COVID-19– Fears of navigating a post
mask mandate era and re-openings with a child with a complex medical history.
This past year
of living through a global pandemic has been difficult for many people in many
ways. Not having the usual contact and
personal intimate interactions with others can become very lonely over time. We are human beings and the connections to
other people are what keep us going, provides support when it is most needed
and provides comfort. When we are having
a hard day, or when we have had a really good one, we instinctually want to
gather with family and friends to share the news. Gathering, is one of the things we have been
repeatedly told NOT to do in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic.
Watching the
news, hearing reports on the dangers of the virus and how it affects the lungs,
I became immediately attuned to learning what I could about this COVID-19. I needed to know what could be done to keep
my daughter safe and healthy as well as myself.
My daughter, Kerstin spent weeks spread over months in and out of the
Special Care and Pulmonary Units of Children’s Hospital of Alabama in the late
Summer and Fall of 2019 then again in 2020 with respiratory illnesses. During these stays, Kerstin required and was
placed on High Flow Oxygen for several days at a time for each of the four
separate stays. I don’t want to spend days
and nights inpatient watching my child be hooked up to numerous machines and
needing that higher flow of oxygen anymore.
We just spent about a week of her on what they call an “at home regimen”
and was told that if she continued to have low oxygen saturations, she would
need to be seen at the hospital. Thankfully
she got through that and has not been on supplemental oxygen in 5 days now.
As we
continue to traverse through the COVID pandemic and vaccines have rolled out
and some have been halted for further research; the world seems to be
completely done with everything “coronavirus”, “pandemic”, “virus”, “mask”, “social
distance”, “physical distance” and “safer at home”. Re-entering the world is not the same for
everyone! There is no going back to “normal”
or “business as usual” for many people.
Like grief, going back into the world with a deadly virus still
ravaging, mask mandates ending (ended here in Alabama) and, a low percentage of
adults being vaccinated (again, AL), it will look and feel differently for
everyone. Some people are eager to go
mask-less, some cannot be vaccinated for medical reason, some will not be
vaccinated for whatever reason(s).
Whatever the reason, I will not judge them and would hope that my
decisions to be vaccinated, to remain distant and masked are for the health and
safety Kerstin and other people considered “vulnerable”.
As we
continue to push through to the other side of this virus, please continue to listen
to sincere and trusted medical professionals, respect the personal spaces of
others, wash your hands and wear your mask.
We will!
Kerstin, wearing her mask!
“You really can change the world if
you care enough.” –Marian Wright Edelman
