Another “one family member is sick” thread

[Spryte]

We’ve had so many of these, sorry to add another!

Remind me — when one family member is sick, would you isolate that member? Anything special you would do/not do? With less than optimal immune systems living in the house, especially.

It’s my DH — he’s sick and has been isolating all day, and is planning to sleep in the basement away from us, to be safe. 

It just feels like overkill, since we were all exposed pre-symptoms’ emergence, most likely and this may not even be Covid. But we want to avoid high viral loads and spreading it if we can, if it is. Heck, even if it’s flu—two of us have been hospitalized for plain old flu in the past, so maybe these precautions are smart for us anyway. Wonky immune systems here.

Other than possibly isolating the sick person, what else would you do?

This is his first day of symptoms, and his RAT was negative, but I think it’s pretty early on to do an RAT. We will retest in a couple days. He never gets sick, so this is throwing me off!

Any BTDT advice for the sick-with-knows-what family member?

[SoCal_Bear]

My sister and my good friend had one family member (teen) sick with Covid. They isolated that family member and took precautions with masks, etc. Everyone else avoided getting it. This was a month ago.

 

Edited February 16, 2022 by calbear

[Catwoman]

4 minutes ago, calbear said:

My sister and my good friend had one family member (teen) sick with Covid. They isolated that family member and took precautions with masks, etc. Everyone else avoided getting it. This was a month ago.

 

This is what I would do, too.

Honestly, with high risk family members, the sick person would be isolating, but the others would be wearing masks around the house, as well, to keep the viral load as low as possible throughout the rest of the house. to hopefully help prevent the entire family from getting sick.

It's probably overkill, but I am a master at that... 😉 

[Insertcreativenamehere]

We are currently isolating our 17 yo in his room as much as possible. If he has to go elsewhere in the house, he wears a mask. Tomorrow will be day 5. He's feeling basically normal now and if his RAT is negative, he can go back to school tomorrow, wearing a mask for the next 5 days.  So far, the rest of us are in the clear although I realize that can always change ....

[Spryte]

Ok, glad to read some confirmation that we aren’t totally over the top! We are all masking around the house, and he is (mostly) isolating. He masks when he makes quick trips to our main level, and is trying to avoid close contact with us when he does. He’s got a tray of meds and supplies for the night, and will sleep down there.

[KSera]

I've known several people who have had this scenario, isolated the sick person, and the rest of the family stayed negative. I've seen it a lot from doctors sharing about their families on Twitter, too, fwiw. Usually it's sick person isolated, windows open or cracked in their room and a corsi rosenthal box (Hepa) inside and outside their room and N95s if they need to leave the room at all. Fingers crossed the rest of you stay healthy!

[footballmom]

I would also open as many windows as possible for a period of time to air out viral load. Hoping his symptoms subside and you all stay healthy!

[Insertcreativenamehere]

1 minute ago, footballmom said:

I would also open as many windows as possible for a period of time to air out viral load. Hoping his symptoms subside and you all stay healthy!

We did this, too, but then our furnace broke down when temperatures were subzero, so we've avoided that for a couple of days. 

[Spryte]

Oh, good reminder! I just turned up the air filter on high and placed it next to the basement door. I’ll have him crack some windows down there.

 

[Spryte]

13 minutes ago, Insertcreativenamehere said:

We are currently isolating our 17 yo in his room as much as possible. If he has to go elsewhere in the house, he wears a mask. Tomorrow will be day 5. He's feeling basically normal now and if his RAT is negative, he can go back to school tomorrow, wearing a mask for the next 5 days.  So far, the rest of us are in the clear although I realize that can always change ....

So glad he’s feeling back to almost normal! What symptoms did he have?

Fingers crossed for a negative test for him!

[Insertcreativenamehere]

13 minutes ago, Spryte said:

So glad he’s feeling back to almost normal! What symptoms did he have?

Fingers crossed for a negative test for him!

Sore throat, cough, runny nose, nasal congestion, fatigue. 

We initially didn't think it was Covid at all. DS 15 developed cold symptoms last week and stayed home Monday-Wednesday. I tested him with rapid tests several times and it was always negative. So when DS 17 (they share a room) developed the same symptoms, I didn't even think of testing him. He stayed home from school Thursday, felt better Friday. Even played in his basketball game Friday night. Saturday morning, he said he felt sicker and thought I should test him. I was shocked when it was positive! Now I wonder if DS 15 had it, too, but somehow never tested positive ...

