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Thankfully hubby isn't in the 1.5 million that the NHS have put into the the very high risk group who have been asked not to leave their homes in the next 12 weeks. He is though in the next group down which is high risk. Basically this means he is at high risk of serious complications or death should he contract Covid -19. I found this out purely by accident on Monday when discussing it with a friend and fellow moderator on Facebook when she posted a link to the Asthma UK website that had detailed information on what Asthma inhaler mean you are considered to be on immunosuppression medication. My blood ran cold as I saw on the list Symbicort the brand my husband uses daily. I dug a little deeper and calmed a little when I read the dosage required and thankfully he is nowhere near that dosage. It then lead me to then google for information regarding methotrexate as that was increased in August to 20mg. The last dose before he would have been put on injections to control his psoriasis.
Now if I am honest I am a little cross that gp surgeries aren't checking to see what patients come under the high risk category. The very high risk group were sent a text or may still be waiting for a letter that should be with them by the 29th March. These are the people who will have the worst outcome should they contract Covid-19. People like Jays mum, who has multiple myeloma , a type of blood cancer. Thankfully Jays parents have taken the sensible precaution of self isolating for the last month. My parents are also self isolating, my dad will be 70 this year, my mum is in remission from ovarian cancer. People are having to search for the information themselves - and not all conditions are listed on it leading to a lot of confusion. Plus many people, my husband included just didn't see himself as vulnerable. His asthma is well controlled, he has been on methotrexate for 6 years without issue. He rarely takes time off sick from work, he gets the odd cold but isn't a sick person. So to now discover he was deemed high risk was a shock. A shock that he is struggling to process.
I know that now everyone has now been told to stay in doors but for almost two weeks hubby was exposed to massive amounts of people who may or may not have been spreading this virus. It took me googling it on Monday and coming across this official NHS document to see that due to his dose of methotrexate and the co-morbidity of Asthma he was now considered high risk. The irony is he was sending all the high risk staff home from his work place last week, on full pay for 12 weeks ( 2 weeks have to be taken as holiday). The high risk group also included anyone with a BMI of 40 or over. I am cross because he could have been home and not putting himself at risk. I am also cross with him because despite showing him the document, printing it off for him and explaining it to him, he didn't believe me. He tried to get information from the doctors surgery, he was unaware that the doctors surgery is effectively closed and you can no longer just walk in off the street. He doesn't really do social media, doesn't read the news papers and kept turning off the news, so he was blissfully unaware of what was going on outside his work bubble. Laughably he also tried ringing 111 for information and was given short shrift by the call handler who basically told him don't ring this number unless you have symptoms of Covid-19.
So now I know for sure that he doesn't pay much attention to me when I am speaking to him as I had talked him through all of this. He seemed to think it was happening elsewhere to other people and I am guessing that is the same reaction for a lot of other people because the lock down is laughable. The roads up to the common have been busier than ever and a lot of people without dogs, with small children even babies are up there. Now I know we are allowed out to exercise but honestly if I had a new born baby I wouldn't be leaving the house and risking it's health. We are only going out to walk Dembe ( I sit in the car) because he won't poo or wee in the garden. We try to go when normally it would be quiet, as we have every day since 2004. It is like a bloody bank holiday up there. On our way to the common we saw families out on their bikes cycling together, again no dog. I am really struggling to wonder why if you had no reason to leave your home you would?
It took Boris's speech on TV on Monday night, when he called for the lock down for Jay to realise that this was serious. After Boris had stopped talking he turned to me and said," I've told XXXX ( his boss, who is lovely), that's me home for 12 weeks. I love my work but I am not dying for it." I burst into tears as I had been at my wits end with him. I couldn't get him to see how dangerous this was especially with him being asthmatic. The relief was unreal.
However in true Mr Myasthenia Kid style the following morning he had a series of melt downs. Which I was expecting to be honest as the longer we are together the more glaringly obvious it is becoming that he is very likely on the Autistic Spectrum. He becomes irrationally angry when confronted with change. He doesn't deviate from journey routes, dog walks, places we go etc. Literally even a suggestion of change will get my head ripped off. I learned a long time ago that unless it was life and death not to bother. He also has to have things broken down in to the minutest detail. I remember years ago when our first dog Travis was ill and in the vets, he badgered me constantly about what they were doing. I tried to give him answers but he kept on and on. In the end I lost my temper and screamed how the fuck would I know I am not a bloody vet. His anxiety was off the scale and when he feels like things have deviated from his routine his default setting is anxiety.
So despite knowing that he would be paid for his absence, he still insisted on messaging HR and having the same conversation with with them, that he had with his boss the night before. Despite also knowing the policy having sent home staff the week before. He was in a right state until he had the text from HR confirming he wouldn't lose any pay. He was in such a state I told him that we would put together a schedule for him so that he would have a routine and a plan for each day. Because without this I know he will fall into a depression. I really struggled to deal with it yesterday as Tuesday is pretty much, 99% of the time his day off. So the fact he wasn't working yesterday shouldn't have been an issue. However it was the anxiety around not working that was causing the melt down.
It is really hard work having to stay one step ahead of him and basically have to guess what the issues are because he doesn't verbalise it. He has told me he is taking this 12 week period a day at a time rather than thinking about it as 12 weeks or even telling himself it will be June before he is back at work, is causing him to be anxious. It is such an enormous change in his life that it is sending him into melt down mode. He is also feeling the guilt that he isn't working alongside his team, who are working in the germ soup that is a supermarket. He knows rationally that staying at work is risking his life but he feels guilty that others ( although they aren't high risk or if they are high risk have declined due to being able to work in an office) will be in that situation day in day out, to keep the country supplied with food.
So his plans are to do some decorating, refurbishing some furniture with Tuesday's and Sundays as his days off as they would always be in a normal week because we need to keep things as normal as possible.
I am feeling a lot less anxious now that I know that he isn't being exposed to god knows what. However the stress levels had obviously been building up over time with me and last night I came down with a migraine. Initially I had hoped I would sleep it off but at 2.15am I was woken with severe pain in the right side of my head and face. I took all my meds and then managed to get back to sleep only stirring at 4.45am when Jay got up and managing to mumble hot water bottle. I managed to stay in bed until 6.30am and then had to get up as my back was killing me. Thankfully by the time I got up the pain had reduced to that of just a bad headache and I knew by then distraction would be better than any pain killer I could take so continued with my day as usual. In the middle of the night I was cursing myself for not getting my blog post written up but thankfully even with helping ( more like supervising) Jay get the table sanded and waxed today I have still managed to get a blog post out.
I hope everyone is keeping well and safe. One day we may even look back on this and laugh, if we are lucky enough to get through it.
Take care
Dembe decided barking at the sander was the way to go! He also tried to get it to do zoomies with him, strange beast.
Sanded and waxed - the biro and lipstick marks removed and it is looking fantastic again
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