The Daycare Germ Train Tried to Kill Me
RaRa, Lark and I are hiding out in Tassie. Hiding from what might be the most contagious winter in the past five years.
You’d think after spending a couple of those masked up, standing 1.5 metres apart, and lathering hand sanitiser like sunscreen on a 40-degree day, we’d have learned a thing or two about stopping germs from spreading like wildfire.
But here we are.
It’s been ten weeks since we got back to Sydney from London, and I’ve been coughing ever since. The very week I dropped Lark at daycare, I spotted a toddler with thick green booger bunny ears and a cough that rattled like a tin full of coins – and I knew. I knew it was coming for us.
I just didn’t realise how hard.
The daycare germ train is a mutating juggernaut that takes no passengers. It ploughs through your body, inhales your soul, and holds you hostage.
How do daycare parents live like this?
I’ve been to the doctor almost weekly:
Nasal swabs
Sputum cultures
Blood tests
Chest X-rays
Asthma flare-ups
Bacterial infections
Antibiotics
RSV and Rhinovirus
Unexplained rashes
Chronic cough
Every time, a new diagnosis. Never the same thing twice. Like a menu of medical mayhem. Even the flu shot was no match for the daycare germ train.
Eventually, the doctor forced me to take sick leave after the double-whammy respiratory virus left me flattened. As soon as the medical certificate allowed, I booked a flight south – fleeing the midnight juggernaut to Daycare Germ Town.
And I’m lucky. Lark’s Nanna – a veteran childcarer with five grown children of her own – jumped at the chance to spend more time with her granddaughter. She’s a warm, familiar presence, and it means the world right now.
Honestly, I’m grateful.
RaRa had jetted off on a long-overdue boys’ trip to Japan.
I was quarantined with an equally sick toddler.
Still recovering.
Still coughing.
Still in IVF.
And doing it all without a village.
Sydney was hard. But Tassie? It’s soul food.
There’s roast lamb with baked veggies, lashings of gravy and mint sauce. Nostalgic apricot chicken. Endless mashed potatoes. The house is roaring wood-fire warm. Lark’s Nanna, Nandad and favourite Aunty live here, along with the meows, baas, and other animals known only by the sounds they make. The farm is full of beauty and mountain fresh air. The gum trees whisper with the wind and sing from the branches. My nervous system is slowly exhaling while our immune systems are rebooting.
So here’s to the country winter escape.
I raise a mug of hot lemon water – lemons picked straight from the trees and water that fell from the sky – and whisper to the germs:
Not today.
