Let me tell you a tale that you couldn’t make up if you tried. It all starts on the 21st of December.
21st December 2021
I had a gathering coming up at my house, I had been at a few places that the Checkin app alerted me on so I went and got a PCR test done.
22rd December 2021
Test result came back negative, friends came over, fun was had by all. Till that night when the friends advised that they had been in contact with a positive case on the 21st however one family member had been tested on the 22nd.
24th December 2021
Friends family member’s PCR test came back as negative, with that and the timeline we opted to head to the farm. Just to be doubly sure I even called NSW Health to see if we were close or casual contacts, they said we were neither.
We stopped at a petrol station to wee in the outdoor toilet block.
28th December 2021
We returned from the farm, we stopped at a country shopping centre to get some medicine for the eldest, and to wee, everyone masked up. I also paid for fuel. Other than that, we avoided everyone and came straight back to Sydney.
29th December 2021
Up at 0545 to queue up for a PCR test, we were heading to Queensland for our LOOOOOOONG overdue holiday. As we were queueing up the announcement came out that Queensland only needed RATs at the border was made so I went out and bought some.
30th December 2021
In a very unexpected twist, we had received our results. Suspicious given that most people were taking up to 6 days but we were happy about that. The missus and the boys were sent to her phone, all lovely negatives. I received my result to my phone, they had a weird way of spelling negative. It came through as positive.
Well there goes our trip to Queensland…
31st December 2021
The rest of the family were up at 0530 to queue up for another PCR test whilst I hid in my room away from everyone else.
1st January 2022
The littlest kid had had a bit of a cough since about Christmas day and by New Years Day it was bad enough that he threw up from coughing so he and mummy went to the ED. At the ED they had to do a RAT to get in, both negative. They then got put in a room on their own as the covid positive area was full, they then were forgotten about. Eventually they got seen to and part of that seeing included a Rapid PCR test which also returned negative. So it looked like it was just his regular asthma/bronchilitis stuff that he’s had before.
2nd January 2022
More results have been SMS’d through. His Rapid PCR from the night before came through as negative. Mummy’s PCR from the 31st came through negative. Little man’s PCR from the 31st came through positive. No result for Big Man’s PCR from the 31st.
Now the question becomes, which result is correct? It has taken 12 calls to the NSW Coronavirus Community Support line, the National Coronavirus Info line, and Services NSW and so far we’ve had a few transfer attempts and one successful call that suggested that isolating from each other in the house is now pointless, if Little Man has been positive from the 31st it is likely that everyone else already has it.
We’re now at the point where we are all just living normally in our house, I’m not isolating with Little Man, we’re just assuming that everyone has it and hoping to get out around the 7th January 2022.
Things I have learned from this experience
No one has any idea what is going on, they’re all just making it up as they go, and I miss Gladys. Domicron “Let ‘er Rip” Pairoftits really dropped the ball on this one, no restrictions should have been eased until AFTER Christmas and New Years, yeah it would have sucked wearing masks for longer but the super spreader event that is Christmas might have been a little less magnified if we had of kept our masks on and our testing and tracing system going.