run and he's chatting to people, including about my illness.. We have a very civilised distanced queuing system at school as it's a tiny school with a lot of space so there's time to have a natter. You end up usually walking back down the lane with someone after drop off too and catching up. The old school we were part of in London, which was much bigger, was a completely different story and I'd be far more reticent to do drop off there as it was always crowded and there just wasn't the space to distance properly with the number of kids moving about.