A mother’s struggle
Jamestown woman with four young children - three of whom have COVID-19 - faces pandemic worry, fear with honesty
Dee Dee Carter is a single, working mother of four young children who is coping with competing outbreaks of coronavirus and influenza in her Jamestown home.
Three of Carter’s four children have tested positive for COVID-19. She tested negative multiple times until Friday afternoon, when she learned she also had the coronavirus.
Carter had to quarantine while she cared for her children before her own positive test. Now, she’s worried she will soon max out on her two weeks of paid coronavirus leave from her full-time job.
“I believed I had it,” she said. “I’ve been feeling under the weather. I’ve had several tests in the past few weeks. The positive result is from a test Tuesday at Adventist Health Sonora. They said the health department would be calling me.”
Unlike some people in Tuolumne County who continue to deny COVID-19 is real, Carter believes people need to speak up and tell others when they or their family members test positive for the virus, so that those individuals can get tested, to try to protect others in the community, and to increase awareness of the pandemic.
“I encourage y’all to please speak up and reach out to those you do know that you had been around two weeks before your positive COVID-19 test!” she posted on social media earlier this week, before she tested positive herself, in a public Facebook group called Tuco Stronger Together ( COVID-19). “This starts with us! Let’s put a curve to slow the spread.”
She began posting about her and her children’s status earlier this week, using only her first name. She agreed to speak to The Union Democrat and to have her full name published because she believes people need to know what she, other workers, and other single moms have been going through in recent weeks as the pandemic has exploded locally.
Her decision to go public coincides with the exponential growth of COVID-19 cases in the county, where the rate this week is among the highest in the state and nearly double that of the state as a whole.
Carter, 27, is originally from South Carolina and
has lived in Tuolumne County since she was 21.
Her 8-year-old boy has been going through chemotherapy for a tumor in his brainstem and tested positive for COVID-19 on Nov. 14.
Her 6-year-old girl was the first member of her household to test positive for COVID-19 on Nov. 11, and she also has influenza B.
“That’s what the doctor said. Somebody else told me it’s called twindemic,” Carter said.
Her 2-year-old boy tested negative for both COVID-19 and influenza on Nov. 14.
Her 8-month-old girl has tested positive for COVID-19, negative for the flu, and negative for Respiratory Syncytial Virus, which can be serious for infants and older adults.
“I also have the flu,” Carter said earlier this week. “Influenza B. We just came from retesting at the hospital, Adventist Health Sonora. Myself and my 2-year-old. Results are not back yet.”
Carter said her 8-yearold and 6-year-old go to the same school, where they have been doing half virtual learning from home and half on campus. She said she immediately contacted teachers and the superintendent when she learned each of her two eldest children were positive.
“They were supportive,” she said. “They worked closely with me and the county health department.”
Being head of her household with three COVIDpositive cases in her home while trying to follow health recommendations and protocols for isolation and quarantine is a challenge.
“What I’ve done, the 8-year-old, he has to isolate alone in his room,” she said. “My daughter, the 6-yearold, has to isolate in a separate room as well. I’ve moved the baby’s crib out to the living room and that’s where me and the 2-yearold stay, too.”
It was unclear Friday afternoon how Carter would be able to continue caring for her children, once she
learned she had tested positive for COVID-19.
Carter said one of the main reasons she started posting online about her and her children’s situation is because she’s been in contact with the county Public Health Department repeatedly in recent days, primarily on her own initiative, and those interactions have been concerning.
“I think they’ve been overwhelmed,” she said. “It seems they have a lot of new outside people helping now, and the people who call sometimes don’t understand my situation. They don’t know why I’m quarantined. Some of them seem to be winging it. Some of them have reached out and told me my quarantine is up, and I have to tell them that is incorrect because there have been new positive cases in my home.”
Carter said she recently went through a divorce, which was finalized in October.
“It’s been kind of like hell,” she said. “It’s definitely been a struggle.”
Another reason she began posting to social media about her and her children’s situation is because “close contacts start with us. We need to speak up and speak out and let people know, hey, we’ve tested positive.”
The community response she’s received so far has been supportive. People share prayers and they are helping with anything they may need, Carter said, which she appreciates in these hard times and with the winter holidays approaching.
“People have been outstanding,” she said. “It’s important not to panic. It starts with us here in our community.”
Carter said her employment has obviously been affected by the pandemic. She works full time and, until her children began testing positive for COVID-19, she commuted an hour each way to work.
She said she loves her job and she doesn’t want to lose it, but the laws right now as she understands them only allow for two weeks of paid coronavirus leave.
“I’ve almost used that up,” she said. “In my case I’ve been off work since the eighth of November, and the health department says every time someone tests positive in your home, they have to isolate for 10 days. And since I’m the mother, I have to quarantine 14 days after the 10 days, which has now pushed me back to Dec. 11. To be able to return to work and even go outside my household, it all depends on future testing.”
Carter said she’s told the county health department a lot of people who have been exposed to coronavirus are afraid to stay home from work because they are not getting paid and they might lose their jobs.
She believes the county health department should step up and try to help people in these dire situations, where people might lose their jobs because of COVID-19, by providing letters immediately to employers
that inform them workers may need to quarantine.
“Contact tracing seems to be lacking, like it’s confusion,” she said. “It seems like that’s where so much is getting held up. Before, they were going back five days, asking about contacts, and now, as of today, they are only going back two days with anyone that has had first-hand contact with a positive case.”
Carter coughed several times during recent phone interviews and allowed The Union Democrat to visit outside her residence to take photos of her and her children Thursday evening, despite the stress from coping with coronavirus and influenza cases among her children in her household. She agreed to have her children photographed to help illustrate the story, but declined to have their names published in order to protect their privacy.
Carter is not alone in her belief that honesty and openness about coronavirus is the best way to slow the spread of the pandemic in the county.
Earlier this week, someone else posted in the Tuco Stronger Together (COVID-19) group, “I think being honest about having COVID, coming into contact with someone that has tested positive, or employees having to quarantine due to family they live with testing positive, is crucial to keeping people safe.”
Carter said she is grateful that other people are taking personal responsibility and being forthright in the midst of the ongoing pandemic.
“I notice a lot of people are hush-hush about the virus, and a lot of businesses as well,” Carter said, “and that’s not how it should be.”