I'm too ill to take DD to school and now DH is unwell too -- can we just keep DD home for a day or two?

[SongsOfSongs]

I have COVID or the flu or something and I have been absolutely floored with fever, congestion, racing heart, etc. since Friday. I've camped out in the bedroom all weekend while DH took care of the children. Now, he says he's got it too. For me, it came on very strongly, so I worry that by the morning he is going to be very unwell. If he is, can we just keep DD home for the day? She's in Y5.

Ideas I've considered that won't work: We live a bit far from the school so no other families near us that I know of. No good enough friends that I would ask this of them either. It's tube + walking and I don't feel comfortable sending her on her own. I have an older DD but their schools are in opposite directions, so she couldn't make the primary drop and then get to her school in time and would get detention. Don't think I'd feel comfortable sending her in a taxi. Is there anything else I'm missing? Hopefully it'd just be a day - maybe two - before I was well enough to take her.

Never had one of us become ill before the other was better before!

We don't even know how old the older kid is. Our school wouldn't be happy with a 14 yo dropping the kid off and wouldn't release DC at the end of the day to them.
And expecting a early to mid teen to get a taxi to school, looking after their sister, then get back into the taxi and go to school then come out early, call another taxi, go to primary school, collect sis and get her home is a lot. It isn't 3 minutes down the road. Why is it OK for possibly GCSE age child to go in late and finish early but yr5 kid can't miss a day?

I was in this position last week. Call the school and tell them the circumstances. They may be able to think of a solution

What a foolish question,shes likely infectious already,is she your child or the govs child?

I'd keep her home. Contact the school and explain why - they might offer an alternative, but if they don't, it's hardly the end of the world, despite what attendance officers would have us believe. She can spend the day reading or looking through online resources on whatever topics they're covering at the moment.

For those saying 'Suck it up and take her', my big strapping 18-year-old had Influenza A at Christmas and for the first few days he was so weak and dizzy that I had to physically help him to get from his bedroom to the toilet - he was mortified but he genuinely could not stand up unaided. Absolutely no way could he have managed anything further than the bathroom, let alone a school run. You will also be highly infectious - not what's needed in an enclosed space like a cab or a tube, where you're risking infecting vulnerable people.

@ScoutOfTheSoftHeartsClub

I'm a little confused here. Unacceptable to whom? Them? Oh, you? Ahh but they're in London. Nope. Sorry. You've lost me again.

Are you proactively building your own supportive network, and if so is this in order to have people on call who can, indeed, support you (as is perhaps clearly ones duty)?

Perhaps you could write a manual to lend to OP?

Christ on a bike!
OK, I am not in UK.
But I have been a teacher for 40 years and I just don't get the paranoia on here about consequences for a child because both parents are unwell.
Just bloody say that she won't be in because the parents are both so unwell that they cannot deliver the child to school. The inference is that the child might be well enough to attend but cannot because the parents are sick.
Is the UK education system so fucked that there is no consideration of a family's circumstances occasionally impacting on a child's attendance?

=

Call the school. Its not the end of the world to miss a few days. Catch up can happen.

For all the people saying to call a taxi and take her to school, how is that responsible? Oh yeah sod the taxi driver who may then catch the illness and not be able to work hence not getting paid it's not like you get sick pay when you are self employed.

Sure, teachers have nothing else to do so they can easily organise a day's work that needs no adult input for one child…

Myself and husband (75) had this back in September. I was literally grabbing gardening tools to get out and do some work, when I was floored with shivers and racing heart like never before (46, more than reasonably fit).
In the next couple of hours, there was fever and absolute inability to stand up (even to change a pillowcase). Shortness of breath followed. My husband caught it, but is fortunately regularly vaccinated. Just for context, I'm (partially) his carer and choose to regularly cut my grass with
a scythe. Physical work well known.
I would believe the OP here!

keep her off, she’s at an age where a couple of days of making herself a sandwich and entertaining herself is fine. Don’t go in a taxi though, wildly unfair to the taxi driver.

Exactly, not that unwell if can post on mumsnet !!!!!

How will it work on pickup. Not all schools let kids out without someone to collect them

But getting her to school may well be actively harmful to others. The child isn’t the only important person in this scenario. The wellbeing of the parents matters too, and also those around them who could get infected with this nasty sounding virus.
And maybe I have exceptionally easy children but at 10, none of mine would or have prevented me resting in any way when they were at home with me and I was ill.

Typing on a phone while lying in bed isn't really the same as getting up, dressed and driving a car / getting on a train, though, is it? Don't be silly.

I've typed paragraphs on my phone from a hospital bed, but I certainly wouldn't have been physically capable of popping out for a trip across town.

Unauthorised, which is not fair as it’s not your daughter’s fault. Can’t you manage to just drop her off and go back home to bed.

As I said above, I wonder about the intellect levels of someone who thinks posting online from their bed requires anything near the same energy as taking them across London on the underground.

Well OP mentioned the tube so doesn't live in one

Who the fuck are these people who think tapping out a paragraph on a phone while lying in bed requires the same amount of energy as getting up and travelling across town with a kid?

It requires a working thumb to post on mumsnet, I’ve done that while horrifically ill in hospital, moving your thumb about is in no way related to whether you can travel on the tube and walking.

Yes, exactly. The op is saying she can’t do it. I cannot understand the people on this thread who are telling her she is wrong about how ill she is and yes she can. Are you peeping through her window? Are you her sister?

Yes, I could lie down and post on Mumsnet with a spinal headache as long as I didn’t in any way shift to vertical. Or with d & v, between activity sessions. Or while in labour. None of those were occasions where I could have also taken my child to school via the tube, despite my intermittently working thumbs. and I hope that’s pretty obvious to most, but clearly not to a few.

The seriously hard of thinking.

Written by someone who has never had real flu, not just a bad cold. A bad attack of flu floors you and leaves you feeling very weak as you recover.

Yes, you can. If that's what you've found to be the best option, do that.