(1) I’m about to attempt a tweet thread to share my experience and views as a clinically extremely vulnerable parent #cevparent who is #shielding . It’s a tough time for ‘the shielding’. Especially shielding parents of school age children, like me,  who are in a particularly...

(2) ... horrible position. I am Clinically Extremely Vulnerable due to lung fibrosis (scarring, caused by chemotherapy in my teens), and a hodgepodge of other conditions. We CEV parents have to choose between our health (and possible risk to life), our children’s education...

(3) ...and social well-being, and our interaction with our children, which impacts on us all emotionally and practically. I’m lucky that I have a husband (M) and that his work have been amazingly supportive (despite this, it’s wearing him down...

(4) ...having to work and provide 90% of the childcare). But there are many CEV single parents out there who can’t possibly shield from their children or have the support that I do and some are having to choose between risk to their life or fines from school due to...

(5)... unauthorised absence. We need to be heard and considered when it comes to decisions being made.

For insight, our lives currently look like this:
Weekdays: I get the kids up and get them downstairs for breakfast, all while trying to stay 2 m away from...

(6)... a 6 (T) and 8 (R)yr old, whenever possible. They’re well trained (at least T is!) so they get their own cereals while I supervise from the kitchen, keeping my safe distance. Then it’s time for them to get washed and dressed. I cannot help with this - I just have to hope...

(7) ...that their teeth brushing is up to scratch and they get dressed nicely. They often don’t, and lots of nagging from the sidelines ensues. All of this is made more difficult by R’s additional needs (possible ASC/ADHD - cannot remember to distance etc)...

(8) ... M finishes his morning meeting about 8:40 and gets them out and down to school for 8:45 start time (often late!), before returning home to work. I mostly stay in my room during the day and work from there (we have had separate rooms since lockdown 1, to minimise...

(9)... the risk). I could go downstairs, but with everything going on my #Fibromyalgia and #ME are flaring and I struggle to be anywhere other than my adjustable bed. M picks the kids up from school at 3pm. They strip off in the utility room and come straight up stairs for a...

Something appears to have gone wrong! Twitter has split my thread. There’s 20 something tweets in this thread - sorry! There there on my profile! Darn tech! (More likely human error )