COVID-19 Again

Posted on by Astrid

I was rather late dedicating a specific post to COVID-19. As such, you might think that not much has changed. However, then you’d be wrong. I guess our government was late with the infection spread prevention measures too. Then again, we didn’t have cases of the virus here in the Netherlands until some two or three weeks ago I think. I may be mistaken, as I hardly ever watch the news.

As such, I did not hear the prime minister’s two press conferences, one last week Thursday and one on Sunday. I did not hear his address to the public on Monday either. I did not watch the Lower House debate yesterday, in which the public health minister apparently fainted. I wonder how they did the debate, given that gatherings are now prohibited.

I did hear some about the news from my family and staff though. My sister called on Sunday, wanting to catch up. She works in a restaurant, so she’s out of work now. Thankfully, her husband works in an office job, so he can work from home.

My mother called on Monday. My parents are both retired, so they don’t have to worry about unemployment. However, my mother is 64 and my father is 71, so I do worry about their health should they catch the virus.

My husband’s work is still going on for now. He works as a truck driver in what is apparently a vital part of transport.

Like I mentioned on Monday, the day center I go to closed yesterday. The day center staff are now coming out to our homes to provide us with activities. I took some of my stuff from the day center with me to the home on Tuesday. Some staff even transferred my elliptical to the home.

Thankfully here, going outside for walks is not yet prohibited. I hope it won’t ever be. I’ve been going for walks with staff twice to three times a day each day now. I don’t need to worry about not getting my physical exercise for now.

I haven’t been in a grocery store yet since the measures took effect, since my facility orders groceries online. However, my husband said yesterday that the grocery store was completely out of regular bread, but it still carried lots of raisin bread.

I do feel that we live in a rather interesting time. It feels very odd, but in a way it feels comforting knowing that we have the Internet now.

Mama’s Losin’ It

#WeekendCoffeeShare (March 15, 2020)

Posted on by Astrid

Hi and happy Sunday evening to you all! I’m joining in with #WeekendCoffeeShare, although I’m not inviting anyone over for a real coffee. Like I said yesterday, it was recommended that my husband do not visit me for the duration of the anti-coronavirus measures. Two of my fellow clients still got visitors today, so I was feeling a bit jealous. Then this evening after the prime minister held another press conference, the staff decided people can’t visit here unless they really need to at all. Day activities are still going on as far as I know, but that might change. So anyway, you’ll need to grab a virtual cup of coffee.

If we were having coffee, I would tell you how amazed I am at the virtual community building this coronavirus pandemic does. I mean, never before have I felt so much in common with my blogger pals from all over the world. Of course, I have a handful of blogger friends with whom I have a lot in common anyway, but with the #WeekendCoffeeShare community and the wider blogosphere in general, I don’t. Now we all over the world share in a common experience, no matter how tragic.

If we were having coffee, I would tell you that this week has been pretty awesome in the exercise department. Though I only went on the elliptical once and never reached my daily step goal, I did get 316 active minutes over the week. That’s more than five hours! I did go for regular walks almost each day. Here’s hoping that the coronavirus crisis won’t ever keep me stuck indoors. I’ve heard in Italy people aren’t allowed to go out on the streets at all, but they sit on their balconies anyway.

If we were having coffee, I’d share that I did some great reading over the past few days. I’m not reading as much as I would ideally want to, but I’m at least picking up books again (figuratively speaking, that is, as I don’t raise my Braille display while reading eBooks).

If we were having coffee, I would share that my husband has been making great progress on living room renovations. We at least used to have softboard on the ceiling, which isn’t fire-resistant. My husband told me he took it all off.

He is a truck driver, so despite the coronavirus management measures, he’s expected to go to work tomorrow. He said it’d be crazy.

If we were having coffee, lastly I would tell you that I spoke to my sister on the phone this evening. My sister works in a restaurant, which is closing for three weeks at least. Her husband can thankfully work from home.

I hadn’t spoken to my sister in a while. She has a six-months-old daughter. I was amazed to learn about my niece’s development. I last saw her in November and apparently she’s making great strides.

How are you all doing amidst the coronavirus craze?

COVID-19 Worries

Posted on by Astrid

The coronavirus came to the Netherlands a few weeks ago. Yesterday, we had the first case in the care facility’s town. The care facility hasn’t yet been affected as far as I know, but still, I grow more scared as the days go by.

I’m not scared of falling seriously ill or dying from the virus. Though some of my fellow clients are in their sixties, we don’t have anyone in my home who is otherwise at risk of serious illness or death as far as I know. I am not really sure whether I should worry about my family in this respect. So far, the thought has only fleetingly crossed my mind.

What I do worry about though is the consequences this will have for our society at large. I worry about people stockpiling food. I know my husband got some extra stuff a few weeks ago already when he saw it coming.

I worry about another economic meltdown. My husband has a pretty secure income, having just been hired indefinitely at his job a month ago. He might be forced to take time off, leading to a significant decrease in income, but he won’t be jobless. I am not sure about my income, as I’m on benefits. I don’t know that I will be able to handle yet another round of budget cuts to health care though.

More importantly in the short term, I worry about the need to isolate if you’re infected. What if I get the virus and need to stay in my room 24/7 for two weeks, not being allowed any human contact? Some other blogger idealized this by writing they’d finally have time to read all the books and binge watch all the Netflix series they wanted. As much as I’d like to escape the day center at times and just hide out in my room, I don’t think I could make this work for two weeks straight.

I also worry about staff needing to self-isolate if they get infected. Will this mean there won’t be staff to care for us? My staff has been trying to reassure me, but the letter sent out to clients’ family yesterday, had no information about what if the virus enters the facility in it. Which seems to be more of a “when” than an “if”.

I’m linking up with today’s RagTag Daily Prompt, for which the word is “Isolate”.

Monday, Merry Monday!

Posted on by Astrid

Today is a pretty good day. Of course, I did experience some anxiety while at day activities, but it was manageable. One of the reasons I was anxious was the fact that a new client was supposed to come to our home today. This woman isn’t going to attend my day activities group, but somehow this got me thinking of what if things change at my group and I get less care. Ultimately, the client’s move in was deferred for now for reasons unrelated to me.

I took a walk in the morning. In the afternoon, I went on the elliptical for twenty minutes. I struggle to make myself exercise, but I can tell it’s definitely helping to lift my mood. I get a lot of satisfaction from seeing my stats on my Fitbit activity tracker. Today, I managed to get 59 active minutes and get 250+ steps an hour for six out of nine hours between 9AM and 6PM. I took a short walk in the evening too.

In the afternoon, I also played a card game similar to Uno with my assigned day activities staff. I won all three games. When my husband and I were in the early stages of getting to know each other, we played this game a lot. Then we forgot about it or did other things. My day activities staff bought a deck of cards for me a few months back and I’ve played games a few times.

I read some Wikipedia entries this evening. Read up on the coronavirus outbreak. The coronavirus in some ways both scares and fascinates me. I mean, I heard there’s at least one confirmed case in the nearby town my husband and I visited on Saturday now. I’m not afraid of getting seriously ill if I catch the virus myself, but all the measures to prevent spreading of the disease do scare me. As far as I know, my care facility doesn’t have a plan on what to do if there’s an outbreak here. I do worry about lots of staff falling ill if there is. Back when the Mexican flu pandemic happened in 2009, I resided in the psych hospital. It didn’t hit the hospital, but if it had and lots of staff would fall ill, management and clinicians would’ve been expected to work on the wards.

As a side note, my iPhone’s spell checker still doesn’t recognize the word “coronavirus”. I think that’s funny.