My Family Is Still Masking. We Have a Good Reason

Masks are still hot topic in our country and can elicit some very passionate responses either way. As a family, we are still often wearing masks when we go out doing things like running errands or heading to the doctor.

We have a good reason. My mom is immunocompromised. She has primary progressive multiple sclerosis and she's at a point where she's pretty low. An attack could render her potentially vegetative, given how her past episodes have made her decline.

On a scale of one to 10, where 10 is great and one is terrible, she gets knocked down like five pegs each time. She's at a five right now, so she can go to a one on her next relapse or attack.

Since the pandemic began, we haven't taken mom on the usual "fun" errands as much as we used to. At first, this bothered her, but it's now a way of life after three years. Her doctor visits are mainly telehealth now, which she prefers because wait times and appointment availability have worsened since the pandemic began.

We are vaccinated. We're boosted. We're all probably due for some more boosters. It's just so hard to get any information. I'm in Florida and it's really difficult to find places that are still doing the vaccines and to get any information on what's available and whatnot.

For example, my kids' pediatrician doesn't have access to the boosters for children. They have everything else. But not that.

It was advised by mom's primary care physician and neurologist that our family continue to mask to help protect her.

Mask wearing is to help protect others by containing the spread of your own germs. But the vast majority of people around us when we do go out in public are not masked. When we mask, we're protecting them as well as my mom.

We do all we can to protect my mom in our household. When my husband came home with COVID in February, we contacted my mom's neurologist and primary care physician. They asked what we were doing to keep him away from her. It was an extremely concerning time.

So that's why we're still masking. My mom is vaccinated against COVID, but she cannot have live vaccines because it could potentially cause severe problems. She doesn't get the flu shot, for example. I also have a few friends who can't be vaccinated.

We discuss masking with mom's doctors. They are now not outwardly saying to wear them or not, they just continue to advise us to not put her in high-risk situations and to take the precautions we find necessary.

There was a COVID spike around us in the summer and another predicted for the winter. It's endemic now. It's just status quo to have this in our lives. But if my mom were to catch COVID versus the flu, it has the potential to be much more detrimental to her health; like on par with pneumonia.

Fortunately, everyone in our area of Florida is respectful of us when they see us out in masks. We haven't gotten any snarkiness out in public. And we don't give out snarkiness if we're around people who are not masked because everyone has their reasons and we're respectful of that.

We have relaxed our mask wearing a little in recent weeks. We tend not to wear them for outdoor events such as markets or at playgrounds. We also haven't worn masks on a couple of other occasions recently, including at an indoor wedding and at the movie theater.

But generally, we still use our masks when we are particularly concerned about the risk of catching COVID and passing it on to my mom.

I honestly don't know how long masking will be a part of our lives. It's scary to think about since we know people who've had COVID five or six times and it fluctuates how badly they are hit with it. And then only last week my husband's co-worker just tested positive.

It feels like there are no other options but to continue to mask because of our personal situation.

Melissa Betterly-Sherman shares videos about her life and family on TikTok.

All views expressed are the author's own.

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