[lmrich]

And everyone should start start drinking lots of water, taking vitamin D, and getting lots of rest. (my kids tease me since that is my response to any illness - water, sunshine, and rest - I would throw in a good book and fun comedy to make you laugh and long shower)

I hope everyone is ok!

Edited February 16, 2022 by lmrich

[mmasc]

My dh got sick on a Saturday. He was around one of my children that whole day, and all of us on Sunday before realizing he was definitely getting sick. So we were surely exposed to whatever he had. However, we still took precautions. What we did:

I moved into the guest room and guest bath. Nobody slept with dh or shared a bathroom with him. He would spend his time in our bedroom away from us. When he’d come out into the part of the house we were in (usually just to get food), he’d wear a mask. Just a normal Old Navy 3-ply cotton. We tested with at-home tests on the first day and worst day (5). Both were negative. He did have fever on day 5 and coughing, so definitely contagious. 

Thankfully, the rest of us didn’t catch anything. I felt like our precautions were doable without making me crazy, and were effective. I have no idea if that would’ve been enough if it had been covid though. 
 

eta: I did let my kids sleep late that whole week so their bodies wouldn’t be tired and more susceptible to illness. I took elderberry, vit d, and a women’s vitamin daily that week. Otherwise, normal eating and drinking etc. 

Edited February 16, 2022 by mmasc
Changed test day

[Spryte]

1 minute ago, mmasc said:

My dh got sick on a Saturday. He was around one of my children that whole day, and all of us on Sunday before realizing he was definitely getting sick. So we were surely exposed to whatever he had. However, we still took precautions. What we did:

I moved into the guest room and guest bath. Nobody slept with dh or shared a bathroom with him. He would spend his time in our bedroom away from us. When he’d come out into the part of the house we were in (usually just to get food), he’d wear a mask. Just a normal Old Navy 3-ply cotton. We tested with at-home tests on the first day and worst day (4). Both were negative. He did have fever on day 4 and coughing, so definitely contagious. 

Thankfully, the rest of us didn’t catch anything. I felt like our precautions were doable without making me crazy, and were effective. I have no idea if that would’ve been enough if it had been covid though. 

I’m glad the rest of you didn’t catch whatever it was! Good job!

We are trying to land somewhere between crazy-making precautions and reasonable caution, too. It’s like a tightrope.

 

[Spryte]

7 minutes ago, lmrich said:

And everyone should start start drinking lots of water, taking vitamin D, and getting lots of rest. (my kids tease me since that is my response to any illness - water, sunshine, and rest - I would throw in a good book and fun comedy to make you laugh and long shower)

I hope everyone is ok!

Excellent advice!

[KSera]

36 minutes ago, Spryte said:

Oh, good reminder! I just turned up the air filter on high and placed it next to the basement door. I’ll have him crack some windows down there.

 

Oh, you can also use whatever house fans you have to increase air changes--bathroom fans left on, and even your oven hood fan, if you have one. We set our central air intake fan to be on 24/7 when kids have been home from college, rather than just 5 minutes every hour.

[Danae]

I hung painters' plastic to create an isolation area with the sick kids' bedrooms and one bathroom separated from the rest of the house.  We ran an air purifier at the entrance to their zone and they wore masks if they had to come out and I wore a mask when I went in.  

 

[Laura Corin]

I isolated myself last weekend - moved to a different room with exclusive use of a particular bathroom. Husband cooked for me.  If I ventured out, it was fully masked.

I later tested negative with a PCR test.

[Carrie12345]

With the OG strain, pre-vaccines, dh isolated in our bedroom suite after about half a day of oncoming symptoms and none of the rest of us caught it, so I will never say it’s pointless!
Now, he had been mostly in our big open space area for that half day. And by big, I’m including our vaulted ceiling in cubic footage rather than straight square footage.  It was winter, so windows weren’t open, but it also wasn’t like we had shared a small bedroom or he had eaten with us in a small dining space.  Still, I felt there was a good chance we’d all get it, but isolated him anyway. And we were fine.