The Daycare Years

Many of our ideas of virus transmission haven't changed in decades, for better and worse.  

Almost 30 years ago, I ran a daycare out of my home for a little over three years. I wanted to have more time with my kids while they were small, but I also financially needed to stay home since the cost of daycare for two kids was almost my entire take-home salary ($300 vs $400/week) even though I'm a teacher, assumed to be rolling in piles and piles of money. I'm so pleased we have subsidized daycare now. 

I cared for my two kids and three others from 7am to 5pm, Mondays to Fridays. I even offered to take the kids when they were sick. That was partly a financial move - I didn't want to lose money if kids were away a lot - but I also knew what it was like on the other end: waking up to a little one with a fever, and scrambling to find someone to stay with them because you still have to get to work on time. The absolute worst part of teaching is having to make detailed lesson plans, minute-by-minute tasks that won't get muddled up too badly, submitted before 6:00 am. As a single mom without available relatives nearby, if I suspected one of my kids might be sick in the morning, I'd have to get up at five to check on them and start prepping classes. 

So one day, in my daycare years, a parent dropped off their 3-year-old and told me he may have been around someone with chicken pox at a birthday party on the weekend. The kid was absolutely fine and running around like usual, but the dad and I both clearly understood that he was a ticking time bomb. At pick up time, the kid was still completely fine, and the dad confirmed that his cousin did indeed have chicken pox - and now all the kids in my care were likely to have it. The dad asked if I wanted him to keep him home the next day, and we both agreed it's likely too late to prevent the inevitable. I alerted all the other parents to keep their kids away from friends and neighbours for a while, but they may as well keep bringing them to my place!

We thoroughly understood, without any debate or discussion, that a very very healthy rambunctious kid could be carrying and spreading a virus to others. We can't always know that we have it. Had he gotten it from another kid they didn't know very well at the party, they wouldn't have even suspected he was carrying it. It's only because it was a cousin, and the parents called them about it after the party that the dad knew to warn me. 

Somehow we're confused about this now. We think that only people who are sick should stay home or wear a mask, which means we continue to spread around a very dangerous virus through all the people who appear to be perfectly healthy. Most transmission (59%) is from people who don't feel sick. How did we forget how this works?? 

My only concern at the time was that I had never had chicken pox before. The other thing we all agreed on back in the day is that it was good for the kids to all get chicken pox and get it over with because it's worse to get it as an adult. We were terribly mistaken on that one, yet, of course, that's the message that sticks. I know a woman who got Covid while pregnant and was pleased that it would give her child additional immunity, which is not how it works at all! Covid in pregnancy increases risks to the child (4x risk of cognitive disability and increased risk of preeclampsia and stillbirth). We need to be extra careful to protect anyone pregnant from getting it. 

All the kids got chicken pox one at a time, which is curious, but it was easier to just have one kid clinging to me at a time during the miserable first day of the illness. But then I got it, and it knocked me out! I didn't have many spots, but it made my skin hurt all over, so every tiny hand on me was torturous.

True confessions time: I still took care of all the kids, but one day, as I read a story to them before lunch, all of us snuggled together on my couch, I completely passed out mid-sentence! I woke up to my 4-year-old making lunch for everyone. My kid was amazing, even getting the little ones in their high-chairs and pouring milk and juice, and everyone ate sandwiches instead of a hot lunch - but, yikes! 

I was doing an MA at the time to keep my brain working, and it was the only time I ever asked for an extension in my life, and my prof said No! I told the tale to all my classes when I was back teaching, to make it clear that they won't always have every request granted. I had all my research done for a major 20-page paper, and just needed to type it all up, but I ended up handing in mainly rough notes because I just couldn't stay awake to finish it by the deadline. At the time, my prof told me that I knew the due date on the first day of class, and I should have allotted time in case of last minute illness. Now, in my current program, it feels like profs expect to grant extensions for every assignment. 

That shift makes it clear to me that we want to be a caring society. We want to take care of each other more, but we often fail to adequately figure out the best way to do that. Will granting extensions allow them to do their best work or will it make them complacent and fail to train them how to manage their time appropriate, leading to a long list of failures later in life?? That's impossible to determine for the collective. 

What we can be certain of, though, is that healthy people are transmitting Covid everywhere, and catching it now doesn't make anything better later! 

Keep wearing N95s inside public buildings and transportation!! There's no cure. There's only prevention. Even if you're not worried about yourself because you're strong and healthy and are pretty sure it can't possibly knock you on your ass like it has for many trained athletes, consider that it's starting to kill more children now, and every additional case increases their chances of having to live with Long Covid. For the love of all that is good in this world, please do all you can to avoid transmitting a fatal disease to a child or anyone who might be around a child, or anyone pregnant, or to anyone, really. Remember that the virus hangs in the air for hours after you leave a room, like cigarette smoke; try not to leave a trail of illness in your wake.