Over Protective Parents Still Won’t Let Their Adult Kids Leave the House Due to the Pandemic

I can still very clearly remember the conversation I had with my husband on a Sunday evening back in March 2020. The Formula 1 race in Melbourne that was supposed to run that day had been cancelled without a car hitting the track. The New Zealand cricket team packed up and immediately returned home in the middle of a series. Shit was going down and we were scared. We made the decision to keep our children home from school until further instructions were given. And then we followed that advice to the letter. We still follow all the recommendations as they have evolved ever since.

But it’s a very different situation out there now. All of us in my family have had Covid. We’re also all fully vaxxed and boosted. Life has more or less returned to normal, albeit cautiously.

It seems, though, that some families are still stuck in those scary few weeks at the very beginning of the pandemic.

A “high risk” father has sought advice and validation from the internet after his young adult children are beginning to become depressed from isolation after he has kept them inside away from all social activity since the beginning of the pandemic due to fear of catching the disease.

“We have stopped a lot of things to keep us safe,” the man wrote on Reddit’s Relationship Advice sub. “We do not go to movies, restaurants, concerts, large social events, or outings with friends, and because they live with us, our children (24 and 19) do the same.”

“We have all sacrificed. And my wife and I have made compromises: we have done short travels as a family just so our kids could “get out” (still very protected and safe of course.)

“We still shop in-person in stores, but wearing double masks and gloved up. We take it very seriously — we still wash our groceries even. That may seem overkill to some, (it even still gets an eye-roll from our daughter) but I want to keep all of us safe.”

Now, all of these measures were very much recommended at the beginning of the pandemic, but now? Yeah, it’s definitely overkill.

The overly-cautious dad continued: “An incident happened where I saw my daughter forgot to put a mask on while talking to someone face to face, thus putting us in danger. I flipped. The next morning, I sat the family down and told them our concerns and our need for them to remain vigilant.”

It was then revealed that his daughter was depressed and feeling down about her life, “as if it’s going nowhere”.

But instead of considering relaxing his strict isolation rules, the father called her selfish for wanting to risk his and his wife’s health while living with them rent-free. ‘My house, my rules’ and all that jazz.

The comments crucified the couple for their stance, suspecting that they might not be vaccinated.

“I don’t mean to sound insensitive but you are being insane,” wrote one commenter on the post.

“Pair of bloody hypochondriacs. There’s a reason why, during the nationwide lockdowns when no one was allowed to go out unless for essential journeys, the vast majority of people experienced deep depression and anxiety.”

What are your thoughts? Is this family to be commended for their strategies to keep them all safe? Or should they get with the times?