Long story short (but there is a complex backstory to this which I will TRY to summarise at the end), my current partner has tested positive for COVID yesterday (Monday) but her son (my stepson) and I have both tested negative and have no symptoms. I am due, per court orders, to have my two children on Wednesday overnight. I already had them from Friday to Sunday, and my partner started having symptoms on Saturday or Sunday (but didn't test positive until Monday) so they've already potentially been exposed. I've advised my ex about this situation and said that given there is no longer mandatory isolation requirements and my partner is already minimising any contact with me and my stepson, I don't see why I shouldn't have the children as per the orders. She's said that she is going to effectively withhold the children until my partner is fully recovered.
While I can see both sides here, I feel that COVID at this point with previous infections and all immunisations is now quite a mild illness and in-line with other common viruses like the flu. Most families manage illnesses as best they can within the unit and take sensible steps to minimise exposure, but ultimately accept that 'whatever will be will be' and that maintaining parental contact is more important than reducing the chance of infection to zero.
In fact, you could even argue that, given the children may have already been exposed to COVID but aren't yet showing symptoms, it might actually make sense that they should come back to our house than to wait until they become infectious and then risk infecting their mother too. Because that's kind of what the isolation was intended to do back when it was mandatory.
The backstory to this is that our family (my partner, and stepson) caught COVID back in January and my two kids were staying with us at the time, but they returned to their mother and THEN tested positive along with their themselves. The kids had almost no illness whatsoever but their mother was unwell for about a week. She withheld them when they were due to return to me, saying that as per mandatory isolation they should not leave the house. Fair enough on a technicality, but we were infected too and almost certainly were the ones who GAVE my kids the COVID, so there was no additional risk in them coming back to us IMO. But because rules are rules, and rules didn't account for children in split families where both sides had COVID simultaneously, I therefore didn't have a strong legal argument even though realistically there was little risk to them staying with us. All together, she withheld the children for about 3 weeks which was even well beyond the mandatory isolation, citing the children remaining unwell when it was obviously bulls**t because they were having friends come and play, were climbing trees, having waterfights etc. My ex has a LONG history of using situations like this to withhold and minimise my time with the kids so please understand the context in which I'm posting this!
So, your thoughts, brains trust?
While I can see both sides here, I feel that COVID at this point with previous infections and all immunisations is now quite a mild illness and in-line with other common viruses like the flu. Most families manage illnesses as best they can within the unit and take sensible steps to minimise exposure, but ultimately accept that 'whatever will be will be' and that maintaining parental contact is more important than reducing the chance of infection to zero.
In fact, you could even argue that, given the children may have already been exposed to COVID but aren't yet showing symptoms, it might actually make sense that they should come back to our house than to wait until they become infectious and then risk infecting their mother too. Because that's kind of what the isolation was intended to do back when it was mandatory.
The backstory to this is that our family (my partner, and stepson) caught COVID back in January and my two kids were staying with us at the time, but they returned to their mother and THEN tested positive along with their themselves. The kids had almost no illness whatsoever but their mother was unwell for about a week. She withheld them when they were due to return to me, saying that as per mandatory isolation they should not leave the house. Fair enough on a technicality, but we were infected too and almost certainly were the ones who GAVE my kids the COVID, so there was no additional risk in them coming back to us IMO. But because rules are rules, and rules didn't account for children in split families where both sides had COVID simultaneously, I therefore didn't have a strong legal argument even though realistically there was little risk to them staying with us. All together, she withheld the children for about 3 weeks which was even well beyond the mandatory isolation, citing the children remaining unwell when it was obviously bulls**t because they were having friends come and play, were climbing trees, having waterfights etc. My ex has a LONG history of using situations like this to withhold and minimise my time with the kids so please understand the context in which I'm posting this!
So, your thoughts, brains trust?
