The Terrific3 travel blog

I’ve been meaning to write since returning, but life has been a whirlwind.

Yes—the usual—adjusting to a new time zone, stocking up a house with food after 2 months, dealing with a mound of mail, the excitement of returning—these were part of the chaos, but not most of it….bear with me through the build up here…

It’s been an incredible 9 weeks if traveling with my kids for sure. A huge adventure. But also, parenting solo (and hey I’m a single mom by choice, so this is my life from day 1) without friends and a village has been challenging. And my kids have also missed their social networks. We all need people outside our immediate families to enrich our lives—me as much as them. So, we were all looking forward to being back—me to exercising more, seeing friends, and getting some reliable, dependable childcare; my kids to reconnecting with friends, getting back into soccer, and getting geared up for school.

Well, the night we arrived in portland was exhausting. The kids were hyped from being up for a very long time, 10 hours of screen time on the plane, and refusing to sleep. I was thankful that our amazing nanny picked us up and brought us home and helped a bit. It was extremely challenging parenting 2 hyped up boys after exhausting travel,

That night, we all slept, but I had a bit of a sore throat and mild cough and my Garmin watch marked my stress levels as high, which is unusual when I am sleeping. I woke up exhausted after 9 hours of sleep and decided to take a COVID test just to make sure, before our nanny arrived. Now, I’ve done this many times with mild cold symptoms, and was expecting the, “of course it’s not COVID” result. To my utter surprise, a very faint line appeared. Now, this is kind of like the faint line on a pregnancy test—can you just be a “little” pregnant? Either there’s a line or there’s not.

I went into action mode—found masks for me and the kids (who had no symptoms), pulled out air purifiers, opened windows, let our nanny know I was positive, etc. I definitely felt disappointed that the universe was taking away any opportunity I had for childcare after so many weeks with my kids, but I guess the universe had bigger plans to bond us?

The kids remained well and symptomless and we isolated, wore masks, I made food then left the kitchen so they could eat, we gave up bedtime snuggles for a couple of days.

And then last night, both kids had sore scratchy throats. This morning, S tested positive right away. Z’s nasal swab was a stark negative and he held out hope to going to a soccer tournament today and I told him he could not as he had symptoms now even if negative. I then swabbed his sore throat, and immediate positive!

So, the golden lining is that we get to all take off our masks now. Windows are still open, air purifiers still on. I’m resigned to there just being a lot of TV for the next few days, as what can I do? I have mild symptoms, but still don’t feel great, and not up for creative parenting games at this time. I’m also very glad we are back in the U.S., near our reliable healthcare and friends, as we get this, we all still have time off from work and school to go through the isolation, and that we are not too sick. I was touched by friends coming by yesterday (thanks Saskia and Sheila!) to do porch visits and drop off food. I needed that contact and love.

I feel guilty that I gave my kids COVID, and z was in tears today as he has to miss his soccer tournament this weekend. I might have logged onto Amazon soon after to buy a bunch of toys and legos for same day delivery. Heck, what else are we going to do?

As for ruminating on our trip, maybe my mind will be more clear after COVID to do so, but I feel like this souvenir from the London tube (I am most certain it was the crowded subway there) has extended our “trip,” and this is still part of our experience.

Yesterday, I managed to get a quick easy bike ride in and then cooked all day. I felt like crap later, so I’m decided to humble myself a bit the next couple of days and give myself some rest. I can’t wait to be back out there exercising some day, but for now, I bow down to COVID. 3.5 years into the pandemic as a physician, and very ironic that I got this on my sabbatical. Life continues to be full of mysteries and surprises!