And she’s really, she’s found it very difficult to settle I think and I’m aware that quite a lot of that I think is anxiety related, I think she’s quite anxious because things are still not back to normal, you know, she’s not had normal, well she’s not had normal for goodness knows how long really. So, she, yeah so she’s now really struggling with things not being normal and Mummy not being at work and having to go to school and a whole new environment and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah and it’s, you know, is still really worried about me, really unsettled by health encounters which is challenging when your mum’s a doctor [laughs]. She’s had certain, because of work she’s had so many swabs poor thing that she’s just absolutely traumatised by them. So worried about me not being well, so, for example, I had my booster jab a couple of weeks ago and I said, “Oh I’m going to go and have my booster jab while Daddy takes you swimming,” and she just cried because she was so worried about Mummy having another injection and so yes so, she’s not, she’s not doing brilliantly from that point of view.

We were just about managing, I was just about managing, I I’d started driving again which was useful because I literally couldn’t go anywhere or do anything if I couldn’t drive because I was like I, I’m not safe to walk which is really alien to me because we live, we’ve moved so that we’re within walking distance of town so I can walk to town with [daughter], we can walk to the park, we can do all this. And so, I couldn’t, you know, do anything beyond kind of be in the garden with her and that was just kind of sitting and watching her rather than doing anything fun…

And then we had, what happened, we had a week off together in May which I in retrospect found very, very difficult because I wasn’t getting any breaks from either of them which sounds really horrible and makes me feel dreadful but I, like just the interaction is hard work and we kind of recognised that a bit and we were trying to kind of modify activities to be stuff that [daughter] would enjoy, that I could kind of enjoy her doing and like normally I would be out swimming every day in the river or the sea, we’d have been going out to parks and like loads of walks and like that’s just the kind of people we are, so it was really challenging to try and work out what on earth we could do. And so we did a couple of bits like we, we worked out that I could go, we could go swimming as a family because I could just kind of stand in the water and she could do loads of splashing and actually that was quite a manageable experience and we could go to the beach if [husband] was coming because he could drop us off literally on the beach and then he could go and park and do all the, like all of our usual stuff that we do just not quite, not, not really happening.

Yeah he’s, yes definitely, he’s always been really hands on and really he’s like I’ve yet to meet a child who doesn’t adore my husband like they just, they’re all fascinated by him because he’s just this big mad over grown child basically who’s really fun to be around and like really silly and, you know, used to be a PGL instructor and a Canoe Instructor like that’s just like babies literally just stare at him, it’s hilarious to watch them and they’re not, they’re not quite sure but they think, they’re like ‘we just need to watch this this person.’ But like I’ve literally yet to meet a small child who doesn’t think that my husband is the most fun person in the world which is probably quite true. Except my daughter who is absolutely Mummy centric and I was like but Dad’s, Daddy’s so much more fun than I am, I am so boring like structure in the right activities come to me, but everything else your Dad’s more fun.

So yeah they, but their relationship has improved is not-, like blossomed I think is probably the right word like before she’d have been really unhappy going out with him without me and it would have been a proper like slog for us both to get her to that point but now they, like they went out yesterday afternoon, just went to the beach together and had an ice cream and had a play and now she’ll settle more for him, not so much at bedtime but she, she now will a bit which she wouldn’t before. And, and like overnight she’ll still mostly call for me but she’ll, she’ll settle with him more readily than she would have done, so yeah, so I think, I think that has improved.

And then, yeah, so that was kind of end of February beginning of March and then I was at home for all of March and about half of April because I just couldn’t, just, well I wasn’t allowed out and to be honest there was nothing I could do anyway even when I wanted to. And I was kind of struggling on like making sure that tea was prepared and stuff like that but on I normally, have Tuesdays and Fridays off those are my days with [daughter] and bless them my mum and [husband]’s mum just stepped up and came and took her, so she was then having an extra like two days out of the house and then [husband] was having her for most of the weekend and I wasn’t really doing anything at all.

And then, yeah, so that took us up to like kind of mid-April…and then what happened after that, can’t remember, let me think, and then in about May time I finally was like this is getting ridiculous like I still can’t walk down the stairs without getting breathless, I can’t hang out the washing without getting breathless. I can’t do anything. I’m still getting loads of chest pain. I can’t walk more, like I can barely walk to the corner shop and back, this is ridiculous. And like I do elderly care, I was like most of, my patients would be lapping me right now, this is embarrassing.

It’s really hard to try and advocate for us as a family with school, without, you know, because, if God forbid I had cancer or some kind, I’d been in ITU or something like that, you know, school would completely understand that there was a really poorly mum at home who, and [daughter] probably needed extra support as a result of that, and actually you get this, you have this kind of idea don’t you. Whereas because this is so new and unknown, they, and it’s not that they’ve not been supportive, it’s just that I don’t think they get quite how much disruption this has brought to our lives. And to [daughter]’s life especially and I think, you know, you don’t want to be that parent who’s like, “Look no this is really messed up her, like this she is really struggling with a really difficult year.” Because what they’re seeing is, a privileged middle class four-year-old who can already read and write and do maths, you know, who’s bright and able and has two parents at home who clearly adore her and work really hard. And a mum who takes her to and from school every day, you know, she’s got all of that. And she’s found school really tricky and it’s-, and, you know, we’ll never know, what would she have been like had I not had Long Covid and had everything just been normal. And actually, you know, we’d probably have been equally disastrous because I’d have been running round at work and it would’ve been incredibly stressful trying to manage all the drop-offs and stuff, you know, it’s just a different level of difficult.

But it’s really hard trying to advocate for her and say, “Look, I’ve been really poorly and I’m working really hard to try and make things as good as I can for her but actually, she’s in a situation where she’s having to put up with a mum who really can’t offer her very much, and that’s really hard.” and I think, because you do push yourself to do the school run because, well, partly because you want to but partly because if you don’t, your child doesn’t go to school and kind of have, that’s like a rule. Like what they see is not the reality of what life is 90% of the time. They see the top 1% where I’m just doing the school run and all of my attention is focused, is geared up on getting her to and from school. And so actually what they’re missing is the rest of the evening where it’s an absolute struggle because like, I’ve used up all my energy on doing the school run, and she’s having to deal, she has to deal with that, and I have to deal with that, and we’re both having to struggle our way through.