At the beginning of December, one of my daughters was showing symptoms so we got her tested and it kept coming back negative and, on the off chance, because I was staying at home with my daughter and she did have symptoms but was testing negative, I got tested at the same time and I came back positive, which was a huge, huge shock to all of us.

Yeah, it was quite surprising with our youngest daughter, she is a tough cookie and it really, it hit her harder than it hit me and she’s a fit young fifteen year old and she had the taste but only for a short period of time, loss of taste, but she did have horrendous headaches and a temperature that lasted probably a week and she was bed bound for a couple of days, which was quite difficult because we were all poorly at different points, including my husband, who is an athlete. He runs marathons, triathlons, very, very fit and he tested positive but was, said, “Oh, I’m fine, I’m fine.” Then, two days later, it completely knocked him for six. He was, he had the temperature and the headaches and it took him quite a few weeks to recover his breathing, when he was running. It took, it did take it out of him for quite a while, a good month I’d say after.

To be honest, I am quite well controlled at the moment. I’ve lost seven stone within the last probably four years. So I am probably fitter than I’ve been in a very long time. So there are people with diabetes who probably were at higher risk than me but, in my job role, I feel like my risk was higher. So, for example, if I had diabetes and I worked in an office with twelve people, then I understand that. That, you know, you can socially distance a little bit more. You can stop as much contact with as many people but, in my job role, my risk was no less because I was in with, I was in the thick of it I mean with, like I said previously, thirty five children plus all their families plus all their siblings. So my risk was very high and I was, it was never, if you get Covid. It was when you get Covid. It was, I felt there was never going to be an option for me in my job role.

I really do feel like I got Covid from school [sighs]. If children aren’t – is it asymptomatic – you know, they’ve not got the symptoms, but they are carriers. And, if you are working in an environment where there are thirty five children in a small classroom and you are less than one metre away constantly, and these children are coming into school when they have got parents at home that are showing symptoms and are being tested or, even if they are asymptomatic, you are putting yourself in a situation where you are in contact with hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of people because that one child then goes home to their parents, their siblings, their siblings who have been in other classes, you know. It is bound to happen, and I definitely know, hand on heart, that I got it from work because I had not seen anybody else.

I was a front line worker so I was back into school, even though I had, on the previous lockdown, being classed as extremely vulnerable. They changed again. They changed the rulings and was extremely vulnerable to vulnerable. It was very confusing.

I find that the way we cope in our family is by giving and it seems a little bit odd but I think the more you give, the better you feel. So I think, as a family unit, we are all giving people. So we always, even if it’s time that we could give to somebody and just listen to them, it’s a massive thing but it’s okay staying safe and it’s okay making sure that you do the sensible thing and keeping your distance and keeping, you know, your hygiene with your hand sanitising and masks but I think you’ve got to keep yourself mentally as well knowing that you are impacting on somebody else, who might be completely on your own.