Alright, so my mom tested positive for covid. She opted to NOT be vaccinated because "you can't tell her what to do" (basically). My dad was vaccinated in February. I was vaccinated in February. My sister was vaccinated in February. Her husband was vaccinated...was that February as well? Probably. My nephew was vaccinated as soon as he was able. My sister and I just received our booster. Our dad just got his last week.
Are we concerned about covid? Yeah, it's a pandemic and we have DoD job contracts. My sister and I work for our dad.
So, my mom tested positive for covid. It came as no shock to any of us. She was very vocal about not getting the vaccine and even went so far as to tell my nephew that we were all going to die because we had received the vaccine. Way to go mom! Over the summer she took a seasonal job with a company that handles the handful of Delta and American Airlines flights.
Face to face with strangers, not vaccinated, not sure if everyone flying is vaccinated or even following mask mandates....chances are higher you're going to get covid. Guess what? Ya got covid! Not just you (Mom), but three of you who were unvaccinated at work got it.
Straight up - I'm not super sympathetic to those who are vocally anti-vaccine, who spout of weird right-wing shit, and end up with covid. Even if it's my mom. I mean, I'm not a total asshole about it, but I'm keeping things to a minimum.
My mom had some serious brain fog going on. My sister said she would take her to the hospital and I was like - great, I can sanitize my parent's apartment. I went over there and said "Mom, you need to get dressed. Maggy is going to take you to the hospital. She'll be here soon." My sister arrived and our mom had no fucking idea what was going on. She also had to be reminded like twice in the truck. What did she tell the nurse at the hospital? "I don't feel like I have covid."
Luckily, I was able to get bedding washed, their spare bedroom set up (mostly), the apartment fairly sanitized, and things just generally ready for her. The day before she had gone through one of those covid drive-thru testing things, but the wait was 48-72 hours for results. The hospital did an immediate test and was like "oh yeah, you have covid". Due to the possible covid results of the day before I had made an extra trip to the grocery store for some basic food items that she might want like soups.
She was angry that she had to sleep in the spare room. She was angry that we weren't waiting on her hand and foot. She insisted that the hospital was wrong and she didn't have covid, so she was super angry when the drive-thru testing came back as "covid positive". She was and still is very ANGRY.
We set up her laptop in the back. My sister brought over a spare tv and roku stick, so she could watch netflix and amazon prime. If she texted or called, we would bring her food or drinks or whatever she needed.
Did she understand "quarantine"? Not really. We had to tell her that she could venture out to use the bathroom, but if she needed anything else she just had to let us know. We would bring her food or books or whatever else she needed. Did that stop her from doing a load of laundry or using the kitchen or camping out on the living room couch? Nope. She sure as shit did that. Then she was angry that she could smell lysol. "I can't breathe because of the lysol!" "No, you can't breathe because you have covid."
After a week, she insisted that her quarantine was over. That turned into a big fight. She broke quarantine on a Wednesday (she just had to wait until Saturday morning) for 72 minutes. She snuck out and went...somewhere. How do we know? My parents apartment and my apartment are both directly above the office...our office...the one we work at. No idea where she went, who she came into contact with, or if she even wore a mask. Telling her that she's still considered contagious until Saturday morning didn't help. She insisted that Wednesday was her quarantine end date. NO. Saturday. Saturday she was free to go to the store and whatever.
She's pissed off and doesn't want to talk to us now. She's sure that we are all just horrible people. We don't care. We wouldn't bring her food. We weren't helpful. I'm sure she's of the mind that we just basically tried to lock her away for two weeks or something. She was majorly pissed off that my dad cancelled their trip to Seattle for a pension board meeting (because it would have occurred in the middle of her quarantine). He decided to do the zoom meeting option.
I have no idea how to deal with this. Her craziness during her quarantine would be calm - Joan Crawford crazy - calm. She had quite the fit over some juice that was "too sweet". We were like FUUUUCCCCKKKK. Our goal was to get some fucking nutrients into her system because she had been having a hard time keeping stuff down due to some muscle relaxers she was taking for her back.
After we got her set up in the spare bedroom, my sister and I went to the store to get her some more things to eat because she was just eating shitty carbs. We grabbed some easy to make frozen veggie things, broth, vanilla yogurt, etc. Stuff that would be a little better than the crap she was eating.
Again...I have no idea how to deal with this. We got her to the drive-thru testing, then the hospital, then attempted to make her as comfortable in the spare bedroom as we could, we checked on her, and we tried to keep the apartment sanitized for our dad. We're all thoroughly disgusted that she broke quarantine for 72 minutes.
My natural instinct is to just ignore her. Act as if she's not here until she comes to her senses. I fully expect her to book a flight to TN to go visit her sister and just rush off with an "I need a ride to the airport"...if she even tells us. That would be a little bit of a relief actually. She's been so fucking negative over the last few years.
Anyway, readers, if you have any tips on how to go about dealing with a weird right-wing parent like this. I say right-wing because that's where she stands right now. Trump is great. Reads the Epoch Times. Is positive that the government is going to activate something in the vaccine that kills the vaccinated. Hospitals are just making up numbers about covid to get more funding. The democrats are just trying to extend covid to make it last longer. Whatever other bullshit she's spreading.
As it turns out, my sister and her family are going to her husband's parent's home for Thanksgiving - just to NOT deal with my mom. As the holidays approach, issues are bound to arise.
