When COVID-19 testing hits home

“Mom, I have a headache.”

(Long pause.) “What kind of headache?”

“The kind in your head.” So it goes, across Carrara marble kitchen islands all over Greenwich. As we enter our first fall pandemic school term, things are getting messy out there. Headaches are no longer just headaches; they can also be a symptom of COVID-19.

So guess what? We all have headaches.

Then there’s seasonal allergies, along with the fact that schools have always been Petri dishes for the common cold, strep, the flu, pink eye, lice and more.

I really can’t talk about lice right now.

The point is, as we amble toward what will most likely be the longest winter since “Game of Thrones,” the “fever-free for 24 hours” rule is a thing of the past. If you send your child to school, they must be symptom free — even if the symptoms are what you are used to seeing every day. If a student goes to the school nurse with a complaint involving anything suspect, including a headache or just not feeling right, they get sent home.

Problem is, in the winter, most kids get sick with everything. And everyone loves the nurse’s office.

If you refer to the Greenwich Public School website under “COVID-19 GPS decision tree,” you will find a color-coordinated flowchart that looks nothing like a tree. The top level, or “School Nurse Algorithm,” says: “Screen all students for potential COVID-19 symptoms or exposure: Any new cough, difficulty breathing, loss of taste/ smell, fever (greater than 100.4), congestion/runny nose, nausea/vomiting, diarrhea, sore throat, headache, myalgia, or exposure to a COVID-19 positive person.”

In our house, at least one of these symptoms tends to stick around from October until March. Illnesses jump from sibling to sibling to parent and then back again, in a twisted game of round robin every winter. We’ve almost gotten used to it.

The school’s decision tree offers various action point “branches” to take depending on your kid’s symptoms. Pretty much every branch says to the parent: “Don’t even think of getting anything done today,” as you look up what “myalgia” is again (muscle ache) — a condition I’m pretty certain I have suffered from since 2008.

Which brings us to this past Friday, when my 11year-old daughter Selma had a headache.

Now I admit, I am a hypochondriac; I convinced my mother I had a brain tumor in sixth grade. But COVID is no laughing matter, and within a day Selma had developed a light cough, scratchy throat and congestion — as had my 10-year-old-George. I was convinced I could not taste or smell anything, which for some reason meant I could eat more of everything.

I decided to have the entire family tested, even though my 12-year-old Louie and husband Ian showed no symptoms. The question was, How do you know a good test from a bad test?

Apparently, you should always ask for the PCR test, otherwise known as the one where they shove the swab up your nose until it feels like it touches your brain. The deeper the better.

“Mom, can we get the ‘nice test’?” Selma asked, referring to the rapid test.

Selma has now been tested for COVID eight times, so she knows the ropes.

“I hear that one is not as reliable,” I told her, as we prepared to drive an hour north to Bridgeport Hospital to get a five-minute drive-thru swab test.

Bridgeport was the nearest of the Yale New Haven Health system facilities that had availability on Monday. And because the kids were missing school (yet healthy enough to vigorously demand screen-time), I wanted to get this done ASAP. Test results can take 24 to 48 hours. All told, this could mean three days with no school.

“If you are positive, they have to call you in 24 hours,” my friend Julie said. “So if you have it, you’ll know pretty fast with any PCR test.”

So off to Bridgeport we went, as George and Selma discussed how much more dangerous COVID-19 is for parents than kids. This led into a cheerful discussion of who all the kids would like to live with if Ian and I were to die.

“It’s important they have good Wi-Fi,” George said.

In an attempt to lighten the mood, I asked for feedback on my new haircut, which no one had noticed, despite the fact that I had shaved it a week ago. Selma told me it was a typical “Karen” haircut, which did not lighten my mood … and left me wondering what happened if your name was actually Karen, although I know a lot of really great Karens.

When we got to the Bridgeport testing center, I hated my hair, and the sibling altercations in the backseat were both lucid and energetic in nature.

I agreed to get swabbed first.

“Look how easy this is,” I told the kids, as I winked at the nurse while pleasantly presenting my nostril.

It was not easy; I kept pulling away just before the nurse inserted the swab, as George and Selma watched with horror.

Selma went next and asked the nurse if she could be put under general anesthesia for the swabbing process.

After 15 minutes of high drama, we were done with our 1:35 to 1:40 p.m. “drivethru”

swab test time slot, and we headed to McDonald’s. It didn’t matter if you couldn’t taste/smell anything because there were Avengers Happy Meal Toys.

And the kids were home for three long days before we got our negative test results.

Caution is everything these days; parents everywhere are enmeshed in complicated issues of trust and quasi-judgment with other parents, as kids start to test positive in private and public schools. These issues are not easily navigable. They are fraught, loaded, necessary and painful. They can strain friendships.

Talk about a headache. So, stay safe out there, Greenwich — and keep testing.

Because, “The night is long, and winter is coming,” as they say in “Game of Thrones.” But you got this; don’t forget you, too, are a “mother of dragons.”